This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of “The Holy Spirit” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, January 22, 1995.
About this sermon
Genesis 1:2’s formless, empty darkness is not left to resolve itself; the Spirit’s hovering is what brings a higher order out of it. Three distinct meanings of that single word ‘hovering’ are drawn out. Creation’s original shapelessness needs the same Spirit the rest of the series will keep tracing forward.
Sermon transcript
Tonight we are reading from Genesis chapter 1, Genesis 1, beginning at verse 1. Hear the word of God. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. And the earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.
And God said, Let there be light, and there was light. And God saw that the light was good, and God separated the light from the darkness. And God called the light day, and the darkness he called night. And there was evening, and there was morning one day.
Then God said, let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters and let it separate the waters from the waters. 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 the second day. Then God said, Let the waters below the heavens be gathered into one place, and let the dry land appear. And it was so. God called the dry land earth, and the gathering of the waters he called seed.
And God saw that it was good. Then God said, Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit after their kind, with seed in them on the earth. And it was so. And the earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed after their kind, and trees bearing fruit with seed in them after their kind. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning a third day.
Our Father, you order things by your word, and even by your word you establish for yourself those within your creation who are set for the ordering of the affairs of your people. By your word, then, officers are established, and by your word, officers must teach and rule and serve. We rejoice, O God, that you have filled us, the assembly of your Church, with officers of your choice. We pray, our God, that such officers as you have given to this Church will be diligent, thus giving expression to the spirit ordering of things within this household of God. O Father, be pleased to strengthen us, your Church, even as you grant us those who do us good in their oversight and in their service on our behalf, even as the Lord Jesus Christ is seen in such rule and in such service. We pray this in Christ’s name. Amen.
As we look at the Old Testament and the doctrine of the Holy Spirit, there are many passages that would catch our eye. Some of these bear upon the New Testament in a most direct fashion, and we will be taking them up in the course of time when we deal with the New Testament more specifically. But before we go to the New Testament and even carry with us some of those Old Testament texts that pertain to the Spirit into our consideration of the New Testament, I want to give attention to two Old Testament texts, specifically Genesis 1-2 and also Zechariah 4-6. Now the King James rendering of Genesis 1-2 is quite familiar to us all.
I read for you tonight the New American Standard version of that text. But you may want to hear that familiar reading of it one more time. And the earth was without form, and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the water. As to the text in Zechariah, Again, chapter 4, verse 6, although not as familiar to us as that Genesis 1 verse, it is familiar enough. It reads, Then he answered, and spake, This is the word of the Lord unto Zerubbabel, saying, Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, saith the Lord of hosts. So these two texts.
Now, the obvious advantage of limiting ourselves to these passages is that it sets before us a manageable project. That is, instead of looking at all the Old Testament texts that concentrate upon the Holy Spirit, we will be focused on these two. There are other advantages. Another advantage is that we have one text from the beginning of God’s Old Testament revelation, and we have another near to the conclusion of that Old Testament revelation. We have one text from a narrative portion of the Old Testament. We have another from a prophetic section of the Old Testament.
So it is that there is a bit of comprehensiveness even as we deal with these two texts. We hope, therefore, that in these verses we might have the prospect of observing something of that sweep of Old Testament revelation with respect to the person of the Holy Spirit. My purpose also is to provide some concrete exposition of texts to go along with the quick survey of materials that I offered to you last Sunday evening. For tonight, we will be looking, then, at Genesis 1, verse 2, and what this verse has to say about the Spirit of God.
First of all, as we look at this text, we notice that the Spirit stands in contrast to the present state of the creation. The spirit stands in contrast to the present state of the creation. Over against the formlessness and the void, over against the darkness, over against even that darkness as it is upon the face of the waters, as it also is expressive of the formlessness and the void, over against all of this is The Spirit.
The Spirit of God. Now, our initial reaction to the introduction of the Spirit at this point is that the Spirit comes for the purpose, then, of resolving the creation’s present state. The Spirit comes. The Spirit appears. for the express purpose of resolving the creation’s present condition.
That is, then, that the Spirit makes His appearance, He comes on to the creation for the purpose of resolving the formlessness, resolving the emptiness, resolving the darkness that characterizes the creation at this point. Now this, our initial reaction as we move into the text, is quite correct. But we need to ask ourselves just what is this formlessness, this emptiness, this darkness of which this text speaks. We need to ask ourselves specifically what is in view as these matters are put in front of us so that we might understand better the significance of the Spirit’s appearance, His work, and even His person in relationship to this creation. Think then of the formlessness that is mentioned here in this verse.
We have been told that God has created the heavens and the earth, but then in the next verse we are told that this creation is characterized by a formless mass. Well, how is it that God creates the heavens and the earth, and the next thing we’re told is that formlessness characterizes what God has made? Does this mean, then, that what God has made is shapeless? It has no form? Even if it were a blob, it would have dimension, would it not? Obviously, then, for the earth to be formed, it has to have shape and dimension. In what sense, then, can the earth be formless?
Well, the formlessness that the Word of God has in view at this point is to be understood in the sense of a wilderness. It is to be understood in the sense of a barren wasteland, thus formless in that sense, because it lies as a wild, chaotic wasteland, that before the advent of the Spirit. As such, in its primal state, then, the earth, Lacking form, in the Genesis 1-2 sense of that word, lacking form or even order, characterized as a barren wasteland or wilderness, stands opposite what we might call a realm, a domain, or a kingdom. The formlessness in view here in Genesis chapter one, verse two, is a condition, a state, pertaining to the created order that stands opposite the ordering and the form that would characterize the world as realm, domain, and kingdom.
But going even further with this notion, and I realize that here we are dealing with things that are quite deep, we must acknowledge that the earth in this condition, as it is described to us at the opening of this verse, is formless in the most absolute sense. In the most absolute sense. Therefore, the earth not only lacks form and order, it defies form and order. It not only lacks realm, domain, and kingdom, it defies realm, domain, and kingdom.
This means, then, that the resolution to the earth’s condition cannot be generated out of itself. Form and order cannot be generated from out of the earth as if the earth had within itself the potentiality of creating for itself form and order. You must understand, then, that the earth cannot generate, then, for itself that which would answer to God’s definition of domain, kingdom, or realm in and of itself. The earth cannot bestow upon itself its own resolution.
It is utterly incapable of doing so, and this is what I mean, then, that our description here of the formlessness of the earth must be taken in the most absolute sense. We are here, then, talking about impossibilities. We are talking about impossibilities. Now we can say the same thing about the emptiness or the void that is mentioned next, as we can with respect to the darkness. Focusing upon that emptiness. The emptiness now in you pertains to the fact that in this state nothing fills the earth. Nothing, as it were, inhabits the earth. We are, after all, speaking about the earth as desolate wasteland. Nothing can live there. It’s empty.
Nothing then inhabits the earth that might bring to the earth a completedness, a fullness, a filling up, by which, through which the formlessness might itself be answered, or at least challenged. But once more, as with the formlessness, so also with the void, the emptiness, you must understand the void in the most absolute sense. It is not merely that the earth is empty, it defies filling. In its present state, it is not only then that the earth is not filled, it cannot be filled. It is impossible for it to be filled. and the earth itself cannot generate that which would fill it or complete it from within itself.
What we have said about the formlessness and the void, we can also say about the darkness. The darkness must be understood, then, as a darkness in the absolute sense. There is nothing within the creation, as God originally made that creation, that can resolve the darkness that characterizes the earth.
The Bible’s declarations, then, here at the very outset of Revelation, as if anticipating the positions of unregenerate men, as if anticipating all that would be said that would be challenging then to the biblical doctrine of creation, lay here at the very outset the ax to the root of all apostate evolutionary thinking. All evolutionary thinking presumes life or the spark of life or vitality, presumes an energy force that is of the stuff of this creation that is then responsible for further generation, assumes that within the created order there is something that has the possibility of generating resolution to the universe’s problems. But as well, the act is laid to the root to all religious and philosophical systems that build upon a belief that the created order has within itself a potentiality to resolve its own complexities and difficulties. People of God We are talking here about impossibilities. It is against the background of these impossibilities then presented to us from the very beginning that the Spirit of God makes His appearance.
The Spirit is the agent of resolution. He is the Spirit of power and the agent of resolution. By Him, in Him, there is now rendered possible what is impossible. given the canons of this created order. But you must understand that the spirit here is introduced to us not just as the spirit of power the divine figure, the agent of resolution to the impossibilities that regard the creation.
Spirit is also introduced as that figure in whom we are able to perceive the reality of an entirely different order of things, that figure in whom we are able to perceive another world altogether. The Spirit carries within him the truth of the reality of a higher sphere of another world, of another order of things, the order of the Spirit. The Spirit, therefore, is introduced to us as that figure who carries within him the testimony to another world, a figure whose work of resolution now, in this particular context, is in keeping with that other world, its order and form, domain and kingdom, and all that fills that other world. as if with this pattern, then resolution is brought to bear upon the predicament that the creation presently confronts. The figure of the Spirit carries within Himself the resolution to the world’s formlessness, emptiness, and darkness. But he carries within himself that resolution in keeping with the other world, which is tied up in him, so that he brings to bear upon the present world the order-formed dominion kingdom, and even that which fills that other world, he brings to bear upon this world the order of the other world. The Spirit of God comes, therefore, to remedy the impossible situation as only He can, but with a resolution and solution that bears the imprint of that higher world from which He Himself has come, or which He carries with Him in His coming.
The clue to this In our text is the mention of the bird-like character of the Spirit of God. Proper rendering of the latter part of that second verse is that the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters, was hovering bird-like over the face of the waters.
Why the bird imagery? Why the hovering language in connection with the Spirit? Birds weren’t as much as yet created. Why the hovering language, the bird imagery, in connection with the Spirit? Now you might note that The bird imagery is used elsewhere with regard to the Spirit. A very important text, you recall, namely the baptism narrative regarding Jesus Christ in the synoptic Gospels. Remember what it said?
The Spirit descended dove-like upon Jesus. when he comes out of the waters of the Jordan, Matthew 3.16 in parallel text. It would seem then that there is some connection, shall we say natural connection, I’ll stretch the word, some natural connection between the Spirit and this bird imagery, even as we see that connection once more in the New Testament in the baptism narratives regarding Christ. But what possible significance could the bird imagery have in connection with the Spirit? So I ask you, what else in Scripture has wings? Not birds. Angels. Angels.
He must then see the advent of the Spirit in Genesis 1-2 as the advent of God. And it is the advent of God in His glory. It is the advent of God in His matchless, wonderful glory. His heavenly glory. You remember the coming of God in the vision of Isaiah? In Isaiah chapter 6, when He appears, He is accompanied by His angelic host, His Pharisees. This, too, is the coming of God.
It is the advent of God, specifically now seen under the heading of the Spirit and the coming of the Spirit for the resolution of those impossibilities that are now upon the face of the creation. God comes then accompanied by his heavenly entourage, and this is a spirit visitation coming out of that other world, he accompanied with all his angelic hosts. The mysterious bird-like movement draws into view the intrusion of God from His throne and His glory, accompanied by all of His angels, as they come upon the plane of this world for the resolution of the impossibilities that overshadow this world as yet. Out of God’s throne then, with His glory, accompanied as He is by His angels, There comes through the Spirit, by the power and pattern of the forming and filling of that world which is transcendent, a resolution to the formlessness and the emptiness and the darkness of this creation. There is significance then for the Spirit’s descent, dove-like, upon Christ at His baptism for it comes as a virtual reenactment of Genesis 1-2, this time with Jesus himself being the creation, upon whom then the Spirit works in order to establish the power and the pattern of the realm above in this world beneath. I might add, neither is this dimension lacking from the Pentecost story in Acts 2, but there the winging imagery might be a bit obscure to us, hidden as it is beneath the reference to the noise from heaven that sounds like violent rushing wind in Acts 2, verse 1.
When we read that Acts 2, verse 2 account in light of passages, like Ezekiel 1.24 and Ezekiel 10.5, we see that the sound of that mighty rushing wind, or the sound of many waters as it appears even in Ezekiel, is because of the beating of the angelic wings that accompanied God as He comes on, upon His creation.
So as to bring the imposition of the power and the pattern of that higher world upon this world in order to answer the impossibilities that have overtaken this creation. What impossibilities might those be in the day of the apostles gathered together in Jerusalem What might they be on the day of Pentecost? The inability for you to resolve your sin, the impossibility for you to reach heaven’s glory in and through yourself. the impossibility for there to be in this creation, apart from the Spirit’s working, a manifestation of the form and kingdom of God that now made possible through the Spirit and asserting itself in the Church of Jesus Christ. At Pentecost also, the beating of angelic wings accompanying God’s advent. Yes, his entourage comes on, bounded to the spirit and in the spirit, a divine visitation by which the power and the pattern of the realm of the spirit asserts itself and imposes itself upon this creation, thus to resolve our impossibility.
As I have already intimated, what the Spirit has done at creation, what He has done for the Church, He also does for us, making us nothing less than temples of His. making it apparent that left to ourselves we have no more possibility of fulfillment or productivity than the original creation, and that even more so because of sin and its sentence of death. But now, having been baptized, we all, having been baptized into the Spirit, what was impossible for us is now possible. We have been made, yes, alive, We have even been made fruitful by the Spirit. Not only are we able to labor unto the Lord, but in the Spirit and life of that world which is above, we are guaranteed that our labor is not in vain in the Lord.
Left to ourselves, our works are emptiness. They contribute nothing to the formation of the kingdom and leave us in a desolate wilderness. But with the Spirit of God, we are now citizens of a higher realm And that realm asserts itself in its power and pattern in this creation presently, in the Church of Jesus Christ, and even as we extend ourselves in Christ’s name, showing that we belong to the Lord. Our God, it may well be that we would say that we have the power in ourselves to resolve the situations that face us, but that is not true.
It is the Spirit of God who has power in himself, and even power to resolve the impossibilities that we confront. as it has been with the creation, as it has been with salvation itself in Jesus Christ, so it is with the Church, and it is with us. Therefore, O God, we will be unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, insofar as we know that our labor is not in vain in the Lord. We pray this through Christ, who blesses us with His Spirit. Amen.
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.