Week 1: Creation

We begin our journey through God's story at, well, the beginning! If I were to ask you to create an expression of yourself that represents something unique about your personality, what would you do? Would you use paint, pastels, write a song? What would that art say about who you are? God has done that with Creation.

God's Story: Genesis chapter 1 and Romans 1:19-20

What we learn about God:

1. God wants to be known by His Creation
2. Creation reveals God's character and qualities
3. God is good, as was His intention for everything He made

SOME of the interesting things we noted about the Genesis account:

• God created both male and female in His image
• God is a communal being: Three persons in one, the Trinity: "Let US create man in OUR image"
• Creation is REALLY REALLY HUGE and yet He cares for the small details of our lives
• God created with unique creativity and detail
• The Genesis account isn't intended to be a scientific blueprint of HOW but of WHO is the source of all creation
• Was it 6 literal days or a longer period of time?
• God placed humanity at the top of creation in order to take care of it...Are we doing a good job of that? 
• Our faith doesn't have to be without science and reason
• Creation and evolution at their core both come down to a faith or belief in something, not simple facts: Where did the Big Bang come from? There's still a need to believe in something even if you don't believe in God...The Christian claim is that God is the source of all things created.

Mankind knows the truth about God because He has made it obvious to them. For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see His invisible qualities—His eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God. 
(Romans 1:19, 20)

What qualities of God can we gather from the Genesis account? From observing nature? From looking at our own lives?

The Dials of Life:

We watched a clip from "Everything is Spiritual" which looked at the precise details of life on planet Earth.What reaction do you have to that crazy information? God is precise and very much involved in His Creation. 

What's the probability that all of that is random chance?

RESPONSE WORK

DIG

Go back over the story of creation in Genesis 1 and re-read Romans 1:19-23.

Make a list of your thoughts and questions about who God is and then post at least one comment on this blog page.

TALK

Talk with your family about how you see God working in creation, your life, and the world around you. Ask them where they God at work in their lives and the world. What questions do they have about who God is?

Secondly, take your list of questions about who God is and spend time asking them directly to God.

EXPERIENCE

Take a short walk outside this week and observe nature. Be specific and intentional about this time. What qualities of God can you see represented in the things you see. Spend at least 15 minutes on this walk and make a list of things you see in Creation and what it might reveal about who God is.

LIVE

So what might all of this mean for your everyday living? What have you learned about God this week and why does it matter to your life? What could, should, and would change in your life if the things God's Story claim about God are really true? Journal these thoughts.

THE BIBLE

At the beginning we spent time looking briefly at the Book we're studying to understand who God is...

Here's some thoughts to keep in mind:

1. The Bible is a collection of propositional truth: Truth statements about God and life that we can believe and trust because it comes from the source of all truth, GOD. These truths are what we intellectually engage and process in order to conform to God's truth.
2. The Bible is a communication of a love metanarrative: A story of God's love for us that started with creation and continues to today. We are apart of that story! This means we're part of an active relationship of experience and transformation by God's love.
3. The Bible points us to God, it is not God. 
4. The Bible is divinely inspired with human involvement: We must consider the Bible's personalities, genres, culture, and emotion, realizing that it always universally relevant.
5. Some verses about the Bible, in the Bible: Hebrews 4:12 and 2 Timothy 3:15-17