The flood

The idea of the flood, as described in Scripture, is widely mocked but there is no reason why that should be so. A careful reading of what the Bible actually says and what science actually reveals would point up no obvious contradiction. For example thousands of fossils of deep sea creatures have been found in the Austrian Alps, presumably left there following the flood. Generally speaking most fossils are better explained by a great flood than by evolution.

As for Noah's ark, there is no reason to doubt the story as long as we remember how very large the ark was, the need for only a limited number of species to be on board (eg all varieties of dog known today coming from the original pair) and the fact reptiles and dinosaurs go on growing and so only babies were necessary not huge examples of grown adults.

Ante-diluvian life

It is clear from Genesis 4 that what we tend to think of as civilisation came in at a very early point. Even before the flood people were lving in cities, music was a common and varied thing. The use of technology aso came in early on - making tools in bronze and in iron.

It is well known that before the flood people lived to great ages - though no-one ever reached a thousand years. Such claims are literal and no doubt facilitated great advances in a life time. Some of theseearly people became truly great. They were heroes of old, achieving more than was easily possible after the flood. The cause is not clear but the flood clearly brought in great changes that considerably lessened longevity.

Although sacrifices took place pre-flood, it is possible that society was vegetarian.

The beginning of the worship of God is noted at the end of Chapter 4. The beginning of the godly and messianic line is alos noted there. One reason for the flood was the co-mingling of the two lines - the godly and the ungodly.

Why not start again?

From the moment of the fall of humankind there a definite decline sets in. First Cain murders his brother and very soon we have a man (Lamech) with two wives threatening multiple revenge for violence. By the time of Noah it has t be said that "every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart" has become "only evil all the time" Left to itself, this is always the drift of human society. The idea is bound to be raised, however, that if humankind simply started over again then all will be well. And so God rescues righteous Noah and his family and destroys all the rest.

Yet, no sooner is Noah through the ordeal than he has fallen into drunkenness and that leads to other problems too. Simply starting over is not the answer.
The flood also anticipates the final judgement - next time not water but fire.

God's Kingship

The fall can look like a mistake, a slip on God's part, and yet the Bible is clear that nothing happens except by his will. We can only suppose that when God contemplated creation he saw the possible outcomes and yet purposed to create the world that would fall but to save a people for himself. Both the fall and salvation from it for the elect are things that are part of God's eternal purpose. He purposed this in such a way that he remains innocent of any guilt and does only what is right and good.

Whom God chooses

Given that who is saved is something God decides not human beings, there are only three broad possibilities. We have already said that God is under no obligation to save anyone and so he could have quite legitimately overlooked all. Alternatively, he could have saved everybody. There is no lack of power in God to do such a thing.

It seems, however, that God worked in neither of those ways but rather chose to save some, a number known only to him. It maybe, Paul suggests, that he did it this way for his greater glory. The illustration is used of the way beautiful jewellery is often best displayed against a dark background.

One can only appreciate this argument if one accepts that God is in absolute control of all things and is quite rightly working everything together for his own glory.

No obligation

God is under no obligation to save anyone. In the case of the fallen angels, he does nothing, as far as we are aware, to provide salvation for them. They have sinned and God has made a hell for them with no way of redemption.

If God treated humankind in the same way there would be no argument. God would be perfectly just to cast every single one of us into hell. What argument could we muster against that result? If hell's eternal nature is questioned, we must remember that our sins are against an eternal God. If someone in hell repented, it might be different but no-one will.
We know that God is a God of love but that does not oblige him to overlook our sins and save us. We have no claim on him except in Christ.

Total depravity

Every person is born into this world fallen and depraved. We are guilty in Adam as he was our representative in the beginning. We are also guilty because we descend from him and inherit both his sin and his sinful proclivity.

There is not a part of us or of our make up that is not affected by the fall. We are fallen physically and spiritually, in our thinking and in our consciences, in every part of us.

The fact of this total depravity must be borne in mind in all our dealings with one another. No-one is totally mired in sin so that there is no good seen but no-one is free from the taint of sin either. 

The fall of humankind

In Genesis 3 we learn of what is often called the fall of humankind. Before this point there was no sin - at least in this world - and so no corruption or decay. Presumably nothing had died, although that is a difficult idea. Adam is clearly placed in the Garden God created as a representative of humankind. He is the obvious candidate as he is the first man and no doubt the best. What happens, however, is that he disobeys God and so sins. Once he sins, everything changes.

God makes a positive law that Adam is not to eat of a certain tree, the moment he does so, he has sinned. What led to the sin? First, there is the activity of Satan who hijacks the snake. Secondly, there is the vulnerability of Eve, who Adam is meant to protect. Instead of doing that, he deliberately follows Eve's lead and sins. That sin dooms all humankind, his descendants, and drags all of creation into a fallen state so that nothing is the same again. Weeds grow where they are not wanted, we sweat and toil, everything becomes subject to decay. There is suffering.

The fall makes no sense. It is a species of madness where all right reason and sense goes out of the window. The consequences are far reaching and eternal. There is not a problem in the world that cannot be traced back to the fall in some way or another.

There seems to be no way out if it and yet even in Genesis 3 we read of the sweat of man's brow, the brow being what keeps the sweat from the eyes, and of the crushing of Satan's seed though at the cost of the bruising of the seed of man's head. God also provides skins for the couple to cover their nakedness, though clearly at the cost of the lives of certain animals.

The creation mandate, etc

Genesis 1:26 is sometimes referred to as the creation or cultural mandate. In that verse we read Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

Similarly, in Genesis 1:28 we read of God blessing man and saying to them “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

Mankind is envisaged as being fruitful and increasing and ruling over the rest of creation. This mandate means that we are all under some obligation to propagate and to fill the earth. The world's population is currently around the 7.5 billion mark. Some get rather alarmed at that (even though if we all  squeezed together we could apparently fit into New York City). When we are nearer 70 billion perhaps people will laugh at earlier fears (it should be 10 billion by 2050). There are undoubtedly issues with large populations but it is equally clear that in nations where the birth rate drops too far problems follow.
As for ruling, this suggests a subduing of the earth so that we are able to use its resources in ways that will benefit humankind. Things such as taming and domesticating animals, growing food, extracting useful materials from the ground come to mind. This is not an excuse for rapaciousness. In fact this suggests rather a conservative approach. What a tragedy when animals become extinct or we fail to explore the universe as thoroughly as we ought.

The creation of humankind

Separate space is given in Genesis to the creation of humankind because this is the zenith of God's creation.

On the one hand, animals and insects, fish and birds, in all their almost infinite variety and diversity are wonderfully made but they have only bodies not souls or spirits like human beings. They live by instinct and when they die that is their end (although God will no doubt make more in the new heavens and earth).

On the other hand, there are the angels and other heavenly creatures we have mentioned that are spiritual and do not have bodies and do not marry or reproduce. As we have also mentioned they are not the objects of God's interest in the way that human beings are.

Humankind, unlike animals and angels, are spiritual beings that have bodies with which to express themselves. This is underlined in the creation of Adam who was taken from the ground and then breathed upon by God. They are said to be made in the image of God. It is not entirely clear what that means but they do reflect the image of God in a way that no other creatures do or can.

Like animals but unlike angels, human beings can be male or female and in combination are able to reproduce. The whole way this difference came about in God's providence underlines a distinction so that although men and women are clearly equal, it is required of the woman that she submit to the man and help him, rather than the other way around. The Bible is thoroughly patriarchal and yet often points up women's great qualities and always resists stereotypical downplaying of women (see the end of Job for example). This arrangement reflects equality in the Godhead. Marriage, which unites man and woman points also to the relationship God seeks with his people.

It is clear that from the beginning, humankind was intended to rule over the creation. Work was to be an every day thing with weekly rest. The naming of all the animals was one of the first tasks completed by man, a hint at the sorts of activity people would engage in in the future.

Over the years people have come up with various alternatives to biblical family life - man and woman coming together and having children - but this is the original way intended and, although in certain circumstances singleness is a legitimate option, anything else is most likely to be a perversion of what was originally intended.

A day of rest

It is highly significant that after the six days of creation comes the day of rest so that the first day of the world's history is a day on which God rested. Clearly God was not in need of a rest but he refrained from creating anything on that day so giving us a pattern for the future. There is to be a pattern in our lives. We work and we rest from work, we rest and we work. Christians differ on how that works out in practice but I would take the view that the Saturday Sabbath existed from Adam until the close of the Old Testament era when Christ stayed in the grave until he rose on the first day of the week at the beginning of the New Testament era. Christians should keep one day in seven, the first day of the week, different to the others, set apart to God and to his worship. We never do that perfectly but we should seek to keep the day to him, nevertheless.

Creation

The Bible is clear that God and God alone created the heavens and the earth, that is all created things, visible or invisible. He initially made the formless and empty world out of nothing but then he immediately proceeded to shape it and make things as he chose from what he had already created.

He deliberately did it all in six (24 hour) days in order that an example would be given and a pattern laid down for the rest of time.

The first thing to be created was light, which was separated from darkness, then the sky and then the earth and the seas.

Notably, the sun, moon and stars were not created until the fourth day. They were put there to mark time and seasons, etc. There is no reason to worship such creations.

On the fifth day the sky was populated by birds and the sea by fish and other sea creatures.

On the sixth day the land was populated first by animals and insects and similar creatures of all sorts and then by human beings.

It is clear that when God created the world it was perfect, without any flaw. There was no sin or evil or imperfection in it anywhere at all.

It is also clear that it appeared to be older than it was. Chop a tree down on day one, count the rings - the wrong answer. Measure how far a certain star is from the earth and the answer would suggest it had been in existence for aeons but that was not the case. Similarly, Adam and Eve were not babies (and also no doubt had navels). This is no deception but the way God created the world.
Creation is marked by careful design, incredible variety and diversity, wise ordering (such as a blue sky and a predominantly green plant life) loving provision (some call earth the Goldilocks planet) and clear revelation (such as the fact the rain comes from above, seeds are buried in order to grow, etc). 

Only God saw the creation and he has revealed the truth about it in his Word.

Angels and demons

It would appear from Scripture, although it is never spelt out in so many words, that before the creation of the world as described in Genesis, several things happened.
Firstly, God created thousands upon thousands and ten thousands of heavenly creatures - angels and other such creatures. These creatures were spiritual, not having bodies, though they were able to manifest themselves with a definiteness, to some extent.

At some point, the most beautiful and the highest placed of these angels, now known as Satan (Accuser), led a rebellion against God, a rebellion that was supported by perhaps a third of the created angels. These fallen angels (or demons) were banished from heaven but their final end in "the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels" (Matthew 25:41)  was delayed.
Since that point, Satan and his army have worked to oppose God in every way that they can. What they can do is limited and depends on God's sovereignty but some leeway is apparently given to these once holy and still powerful creatures.

The eternal covenant

Before the beginning, the true eternal and infinite Trinitarian God entered into an eternal mutual agreement or covenant - the Father with the Son and both with the Spirit. In this covenant, certain ones yet to be created were considered to belong to the Son and so set apart to him. At that time the detail of how this would be brought about was agreed. Whether these chosen ones were seen as sinners or not is unclear. The essential thing about this covenant is that it was a covenant of grace not works.

Before the beginning

Before anything else at all, there was only the immense, infinite and eternal God. There was always God who is spirit and has no body. There was no-one else and nothing else.
God has no beginning. He is in every place and fills every place. There is nowhere where he is not. 

This God, though simple in his make up, was never lonely or self-centred for he was always one and yet three. He existed in perfect happiness and harmony always. He was always what we usually refer to as Father, Son and Holy Spirit - three equal persons yet one God with an order wherein the eternally begotten Son, though equal to the Father in every way, willingly submitted to him and the Spirit, again not inferior to the other two, proceeded both from the Father and from the Son.

Even at this point he knew all things, including exactly what he could or would do and the consequences of his every act.