In Genesis 1, we have the account of a six-day creation. There is a lot of debate about the nature of a day. Some would hold that the day is a literal 24-hour period while others would say that a day is more like an era. In all that debate, something fundamental is overlooked, something that should help us better understand why the creation narrative was written in the way that it was.

Genesis 1:1 tells us that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. This is often understood to be a summary statement for what follows. The next statement tells us that the earth was formless and empty and that the Spirit hovered over the face of the deep. God was there, but there was nothing to sustain life. It is then that God begins his work of creation. Again, we need to return to the statement that the earth was formless and empty to fully understand the significance of what happened on the six days of creation. In the first three days of creation, God gives that which is formless form and that which was empty fullness. The following chart helps clarify what the text is telling us.

As we look at this chart, we cannot help but see the pattern that has developed. Day 4 fills Day 1, Day 5 fills Day 2, and Day 6 fills Day 3. Again, the first three days are about forming, and the last three days are about filling as God forms and fills that which was formless and empty. What we have at the end of the sixth day is a world which provides a place for life and which is designed to sustain that life. When the earth begins to revert back to formlessness (floods, desertification, etc.), life can no longer be sustained. The life that is most affected by any reversions of creation is that which was created on the sixth day, animals, but most specifically human beings. We also learn from Scripture that human beings have the remarkable ability to cause formlessness and emptiness. Sin leads both to flooding (Noah and the ark) and the disappearance of sustainable farmland (the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, which were at one time fertile but are now a wasteland). We also notice that when God restores his people, he also does so in conjunction with the restoration of creation.

The forming and filling of creation is an often overlooked aspect of the creation narrative, but it is an important one. What is even more important is the seventh day of creation, the rest that God provides. By making one day holy (an important attribute of God), God transmitted to creation the opportunity to experience his presence and blessing. It is rest that is the goal and purpose of creation, for resting is the end for which creation was designed.

The sin of Adam and Eve (and all of humanity with them) results in the final form and fullness of creation to be destroyed. God, because of his holiness, is no longer able to be present in creation, and that empties creation of its fullness and robs it of its form. All of creation is meant to experience God, and sin reverses that experience.

It is God who makes the first move to restore what was lost, but his move must be careful and measured. Thus, when the holy God makes himself present first in the tabernacle and later in the temple, he must carefully guard himself against all that is sinful. Thus, these two buildings have curtains and walls which are designed to keep him from being tainted with sin. These two buildings restored to creation something which was lost when sin entered the world, but not fully. In Jesus Christ, God comes to us again, and he comes in power, for although he was God among us (and we are sinful), he is not tainted by sin; rather, he pushes back against sin and its impact, bringing healing and restoration. In the church, which consists of people who have been made holy, the Holy Spirit dwells, and God continues to be present in this world.

But none of these manifestations of God in the Bible are the final reversal of sin. It is only in Revelation when sin is cast into the lake of fire and all things are made new that God comes to dwell among his people, being present once again in creation and establishing the rest that was lost because of sin.

All of this is to say that the real purpose of the creation narrative is not to give a scientific explanation of the beginnings of this world but, rather, to give us an understanding of what was meant to be, no longer is, but will one day be restored. Often we talk about a 6-day creation, but that is inappropriate. Humanists believe that the goal of all things is the wellbeing of humanity, and a Christian humanist believes that humans are the epitome of creation and that creation was made to serve us. The Genesis account says something different, for while the world was ultimately created to sustain life for humanity, the goal of creation is not to serve humanity but, rather, to give humanity the opportunity to serve God (and to cause the rest of creation to serve him as well). God’s intention is that we live in a creation that is properly formed (he is with us) and is properly filled (he is present among us). Thus, our efforts are not so much to maintain the place where we live so that we can survive but to seek God who makes himself known to us. Having God among us is the first step in restoring the emptiness and formlessness caused by sin. The Genesis narrative was not given to us, first and foremost, to describe how the world was made but, rather, to reveal to us what God intended for creation: that we all experience his presence, something that is lost in sin but is made possible again through Jesus Christ.

In the map to the right, we see the Nile River. The Nile flows from the south (the bottom of the map) to the north and empties into the Mediterranean Sea. Most of the water that flows into the Nile comes from Lake Victoria (more than 60%), and nearly all of that water flows during the summer months, which is the rainy season around Lake Victoria. Lake Victoria is the second largest freshwater lake in the world, but the area that feeds the lake is relatively small. What this means is that if the countries surrounding Lake Victoria happen to experience a dry year, the size of the Nile River diminishes significantly and the water level in the Nile drops.

What makes this significant is that it almost never rains in Egypt or Sudan. In Luxor, most probably the place where Moses was raised, a rain event is remembered for years. In Cairo, where the pyramids are located, we would consider their definition of a rainfall to be no more than a light misting, by our standards. Consequently, Egypt’s existence as a habitable country is entirely dependent on the flow of water in the Nile. Again, if the rainy season does not happen in the region around Lake Victoria, Egypt will dry up, and its people will have to move or die.

In the book of Genesis, we can read the story of Joseph. Joseph, as we remember, was sold as a slave into Egypt, but God blessed him, for he gave Joseph the ability to interpret dreams. When Pharaoh had two dreams involving fat cows and thin cows and plentiful sheaves of wheat compared to blighted ones, Joseph, receiving understanding from God, informed Pharoah that God was going to give Egypt seven years of plenty followed by seven years of famine. The weather did not change in Egypt (it’s always hot and dry), but it did have to change in the region around Lake Victoria for this to happen. Much of the moisture needed for farming in Egypt came from the flooding of the Nile following the rainy season around Lake Victoria, and for seven years, the moisture was plentiful. However, during the seven dry years, the rainfall around Lake Victoria would have been so low that the Nile did not flood and in the regular season, the river would have been so low as to make irrigation nearly impossible. While the people would have had enough to drink, they would have found it impossible to irrigate their fields. The food supply was in jeopardy, as we read in the book of Exodus.

As we know from the Genesis account, God guided Joseph to advise Pharaoh to collect food during the seven good years so that the people could eat during the seven lean years. Instead of doling that extra food out for free, however, Joseph sold it to the people, and eventually the people were forced to sell their land at fire-sale prices and later themselves to become slaves to Pharaoh just so they could eat. As a result of this good business move, Pharaoh acquired for himself all of the Egyptian farmland, with the exception of the land that belonged to the Egyptian priests, and he became more powerful than ever before.

In these two seven-year periods, God showed his immense power over creation as he changed the weather patterns in the Mideastern part of Africa so that he could save the Israelites from sure starvation, for that is ultimately why God allowed Joseph to be sold into Egypt. God showed his concern for one of Abraham’s descendants, Joseph, elevating him to a position of great power in Egypt. But in all of this God set himself up to face an even more powerful enemy, the Pharaoh of Egypt.

In changing the weather patterns around Lake Victoria and by giving Joseph the interpretation of the dreams, God created circumstances for Pharaoh to become a king of immense power. God inadvertently built up Pharaoh’s power through these events, a rather unwise military move, for most heads of armies try to weaken their foe before they attack. But even though he as strengthened, Pharaoh did not stand a chance, for when God went head-to-head against Pharaoh in battle, he roundly defeated him through a series of ten plagues. Though Joseph’s God-led actions gave Pharaoh power and prosperity, God impoverished Pharaoh and Egypt with him by sending plagues that would have ruined the agricultural economy of the nation. Egypt nearly died when God went to work, but Israel was saved. In saving Israel, God also cleared the way for a Saviour of the world to be born years later.

Reflecting on this story, we might wonder how the people around Lake Victoria felt as they experienced these very odd weather patterns. Years of heavy rain followed by years of near drought would have destabilized their lives, and, we can be sure, would have made them wonder why their gods (for they didn’t know the Lord) were not controlling things as expected. Then, as now, changing weather patterns cause all sorts of alarm, but in their case, the changing weather patterns had an explanation (which they could not have known): God was at work bringing about salvation not only for his people but for the world. The strangeness of their weather was a result of God doing something in another area of a world, an area that many would never have dreamed existed.

We might wonder why things happen as they do. There are events which seem to have no purpose and no meaning. We might even ask the question: why would God allow this or that to happen? We will probably never have the answer, but we can always trust that our God is at work somewhere doing something for the purposes of moving redemptive history forward. Just as the people living in sub-Saharan Africa could not know the full picture and thus not see how God was working, so we do not always see it. But that does not mean he is not at work. It is because God changed the weather patterns in the region around Lake Victoria that his plan of redemption could go forward and, eventually, the good people of Lake Victoria could be saved. After all, because Joseph saved Israel from starvation and because God released his people from slavery, Jesus was born. And today Jesus is known by many of the people around Lake Victoria.

There is a big difference between two similar words: description and prescription. When we have a sore back, for example, the doctor, after doing all the necessary tests, describes the problem by saying that an injury from years ago has caused deterioration in one of the disks, and that is what is causing the pain. A description often leads to a prescription: surgery will most probably correct the problem. We have little problem differentiating between description and prescription, especially when it comes to our health.

When it comes to how we use the Bible, however, we seem to have more trouble. When reading the Bible, we have to ask ourselves if what we are reading is description or prescription. For example, we read numerous times that the Israelites went to battle against neighbouring nations, often taking over their territory, confiscating their possessions and making them slaves. Some, when they read these stories, which are entirely description, want to make them prescriptive. During the time of the crusades, about 1000 years ago, these descriptive passages were used by church leaders to rally the people, and thousands joined ragtag armies to go and “liberate” Jerusalem from the “infidels.” Not only were people misled in their quest to Christianize Jerusalem, but on the way, sadly, they also killed many innocent people, causing great harm to the name of Christ and of Christianity in general. This is one example of making biblical description in prescription, and there are many, many more.

The Bible is not only descriptive; it also contains prescriptive passages. The 10 Commandments, for example, are prescriptive. They prescribe a certain kind of behaviour, one that Jesus says is rooted in love for God and neighbour. Paul’s letter, likewise, are full of prescription, calling us to live in a way that is worthy of the calling we have received.

When we read the Bible, there are two pitfalls we must avoid. As was already mentioned, when we confuse description for prescription, we run into serious problems, for we tend toward randomness. One rather common example is the current trend to base diets on food described in the Bible, calling it a biblical diet. This is random, for seldom do we see people using biblical descriptions of transportation or battle armaments as prescriptive. We don’t go to battle with spears and swords or walk or ride donkeys because we say that these are better because they are described in the Bible. Even more dangerous is to take someone’s actions as prescriptive. We may emulate David as he writes and plays music that honours the Lord, but do we follow him as he and his men annihilate entire villages so that no one remains who can say who led the attack? If we make descriptive passages prescriptive, we must do so consistently, and we will find that to be impossible.

A second error which we must avoid is making prescriptive for them prescriptive for us. As an example, the Bible says that the Israelites may not mix two kinds of thread together as they weave cloth for a garment. That is prescriptive for them, but if we make it prescriptive for us, most of us are sinning at this very moment, for almost all of our clothing is made up of a combination of fibres. We end up becoming random in our choice of which prescriptions we will obey because we tend to focus on some and ignore all the rest. Another prescription which we have ignored completely is “Greet one another with a holy kiss,” a command that appears several times in Paul’s letters. I haven’t seen that happen lately, not even in the council room on a Sunday morning, although we do shake hands.

When thinking about a prescriptive passage, we always need to ask the question, “To whom is this addressed, and what is the situation that it is addressing?” Further, we must ask, “Is this prescription meant to be universal or situational?” It is not always easy to find the right answer, although some helpful attempts have been made. For example, many people will say that we can divide the various commands (prescriptions) in the Old Testament into three categories: religious, civil, and moral. They go on to say that religious commands have been fulfilled in Christ (sacrifices, etc.), that civil commands are only for the nation of Israel (boundary stones, etc.) but that moral commands (don’t murder) are still in force. It is convenient to differentiate biblical prescriptions in this way, but it is also artificial, for the Bible does not recognize or practice this.

The best way to determine whether a prescription is still in force is to seek to understand it in its context and determine its force for the people then. For example, greeting one another with a holy kiss is a way of expressing unity, something that we can replace with a handshake. Commands about dress (women wearing head coverings or men having short hair – Jesus probably had short hair) also have some cultural background, and we must make sure that we understand as completely as possible the reason these commands were given in that culture and place before we apply them universally to all people. This does take some hard work and careful research, recognizing that while we can gain insight into most of the prescriptions in the Bible, we cannot into all of them. We simply are too removed from that culture and place.

So, to summarize, we should never make descriptive passages into prescription for us. That is a blatant misuse of Scripture and can create all sorts of problems. And second, when the Bible prescribes something, we must be careful that we understand fully what the force of scope of the command is before we apply it to our situation. All of this requires serious Bible study, something that we should always be ready to do.