I Believe in God the Creator

The only ultimately significant question for us from this passage is: Who has created us? Who has created this world, which is infinitely complex, staggeringly beautiful, and at times deadly? We have had reminders of the latter this week as we have watched the catastrophes unfold in China and Myanmar. “We believe in God . . . the creator of heaven and earth.” We believe in the Creator, not in any particular theory about how it happened. Debates about creationism versus evolution are attempts to answer the How? question: How did we come to be? These debates are sterile, because they tell us nothing substantial who created us. By contrast, once we are clear about the Who? question, this passage begins to open up for us. Who is God the creator for us today?

“I look to the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth” (Ps. 121:1).

For the psalmist, the creation witnesses to God’s goodness and providential care. The one who created the mountains is our helper. Creation witnesses to God’s providential care. Every day, we have tangible reminders that God is for us: in the lush smell of a fresh spring morning and in the purple glow of the evening sunset. These daily reminders take creation from the realm of an abstract event in the past and place it before us as a present reality. God the creator is at work around us every day, continuing the work of creation.

It is fortunate that we consider this text in the spring time, at the point when the earth is regenerating itself. Taking a walk, working in the garden, or riding your bike can be just as important and salutary as reading the Bible – sometimes, even more so. When you cannot read the Bible or pray, it is time to take a walk, to enjoy the bounty of creation, and to remember our place in it. The created order teaches us to praise God: “We bless thee for our creation, preservation, and all the blessings of this life” The General Thanksgiving, BCP, p. 58-59).

“And God said: ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light. . . . And God said: ‘Let the earth bring forth vegetation’ . . . . And it was so.”

God creates by speaking. Unlike man, homo faber, the tool-maker, God doesn’t need tools – he creates by his word. When he speaks, he accomplishes his will.

We also use words to accomplish things. Imagine that you are standing at the corner of a busy street and you see a cyclist about to veer into the path of an oncoming car. Suddenly you shout: STOP! WATCH OUT! An accident is narrowly averted. The man asks his beloved: Will you marry me? She says: Yes! Words can be powerful. They can accomplish things.

But human language is ambiguous. Sometimes our words are ineffective. We speak, and absolutely nothing happens. Anyone who has raised children has experienced this. You tell your child that it is time to wake up, and nothing happens. So you try again: “It’s time to get up. . . . You’re going to miss the bus, etc.,” and still, nothing happens. With God, it is different. God’s words are effective. This is true when he speaks through someone. It was said of the young boy Samuel, who became a prophet, that “not one of his words fell to the ground” (1 Sam. 3). Wouldn’t it be great if none of our words fell to the ground?

God’s word is not only effective; it is also the means by which he shares his heart, his very self with us. His word is his going-forth-of-himself to us – just as we give ourselves to another by communicating the thoughts of our hearts. Creation is God’s Yes! to us.

And God said, “let us make man in our image, in our shape; and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea and the creatures in the heavens and of all the swarming creatures swarming upon the earth.”

God the creator is hospitable. He makes room for us. He has not placed us in heaven, with the angels, but on earth. He makes space or a place for us. One sign of genuine hospitality is when someone invites you into their home, and then gives you some space – freedom to roam. God gives us freedom to exist and to act. When he created us, he endowed us with our own existence, with a life of our own.

This God-given creaturely existence is evident in the fruitfulness of creation. God not only creates, he gives his creation the capacity to reproduce. He creates the earth with the capacity to bring forth vegetation and trees. And these are not just any kind of trees, they are fruit bearing trees. Likewise, he creates the seas with the capacity to bring forth living things; the sky, which brings forth flying things; the earth “swarming with swarming creatures.” He gives each created object its own existence, which is distinct from God. God creates it, but it has a kind of momentum – his creative power sets it in motion. This is particularly clear in the case of the human being, the climax of creation. God creates them “male and female in our image” – and gives them dominion over fish, flying things, and swarming creatures on earth. God trusts us by giving us a part in the continuing act of creation.

And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. . . . And God . . . separated the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament. . . . And God said, “Let the waters be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.”

God is a God of order and not of chaos. He creates by establishing a series of boundaries. He says to the sea: You may come this far, but no farther, so that the good earth and the creatures, including man, have a place to exist.

But this raises a huge question. If God is a God of order, and if the creation is good, then how do we explain creation’s destructive and annihilating power? What about China and Myanmar? What went wrong? Does he create something malignant? Is he removed from his creation? Did he create it and then walk away to let it run on its own? If this is the best God can do, then maybe he should step aside and hand things over to someone more competent. [1]

Recently, Elliott (age 16) asked: “If we thank God for the good things that happen, then why don’t we blame him for the bad things?” At the moment, all I could say to him was: I do blame him. God is ultimately responsible for everything that happens to you and to me. He is not evil, but he permits tragic events to happen. I realize that this comes dangerously close to attributing evil to God, but it’s a risk the church is willing to take. Read the psalms. Often, the psalmist is shaking his fist at God and asking: Why are you doing this?

God is hidden as well as revealed in his creation. He is hidden in natural catastrophes just as the Son of man is hidden in suffering. Who, looking at Jesus expiring on the cross on Good Friday, would have guessed that here we see the power of God? Likewise, even in violent and catastrophic natural disasters, we do meet God – though we seem to meet God as his face is turned from us. It is a side of God that we would rather not see. But if we look at these events as believers, we are able to see in them the birth pains of the new creation. The creation groans, waiting for its redemption. And we groan with it as we wait for the redemption of our bodies (Romans 8).

So we come this morning, as those who are “beautifully and wonderfully made” (Psalm 139), living in a world that is infinitely complex and grand and which we are invited in to enjoy. But we have mismanaged the created order; and we have mismanaged our lives. As we say in Eucharistic Prayer C:

From the primal elements you brought forth the human race, and blessed us with memory, reason, and skill. You made us the rulers of creation. But we turned against you, and betrayed your trust; and we turned against one another.

We come broken and needing rest; ashamed and needing to hear a word of pardon; deaf and needing to have our ears unstopped. But we are also in the presence of the one who speaks and as he speaks, also forgives and rectifies. God the creator is also God the savior. So we can pray with the psalmist, “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.” God who caused light to come into the world has caused his light to shine in our hearts. God who creates out of nothing can make something out of the chaos of our lives.

[1] Paraphrase of Elie Wiesel’s comment after reading Kushner’s When Bad Things Happen to Good People.