Sermon Tone Analysis

We as human beings need to organize the events and the makeup of our lives into a story that gives us hope.

Without such a story, we are, in the words of anthropologist Clifford Geirst, “A kind of formless monster with neither sense of direction or power of self-control in the chaos of vague emotions.”

If we do not have a grand story or great end into which we see our lives, we are left with simply the gratification of desires, and the endless pursuit of immediate satisfaction, which offers no hope at all for our world.

I believe that when it comes to gender, we as a society do not have an overarching story to make sense of our lives and our gender, and so we have no avenue for hope with regards to the many issues of gender, and all we have is the pursuit immediate happiness in the chaos of vague emotions.

What we need is a story to make sense of it all.

The good news is that there is such a grand narrative that makes sense of our lives and our world, and when we view gender through the lens of this grand story, the blurry lines come into focus, and we can begin to understand its meaning and purpose.

Look with me at the first page of this story, in .

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep.”

I remember seeing Star Wars for the first time when I was a kid, and that big yellow text comes on the screen, “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...” The movie is silent until the big theme song blares.

This is how epic stories begin, and this is how the biblical story begins, “In the beginning...”

“The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the deep.”

Now as modern readers, you probably have an image of the planet earth, one of those iconic images that we’ve seen.

If that is the image in your head, this verse doesn’t really make any sense.

But remember, humanity has had that image of planet earth for only about 50 years or so.

So Genesis, written about 3500 years ago, does not have that picture in view here, so neither should we.

Now, formless and void is one way of translating these Hebrew words.

The phrase is actually quite memorable, because it rhymes “tohu va vohu.”

It can be translated formless and void or empty, but I think a better way to think of it is “wild and waste.”

The earth was wild and waste.

Tohu va vohu are used elsewhere in the Bible to describe a wilderness or desert.

So the story begins with the earth in a state of tohu va vohu, wild and waste, and is all about taking this chaotic and barren land and turning it into something wonderful.

We see there is darkness over the face of the deep, but along with the darkness is something else, “And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.”

Now, what happens when the presence and goodness and glory of God comes into contact with darkness?

Good things happen.

And indeed, throughout the story of , God turns the earth that is wild and waste into something wonderfully good.

The word for good in Hebrew is tov.

So God turns tohu va vohu into tov.

Do you hear the wordplay?

What’s fascinating about this story is that everything that God does in is for the good of humanity.

Humans will be the pinnacle of God’s creation, and everything he does and makes and orders is for their benefit.

Look at verse 3.

But this is very important.

Good for who?

“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.

God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night.”

Do you see that God is bringing order to the tohu va vohu?

He separates the light and the darkness, and calls them Day and Night.

Now is Day a thing that you make?

No! It is a period of time that is meaningful to whom, specifically?

To humans!

God is creating time.

He’s creating structure and order and meaning in the midst of chaos for the benefit of one creature in particular.

This is what is all about.

In verse 11 we see that God creates vegetation.

Specifically we are told that up springs fruit trees.

Well what about all the other trees like pine and oak and aspen?

Well of course, yes he created those too, but the story is telling us something in particular.

Who benefits from fruit trees?

Humans!

Everything God is doing in bringing order and structure to the wild waste of the earth is for the benefit of humans.

In chapter 2 we read this in verse 9:

And out of the ground the LORD God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.

Who benefits from things that are simply pleasant to the sight?

Who benefits from things that are not useful in the sense that we can eat or use, but things that are simply beautiful?

Who benefits from beautiful sunsets or the brilliance of an azalea?

Humans! is all about God bringing order to the earth, and specifically ordering it for beauty and benefit.

And so at the pinnacle of creation, he makes humans.

Now if everything that God has made and ordered up to this point has been for beauty and benefit for humans, than it is not a stretch to say that God also makes humans themselves in such a way as to bring them beauty and benefit.

Let’s look at verse 26.

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.

And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

So immediately we see an important distinction being made.

All the other creatures that God made were created “according to its kind.”

Again and again this phrase is repeated as God creates the animals, the fish, the birds, even the plants.

But here we see that humans are created not according to its kind but in God’s own image.

Now the word for man in this verse is the Hebrew word adam, which is where we get the name Adam.

But adam is the generic Hebrew word for mankind or humanity.

It’s taken from adamah which is the word for ground, the substance from which God forms the man in .

Adam comes from adamah - kind of like how earthlings come from the earth.

So in the Bible’s first poem in verse 27, we see that God creates adam, or mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created adam, or mankind, and then remarkably, the poem goes on to describe adam as male and female - male and female he created them.

So humanity is created in the image of God, and right from the beginning we see that humanity is ordered as male and female, man and woman.

Humanity as a whole reflects the image of God, and humanity consists of men and women, two genders that are different one another.

What am I getting at?

God is not wholly reflected in one gender or the other, but rather it is their oneness in difference that reflects God.

It is their unity in diversity that reflects the image of God.

Men and women are united, yet diverse.

They are the one, and yet different.

And in this, they reflect the image of God.

I know this is a little trippy, but I think it will begin to make sense as we continue.

The only time in Genesis that God refers to himself as “us” is when he creates humans.

“Let us make man in our image.”

This is the only time he refers to himself in this way in the entire book.

Why?

Because this is a hint that the relationship between male and female is a reflection of the triune nature of God.

Where else in theological studies have we heard phrases like oneness in difference or unity in diversity?

We hear it when we talk about the trinitarian nature of God, that God is one in three persons.

God is a unity, one God but in the Trinity we see a diversity of personality and roles, which each person constantly pursuing the beauty and benefit of the other.

So it is with men and women.

If we look at , we see in verse 18 that God says, “It is not good that man should be alone.”

If everything God orders and creates is for beauty and benefit, and everything was good for that purpose, here we see that humanity without the diversity of male and female is not good!

And so God says, “I will make him a helper fit for him.”

Now, we don’t have time to truly explain how powerful the title of Helper is, except to say that it in no way designates an inferior person, but the title of Helper is most often applied to God in his rescuing acts.

What I want you to see though is that God makes for the man a partner that is “fit for him.”

The image is that of two puzzle pieces that fit together to form a complete picture.

When you look at a puzzle, the pieces are not the same, but they also aren’t randomly different.

They are differentiated such that they can create a complete whole.