Familiarity with passages of scripture can often rob us of the blessings of God’s truth. All too often, we breeze past familiar verses, thinking that it is pretty basic, and that we already know what they say. The truth is that deeper meaning and Spiritual nourishment can be found in those familiar passages.

One good example of this is in the Genesis account of creation. One might be tempted to skim through that passage thinking, “Yeah, God created the heaven and the earth,” and completely miss the implication of it. So in the interest of maximizing our blessings from scripture, let’s take a closer look at Genesis 1-3.

Genesis 1:1 famously tells us, “In the beginning, God created the Heaven and the Earth.” I cannot read that verse without thinking of a dear Christian friend of mine who emphasized the first four words, “In the beginning, God!”

God was there in the beginning, and He is the beginning. He pre-existed everything. This means He created everything. This means, having created everything, He is more powerful than everything, which means He is more than capable of overcoming that which overwhelms me.

Another observation from the Genesis account of creation is that it demonstrates God’s character and attributes to us. Romans 1:20 tells us that “The invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.”

In examining the attributes of God from the creation of the world, we readily see three attributes in Genesis 1.

God creates order from chaos in Gen 1:2. The Earth was without form and void, but the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. The resulting creation is demonstrated throughout the rest of Genesis 1, and can still be observed in person today.

God creates abundance where there is emptiness. Genesis 1:2 tells us that the Earth was “void,” or empty. By the end of Genesis 1, we see a world created with abundant resources.

In the beginning, the world was dark. God’s first creation was light. So, we see that God shines light into darkness. Furthermore, He separates the light from the darkness, giving a picture of our future deliverance.

Then, in Genesis 2, we read about how God created man, and placed him in the garden of Eden, giving him abundant food and a great living space. This demonstrates the loving care God gives us.

However, in Genesis 3, man rebels. Believing that eating the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil would elevate them to God’s status, thus freeing them from His authority, Adam and Eve ate, and thus rebelled against God.

God responded by offering them redemption (Genesis 3:15) and covering their nakedness.

If you want an idea of Who God is, read about Him in the creation. What you will learn is that He is good, loving and merciful, even when we don’t love Him back.