Daily Bible Reading Reflection - "The Earth Was Ruined" (Gen 6)

Sometimes reading from a different translation leads to renewed insights and appreciation for the message.  Genesis chapter 6 paints a picture of a world where mankind has multiplied and filled it.  It mentions the Nephilim who were the ancient warriors of renown.  The New English translation does not translate Nephilim.  I remember older translation used to translate it as giants.  As I understand, the reason for this is that the Israelites called the inhabitants of Canaan, “Nephilim,” and declared that they were as grasshoppers compared to them.  It seems to me that the Israelites were exaggerating due to fear, and used the scariest word they could think of to describe the Canaanites, which would have been the Nephilim of Genesis 6.  

The Hebrew root behind the Nephilim,  N-PH-L, means “to fall.”  It should be translated as, “fallen ones.”  They may have in fact been large, strong, and scary people.  However, this is not something that comes from the word, “Nephilim,” but comes from the description of them in the text.

In Genesis 4, we see that men began to build cities, work metal, create music, and engage in the sorts of things you would expect in the building of a cultural civilization.  The text describes the Nephilim as “gibborim ‘asher me’olam” which means warriors or heroes of ancient times, and as “enoshey hashem” which means men of the name/reputation.  These designations do not appear to have been criticisms.

I would imagine that by human standards, mankind along with his technological and military progress was impressive.  This may not be unlike the way things are today.  Our technology allows us to do things that would have been unthinkable just a few short generations ago.  Our military might is unmatched compared to where things were in the 18th and 19th centuries.  

However, a word jumped out at me as I was reading the New English translation of Genesis 6.  Verse 11 says that, “The earth was ruined in the sight of God; the earth was filled with violence”  The word, “ruined” is probably not how mankind saw things.  The violence might have been so commonplace that it did not shock or bother people as much as it should have.  The next verse goes on to say that, “God saw the earth, and indeed it was ruined, for all living creatures on the earth were sinful.”

God saw from a completely different lens than mankind.  Mankind, who God had tasked with having dominion over and governing the world in service to the good God and creator, had ruined it all due to sin.  Lack of morals, ethics, and righteousness ruins God’s good world.

Another word that jumped out at me from Genesis 6 is from verse 6, where it says that “The LORD regretted that he had made humankind on the earth, and he was highly offended.”  Other translations give the softer translation of, “…and he was deeply grieved/troubled” or something like this.  However, God’s subsequent actions of wiping out the earth by flood suggests that “offended” is a better translation that conveys the sheer insult sin brings to God.  Understanding this helps us to appreciate his grace and his mercy even more!

I am also struck by the fact that God tasks Noah and his family with not only building an ark for themselves, but also to preserve male and female specimens of the various types of animals on the earth.  This demonstrates that type of responsibility that God has placed into the hands of mankind when he told mankind they were to rule over the earth.  As God’s stewards, mankind is to care for the earth responsibly in service to God.  This means that discovering and exploitation of its resources must be done thoughtfully and responsibly.

This causes me to reflect.  What should the earth look like when it is NOT ruined?   In reflecting on this, I looked up some words that mean the opposite of ruined, and they include: “build, construct, create, fix, heal, mend, repair, adorn, beautify, protect.”  When we build marriage, families, and communities, the beauty of it all comes not from sound infrastructure, but from sound spiritual structure.  The beauty of holiness, righteousness, and devotion to God is the foundation of life.  Indeed, Jesus declared in John 17:3 that eternal life is knowing God and his son.

The Meaning and Purpose of Life

When I was in graduate school studying Old Testament wisdom literature, I had some intriguing conversations with a young man in the congregation who was attending the local community college.  He was taking a class in Philosophy, which included readings from the Bible, particularly Job and Ecclesiastes.  Both book deal with, among other things, the issue of meaning.  The meaning of life is a questions mankind has wrestled with from the beginning.

It is interesting that the book of Ecclesiastes opens with the statement that everything under the sun is meaninglessness piled on top of meaninglessness.  The sage’s pursuit of meaning in every type of endeavor always ended up with empty meaninglessness.  In the end, the conclusion was simple yet profound: The whole of man is to fear God and keep his commandments.  The pursuit for meaning in life will always come up empty in the end.  Instead, one should pursue God, and meaning will come.  

Where does one start in keeping God’s commandments?  Are there certain commands that are greater?  This was a discussion among the teachers of Jesus’ day.  They came and asked him for his assessment as to which commandment was the greatest.  Jesus answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.  And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.  On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets” (Mt 22:37-40).  

Every commandment given in the Bible is connected to the greatest command, which is love for God.  This is why Paul wrote that, “love is the fulfilling of the law” (Rom 13:10).  This is why John elevates love when he speaks of keeping the commandments of God: “And this is his commandment, that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he has commanded us” (1 Jn 3:23).

Love is the one command that will either make our service acceptable or render it meaningless.  If my religious speech is without love, I become a “noisy gong or a clanging cymbal” (1 Cor 13:1).  If I serve sacrificially without love, I am “nothing” (1 Cor 13:2).  In other words, it is meaningless.  Without love, everything is meaningless.  The pursuit of meaning in life is a chasing after the wind if it does not begin with love for God.  

If anyone asks the question of Christians, “What is your purpose?”  Without hesitation, our biblical answer should always be this: “Our purpose is to love God.”  Unpacking this statement biblically will help to order our lives in a way that is in harmony with the heart of God.  Love is what is to motivate worshipping, serving, teaching, maturing, and sharing the Gospel.

Unpacking this statement as part of an explanation to the unconverted can also lead to a conversation about the Gospel.  Love is what moved God to make his covenant of faithfulness that culminated in Jesus coming personally in the flesh to work his ministry of reconciliation through redemption in his blood, which he shed on the cross.  

Labor Day Reflections

 There are some holidays on our calendar whose meaning we reflect on, whether it is civic or religious. Whether it is Independence Day or Thanksgiving, these are days that were set apart to commemorate something important.

Labor Day was intended to be just that. As I understand it, this was a day set apart to honor the laborer and their contributions to society. Early Labor Day parades featured workers and labor organizations. I remember reading about a banner in one of these early parades that read, "Eight hours for work, eight hours for sleep, eight hours for recreation."

As I reflect on the nature of work from a biblical perspective, I am reminded that it is a reflection of God. God is a God that works, and he calls us, his people to work to fulfill his purposes. In order to understand this, we must find the true meaning for our work in the scriptures. 1 Timothy 2:15 says, "Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth." If I am going to be an approved worker, I need to go to the word to learn what this means.

The place to start, as with anything else, is at the beginning, in Genesis. The reason one should start with Genesis is because this is what Jesus did. When they asked him about marriage and divorce, Jesus did not refer to the law of Moses, but went all the way back to Genesis, where God designed marriage and set the paradigm. The same is true for mankind and work. The very first command was to be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, subdue it, and have dominion over it. This means that the taming, harnessing of the earth's resources, enculturation, and the building of society are all part of the mandate that God has given to the human race. Whether it is scientific discovery, teaching, art, literature, building, engineering, planting, growing, repairing, maintaining, cleaning, etc. it is all part of the mandate God has given to us.

This means that all work is ultimately God's work. This is why Colossians 3:23-24 says, "Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ." This means that there is no such thing as a "secular" job. All work is sanctified. Every individual person's work fits in some way with God's mandate to fill the earth and subdue it for his glory.

There is no meaning or significance in work apart from God. This is what the teacher in Ecclesiastes discovered after a lifetime of impressive accomplishments. Without God, there was no meaning or significance in any of it. When he instructs young people to remember their creator while they are young, he is calling them to reflect on the significance of work under God, rather than merely under the sun.

As God called mankind in Genesis to work in order to fulfill what many now call the "Cultural Mandate," he also calls us as Christians to work to fulfill what we call the "Great Commission." Redemption from the corruption of sin can only come through the Gospel. Romans 8:18-25 tells us that both the creature and the creation will be redeemed from the corruption of sin through Christ. To participate in his work of redemption, Jesus charged his followers to proclaim the Gospel to all creation.

All of this means that our Cultural Mandate and the Great Commission are connected. 1 Timothy 6:1 says, "Let all who are under a yoke as bondservants regard their own masters as worthy of all honor, so that the name of God and the teaching may not be reviled." Titus 2:9-10 says, "Bondservants are to be submissive to their own masters in everything; they are to be well-pleasing, not argumentative,  not pilfering, but showing all good faith, so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior." Working with honor and integrity is connected to the teaching of the Gospel.

Reflection on Genesis 1-11: The Earth is Filled With His Glory

Be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth. Several times in the early stories of Genesis, God instructs humans to multiply and fill the earth. Is God glorified through marriage and bearing of children? Does God like large families? Is God pleased with the earth filled up with people? 

I reflect on men and women, whom God created in his image. God instructs mankind to fill the earth and to govern it. Unlike any other created thing, only we are created in the image of God. When we are submissive to God, we bear God’s image to the world. When we are righteous, just, merciful, faithful, kind, and loving, we reflect the image of God to the world. When we do so in the name of our Lord we radiate the goodness of God around the earth. When we share the Gospel alongside all we do, we can truly be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. 

Jesus put it this way in the Sermon on the Mount, “You are the light of the world.” So some questions to ask of ourselves might include questions such as, “What do I reflect? What do I fill the earth with? Do I reflect the image of God in my family, workplace, and among friends?” 

Prayer: Lord, I see the fruits of your graciousness, mercy, and kindness all around me. I see how things reproduce after their kind that goes in a line all the way back to you. May I be yielding and submissive to you so that I also can be fruitful and reproduce all your goodness in my words and actions every day. Thank you for Jesus, thank you for the Spirit, and the fruitfulness that comes as a result. In his name and through his grace, Amen.

Reflection on Genesis 1: Our Place in the World

When God fashioned the world, he created something initially that was formless and void, or a vast wasteland.  Then, God brought order to all of that primordial stuff.  After creating the firmament, he place stars, the sun, and the moon in it.  He said it was for signs, seasons, and years.  He also said the greater and lesser lights were to "govern" or "have dominion" the day and the night, and to separate the light from the darkness.

When God created man, he instructs that man is also to have dominion.  But man's dominion is to be over the sea, the things the fly in the sky, and the things that roam on the earth.  As the functionaries in the firmament bring order, beauty, and goodness there, so men, God's functionaries on the earth, is to bring order, beauty, and goodness on the earth by exercising dominion over the earth. 

Some have pulled an ecological message out of this, understanding that we need to be caretakers of the earths' resources and its wildlife.  In exploiting the earth's resources, we need to do so responsibly and with care.  While there seems to be some of this in inherent in God's design, it doesn't seem to be the main thrust of what "dominion" means to man.  The next chapter and the remainder of the Bible is focused on man, not the environment.  The next chapter shows how God instituted the very first social institution, which is marriage and family.  It seems that governing, or exercising dominion has to do not mainly with ecological order, but with social order.  Whether it is marriage, family, governance, social contracts, exchange of goods, etc., there is a design for governance from the designer.  When that design is honored, things tend to work well to his glory.  When that design is ignored, disorder, ugliness, violence, and death usually follow. 

When I look up, and consider the sun, moon, and stars, I will be reminded of these things.  The sun faithfully governs the day as the moon does the nights.  The stars twinkle in the heavens and give guidance to travelers.  The seasons faithfully come and go.  These functionaries in the heavens provide order, beauty, and goodness as they faithfully perform their governing functions to the glory of God.

How do we, as God's functionary on the earth, perform our governing function?  Unlike what we see giving it's light in the heavens, we give a different kind of light.  The text says that we have been created in the image of God.  Our light is not for seasons, years, day and night, but for a different kind of order and beauty.  Our light illuminates the beauty of righteousness, virtue, holiness, and love.  These things are designed by God to be part of the foundation for our marriages, our families, and our social institutions.  As the heavens submit to God's design for their governance and bring goodness and beauty to the heavens, so we, when we submit to God's design in our governance here on earth, bring goodness and beauty to the earth that God has created for his glory.

Prayer:  Lord, may our hearts be humble and submissive.  May we look to your instructions and commandments in ordering our lives.  May we truly understand true beauty, goodness, and holiness from you, our creator and designer.  May we be reminded that all of this belongs to you, and that we are here to serve your purposes.  May we be submissive to you, holy, righteous, virtuous, loving, and kind.   Please forgive us when we, in our pride, forget all of this.  Please pardon our sins according to the grace you have shown in Jesus, our crucified and risen Lord.  In his name…AMEN.