The Masterpiece
From a panoramic, fast-cut views, the scene changes and zooms to the creation of mankind in Genesis 2. God was seen with his proverbial “hands” wet and fashioned the first man. He then breathed out His Spirit, the same Spirit that was hovering over the darkness and void in the beginning. When God did this, life came to the man.
It would be tempting to think that when God created mankind he would just let them be lazy in his world. I also find it amazing that God did not also create mindless masterpieces that would blindly follow him. He gave them a choice, God wanted a relationship with them and for a relationship to work there needs to be a free will. Also for life to continue there needs to be a purpose or mission. God provided both relationship and mission when he said:
And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. (Genesis 1:28-30)
“The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” (Genesis 2:15-17)
God wanted the world filled with his image and he gave mankind that responsibility when he commissioned them to be fruitful and multiply. God also said that man can subdue the whole creation, being created in the image of God, man has dominion (rule) over the creation. We were given a divine responsibility, a great stewardship for God’s good creation. We are like kings and queens of the kingdom, inferior only to God.
But this kind of rule is different from the power consuming leaders we may know. God’s definition of rule is not that of consuming (although there are plenty of resources for food as God commanded in Genesis 1:30) but that of serving and contributing. So God took the man and gave him responsibility over the garden that God was making. God gave man a job to do. Even before sin came, work was present. Work came from God! And this work was within the context of our relationship with him and mission for him. Mankind’s first job is to “work and keep it”.
Work here came from ‘abad’ which means to cultivate, serve or till. It can also mean worship. It is an agricultural term that prepares the land for growth. When a land is cultivated, the soil tends to become healthier and crops grow easier. The word cultivate came from the Latin word cultīvātus which is to care for by tilling. It involves hard work, and looks like you are ’serving’ the land because of the attention it demands.
‘Keep’ on the other hand is ’shamar’ which is to guard or protect. To be militant over what is entrusted. It means we are ready to protect what is entrusted to us.
When God said to work and keep ‘it’, He was inviting the man to use ‘it’ (whatever God created) to produce something that would be a blessing to the whole creation. That is how we can be fruitful in this world.
God calls us to cultivate and use what he has given us to create things that would add value to his creation. He wants us (and commands us) to contribute to what God has created. It is such a humbling task! To be given a space to showcase our own creations and be allowed to contribute to the Master Artist’s canvass brings delight to him and awe for us!
God also knows that working and creating is not fun when done alone. When we read the first verses of the bible we may be led to think that God was alone and lonely when he made creation. But in verse 27 we are stopped when God said “Let ‘us’” in plural. Meaning that there exists with him before anything else was created someone whom he confides. God was talking to His eternal Son and the Spirit, what we come to call the Trinity. In John 1:1-3 we find:
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.
This Word or Logos is not just the spoken Word but reflects the one who said it. But it went a step further that this Word is not just sounds and letters but a distinct person who is eternally existent and creates life. This is Jesus, the Word that became flesh.
In Genesis 1:3 we remember the Spirit hovering over the darkness and void and providing order, life and light.
God is a communal God. The Father, the Son and the Spirit. He always created, delighted and rested as a community. It is no surprise then for us that when he commissioned us to create he wanted a community for us. All the things we have seen are good, until we reach Genesis 2:18:
Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.”
A helper fit for him means a partner of equal value. The scene eventually led to the creation of the first female. But the observation of God goes even beyond the relationship of a man and a woman, but of mankind in general. To fulfill the commission of God, It is not good for man to be alone. If the God who created us is communal in nature and we are created in his image, then we are meant to live in a community that is a suitable helper for us.
This is the picture of the first mankind. We cultivate and create so we can contribute to God’s world and fulfill his mission for us. All of this are within the context of an unhindered and without shame community with God and other human beings.
you got it dave! keep writing!