Spirit. The spermatozoa of God’s Word inseminated the earth that was formerly
“without form and void,”
hovering over the womb of creation, or the
“face of the deep”
(Genesis 1:1-2 ESV). God spoke and said
, “‘Let there be light,’ and there was light”
(Genesis 1:3 ESV). We know that it was God’s Word—even Christ—that brought everything that is into being. John 1:1-3 tells us that
“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”
(ESV).
Creation has yet to be fully delivered. In Romans Paul wrote,
“All around us we observe a pregnant creation”
(Romans 8:22 MSG). We have yet to see God’s glory carried to full term. Creation, like an expectant mother, is waiting
“in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed”
(Romans 8:19 NIV). Paul went on to add,
“Creation looks forward to the day when it will join God’s children in glorious freedom from death and decay. For we know that all creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time”
(Romans 8:21 NLT).
All that exists in the earthly realm responds to the voice of God, the Father of all creation. When God releases His Word into the womb of the earth, He germinates His purpose and sets in motion a type of mitosis that cannot be reversed. He said through the prophet Isaiah,
“My word that goes out from My mouth: it will not return to Me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it”
(Isaiah 55:11 NIV). The voice of God produces its assignment in a set time and season. Even now the earth is forming gold and silver and pearls, oil and metals and minerals, oxygen and water and wind, continually supplying what we need for life. It seems as if no matter how much humanity extracts from the earth, it always brings forth an abundance of resources. I think of Isaiah 66:11:
“For you will nurse and be satisfied at her comforting breasts; you will drink deeply and delight in her overflowing abundance”
(NIV).
Everything that is—all we see, are, and have—started from a seed. Not only plant and animal life, but all of the earth’s resources began in seed form. Rain is birthed from seeds, or dust particles, in the womb of a cloud; pearls are birthed from grains of sand in the womb of an oyster; a diamond is birthed from coal in the depths of a mine; while coal is birthed from the seeds of fossilized vegetation in the womb of the earth’s crust. God proclaimed through Isaiah,
“Let the earth hear, and all that is in it, the world, and all that comes out of it!”
(Isaiah 34:1 NIV). Even man was birthed from
“the dust of the ground”
(Genesis 2:7). You never need to be intimidated because of your past—everybody comes from dirt!
All of creation is a testimony of God’s redemptive, regenerative, resurrection power. It is God who makes
“everything beautiful in its time”
(Ecclesiastes 3:11). In the words of author and evangelist Kevin Graham Ford, “No matter how hard we try, we cannot separate God’s work of creation and His work of redemption. Paul makes it perfectly clear the Logos, Jesus as wisdom personified, is the force behind both redemption and creation.” It was the great reformer Martin Luther who profoundly stated, “God writes the Gospel, not in the Bible alone, but also on trees, and in the flowers and clouds and stars.” And it was Paul the apostle who so poignantly wrote:
For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—His eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse
(Romans 1:20 NIV).
All of creation points to the glory and majesty of God. And just as God spoke forth all of creation, so creation speaks forth of God. It is pregnant with His purpose, provision, and redemptive power.