This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Genesis 1-4” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, December 22, 1991.

Tonight we begin our scripture reading in Isaiah chapter forty. Isaiah chapter forty. And we begin with verse twelve. Hear the word of God. Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand and mark off the heavens by the stand and calculated the dust of the earth by the measure, and weighed the mountains in a balance, and the hills in a pair of scales. Who has directed the spirit of the Lord, or, as his counselor has informed him, with whom did he consult, and who gave him understanding, and who taught him in the path of justice, and taught him knowledge? and informed him of the way of understanding.

Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are regarded as a speck of dust on the scales. Behold, he lifts up the islands like fine dust. Even Lebanon is not enough to burn, nor its beasts enough for a burnt offering. All the nations are as nothing before him, They are regarded by him as less than nothing and meaningless. To whom then will you liken God? Or what likeness will you compare with him?

As for the idol, a craftsman casts it, a goldsmith plates it with gold, and a silversmith fashions chains of silver. He who is too impoverished for such an offering selects a tree, that does not rot. He seeks out for himself a skillful craftsman to prepare an idol that will not totter.

Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been declared to you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he who sits above the vault of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. He it is who reduces rulers to nothing, who makes the judges of the earth meaningless. Scarcely have they been planted, scarcely have they been sown, scarcely has their stalk taken root in the earth, but he nearly blows on them and they wither, and the storm carries them away like stubble. To whom, then, will you liken me that I should be his equal?” says the Holy One.

Lift up your eyes on high and see who has created these stars. The One who leads forth their host by number, He called them all by name. Because of the greatness of His might and the strength of His power, not one of them is missing. Why do you say, O Jacob, and assert, O Israel, my way is hidden from the Lord, and the justice-dooming escapes the notice of my God? Do you not know, have you not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, does not become weary or tired?

His understanding is inscrutable. He gives strength to the weary, and to him who lacks might he increases power. Though youths grow weary and tired, and vigorous young men stumble badly, yet those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength. They will mount up with wings like eagles. They will run and not get tired. They will walk and not become weary.”

And then from Genesis chapter 1, verses six through eight. Then God said, Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters. And God made the expanse and separated the waters which were below the expanse from the waters which were above the expanse, and it was so. God called the expanse heaven, and there was evening and there was morning a second day. We come now to the creation second day.

It could be said that the second day is the most neglected, the least written about, the most quickly overlooked day of the seven. One commentator passes over the second day with the mere comment There is apparently very little to say about this section. Another commentator in an expansive commentary on the book of Genesis, and I do mean expansive, gives two short paragraphs to the second day. He doesn’t waste much time on it, regardless of how much time God took. Well, after all, so it seems to be suggested by these commentators, we have here but three brief verses.

And obviously our objective is beyond what is recorded here. We are pressing on to the third day and subsequent days. and the important things that transpired on them. So let’s not waste much time on the second day. In fact, it is noticed that the second day is devoid of that expected, that customary divine inspection in which God sees the works he has done on a specific day and sees them as good. You might note that those words are absent here from the description of the second day. The declaration about the goodness with respect to the things that are in view in the second day must await the arrival of the third day. We have two declarations with regard to the goodness of what God has made in that third day. So it seems that the second day, both from the perspective of the revelation itself and the perspective of the Lord, who doesn’t even as much as declare that these things are good, is of slight importance.

But before we too easily move on, after a superficial reading of these verses, it might serve us well to take a closer look. First of all, we should not minimize the importance of the transitional effect that registers in this day. To be sure, we’re moving on past the second day to better days still, if you will. But we would do well not to dismiss too easily this day and its transitional value.

In fact, the events of the second day must be appropriated and understood as indispensable to what follows. You will recall that God, in the first day, spoken of in verse 3 of chapter 1, has resolved the darkness problem that was mentioned in verse 2. This resolution from God, although we may not grasp everything in view, sets the stage for what we might call differentiation within the creation. The ability to make distinctions within the fabric, within the structure of the creation, as that creation subsequently unfolds. But here in the second day, or verses six through eight, God will go to work on the formlessness and the emptiness also mentioned in that second verse.

The earth is described as a raging, swirling mass. The earth is described as the deep. Darkness covers the surface of the deep. And as yet, there’s no distinction made between land and watery mass. So the earth here is looked upon as a raging, swirling mass. It is described as the deep.

Now it’s into this chaotic state, that the light comes, and there is the beginning of the resolution of the earth’s formlessness and emptiness. God is at work. He employs the principle of separation, so that He now, in the light and with the light, separates light from darkness. And now, with this same principle in hand, he goes to work upon the raging, swirling mass, and he will introduce separation into it.

Now, the picture we are given is not unlike some of those that come out of ancient mythology. Some of you are acquainted with Babylonian mythology. Maybe you know the creation story out of the Babylonian myths, how Marduk is portrayed as defeating Tiamat and then splitting open her body, using half of her body to form the star, but not without fixing a crossbar. to retard the waters that threaten to break forth from her body upon the earth. The biblical picture from which that Babylonian myth originally came presents us not with Marduk or even with Thaonot, The biblical picture presents us with the imposing, impressive, glorious figure of God, who now isolates the earth with its waters from the waters that lie beyond the vault of the heaven. The watery chaos, therefore, in all of its impossibility, in all of its unbridled impossibility, is now bounded by God, limited by God, as God introduces into this chaos what is called the firmament. or what is called in the New American Standard Version from which I have read this evening, The Expanse.

Now, I think where Babylonian myths and other primitive cultures and their myths fall flat is precisely at this point, because you see, what they have constructed with their misimpressions and by way of their perversions of the original creation story introduces necessarily a flat earth. The glory of the biblical account in Genesis 1 is that It avoids even the flat earth construction. Properly read, it circumvents that difficulty. The second day of creation, as it is described for us here in Genesis chapter one, does not introduce us to a flat earth, but truly the picture we have is of the creation of the firmament around the earth, that firmament then bounding the watery expanse, the chaotic elements, bounding the waters above and beyond the firmament away from those waters which are below and belong to the earth itself.

The events of the third day, as they are described subsequently, will complete God’s dealings with the waters when the dry land appears. Thus it is, while the second day may appear minor, insignificant, hardly worth anyone’s time, hardly worth a consideration. In actual fact, it signals the bounding and the fixing of spheres. A bounding and a fixing which is absolutely essential for life, both in its most rudimentary sense and in its most As to life in its most glorious sense, we press on, relating what transpires on the second day then to that. For it becomes obvious to us that the second day is important for more than just transitional reasons. We are on our way to the third day and to the subsequent day and thus we must have a second day if we are to have a third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh. The second day is important to us for more than mere transitional reasons, for it sets before us a deepening impression with regard to God’s relationship to his work.

You may recall, as we work this out, you may recall what we said about day number one. In that day, God creates the light, and by so doing, establishes an analogous relationship between what is true in his eternal domain, where he himself is the light, and this creation in which the light appears. There is a relationship then between what is here and what is there. Now, some have pursued this specific bond a bit further, a bit deeper.

In regard to the appearance of the Spirit at the end of verse two, we read about the Spirit of God hovering, moving bird-like upon the surface of the waters. And this is what they have suggested The appearance of the Spirit of God at the end of verse two is by way of a theophonic cloud. Theophonic meaning an appearance of God. A cloud then in which God himself appears.

And they hold to this because they have found certain texts in the Old Testament where the language that is used here in Genesis 1-2 compares very strongly with language that is used to describe the cloud of God’s glory that appears for the sake of the children of Israel in the wilderness and also with respect to the temple, or rather the tabernacle and the temple, and the Shekinah glory.

Following this theme through, those who have made this observation suggest that not only is the creation then filled with those things that bear a relationship to the eternal dwelling of God, but the creation itself as a whole takes on the description of a dwelling place, of a tabernacle, of a temple. It has not been just the tabernacle that is built in keeping with the pattern above, It is not merely, then, that tabernacle that is built in keeping with the pattern above, but now this tabernacle itself takes on those descriptions of a sanctuary of the Lord. This means, then, that as this creation comes into existence, as it is formed, it is as if God Himself were building a holy sanctuary in which He would meet with His people, in which He would meet with mankind, and receive the service of all mankind rendered unto Him.

This then means that all of life, as we view things, all of life is lived within the sanctuary of God. All of life is holy. All of life is religious service. What we are about, then, is laboring as those who would consecrate all that is about us unto the Lord, all that we do in light of the fact that we are living in a vast temple. Now, that’s marvelous stuff. that says a great deal about individual existence. It says a tremendous lot about daily tasks, work, labor, whatever that labor may be, and the importance and the sanctity of our vocations, our callings.

But there is more here Well, you see, it’s not only that God creates His world as an analogy of that which is above. It is not simply the fact that the temple that is beyond provides the pattern for the temple which the creation is. But even more than that, the earth itself becomes the place from which we must approach that eternal, everlasting, transcendent temple above. So not only is God coming down to fashion a temple, we are aspiring to a temple. from the plane of this creation, from this world in which we find ourselves.

This becomes apparent to us even from the language that is used by Moses in this description of the second day. For the word that he employs to speak about God’s making the firmament—the firmament, that’s firm—the word that he employs to describe God’s making of the firmament is the word that is used repeatedly to speak about a craftsman that hammers out a piece of metal. This very language is used, although it’s not employed clearly in translations, in Psalm 136, verse 6, and in Isaiah 42, verse 5, where it speaks about God fashioning the heavens. So it’s as if God has fashioned a piece of metal Now, in bounding the waters that are above the earth, or those that are above the heavens, but note also the language of Job chapter 37 verse 18, where the spokesman there speaks about the heavens as molten mirrors. Drawing this language together, we have talk about hammered metal and mirrors, and we join hammered metal and mirrors together with the bounding of waters. All of this is suggestive of one thing and one thing only.

Are you ahead of me? It is the labor. outside of the tabernacle, outside of the temple. It is the labor set there for cleansing. How will you enter the sanctuary above but by that labor, but through that labor, through the cleansing that is there implied? A cleansing that comes irrespective of sin, because you must be purified by trial. Even Adam had to be purified by trial in order to arrive at the ultimate dwelling. The labor, then, at the sanctuary, at the entrance of the sanctuary, at the entrance of the eternal, the everlasting temple above, where those entering the tabernacle or the temple are cleansed. This labor is that through which man will come in order to enter the sanctuary above. Here, then, in the second day of creation, is the grounding for the significance of baptism. And I might say here is the explanation Finally, a revelation chapter twenty one verse one. Where in John’s vision, seeing the new heavens and the new earth. He tells us that there was no more see. Passing through it. There’s no more need for it. And it is gone.

Now, adding weight to all of this is the fact that the heavens are spoken of elsewhere, and that is why I read for you tonight from Isaiah chapter 40, especially verse 22. You can compare with that Psalm 104, verse two, where the heavens are described as a curtain behind which God conceals himself in which he dwells. What curtain is there behind which God dwells? What tent has God pitched in which he will dwell? The curtains of the tabernacle. The tent of the tabernacle. The draperies of the temple.

And so it is the creation from the very beginning. Even as it is proclaimed in this monumental secondary. The creation from the very beginning is meant to look beyond itself. The tabernacle, the temple are built after the pattern of those things which are above. That’s true. At the same time, this world is the place from which we must enter the true and heavenly temple. We, having been purified by triumph in the waters, having passed through the waters and through the veil, that is the curtain, into the very presence of God. There is a pioneer for us in all of this, and his career is described for us in great detail in the Epistle to the Hebrews. Look unto him, the author and finisher of your faith, who has gone before you, and most surely you shall follow.

Let’s pray. O God, we pray that we would understand better the very fabric and structure of your creation, that we would appreciate greatly, Lord, all of its many facets, its wonders, its beauty, marvelous detail and intricacies, that we would wonder at its mysteries, that we would glory in you before the wonderful testimony that arises from the creation and all of the works that we behold. And we ask you, Lord, that through this appreciation We might better appreciate you and the heavenly dwelling and all of its particulars that are revealed to us in your word by and through Christ and with your spirit. Oh father, may there be a deepening of our devotion and our grasp of these things. so that we ourselves are fixed, unmovable in our faith, and set upon Jesus Christ, who sits at your right hand.

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.