Genesis 2: 4 - 17

4 This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, when the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.

⁵ Now no shrub had yet appeared on the earth and no plant had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no one to work the ground, ⁶ but streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground. ⁷ Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

⁸ Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. ⁹ The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground – trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

¹⁰ A river watering the garden flowed from Eden; from there it was separated into four headwaters. ¹¹ The name of the first is the Pishon; it winds through the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold. ¹² (The gold of that land is good; aromatic resin and onyx are also there.) ¹³ The name of the second river is the Gihon; it winds through the entire land of Cush. ¹⁴ The name of the third river is the Tigris; it runs along the east side of Ashur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.

¹⁵ The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. ¹⁶ And the Lord God commanded the man, ‘You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; ¹⁷ but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.’

Breath of Life.

Sometimes people say that there are two creations stories in Genesis – one in chapter 1 and another in chapter 2. To an extent, that is correct. The style of the narrative and the details are quite different in the two stories. However, there is no contradiction between the two. In chapter 1 we read the day-by-day account of how God created the world and everything in it, and the sun, moon and stars, in six days. But as we have already noted, mankind was the pinnacle of the creation. And what happens in chapter 2 is that a spotlight shines on Day 6 of creation. The narrative zooms in on the creation of mankind and the land animals; it describes the human need for companionship, and it fills in that vital part of God’s creation.

Chapter 1 is about ‘God the Creator’, making the entire universe out of nothing. Chapter 2 is about ‘the Lord God’ (a more personal name) the craftsman, making man out of the dust, in a garden, and woman out of the man. In verse 7 it says that God “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.” The breath of God is the breath of life. It is only through the breath of God that we can become living beings. When a person is alive they breathe and their heart beats. When those things stop, a person dies. But it is only the ‘breath of God’ leaving a person that can truly make them die. God breathed his spirit into Adam, and he breathes his spirit into each one of us.

In Ezekiel 37 the prophet has a vision of dry bones, and when he prophesies to the bones flesh comes upon them. But it is only when the breath of life enters them that they come to life. In John 20, after the resurrection, Jesus ‘breathed on the disciples’ as a picture of the Holy Spirit who was to come upon them. There are many places in the Bible where we find this imagery – the breath of God brings life, and it can be a symbol of the Holy Spirit.

People sometimes think that man’s ‘work’ began after the fall. But that is not the case – we see here in verse 15 that ‘The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.’ Work was part of God’s perfect creation. God rested from his work of creation on the seventh day. Similarly, we (in God’s image) are created to work. After the fall the work became a lot harder, but right from the beginning it was Adam’s job to work the soil in the Garden of Eden. God is the creator, but when man came along he took on a part of the creative role with God, and the same remains true today.

 

Prayer

Lord, I thank you for the breath of life that you give to me and to all people. May I also be filled with the Holy Spirit as I live for you, worship and serve you. May my work be a joy, as I serve in your image, and may I take my place in sharing your creativity. Amen.