The Needful Dividing of Light From Darkness
Genesis 1:16-18
Passage To Study: Genesis 1:16-18
16Then God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars also. 17God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth, 18and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good.
Flow of the Passage:
- (Verse 16) – God creates the two great lights in our sky, the Sun and the Moon. We are also told that He here makes the stars.
- (Verse 17) – God establishes them in the stellar heaven in order to give light to the earth.
- (Verse 18) – He also made them to rule over the day and night, and to give order to time.
What Do I Think About It?
(Verse 16) – “Then” is a time reference, or at least a sequence reference in this account. Some would argue that time didn’t exist until God created the Sun and Moon and set them to rule over it. However, this is not, strictly speaking, so. The Sun and the Moon are set to “rule over” time in verse 18, implying that time already existed. We are not now in eternity past, but in the present time of creation and existence. God is simply filling and order what He created in days 1-3. This result of this “filling” is fully particularized in the next three verses. This word, “made,” corresponds to the word “be” in the command, and indicates the disposition and adjustment to a special purpose of things previously existing.
The two great lights - The well-known ones, great in relation to the stars, as seen from the earth. The great light—in comparison with the LITTLE light. The stars, from man’s point of view, are insignificant, except in regard to number (Gen. 15:5).
(Verse 17) - God gave them - The absolute giving of the heavenly bodies in their places was performed at the time of their actual creation. The relative giving here spoken of is what would appear to an earthly spectator, when the intervening veil of clouds would be dissolved by the divine agency, and the celestial luminaries would stand forth in all their dazzling splendor. This is not to be taken as a commentary on their actual size or influence. We know (now) that the stars are huge, many larger than our own sun and all of them larger than the earth. This is speaking to their appearance from the perspective of a man gazing at them from the earth and nothing more.
(Verse 18) - To rule - From their lofty eminence they regulate the duration and the business of each period. The whole is inspected and approved as before. Now let it be remembered that the heavens were created at the absolute beginning of things recorded in the first verse, and that they included all other things except the earth. Hence, according to this document, the sun, moon, and stars were in existence simultaneously with our planet. This gives simplicity and order to the whole narrative. Light comes before us on the first and on the fourth day.
The heavenly bodies become the lights of the earth, and the distinguishers not only of day and night, but of seasons and years, of times and places. They shed forth their unveiled glories on the budding, waiting land. How the higher grade of transparency in the atmosphere and space was effected, we are not told; and, therefore, we are not prepared to explain why it was accomplished on the fourth day, and not sooner. But from its very position in time, we are led to conclude that the constitution of the expanse, the elevation of a portion of the waters of the deep in the form of vapor, the collection of the sub-aerial water into seas, and the creation of plants out of the soil, must all have had an essential part, both in remaining undone until the fourth day, and in then bringing about the dispersion of the clouds and the clearing of the atmosphere. Whatever remained of hindrance to the outshining of the sun, moon, and stars on the land in all their native splendor, was on this day removed by the word of divine power.
Now is the cause of day and night made obvious to the observation. Now are the heavenly bodies made to be signs of time and place to the intelligent spectator on the earth, to regulate seasons, days, months, and years, and to be the luminaries of the world. Now, manifestly, the greater light rules the day, as the lesser does the night. The Creator has withdrawn the curtain, and set forth the hitherto undistinguishable brilliants of space for the illumination of the land and the regulation of the changes which diversify its surface. This bright display, even if it could have been effected on the first day with due regard to the forces of nature already in operation, was unnecessary to the unseeing and unmoving world of vegetation, while it was plainly requisite for the seeing, choosing, and moving world of animated nature which was about to be called into existence on the following days.
What Difference Does This Make To Me?
We need to remember that all that God did in creation He did for one purpose, and one purpose alone – that is, to provide a place where His supreme creation, man could live and prosper. All that God did He did heading toward that purpose and to serve that end. The rest of creation is not an end in itself. The flowers and the animals so not exist for their own benefit, but for man’s. This is true even of the dividing of the day from the night, and the imposition of rule over the seasons and the times. It was needful for the day and the night to be divided because of the necessity of the rest/active cycle for the created things. It was needed because the rotation of the earth was necessary for a wealth of reasons, and that necessitated the darkness/light cycle as portions of the earth turned away from the sun. The tilt of the earth was necessary to provide growing seasons and to give the jungles a place to rise and provide oxygen and other essential aspects of the environment, as well as to allow the eventual formation of ice caps (after the flood) and our current ecology. This is not happenstance, it is deliberate and served a necessary function – the providing of a perfect environment for Adam to emerge and walk with and worship God.
Is There Anything For Me To Do?
I need to ponder the design of the world more – I need to see that it is marvelously made and not take its wondrousness for granted.
Care To Respond?
Other Devotionals: