AND ITS SPIRITUAL VALUES
By Pastor Glenn Pease
CONTENTS
1. MOTHER NATURE'S FATHER
Based on Gen. 1:6‑8
2.
THE WONDER OF WATER
Based on Gen. 1:1‑2
3.
THE MOON IN THE BIBLE
Based on Gen. 1:14‑19
4. THE BIRDS OF THE BIBLE Based on Gen. 1:20-23
5. TALKING TREES based on Judges 9:7‑15
6. THE TREASURES OF THE SNOW Based on Job 37:1-14 and 38:22
7.
GOD'S AQUARIUM
PSALM 104:24‑35
8.
ROCK OF AGES
Based on Psa. 61
9. THE BIBLE AND ASTRONOMY Based on Psa. 8
10. THE WINGS OF THE
WIND BASED ON PSALM 104:1‑12
11. THE WONDER OF CLOUDS Psalm 104:1‑24
12. THE EAGLE LIFE Based on Isa. 40:27‑31
13. HARMLESS AS DOVES MATT.
10:16
14. THE REMARKABLE RAINBOW
based on Rev. 4:1‑11
15. NATURE AND
WORSHIP Based on Rev. 4:1‑11
1. MOTHER NATURE'S FATHER Based on Gen. 1:6‑8
The Bible consistently represents God as male. This is true for all 3 Persons of the
Trinity. When the Son became flesh He
became a man. The Holy Spirit is always
called He. The male was also the first
to be created. All of this in no way
means that the Bible depreciates the female, for we will see that woman was the
crown of creation. She put the
finishing touch on it all, and history reveals that the Bible has done more to
advance the status of women than any other force. The Bible is not anti‑female, but it is anti‑goddess. All through the ages men have worshipped
mother goddesses. Archaeologists are
constantly digging up figures of these goddesses from ancient
civilizations. It even crept into
Christianity when Mary was proclaimed the Mother of God, and many in ignorance
began to worship her. Many worship
Mother Nature, and for all practical purposes they consider nature as God.
Goethe in his Hymn To Nature says, "She placed me in
it; she will also lead me forth. I
trust myself to her." The advantages
of this commitment to Mother Nature are that you can be extremely religious,
for your goddess is everywhere. At the
same time you have no obligation to do anything but what comes naturally. In other words, you combine pantheism, which
says all is God, and atheism, which says nothing is God. You get, as a result, religious
atheism. This permits you to have a
sensible explanation of the world, for all that happens is according to the
laws of Mother Nature.
The Bible, however, says that the laws of nature are not
eternal, but that they began in time, and they were put into operation by the
Word of God. God is the Father of all
nature, and He is the Father of all the wisdom and order that men attribute to
nature. Those who think they can
explain anything by reference to the laws of nature fail because they can find
no source for the energy of these laws.
None would be so foolish as to think that it is the laws of architecture
that builds buildings, or that the laws of navigation sail our ships. They recognize that these laws must be put
into operation by persons. Persons must
supply the energy. You can have a law
on the books that will find you for breaking a parking meter, but a man can
break one and drive away with nothing happening. The law is powerless without persons to enforce it. Laws do not punish or protect anyone. It is only as persons give them energy that
they operate.
The Bible says that this is true also of the laws of
nature. It is not the laws that keep
order, but it is the energy behind them, and that energy has its source in
God. The laws of nature are the
impersonal means put into operation by a personal God to accomplish His
goals. We who believe this reserve our
praise for the wonders of the universe for God, and not for impersonal laws.
With Alfred Tennyson we say, "Hallowed be thy name‑Hallelujah,
Infinite Identity, Immeasurable Reality, Infinite Personality! Hallowed be thy name‑Hallelujah!"
As we continue our study of creation we see how God gives
birth to all that men attribute to the wisdom of Mother Nature. God began with the raw materials of land and
water, and on the first day He called forth light. This, of course, is another basic factor needed to produce and
sustain life. But as we continue into
the second day we see that God has much to do yet to prepare this planet for
life. Walking into you attic and
turning on the light does not change the mess.
It is only as you exert energy that you can put it in order. So God by His Word begins on the second day
to bring order into the chaos. In
verses 6 through 8 we have the creation of the atmosphere.
In verse 6 God said, "Let there be a firmament in the
midst of the waters to separate them."
The word firmament comes from the Latin word, which carries the idea of
firmness. A better word might be
expanse since firmament has led critics of the Bible to say that the Hebrews
thought that heaven was hard and had holes in it through which the rain came
down. This is completely unfair to
judge Moses by the meaning of a Latin word when the original Hebrew doesn't
mean any such thing. Critics also say
that they probably thought the sky was blue because there was an ocean up
there. All of the ignorance that men
try to impose on the Bible is the result of their own ignorance. The Hebrews were not so foolish as to
believe what the critics try and make them appear to believe. Critics twist the poetic language and try
and make them literal statements.
Dr. Albertus Pieters says that by this same method you can
make the modern American look ignorant and gullible. You would be offended if a Russian publication described us as so
scientifically immature that we think the sky is solid, and only a few hundred
feet high. Yet what else are they to
think if we persist in calling our tallest building skyscrapers? Wooden literalism gives the critics much to
mock at in the Bible, but it is completely dishonest. God's inspiration did not reveal to the Hebrews any modern
science, but it kept them from all the false science and speculation of the
heathen, which would have discredited the Bible.
It is important to keep in mind that it is just as dishonest
for us to claim that the Bible teaches modern science as it is for the critics
to impose ignorance on the Bible writers.
Both arise from the same source, which is an over zealous search to find
evidence for a pre‑conceived idea without trying to see what the Bible is
really saying. In other words, the
Bible does not predict cars, airplanes, radio, TV, and the atom bomb. To say this leaves you just as guilty as
perversion of God's Word as the critic who reads ignorance into it.
Getting back to the firmament, we see that Moses says God
created it to separate two bodies of water.
That sounds like it would support the critic who says the Hebrews
thought there was an ocean in the sky.
As a matter of fact, that is exactly what they did believe, and so do
we. Delitzsch says, "The upper
waters are the mists and clouds which move above us." It is estimated that the average quantity of
vapor in the air is 54,460,000, 000,000 tons.
In other words, it is scientifically accurate to believe there is a
ocean in the sky. If all of the water
in the atmosphere fell at once it would be as it was in the day of Noah. There would be a universal flood.
God on the second day established the atmosphere, which
would be essential for the whole program of maintaining life on all levels
through the power of evaporation and rainfall.
We see the logical order of God's plan.
First there is the provision for life, and then the plants for food, and
then animals, and finally man. Science
and Scripture agree on this order. The
Bible only states the fact of what God did on each day. It does not go into detail except on the
creation of man. Chapter two goes back
and gives a more detail account of what was just briefly stated about man in
chapter one. The details of these other
days we can learn from science. The
Christian says that science can be used to glorify God in that it spells out
for us just what God did when He set in motion the laws of nature.
Water, for example, is 773 times heavier than air, yet
through the process of evaporation tons of it are silently lifted into the
sky. God was the author of automation
that makes man's machines very small in comparison. The whole world is watered
by this process. The rivers carry the
water back to the ocean, and the cycle begins again. The unbeliever can say what luck that it all worked out like
this, for life would perish without this process. The believer, however, says this is my Father's world, and he has
made it livable. The unbeliever is not
so ignorant as to look at a water tower and say, "What luck that there is
such provision of water." But they
can look at the reservoirs in the sky and call it chance, or they call it the
work of Mother Nature, but those who have seen the light of God's Word say with
Jer. 10:12‑13, "It is He who made the earth by His power, who
established the world by His wisdom, and by His understanding stretched out the
heavens. When He utters His voice there
is a tumult of waters in the heavens, and He makes the mist rise from the ends
of the earth. He makes lightening for
the rain, and He brings forth the wind from His storehouses." Personally is behind all the wonders we see
in the universe.
Someone might say that it seems strange that God would take
a whole day just to make the atmosphere.
It is essential, but it is only air, and air is nothing. According to Roy Laurin there is in the
space the size of a small pinhead 31 quadrillion molecules of nitrogen, 8
quadrillion molecules of oxygen, 16 trillion molecules of carbon dioxide, 400
trillion molecules of agon, 400 billion molecules of neon, and 2 to 40 billion
molecules of helium. I know there are
those who believe nothing but what they can see. They must reject the truth of science as well as Scripture
then. For it is the unseen that makes
life on every level possible. If the
balance of these unseen molecules were not maintained, there would be universal
death. We see here the marvelous wisdom
of God again. Plants were made not only
for food, but also because they set oxygen free for animals were breathe
oxygen, and in turn the animals set carbon dioxide for use by plants. It was on this second day that God made the
environment for life.
The reality of the unseen is basis to science and faith. God made us with 5 senses that we might we
aware of far more than what we could be by sight alone. If you put sugar in water it disappears from
sight, but none argue from this fact that it is gone, for their taste buds tell
them it is still there. All of us have
known the presence of a skunk without ever seeing it, and so everyone believes
in the unseen to some degree. Science
devices ways to go deeper and find much more in the unseen world that our
senses can detect, but faith goes even beyond this. Faith is not ignorance, but it is the greatest intelligence, for
it rises to the awareness of the highest and ultimate unseen reality, which is
the reality of God. So we read in Heb.
11:3, "By faith we understand that the world was created by the Word of
God, so that what is seen was made out of things which do not
appear."
The Bible makes it clear that not only is the visible a
product of God's creative power, but also the invisible, which still does not
appear. Col. 1:16 says, "For by
Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible
and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or
powers. All things were created by Him
and for Him." God forbid then that
we praise Mother Nature for the marvels which science reveals. All of our praise belongs to Christ, or more
comprehensively to the Triune God of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We reject those poets who put Mother Nature
in the place of God, and who write like Spenser in this poem:
Through knowledge we behold
the world's creation,
How in His cradle first He
fostered was,
And judge of Nature's
cunning operation
How things she formed of a
formless mass.
He agrees with a Genesis account of how by wisdom the
formless mass of chaos became an ordered cosmos, but refuses to accept God as
its author. Though science and the
Bible agree as to the basic pattern, yet many scientist refuse to accept the
revelation that a personal God is the source of all the energy needed to
produce this pattern. They are like a
group of men who find a complex instrument in the desert. They begin a study to figure out where it
came from and what it is. As they
speculate and offer up their learned guesses, a man comes along and says I made
that to measure the intensity of the light during and eclipse. Now this has spoiled the whole thing, for he
has shattered all their speculation and research in an instant. They wanted to discover the origin and
purpose of it. They didn't want anyone
to tell them right out, for that ends the search. Many happy debates are cut short and ruined by someone who comes
along with the answer. This is the
basic reason why many do not want to listen to the Bible. If they admit that God was the cause of all,
and is the sustaining power of all, it stifles the whole search for the
answer.
The believer, however, says we are satisfied to accept the
answer, and to pursue other problems far more crucial to man's well being. Believing scientists also recognize there is
much for science to do after accepting the answer of revelation. Sir Isaac Newton, one of the greatest of
early scientists, said, "He must be blind who from the most wise and
excellent contrivances of things cannot see the infinite Wisdom and Goodness of
their Almighty Creator, and he must be mad and senseless who refuses to
acknowledge them." The believer
sees both the glory of the world and the God it glorifies, and they accept the
poetry of men like Addison who wrote,
The spacious firmament on
high,
With all the blue ethereal
sky,
And spangled heavens, a
shining frame
Their great Original
proclaim.
Forever singing as they
shine,
The hand that made us is
divine.
A pastor in England once preached a sermon on
astronomy. Someone came up after and
asked, "What practical value is there in such a sermon?" He answered, "None at all, but it
greatly enlarges my concept of God."
I would go even further and say that nothing is more practical than that
which enlarges your concept of God. It
is a fallacy to think that the study of creation, and of the great wonders of
what God has made is not spiritual, and of no food for the spirit for everyday
living. What can be more encouraging
than to know that the order, beauty, and marvelous mystery of all about you is
the handiwork of one you can know and pray to as your heavenly Father?
2. THE WONDER OF WATER Based on Gen. 1:1‑2
The Bible begins and ends with God in the midst of water. It is the physical substance that is nearest
to the spiritual. It is the physical source
of all life. There is no known life on
earth that can survive without water.
God gave birth to the world out of a mass of water as the Holy Spirit
hovered over the deep. The earth was
immersed in water before it came to life.
And so it is with us. From
conception to birth we are immersed in water. When the water breaks we are born
into a world totally dependent on water.
Seven eighths of our body and OF all animal life is water. Nine tenths of all plant life is water. 75% of the worlds surface is water.
The clouds above us are floating lakes of water. They are tiny droplets so small that one
hundred billion of them would not fill a tea cup. They form the clouds that make rain possible, which keeps the
world alive. Water is the blood of the
world that gives life to all that God has created. The blood in our veins that keeps us alive is 90% water. Water supply is not just vital for farmers,
it is vital to the life of each one of us.
When everything is working normally there are about 16 billion
tons of rain that fall on U.S. soil every day.
We take water for granted, but have no idea just how much of it is
needed to keep life going. Ten to
twenty tons of water are needed for every bushel of corn that is harvested. 15 to 20 tons are needed for every pound of
beef, and 120 gallons for every egg. If
it was not for all the irrigation in this country we could be going through a
drought like they often do in Africa.
Water is the blood of our nation just as it is all the nations of the
world.
Water is also the key factor in industry. All that man makes is just as dependent on
water as all that God has made. The
production of one car requires 60 thousand gallons of water. For every gallon of gas you put in that car,
it takes 10 gallons of water to produce it.
Water is the life line of nature, and also of industry. Nothing significant happens in this world
without water.
Therefore, it is not surprising that water plays a major role
in the Bible. It would take hours just
to read all of the verses in the Bible that deal with water. Some of the highlights would be‑
1. The creation.
2. The flood, where Noah and his family were saved by water, and
where the most
universal symbol God ever created, the rainbow, is dependent
upon water.
3. The great exodus of Israel out of Egypt by crossing the Red
Sea.
4. The striking of the rock that gave water to Israel, and which the
New Testament
says was Christ.
5. The crossing of Jordan into the Promise Land.
6. The 23rd Psalm where he leads us beside the still waters.
7. Jesus is the water of life, and He walked on water, and He
stilled the stormy waters,
and He turned the water into wine, and He made water basic to
the ordinance He gave
to the church to go into all the world and baptize. The Lord's Supper has two elements
Bread and wine, and both are products of water. Some would add His washing of feet, another water event.
There is no escaping the importance of water for both the
physical and spiritual life.
We cannot live without
water, and we cannot live a life of obedience to Christ without water. All three persons of the Godhead are
identified with water. God the Father
says in Jer. 2:13, "My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living
water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold
water." Jesus said to the woman at
the well in John 4:10, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is who asks
you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living
water." Later in John 7:37‑39
this living water is identified with the Holy Spirit. Jesus said, "If a man is thirsty, let him come to me and
drink. Whoever believes in me, as the
Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him. By this He meant the Spirit, whom those who
believe in Him were to receive,"
It is through faith in Christ that we receive the Spirit of
Christ‑the living water, and for all eternity Jesus will lead us to
springs of living water, says Rev. 7:17.
Water is not only essential for life in time, it is basic even to life
in eternity. Water is forever because
God made it the key to life. In Rev.
21:6 there is a fountain of the water of life in heaven, and in Rev. 22 there
is the river of the water of life that flows from the throne of God and the
Lamb, and produces the fruit of heaven.
For all eternity nature and man will still depend upon the water of
life. There will be no more thirst in
heaven. This may not seem relevant to
us, but for many of God's people in Bible lands this was a precious promise
that meant paradise to them.
Geoffrey Moorhouse in The Fearful Void tells of running out of
water while crossing the Sahara Desert.
He almost died of dehydration, and he writes, "Almost unconscious
even of my mind, I was aware of trees somewhere ahead, somewhere beyond Ibrahim
and the Camels, who seem to be a great distance ahead. Then there was a tent. Ibrahim was squatting by it, drinking from
his brass bowl. Then a small boy was
running towards me trying not to spill what was in the bowl. The water in it was the color of diluted
blood. This was the most beautiful
thing in the world, more beautiful by far than the stained glass of Chartres,
than a fugue by Bach, then the moment after ecstasy with the one woman you
love, or the moment when your son scrambled to squeeze the breath out of you
and say, I think you're smashing dad.
There was nothing in the world as beautiful as this bowl full of
water." You may never have this
emotional experience with water, for you would have to pay too high of a price
to have it, but we should be able to have an intellectual appreciation of this
experience.
Like the oceans, the revelation of God about water is two vast
to cover. So we will
specialize on one aspect of
water, which is the water of baptism.
It is all a wonder, but the water of baptism has additional
wonders. It takes a lot of water to
obey Christ and be baptized. The
Ethiopian Eunuch went down into the water, and Lydia was baptized in the river,
and the early church stressed the importance of being baptized in living water,
that is, in natural flowing water, like the Jordan, where Jesus was baptized.
There were no churches and baptisteries, and so this was not an option open to
them, as it is to us. It was several centuries before baptism
inside was accepted as the norm.
Baptism for the early Christians was an experience with
nature, as well as with God.
This is still true for
Christians on many of the missions fields of the world. Rivers, streams, lakes, and ponds are used
all over the world to immerse people in.
Creation is used to worship the God of creation. Baptism is a spiritual use of nature to glorify
God. There's no way to separate the
spiritual and the natural in baptism, for they are one. We cannot do it in the Lord's Supper either,
for you cannot have bread and juice without nature and the power of water.
Literal, physical water is not only essential to physical
life, but to a life of obedience to God, or spiritual life. The person who attempts to be spiritual
without the physical is forgetting just who it is that created the physical,
and that He rejoices in it, and expects that we will also, and use it to
glorify Him. The point is, baptism
links the Christian with nature. We
cannot obey God without nature. We can
go inside to a man‑made baptistery, but we cannot make water. Water is essential to baptism, and so nature
is essential to baptism.
Jesus began His own ministry with His baptism in the
Jordan. He made baptism in water a
symbol of the transition from the old to the new. His ministry was to take the world from the old covenant to the
new covenant in his blood. Baptism is
the symbol of new beginnings. Many
churches make baptism the transition from being a non‑member of the local
church to becoming a member. It means
new opportunity, new service, and a new voice in the local body.
Water is a transition element. We can't explore it in depth, but water is a key factor
in the transition of the
seasons. We use it all the time for
transition. From work to a night of
relaxation, we take a shower in between, for we want to clean up and be refreshed
for the evening. Water gives us the
feeling of newness. So it is with
baptism, for it is like a spiritual bath that cleanses us and makes us ready
for a new agenda in the will of God.
Every square mile of air has a two and one half million cubic feet of
water in it, and this is crucial for the cleansing of the atmosphere. Without this water all life would soon choke
on the dust and smoke particles in the air.
Water is the cleansing agent of the natural world, and God made it the
cleansing agent of the spiritual world as well. The blood of Christ cleanses us from all sin, and 90% of blood is
water. When Christ's side was pierced
there came forth blood and water.
The waters of baptism are to be seen as the symbolic cleansing
agent of sin. In Acts 22:16 Ananias
came to blind Saul in Damascus and said, "Get up, be baptized and wash
your sins away, calling on His name."
It is faith in Christ, and calling on His name that leads to the
cleansing of sin, but this is symbolized in baptism. Only God can cleanse from sin, but He gives the symbolic power
to the water of baptism, and, thereby, gives a new slant to the old saying that
cleanliness is next to godliness.
The old man is buried in baptism, and the new man that rises
out of the water is to be a cleansed man, ready to walk a new path on the Rock,
which is Christ, and no longer on the dusty road of the world. Paul fell on the road to Damascus, and was
likely quite dirty. His baptism could
have literally washed away the dirt, but it also cleanse him from his evil
attitude toward Christ and the church.
Paul was a new man after his baptism because the old was buried, and he
came forth from the water to walk in newness of life.
Lydia was not a wild woman on a rampage against Christianity,
and so her baptism was not as great a cleansing, for she did not have such
dirty feet as Paul. Baptism is to be
seen as the symbol of God burying our sins of the past in the deepest sea. We sing,
Let the water and the blood
From thy wounded side which
flowed,
Be of sin the double cure,
Cleanse me from its guilt
and power.
Cleanliness was next to godliness in the Old Testament. All that was done in the presence of God had
to be done with the participants cleansed with water. Everything the priest did had to be preceded by washing, just
like a doctor does today before he goes into surgery. The high priest on the day of atonement had to wash himself
before he put on the holy garments, and after he came out of the holy of holies
he had to wash again in water. Our
baptism is very much like the high priest getting ready to enter the service of
God. Paul in Gal. 3:27, "For all
of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with
Christ." Just as the high priest
put on the holy garments to enter God's presence, so we, in baptism, put on the
most holy garment of all, for we put on Christ. We clothe ourselves in that which is most acceptable in the
presence of God‑His Son. We put
on Christ and stand before God clean and pure.
Here is the wonder of water par excellence.
The fish became the symbol of the early Christians. A creature that lives in water became their
primary sign. Like fish, we are to be
at home in the environment of the water of life, and have a hard time when we
find ourselves cast up on the dry land of the waves of the world. The Christian should feel out of his
element, and very uncomfortable in settings displeasing to God. They should be eager to get back into the
element of Christlike ideals. Holiness
is feeling at home in the realm of the spiritual, and like fish out of water,
feeling not at home in the realm of the worldly.
Our baptism is to mark that time in our lives when we begin to
focus on the things of Christ more completely, and let the things of the world
fade into the background. Baptism is to
be that bath of transition. We are wash
up and leave the grimy work of the world, and enter into the joy of serving our
Lord. Jesus began His public ministry
with baptism. Paul was baptized, and
after his time in the desert, he began his public ministry. Baptism is to be a turning point where the
goal is to be immersed in the things of Christ. Baptism is a commitment to make the Christian life more than a
mere part time, and side line religion.
To rise from the water and walk in newness of life is not
easy, in fact, it is impossible. Our
very failure to be able to be Christians as we ought to be, is to keep us ever
conscious of our dependence upon Christ.
The wonder of wonders is that He loves us, and will use us for His
glory, even after all we have done out of His will. And the wonder of water is that Jesus uses it to symbolize His
love for us in forgiving and cleansing us from all sin. Let us now go and worship our Creator and
Redeemer by obeying Him with water.
3. THE
MOON IN THE BIBLE Based on Gen. 1:14‑19
Bruce Barton said, "When you're though changing, you're
though." Change is inevitable, and
one might just as well refuse to accompany the earth in rotating on its axis as
to refuse to accept change. Robert
Burns said, "Look abroad thro' Nature's range, Nature's mighty law is
change." Longfellow points out,
"There are no birds in last year's nest." Change is constant, and Robert Browning feels we should be
excited about this fact of reality, for he writes, "Rejoice that man is
hurled, from change to change unceasingly, his soul's wings never furled."
Change is essential to progress, and as man's concepts of
reality keep changing and expanding, he draws nearer to the Author of reality,
and the God who changes not. Truth in
any realm points to the Author of truth.
When man stopped centering his thoughts on himself alone, and took the
whole world into consideration, he became geocentric. When he realized that the
earth was not the center of the solar system, but that the sun was, he became
heliocentric. Then man learned that the sun is just one of billions of stars in
the galaxy, and he became galactocentric. The final stage of growth is when man
learns that the one who made all of the vast universe is a Person, and then
they become Christocentric. When we study space and objects like the moon we
are studying the handiwork of Jesus our Savior. This changes how we see
everything.
There were many who objected to man's going to the moon, and
many even said the Bible taught that it was impossible. They said that it was
not God's will for man to go into space. But Wernher Von Braun, the Christian
who was greatly responsible for man getting to the moon said, "..don't
tell me he doesn't belong out there. Man belongs wherever he wants to
go." Man is made to be an
adventurer and climb every mountain just because God put it there. The Bible
does not settle all issues dealing with the moon, even though it refers to the
moon 34 times in the Old Testament and 9 times in the New Testament. Our interest in this message is to just
learn all we can about what the Bible says about the moon.
I. THE PURPOSE OF THE MOON.
Our text makes it clear that the moon was no mere
accident. God created it for a definite
purpose. The God of light filled His creation
with lights, and He prepared the earth to have a lighting system for both day
and night. The creation of the moon was
an act of God's love for man, even before man was created. If there was no moon or stars, man would be
plunged into total darkness each night.
Total darkness, however, is reserved for those who reject completely the
light of God, and especially the light of the world‑Jesus Christ.
The most simple and obvious purpose of the moon is to give
light to the earth at night. It is the
secondary of the two great lights. The
first reference to the moon in the Bible in verse 16 does not name it, but it
simply calls it the lesser light.
Lesser is an understatement, for it would take 600 thousand full moons
to equal the splendor of the sun. The
moon always plays second fiddle to the sun.
In Buddhist thought the sun is spirit and the moon is matter. The ancient felt that when man died his
spirit went to the sun and his body to the moon. Being inferior to the sun lead the ancients to think of the moon
as female, and the sun as male. We
think of the man in the moon, but the people of the East think of a maiden in
the moon. We shall see that the Bible
followers the Eastern imagery, and it refers to the moon as the Queen of
heaven. Verse 16 says a greater light
is to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night. It follows then logically that the sun is
king and the moon queen. George Croly
wrote,
How like a queen comes forth
the lovely moon,
From the slow opening
curtains of the clouds,
Walking in beauty to her
midnight throne!
In Gen. 37:9 Joseph had a dream that the sun, moon and
eleven stars bowed down to him. The sun
was his father, the moon was his mother, and the eleven stars were his
brothers. We see the moon is associated
with the female. Later we shall we that
poets always refer to the moon as female.
The moon is second to the sun, but it is superior to the stars. In Joseph's dream the stars are the
children. Here in Gen. 2 it the great
lights that are stressed and the stars are merely mentioned. Elsewhere the stars are made much of, but in
terms of visible and practical light the moon is superior to the stars. Sir Henry Wotten wrote,
You meaner beauties of the
night,
That poorly satisfy our
eyes,
More by your number than
your light;
You common people of the
skies.
What are you when the moon
shall rise?
The stars then are the common people of the skies, and the
sun and moon are the royalty. The Bible
supports this image, and Milton in Paradise Lost gives a beautiful picture of
it.
Now glow'd the firmament
With living sapphires;
Hesperus, that led
The strong host, rode
brightest, till the moon,
Rising in clouded majesty,
at length
Apparent queen, unveil'd her
peerless light,
And o'er the dark her silver
mantle threw.
The sun, the moon, the
stars, in that order is there glory, for in that order God made them for the
purpose of giving light to the earth.
In verse 14 we see another purpose of the moon, and that is
to be a sign. God expected man to be an
astronomer. No one puts signs where
they will never be read. God put the
sun, moon and stars in the sky for signs, and He expected man to read these
signs and learn how they regulate the days, months and seasons. Man got the point of God's purpose almost
universally. The Chaldeans, Persians,
Hindus, Chinese and Egyptians all named the 7 days of the week after the sun,
moon and the planets, just as we do. We
begin with sun‑day, then moon‑day, and then Tuesday from the name
for Mars, Wednesday from Woden, which is the same as Mercury, then Thursday for
Thor, who was also Jupiter, then Friday for Friga, who was also Venus, and
finally Saturday from Saturn. There are
two females out of the seven, and they are the queen moon and Venus Friday.