God created all things by his powerful Word, and all his creation was very good; everything flourished under his loving rule.
God created all things and all his creation was very good.
And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. . . .
Sometimes I begin my personal time of prayer and devotion by reflecting on the mind-boggling size of the universe—that our own little galaxy has a hundred thousand million stars, that there are a hundred thousand million more galaxies each with a hundred thousand million stars, that our galaxy and each of those galaxies is a hundred light years across, and that there are three million light years between each of those galaxies. Absolutely phenomenal and amazing.
The opening line of the Old Testament says, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Gen. 1:1). Now when it juxtaposes two words—heavens and earth—two opposites, it means he created everything. So you could really read that as, “In the beginning God created the cosmos.” And then he said it was good, but he said even more than that. He said it was very good.
When we come to the New Testament and the fuller revelation of Jesus Christ, we learn that the cosmos is created by Christ himself. So the opening line of the Gospel of John says, “In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God, and without him was not anything made that was made.” And so what we have there is the cosmic Christ, the Creator of all things. In fact, the apostle Paul brings both together in 1 Corinthians 8:6 when he says that our existence is due to the one God and Father and the one Lord Jesus Christ. All our existence depends on them.
And then you come to that incredible, lyrical song in Colossians 1:16–17, which speaks of Jesus: “For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.”
I’ve often thought that if I could commandeer the Enterprise from Star Trek, and I could travel out to our galaxy and across the Milky Way, and then kick it into warp speed eight so the galaxies would fly by like fence posts, and finally come to the very backwater of the universe, make a right turn and find a piece of stellar dust, it would have been created by Christ and sustained by Christ. Everything is made by Christ. The fires of Arcturus, the fires that light a firefly, all textures, all shapes, things in heaven, things on earth, things under the earth, things under the sea, everything is created and sustained by him.
And that means that, as he’s the Creator of all things, everything is under his loving, benevolent care. We must also keep in mind that as human beings, the apex of creation, we were made in the image of God. But as regenerate people, we also have the image of Christ. Which means that we can rest in his goodness, in his great creation power, as he controls all of life, and we can flourish under him.
Lord Who Spoke the World into Existence, we marvel at your creation, even though it has been corrupted. Your beauty is revealed in the splendor of the stars. Your might is shown forth in the strength of a hurricane. Your order is displayed in the laws of mathematics. Let everything that has breath praise the Lord for the works of his hands! Amen.
Commentary
JOHN CALVIN
God has given us, throughout the whole frame-work of this world, clear evidences of his eternal wisdom, goodness, and power; and though he is in himself invisible, he in a manner becomes visible to us in his works.
Correctly then is this world called the mirror of divinity; not that there is sufficient clearness for man to gain a full knowledge of God, by looking at the world, but that he has thus so far revealed himself, that the ignorance of the ungodly is without excuse. Now the faithful, to whom he has given eyes, see sparks of his glory, as it were, glittering in every created thing. The world was no doubt made, that it might be the theatre of the divine glory.