The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone. — Isaiah 9:2
Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” — John 8:12
God is Everlasting
Creation in Christ is the second teaching in The Beginning subsection of the Essentials series. The first is the triunity of God, not only because it is was on full display at creation, but because God has always existed.
Moses once revealed in prayer:
Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God. (Psalm 90:2)
In the book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ, the Lord declared:
“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.” (Revelation 1:8)
God is everlasting or eternal. He has no beginning or end.
Creation and the Gospel
The apostle John gave us a customized description of God’s creation:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. (John 1:1–5)
The apostle Paul also elaborated on Jesus Christ and creation:
He [Jesus Christ] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. (Colossians 1:15–20)
The universe was created by God speaking it into existence. The spiritual and natural things of the heavens and earth were made out of the invisible. They were created with information. The theories of Big Bang and Evolution are lies because you cannot get information from material substances. The universe and life on planet Earth could not have come strictly through natural elements and processes. There are unique information codes that could only have come through a designer.
“The theories of Big Bang and Evolution are lies because you cannot get information from material substances.”
God made all things through the Word of God, Jesus Christ, and He made all things for Him. Jesus Christ, the Son of God and second person of the Triunity, is where God meets man, the pinnacle of His creation. In Him was life and this “life” was the light of men. This is a profound revelation. God designed a blessed life with Him through Jesus Christ. This “connection” is the nucleus of Creation as Paul described: “in him all things hold together.” This life was lost when man sinned, but the Son of God came down from heaven and lived as the Son of Man to be the only perfect sacrifice necessary to redeem all those who believe in Him back to this life for all eternity. There is eternally life with God through Christ. In this context, the “life” in the following verses takes on more meaning:
Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life. (John 5:24)
For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself. (John 5:26)
Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12)
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. (John 14:6)
Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life. (1 John 5:12)
This life is found in the “name” of Jesus Christ which is His personhood. John described the purpose of his gospel as being “written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name” (20:31; emphasis mine). This is why when a person comes to believe in Jesus the Holy Spirit baptizes them in the name of Jesus Christ. In other words, the Spirit places them back into the (originally designed) life with God that was lost to sin by regenerating their spirit.
God’s design for life in the Son of God is a critical aspect of Creation that is often overlooked. As we proceed with the Genesis account of Creation we will see that this is immediately relevant:
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day. (Genesis 1:1–5)
The first thing God created was “light.” He had yet to create the sun, the moon, and the stars so this is a different type of light. This is the light of life in Christ, but it also includes foundational aspects of physics. Paul implied a connection between the two when he wrote, “And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” This suggests that the light of life in Jesus Christ is the “cornerstone” of Creation as John affirmed: “All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.”
It is God’s creation of the light of life in Christ that I want to emphasize. It is here that God spoke into existence through Himself, the Word of God, the spiritual configuration of how man would live with Him. Paul revealed this to the Ephesian church:
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. (1:3–10)
Paul was writing to the saints in Ephesus who were “faithful in Christ Jesus” (1:1). These were believers whom the Spirit of God had baptized into the life of Christ that all people were originally created to live in. In other words, upon having faith in Christ, a believer is stripped of his spiritual sin nature and spiritually placed back into the spiritual union with God which was His original design. Paul noted that God “chose us in him before the foundation of the world” revealing this design. There are spiritual blessings in Christ available for everyone, however, they must come through God’s chosen door, Jesus Christ, to obtain them. There is no way around this. It is God’s design.
Framework For Revelation
God spoke the light into existence, saw that it was good, and then separated it from the darkness. Since God created the light and there is no mention of Him creating darkness it is tempting to think of darkness as the absence of God’s presence. However, David declared:
Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.
If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night,” even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you. (Psalm 139: 7–12; emphasis mine)
There is nothing evil about this “darkness” of Genesis 1:4–5. Satan had not even been created yet and we know that he did not fall until sometime after the Garden of Eden was created (Ezekiel 28:13). The emphasis is God advancing His plan for man through the creation of light. The darkness serves as a contrast to His light. He was a pillar of fire by night for Israel in the wilderness. He even uses the darkness for His purposes. Light and darkness, Day and Night are a framework for God’s purposes. There is a deeper meaning here.
After creating light and separating it from darkness God called them Day and Night. God was doing more than simply defining Day and Night. He was establishing a framework for revelation. Through the creation of light, God was beginning to reveal Himself. The visible difference between day and night helps us understand the vast difference between a life in the light or in the darkness. This was a pattern that would later repeated in the coming of Jesus Christ. Jesus made this a visible reality and confirmed it when He declared: “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12). Writing his gospel years later, John encapsulated this with the following striking statement concerning Christ at Creation: “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1:5).
When we get to the fourth day of creation we are told:
And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth.” And it was so. And God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars. And God set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning, the fourth day. (Genesis 1:14–19)
(Note: the remaining days of Creation will be covered in a separate Essentials teaching.)
The Day and Night of day one of creation have preeminence. The natural lights—the sun, moon, and stars—were created three days later to give observable definition to day and night. God “set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth … to separate the light from the darkness.” This second separation of light and darkness, specifically in the celestial realm, reinforces the notion that the separation of light from darkness on day one was God making the light of life in Him distinct and that which underpins everything else. The light-giving celestial bodies symbolically reflect this. The dominant giver of light, the sun, is the center of the universe which everything else is ordered around.
Many a cold morning I have sat in the woods and welcomed the light, and especially the warmth, of the rising sun. Every northern hunter can relate. This physical experience is a reflection of what one feels inside when the Spirit of Christ arises in their soul.
At the end of the day one account we are told that “there was evening and there was morning, the first day.” God’s day begins with evening and ends with morning. Why evening and then morning for a day? God does like symbolic and prophetic patterns. Consider the following:
Evening and morning are marked by the sun. Our concept of what evening and morning are cannot be separated from the context of the sun. The sun determines when each begins and ends. In other words, the sun controls and determines the day. The sun is the core of the universe and reflects the integral role of the Son of God in man’s lives, in man’s day.
The sequence of evening and then morning reflects the first day of Creation. There was darkness and then there was light. Darkness and then light, evening and then morning. A day observed from evening to morning brings to our remembrance God creating the light of life in Christ for us to dwell with Him in, separated from darkness.
When I think of evening, I think of a brief period of light followed by a slow fade to darkness. When I think of morning, I think of a brief period of darkness followed by a slow fade to light. This reminds me of the history of the world. Adam & Eve lived briefly in the light before their sin plunged the world into an extended period of darkness. I picture the birth of Christ as the very beginning of the sun starting to rise for man. By the time He was resurrected, the sun had fully risen and man was now able to walk in the light again.
Finally, God would institute this pattern in the Jewish Sabbath which begins at sundown on Friday.
A Final Warning
This teaching makes it clear that the life God created for man with Him in Christ was uniquely integrated with Creation. Those who would tamper with a literal, 6-day creation are actually tearing the fabric of the gospel. Such teaching has Satanic origins. I am happily a friend to sinners, but I separate myself from mature “Christians” who compromise Creation because it undermines the authority of God’s Word and the gospel. Many have “another Jesus” (2 Corinthians 11:4).
Appendix: A Clue on the Creation of Angels?
In this Essentials teaching I explained how the light of life in Jesus Christ is the “cornerstone” of Creation. Cornerstone is a symbolic name for Jesus Christ in the Bible as Paul made perfectly clear: “Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone” (Ephesians 2:20). When the Lord spoke to Job out of the whirlwind, He said:
"Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me; if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements—surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning starts sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy? (38:4–7)
The sons of God are the holy angels which may have actually encompassed all the original angels at this time assuming Satan had not yet fallen (Satan is not an angel but he caused one-third of them to leave their holy beginning). Stars is also a symbolic reference to the angels.
When I wrote Part 2 of my Essentials teaching on Holy Angels, I commented regarding these verses that “some Bible teachers have surmised that the angels were created before the earth” because of them. I went on to say:
This view is inconclusive to me because “cornerstone” is most likely a reference to Jesus Christ. Every single time the word appears in the Bible, it is used symbolically for Him. The previous verses from Colossians exemplify the cornerstone nature of Christ in God’s creation. The angels may have been shouting for joy at the revelation of the awesome integration of the second person of the Triunity into His own creation.
What I meant when I wrote this was that the angels singing and shouting for joy at God laying the cornerstone may not have necessarily been before He created the earth but conceivably at some point afterward when His magnificent plan for Jesus Christ was revealed. However, the completion of this teaching led me to a possible new discovery related to the original question of, “When were the angels created?”
God told Job that “the morning stars sang together.” The Holy Spirit brought “morning” to my attention a few days ago. This is the only place in the Bible that this phrase “morning stars” appears. Why did God call them “morning” stars?
We are told regarding day one of creation: “And there was evening and there was morning, the first day” (Genesis 1:5). There was darkness and God spoke “light” into existence which I explained in this teaching is the light of life in Christ which includes what we call “physics.” I concluded that this light was the “cornerstone” of Creation and this was before I even considered these verses from Job. Darkness and then light, evening and then morning. There is a subtle pattern in this construct in which the evening reflects the darkness and the morning reflects the light. This is why I think God called the angels morning stars in reference to Him laying the cornerstone of the foundation of the earth. There was darkness in the evening and then the light came in the morning at which time the angels were then present to rejoice.
If I had to choose, I would now say that the angels were created on day one when God said, “Let there be light.” Furthermore, there may be some sort of direct connection between angels and the light of life in Christ. Paul did technically refer them as angels of light when explaining that Satan disguises himself as one (2 Corinthians 11:4). Throughout the Bible, the angels are only seen taking actions that support God’s purposes in Christ. They seem to have been created for the singular aim of administering the light of life in Christ which adds color to why they may have been shouting for joy at the onset.
To be sure, as I also concluded in my Essentials teaching on Holy Angels, the Bible is not explicit about when the angels were created. Given the very limited amount of information we have, it would be dangerous to make an absolute assertion about when angels were created. The takeaway is to understand why the Bible does not make it clear and this is because God wanted the focus to be on man.