Extended Open Worship
Genesis 1:1-26, 31
If you were going to just start reading the Bible for the first time, where would you begin? Well, for better or worse, many begin at the beginning, and that’s what we’ll do today. I want to read you part of the Biblical creation myth. And, of course, by “myth” I don’t mean falsehood or lie, I mean a story that sets up a world, a story that can help a group of people understand who they are, what is most sacred to them, and what they ought to be doing. A story that isn’t meant to be factual but truthful.
This is not a literal history of how the world began, and to expect that of Genesis 1 is an imposition of our own wishes or fears, and probably a misunderstanding of how literature works. This story can’t tell us what actually happened, but it can help us understand what is happening here, now, all around us.
So as we sit with this text today, I encourage you to listen for what is good, what is sacred, what is enduring; to notice places of discomfort, and whether that is because the text itself is problematic, or because it has been framed for you in a problematic way; to notice what challenge you feel, what this text calls you to attend to, or how it invites you to take action, whether a one-time action or something small, steady, and ongoing. Notice connection, life, evolution, growth, harmony, dissonance. Notice what it means, to you, to be a sustainer of life, or to be sustained by the life around you…
Genesis 1:1-26, 31 (NRSV):
1 When God began to create the heavens and the earth, 2 the earth was complete chaos, and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. 3 Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 And God saw that the light was good, and God separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.
6 And God said, “Let there be a dome in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” 7 So God made the dome and separated the waters that were under the dome from the waters that were above the dome. And it was so. 8 God called the dome Sky. And there was evening and there was morning, the second day.
9 And God said, “Let the waters under the sky be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. 10 God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good. 11 Then God said, “Let the earth put forth vegetation: plants yielding seed and fruit trees of every kind on earth that bear fruit with the seed in it.” And it was so. 12 The earth brought forth vegetation: plants yielding seed of every kind and trees of every kind bearing fruit with the seed in it. And God saw that it was good. 13 And there was evening and there was morning, the third day.
14 And God said, “Let there be lights in the dome of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years, 15 and let them be lights in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. 16 God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars. 17 God set them in the dome of the sky to give light upon the earth, 18 to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. 19 And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day.
20 And God said, “Let the waters bring forth swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the dome of the sky.” 21 So God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that moves, of every kind, with which the waters swarm and every winged bird of every kind. And God saw that it was good. 22 God blessed them, saying, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.” 23 And there was evening and there was morning, the fifth day.
24 And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures of every kind: cattle and creeping things and wild animals of the earth of every kind.” And it was so. 25 God made the wild animals of the earth of every kind and the cattle of every kind and everything that creeps upon the ground of every kind. And God saw that it was good.
26 Then God said, “Let us make humans in our image, according to our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over the cattle and over all the wild animals of the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.”
31 God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good.
Queries:
How does this text speak to my condition, today? What am I noticing?
How does the Earth sustain us? How do we sustain the Earth?
How are we participating in the creating and sustaining of Life?
How does the repetition of “it was very good” speak to me today?
What can this creation story tell us, if anything, about who we are?