Through the Bible (Genesis - Part 1) — Zac Poonen

The Purpose and Authority of Scripture

We are going to begin by looking at a verse in 2nd Timothy chapter 3, because we want to understand why God has given us his word. You know it is possible to study the Bible for the wrong reasons, and I think a lot of Christians do.

Now we need to study the scriptures and approach the scriptures for the same reason with which God gave it, and that's described in 2nd Timothy 3 verse 16 and 17. It says all scripture is inspired by God.

God is the one who breathed his breath into this book, just like he breathed into Adam. If God had not breathed into Adam, he would have been just a pile of dust, and any book into which God has not breathed is just a pile of dust.

God breathed into this, and it's been given to us for teaching, to show us the right path for reproof. God has given us his word to rebuke us strongly, reproof is a strong word, to correct us when we've gone astray, to lead us back to the right path, to train us in righteousness.

That means our character should change, to straighten us because we are all crooked, and ultimately so that we can become men and women of God. That the man of God, verse 17, may be adequate or complete, you know like a glass of water when it's filled is complete, that our character is rounded off, balanced, complete, and that we are equipped, anointed for ministry, to serve him for every good work that God has prepared for us.

So that's the purpose of scripture, and if you study the Bible, you must study it for these reasons, that your character might be full rounded and become the way God wants it to be, that you can be anointed and equipped to serve other people the way God wants you to serve.

The Bible was not given for us to increase in knowledge, or just to teach other people, no. A lot of people use it for the wrong reasons. You must keep that in mind my dear brothers and sisters, when we go through these studies and all through your life.

I started studying the Bible 41 years ago, and this is the goal that I've had before me all these 41 years. I did not study the Bible to teach other people. I studied the Bible because I wanted to know what God had to say to me.

I studied it at the feet of Jesus, and asked the Holy Spirit to teach me. I've never been to a Bible school, but God who taught the apostles in the first century, I believe he could teach me in the 20th century, and he can teach you too.

Christ Revealed Through the Scriptures

You know it says that when the disciples were walking to Emmaus after the resurrection, Jesus opened the scriptures to them, and that is the thing which we want him to do to us as well. We want Jesus to walk with us.

That's how I want to study the scriptures. Jesus walking with me, opening the scriptures, and those disciples said our hearts burned within us when Jesus opened the scriptures. And that's how it should be in our life, when the Holy Spirit shows us scripture, our heart should burn within us.

The scripture is not boring. Do you think those two disciples to Emmaus found Jesus boring? Jesus is never boring. An anointed ministry is never boring, at no time. If we walk with Jesus and allow him to open the scriptures to us, our hearts will always burn because the scriptures revealed Christ.

The other thing I want to say to you is, God has not written the scriptures for lazy people. We got to meditate on scripture. Blessed is the man, it says in Psalm 1, who meditates on the law of the Lord day and night.

That doesn't mean he's reading the Bible day and night. He meditates on it. Maybe he read it just a few minutes in the morning, but he meditates on it right through the day and in the middle of the night, if he wakes up, he thinks about scripture.

And as he meditates, he understands God's laws. Now, in the Old Testament, they meditated on God's laws. In the New Testament, we are told in 2nd Corinthians 3, verse 18, that we meditate on Jesus. The word made flesh, and we see Jesus in the scriptures.

We meditate on him as he is revealed to us in the pages of scripture. And such a man, it says in Psalm 1, will be like a tree planted by the rivers of water. He will always be green. He will always be fruitful all the time.

Another Psalm, it says, even in old age, he will bring forth fruit. That is God's will for every one of us. It is not God's will that any of you sitting here should be a barren tree, even when others around you are barren.

In a time of drought, you can be green and fruitful. The secret is to meditate on the scriptures, on God's word. There's another verse, that's in Proverbs 25, verse 2, which says, it is the glory of God to conceal a matter, and it's the glory of kings to search it out.

God has, in the world, concealed deep down under the surface of the earth, all the valuable metals. You don't find gold on the surface. You don't find diamonds on the surface. They're all deep down. What you find on the surface is grass and mud and dirt, cheap stuff.

If you read the scriptures superficially, you won't get the real riches of it. It's the glory of God to conceal a matter. And if you're going to be a king, a king, one who's reigning in Christ, it's your glory to search it out, to dig out and find it.

And as God sees that wholeheartedness and eagerness in you, the Holy Spirit will reveal to you the meaning of scripture. Jesus said, I thank you, Father, that you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent, and you have revealed them to babes.

You don't need to be clever, but you've got to have a clean heart. A babe's got a clean heart. It's your heart condition that determines whether you understand scripture, not your head intelligence. It's hidden from the clever and the intelligent.

You can't understand scripture by getting a doctorate in theology. You can understand scripture if you've got a humble heart and a good conscience. That's how we understand scripture. Scripture gives us promises and commands that we have to believe and obey, words to rebuke us and words to comfort us.

Genesis as the Book of Beginnings

So having said those words as an introduction, let me move straight away. We're going to go right through the scripture, starting with Genesis chapter one, and God willing, complete it in 70 sessions in Revelation 22.

Genesis chapter one. There are three things I want to say here. We're not going to finish Genesis in this session, but because Genesis is a very important book. Genesis, you know what that means, is an English word, speaks about beginnings.

And here we read about the beginning of creation, the beginning of man, the beginning of sin in the human race, the beginning of the message of redemption, the beginning of two streams of religiosity and spirituality, the beginning of Babylon, the beginning of Jerusalem, the beginning of that which is counterfeit religion and true religion.

It's all here. It's beginnings. It's a book of beginnings. And it's wonderful that the scripture begins with the words, in the beginning, God. That's how it must be in our life. Every day, in the beginning, God, not man.

Not my cup of coffee, God. In the beginning, God. It must be like that in every area of my life. My goal in life, ambitions, everything, it must be in the beginning, God. And when God finds a man or a woman like that, who will put him first in every area, in his business, in his daily life, in his finances, in everything, I tell you there's no limit to what God can do through such a man or a woman.

So there's a lot in those first four verses of the Bible. And here it says that in the beginning, God, you know, we have a description of creation here and there are two words that occur in this chapter.

One is the word created and the other is the word made. Now there's a difference in created and made. It says God created the heavens and the earth. And then it says in verse seven, God made the firmament or the expanse.

And many times thereafter, you find God made, he created man, but he made the beasts of the earth. Verse 25. Have you noticed that difference? Verse 25. God made the beasts, but verse 27, God created man.

There's a difference. See, made is from something that already exists. Created is from something that doesn't exist. So it says in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and that could have been millions and millions and millions of years ago.

And then something happened, which is not described in Genesis chapter one. And that was the fall of the angel, Lucifer, who became the devil. Now the reason it is not mentioned here is because this book was not written for the devil.

It was written for man. So therefore, man is prominent and so the creation of man comes first. And in later chapters, it's described about how the devil fell. But something did happen before man was created, and that's how we find the devil suddenly entering in Genesis chapter three.

And that happened between verses one and two. When God created the heavens and the earth, God always makes everything perfect. There's nothing that God does which is imperfect. When God created the world with a spoken word, the Bible says that what we see is being created by the word of God.

God spoke and it was created. It was perfect. How is it then in verse two that it says the earth was without shape? It was empty. It was dark. God never creates anything empty, dark and shapeless. It became like that because something happened between verse one and two, which is not mentioned here because this book is written for man.

It's about man's history. It's about man's relationship with God. And what happened there was the fall of Satan. And that's why when sin came into the world, this beautiful earth and heaven that God had created in verse one became, the earth became shapeless.

It became empty. It became dark. And what we read in Genesis chapter one is the remaking of that corrupted, spoiled, dark, empty earth. And by the time you come to the end of the chapter, you find it has become a beautiful heaven and earth again, that God Almighty himself could look at it and say, it is very good.

Now, this chapter has got a message for us because we also, Satan has come into the human race and made us exactly like verse two. Human beings are like verse two, empty, dark, shapeless, lost the image of God.

And God didn't create us like that. God didn't create Adam like that. The creation of Adam is like God created the heavens and the earth. Perfect. But the devil came in. What happened there between verse one and two came into Adam, spoiled him, and God began to remake.

That's the first. That's the message that comes in the first chapter of the Bible that God is in the business of remaking ruined situations, ruined humanity, ruined earth. And it doesn't matter how shapeless you are, how dark you are, or how empty you are.

Remember the first chapter of the Bible says God can remake you and make you so perfect that at the end of it, what does it say? He made man in his image. That's what happens at the end. And he can make you in his image too.

That's the message of the first chapter of the Bible. But how did it happen? And that's important. And if you understand how it happens and you submit to it, the same thing can happen to you too. Every day God spoke.

God said something the first day, he said something the second day, he said something the third day. He went on saying, he's a God who speaks. That's the thing you see in the very first chapter of the Bible.

And the most important thing for you to, that you need is to hear God speaking if you want to be transformed. You can't be transformed if you don't hear God speaking. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

That's how man is supposed to live. And if we don't listen, we are not going to be transformed. We have to develop the habit of listening. God is speaking like he spoke every day. He's speaking every day.

Most people in the world don't listen. Most believers don't listen. Even people who read the Bible every day, don't listen to God speaking to their heart every day. Don't think listening to God is just reading the Bible.

You can read the Bible to ease your conscience and not listen to what God is trying to say to your heart. The other thing we see is not only God spoke, it says the spirit of God, verse 2, moved upon the face of the waters.

Even if you hear God speak, you will not be transformed unless you allow the Holy Spirit to move upon you. The Holy Spirit comes right there in the beginning. The Holy Spirit is the one who changes man.

The Holy Spirit is the one who cooperated in this work of remaking man along with the Father. God spoke and the Holy Spirit moved. And it's the combined working of the word of God, which God spoke and the Holy Spirit that brought transformation.

The Word and the Spirit in Christian Growth

And so the other thing we learned right in the beginning of scripture is we must always be balanced. The great need in Christendom today is balance. There are people today who emphasize the study of the word of God.

I'm all for it. But if you have the study of the word of God without the Holy Spirit, you're going to be dead, dry as a bone. And then there are other people who emphasize the Holy Spirit, oh the Holy Spirit.

And very often they're like a train that's gone off the rails, just blowing the whistle and making a lot of noise. A lot of steam there, but no rails, no word of God. They've gone completely astray. And ultimately what they have is not Holy Spirit, but some other spirit.

Because they did not allow the word of God to guide them. See all these things are there in the first page of scripture. Blessed is the man who meditates. In the first page of scripture you can get correction, training, instruction in righteousness so that you can be perfect, thoroughly equipped for good work, every good work.

That's how we must study the scriptures. You realize that we can't study the scriptures in 70 hours. I find that even after 40 years, I'm discovering new things today. I'll tell you something I discovered just today, even though I've read this for 40 years.

I noticed only today that in Genesis chapter 1, twice, I knew it said it once, but I discovered today it said it twice, that God separated the light from the darkness. Now how many of you knew that, that it was written twice there?

You know, that teaches me something that when God created light, He didn't want the darkness mixed up with it. The first day you know God created light, and He didn't want the darkness mixed up with it.

He brought a division. Some people think all division is from the devil. No. The first person who divided something was God. In the very first paragraph of the Bible, what fellowship is light with darkness?

When light comes into your heart, the very next thing that God wants to do in your life is to separate you from all darkness. You read that in Genesis chapter 1, verse 3 and 4. God said, let there be light.

In 2nd Corinthians 4, it says that is a picture of the light of the gospel of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ coming into our hearts. That's a commentary on that in 2nd Corinthians 4. And what's the next thing God did?

As soon as light comes into our heart, it must be separated from everything that is darkness. The world is in darkness. There must be nothing of that in my heart. And when Christians don't do what God wants to do to separate the light from darkness, there is confusion.

There is confusion. And it says a second time, in verse 18, about God placing the sun and the moon in the skies. In the middle of that verse, to separate the light from the darkness, and God saw that it was good.

He separated the light from the darkness in verse 4, and he saw that it was good. And he separated the light from the darkness in verse 18, and he saw that it was good. When he sees the light separated from the darkness in your life, he'll also say that's good.

Otherwise, he won't say it's good. A lot of people have got light, but they haven't separated it from the darkness. That's their problem. And we read here further that, I want to ask you, I don't have time to go through the whole thing.

I'm just trying to whet your appetite so that you will go and dig into the scripture and find out some things. I want to ask you something. Man was created on the sixth day. We all know that. On which day were the beasts of the field created?

The lion and the dog and the monkey, when were they created? Most people don't know. The beasts of the field, the animals in the field, were also created on the sixth day. Isn't that interesting? On the same day that man was created, the animals were created.

The fish and the birds were created on the fifth day, and on the sixth day, it says in verse 24, the living creatures were brought forth the first part of the sixth day, and the second part of the sixth day, God created man and breathed into him.

And that's why you see in animals the same internal organs that you find in a human being. They're made from the same dust that human beings are made from. But there was one thing that distinguished man, God breathed into him, and it's only the breath of God, the spirit of God that distinguishes us from animals.

And what the Lord was saying through that was, when you stop listening to the spirit of God and stop living by the breath of God in your life, it's very easy to sink to the level of the animals, for they were created on the same day.

Please keep that in mind. And on the seventh day, we read that God kept it as a day of rest. It was the seventh day for God, but it was the first day for man. Man was created towards the end of the sixth day, and his very first day was a holiday.

Isn't that good? God was trying to teach man, you don't have to work first, you've got to have fellowship with me first. You fellowship with me for one day, and then go and work in the garden for six days.

That is the order. God wants you to fellowship with him, and then go out and serve him. Always come back and fellowship with him, go out and serve him. Come back and fellowship with him. That's why he ordained a day of rest for Adam.

It was a day when he was to walk with God, forget about the garden, forget about all the work that has to be done, and walk with God. In the beginning, God. Those are the lessons we learn, and that's why God taught the importance of the Sabbath to Israel.

He tried, it was a picture, like many other things in the law were a picture, and it applies to us, the spiritual reality of the Sabbath is walking with God and being in rest. Think about that, and I believe that God will have much more to say to you.

Marriage, Dominion, and the Image of God

I want you to see here that when God blessed man, it says here in verse 28, he says be fruitful and multiply. How did he expect God, the man, to multiply? By having a sexual relationship with his wife.

God created that sexual relationship and said that they were to exercise that function in their marriage and produce children, and he looked at it, and he said it was very good. Verse 31. You know that sex and marriage, God himself has said it is very good, and it's very bad and evil outside of marriage.

I just mention that because some people have got a wrong idea about this. They think you can be holier if you don't get married. It's not true. And the other thing I want you to notice here is that when God created man, he blessed in verse 28 and said not only be fruitful, he said subdue everything under you, rule over everything.

God created man to be a ruler, not a slave. God created man to have everything under his feet, to be an overcomer. Here it speaks about ruling, you come to the end of the Bible revelation, it speaks about overcoming, overcoming, overcoming.

That's God's will. And he finally accomplishes it in revelation with a few who become overcomers. But that was God's purpose for Adam. It's his purpose for you to rule over everything, to rule over sin in your life, to rule over your anger, to rule over your lusts, to rule over your passions, to keep them under your feet.

God has not created you to be a slave. He created you to be a conqueror, a ruler. But that can only come like it says when God blesses you, God blessed him and that's how we became. The other thing I want to say about Genesis 1 before I move on is, you know, God, it says here he examined each day's work and he said it is good.

And it's good for you also to examine each day's work in your life. Many people don't have that habit. If God did it, can't you do it? Look at the work you did during the day and judge yourself and examine yourself.

Is it good? So many lessons from that first chapter. When you go to chapter 2, you find here that God was the one who, there's a greater detail given here about the creation of man. But the wonderful thing we see here is that God is the one who gave man a work to do, a job in the garden.

God's the one who gave him a home in the garden and God's the one who gave him a marriage partner. Now, these are three very important things that people look for today. They want a house to live in, a home to live in.

They want a job and they want a marriage partner. And you have all three in Genesis chapter 2. God provided it for Adam. He gave him a home. He gave him a job and he gave him a marriage partner and Adam didn't even ask for it.

That teaches us right in the beginning of scripture that those needs of yours, of a house, a job, a marriage partner, God is interested in. If you walk in fellowship with him, he'll provide all your need according to his riches and glory in Christ Jesus.

God made man from the dust to teach him that he's worthless apart from God's breath. There's just one interesting thing I want you to notice here in Genesis 2. It says here about the rivers that flowed out of Eden in verse 10 and it says in one of those places in Havilah, last part of verse 11, there is gold and the gold of that land is good.

In paradise, gold is good. On this sin-cursed earth, it's a snare. You've got to be careful. That's just in passing. The other thing I want you to notice in verse 19, out of the ground, I want you to notice that, read this very carefully, out of the ground, God brought all the animals, formed every beast and brought them to the man and man named all these animals, verse 20, gave names to all the birds, but for Adam, verse 20, there was no, not found a helper suitable for him.

And I get the picture when you read, when it says there, but for Adam, in the same sentence, that he was looking at the animals and say, which of these will be my partner? The lion's got a lioness and the elephant has got its partner and the cat has got its and which is the one for me?

And he looks by all of them and he says, no, that one won't do. That doesn't fit with me. That's not, that doesn't agree with my nature. And when he said no to all of them, God said, okay, verse 18, he said, I'll make a helper suitable and he caused a deep sleep, verse 21, and he made him a wife.

Now the spiritual application of this is when you're a child of God and you're looking for a partner, God will allow a lot of pretty handsome people to go by you who don't have your nature and he will see whether you're going to pick one of them.

And if you pick one of them, you miss the one God that planted. Adam passed the test. He looked at the pig and he said, no, I don't want that one. And he looked at the lion and he said, not even lioness, I don't even want a lioness.

None of these got my nature. Then God gave him the best. Honor God and he'll give you the best. Say no to that. Don't be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. It's all there in scripture. The other thing I want you to notice in marriages, it says in verse 24, something which all Indian Christians particularly need to listen to that when a man gets married, he must leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife.

In other words, it's not talking about physical leaving primarily as much as that from now on, his wife must be more important than his father and mother. That's the essential message. I wish I could go up and down this country proclaiming that message, that when you get married, your wife must be more important to you than all, than your father and mother and all your relatives.

I believe there'd be a lot more happy marriages if they just follow that simple rule, which is written before sin came into the world. Do you know that's the first commandment in the Bible for us, which is the first commandment in the Bible for man today, leave your father and mother and cleave to your wife.

Why did God put that as the first one? Because he knew there'd be so many people who wouldn't obey it and whose lives and married lives would be miserable. It's amazing what there is in just two chapters of scripture.

The Fall, Temptation, and Choosing the Creator

Okay. I want you to see here further in Genesis chapter three and four. I want you to see here about two men who listened to the devil. One was Adam in Genesis three and the other was King in Genesis four, two men who listened to the devil.

Now notice God had allowed Adam to go into this garden and he did not send an angel with him to check up whether he is sinning or not. Why? Because it's only in an atmosphere of freedom that God can test us.

He tests you when you're alone, when other believers are not there, when nobody knows what you're doing, when you're all alone, Adam and Eve were all alone, they could sin as much as they liked and they went alone and they saw this forbidden tree.

There were 10 ,000 trees there, beautiful fruit and all that. They ignored all that. They went after knowledge. There was another tree of life. Now if you were, you had a choice between knowledge and life, which would you go for?

I'm sure you'll all give the answer life, but wait a minute. You people are studying the Bible. Tell me honestly, are you studying the Bible for knowledge or for life? You have the answer there. Are you studying the Bible to get a degree or to get life?

You're going for the tree of knowledge too. The Bible was not given for knowledge. It brings death. Knowledge of good and evil brings death. Life, God wants us to know good and evil through a connection with him, not by study.

You know, you can get a knowledge of good and evil without reference to God. And that's how you go astray. That's the sin here. Getting a knowledge of good and evil without God. A lot of people in the world like that.

I don't want it. I want a knowledge of good and evil that comes from the Holy Spirit telling me in each situation that's wrong through my living contact with God. That's how you must know good and evil.

And if we don't know good and evil like that, it brings death into your life. So that's what the devil was trying to tempt him. The devil tempted Eve to say and told her, you can be like God. That was the temptation.

If you eat it, you will, verse 5, you will be like God. Now, it's interesting that Jesus also came with a message saying you can be like God. Isn't that interesting? The devil comes and says you can be like God.

Jesus comes and says you can be like God, but completely opposite. The devil says you can be like God in knowledge, authority, power, position. And a lot of people go for that. Even a lot of Christians, they want to be like God in knowledge, authority, leadership in the church, position.

And Jesus says you can be like God in character, in humility, in love, in goodness. How many people want that? This is the difference between the voice of the devil and the voice of God. They sound so similar.

Temptation is so subtle. The devil is a deceiver. Like somebody giving you a 500 rupee note, it looks like the real thing. You shall be like God. In what way? That's the question. So you see, temptation is very, very subtle.

And when the devil was tempting Eve, what he insinuated, what he put into her mind was that God doesn't really love you. If God loved you, he'd have given you this beautiful tree to eat of it. And that's very often the way the devil gets into our hearts, by making us doubt God's love.

When Jesus said to Peter, Peter, Satan has decided to sift you and has asked for permission and has been given permission, just like God gave permission to Satan to sift Adam and Eve here. He gave permission to Peter also to be sifted.

But Jesus said, I'm praying for you, not that you won't fall. I'm praying that your faith will not fail. I'm praying that in that moment of temptation, even if you do fall, I'm praying that you will not doubt the love of God.

That's the thing, brothers and sisters, in the time of deepest trial and temptation, whatever may happen, don't doubt the love of God. Even if your prayer is not answered, even if you find something that you want is not being given to you.

Some deep trial, perhaps like Job, your children dead, your property gone, don't doubt the love of God. That's the message that comes from Genesis chapter 3. That's what the devil... See, faith, what does it mean to live by faith?

To live by faith means, I know one thing, God loves me. That's what brought the prodigal son back to his father's home. I know I've done a lot, I've made a mess of my life, but I know my dad loves me.

I'm going to go back. So that's faith. And this tree, which looks so attractive, God made it attractive, because God wanted to test Adam and Eve to see, will they get more attracted by my creation or by me, the creator?

In every temptation, essentially the temptation is this, the creator or creation. Are you tempted by a pretty woman? What is the temptation? Your creator or what he created? Are you tempted by gold and silver?

What is the temptation? Your creator or what is created? That is the essence of every temptation. And essentially, to overcome temptation means just this, that I choose my creator. I don't choose what is created.

When people, when you are interested in the honor of men, the approval of men, the other choice is the approval of God. Which do you want? All temptation figures is basically between these two things, the creation versus the creator.

You either worship the creation and say, Oh, this beautiful face. Oh, this gold. Oh, this man's approval. I want it. Or you say, this is all garbage. The face of Jesus and his approval and spiritual riches.

My creator is more important to me than everything created. You just make that choice in every decision in life. And I tell you, you will be a man of God. You'll be a woman of God. And you will have understanding of scripture more than anybody can ever teach you with any amount of classes that you attend.

You got to make a choice. And say, Lord, in every situation, I choose you, my creator, above all created things. That's the essence of overcoming temptation. I want you to notice, I don't have time to go into everything here.

Authority, Atonement, and Covering Sin

I want you to notice further down in, what was Adam's sin? Was it just that he ate of the fruit of the tree that was forbidden? No, it was more than that. It says here that the Lord told Adam in verse 17, because you, not because you ate of the fruit, that was second.

Because you listened to the voice of your wife. Is that a sin? To listen to the voice of your wife? God says it is. Why? Because he says, I made you the head of your house. And you did not exercise authority as the head of your house.

You saw your wife talking to the devil and you just kept your mouth open and stood there watching the whole thing instead of stopping her. You should have put your foot down and say, come away Eve, don't listen to her.

You know, there are a lot of husbands like Adam today. They're not the head of their homes. And exactly the same thing God has to tell them. So you see, Adam's sin was he did not assert his headship. And God is a good God, he did not curse Adam.

It says here, he cursed the serpent and the ground. But he did not curse Adam. And you see the tremendous love of God that he kills an animal. This is the first death that you read after Genesis 1. An animal is killed.

Because that's the way God made these garments of skin for verse 21. An innocent animal is killed for Adam's sin. And that animal's skin is taken off to cover Adam and Eve. A picture of what God was going to do one day on Calvary's cross.