Creation Bible Studies 2012 - WordPress.com ·...
Transcript of Creation Bible Studies 2012 - WordPress.com ·...
Seven Meditations on the Creative Nature of God Introduction: The Biblical Creation account is not a chronological history nor a scientific explanation, but rather a meditation on the ever-‐present mystery of creation. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. What does that mean? What does that mean to us personally? We can never truly know how to unlock the mysteries surrounding this life, from the miniscule microorganism hardly visible through the most powerful microscope, to the infinite distances of this vast cosmos gazillion of light years across. Never-‐the-‐less, what does it mean to you that there is a God who called all of this into being? What does it tell you about God? What does it tell you about yourself? Upon what truth is the meaning of your life based? This is will be our meditative journey together -‐ to move knowledge from our head into our hearts and back again to a place of understanding. If we say “God created” – then life takes us in a certain direction. If we say it is by random chance, life will take us in a different direction. What do you say here and now? Yes to God or no to God? Is there meaning and purpose to life? Is there light to shine in the darkness and bring understanding? This study will focus on the creative nature of God as seen in Genesis 1. As we know God as our maker, so do we understand ourselves more clearly, for we are created in the image of our Creator. The intent of this study is to tap into the creative energy that God has placed in each of us as we join Christ in expanding God’s vision and desire for his creation. The seven characteristics of God that we will study together are as follows: Lesson 1 – The Light of God Lesson 2 – The Wildness of God Lesson 3 -‐ The Fruitfulness of God Lesson 4 – The Harmony of God Lesson 5 – The Creatureliness of God Lesson 6 – The Image of God Lesson 7 -‐ The Stillness of God Much of the material in this study is inspired by J. Philip Newell’s book, The Book of Creation: An Introduction to Celtic Spirituality, Paulist Press, 1999. It will be helpful for participants of this study to have access to paper for writing, drawing and some creative tools such as pastels, colored pencils or crayons or even modeling clay to help with creative expression and interaction with Scripture. Some participants may want to create music, knit or crochet, mold or carve sculptures. Some ideas will be presented for the group to work together and some are to work on independently. It is not about the quality of the product, but the creativity of the process and the freedom to express our faith in a different medium than most church experiences offer. We are God’s creation, so in a sense, says Dante, the art we create is the grandchild of God . . . Art has a unique capacity to take one or other facets of the message and translate it into colours, shapes and sounds, which nourish the intuition of those who look or listen. It does so without emptying the message itself of its transcendent value and its aura of mystery. (Quote from Karen Spears Zacharias: “God’s Children: Your Handiwork”)
Week 1: The Light of God Day 1. Begin by reading Genesis 1: 1 – 5. Read it two or three times with different readers. Sharing: What thoughts come to mind as you hear these words? What questions come to mind? What hopes emerge? Share your initial thoughts with one another. So in Day 1, we see that God is light. He didn’t just create light – he brought his very being of light into this dark mass of meaninglessness – chaos, void – to bring meaning and purpose and rhythm and connectedness and interdependency and beauty. Listen to these words of Scripture as we being our journey focusing on the source of all – our God as Light: Read out loud: John 1: 1 – 5; John 8:12; I John 1: 5 – 7; Matthew 5: 14 -‐ 16 The light from the first day is not from the sun, moon or stars – it is an invisible fiery power: It is the sun behind all suns. It cannot be seen or comprehended – you can never grasp it and say, this is it, and that it – it is cloaked in mystery. God shows himself in all things, but can be known in nothing. In our reading from John – in the beginning was the Word and that Word was the “light of life”. God is Light – God is the source of everything and runs through everything. God is not the same as Creation, but He also cannot be separated from Creation. Theos, the Greek word for God could be seen as coming from the word Theo (He who runs) – for God runs through all things and never stays but his running fills all things. And thus He cannot be separated from you and me. Sharing: How do you understand “God within you”? How is God separate from his creatures and yet part of all his creation? Where do you focus your worship when you envision God? Although God’s light is present within all His creation, and us in particular, there are aspects of our lives that block the light of God – that dim his image within us. Sharing: What are some of those aspects that keep God’s light from shining through to one another?
The agate crystal is a wonderful illustration out of nature that shows how what we see on the outside may not be what is contained on the inside. . . . the pebble of rough, the unprepossessing stone, the harsh dull case, splits open, to reveal, the lovely agate crystal, the boulder cut asunder, shows a blue-‐gleaming layer of amethyst – there is a principle of beauty and order, at the heart of chaos, within life there is life. (K. White Walking the Coast in “The Bird Path”, pg 51 – Mainstream, 1989)
Too often in our Western tradition we have been given the impression that sin has the power to undo what God has woven into the very fabric of being. Redemption in such models is about light coming from a far to shine into the darkness. However, redemption is not bringing light to a creation that is essentially dark, but rather the liberating of light from the heart of life. Entering attentively into the depths of the moment is where we find God – being alert to the One who is always and everywhere present, closer to us than we are to ourselves. Sharing: Have you considered that sin blocks the light from within and that light – that image of God needs to be released once more? How does that affect how you look at sin in your own life and what repentance might mean? God never leaves us – he is always there, but our sinful attitudes and actions can hinder his light from shining through us, causing us to live in shadow, rather than light. There is a definition of repentance that comes from the Hebrew word, “schoob” and it really means to “turn again” to re-‐turn – rather than to turn around. It offers the idea that when we regret the sin in our lives and desire to rid ourselves of that which blocks the light of Christ from bringing clarity and direction, rather than the idea of “turning around” and going a whole new direction instead we “return” – turn again -‐ to the source of our life, which is God. We return to the essence of who we were created to be. We are not trying to change and become something that we are not, but rather we go deeper to discover who we were truly meant to be. We return to the “Day 1” of our created soul. That doesn’t mean that we return to infancy, but rather we come back to the purity of God’s vision for us. We are “born again”. How does that idea affect your understanding of repentance and is there anything that is encouraging or more hopeful? Exercise: Draw a circle in the center of a page, with various lines radiating out from the center. Label those lines: church, family, work, personal health, devotional life, community, neighbors, volunteer work -‐anything that is part of your life. Now mark a spot on each line of how that area of life either draws you closer to God or further away. After prayerfully considering where to place your marks, write down what is it about that area that causes blockages to God’s light. How can you change that? How do you need to turn again toward your true nature in God? Share with one another your thoughts, as you feel comfortable.
Close with this benediction God to enfold me, God to surround me, God in my speaking, God in my thinking, God in my sleeping, God in my waking,
God in my watching, God in my hoping, God in my life, God in my lips, God in my soul, God in my heart, God in my sufficing, God in my slumber, God in mine ever-‐living soul,
Work
Personal health
Family
Church
Devotionals
Neighbors
Friendships
God in my eternity. Week 2: The Wildness of God Read Day 2 of Creation found in Genesis 1: 6 – 8 As you read it again, reflect upon the Ancient Near East understanding of the world at that time. They saw the sky as a canopy or dome covering the earth. It is also helpful to remember that the Hebrew people were not fond of seas or oceans. They were land loving people, not sailors, so they saw the seas as a sign of struggle, chaos and disorder.
Sharing: What is God doing in this second day of creation in light of these ancient perspectives? It is quite symbolic in the book of Genesis that God starts to tame the waters, bringing in some order out of their chaos. This study will reflect upon the chaos that first comes with creativity and why we are often afraid to be creative in our work and life because it is messy. Creation isn’t always neat and orderly. There is a wild side of God that willingly works with very raw materials to bring about beauty and order.
From the opening verses, we see that God was working with material that was “formless and void”. There is some controversy regarding the theory of “creation ex nihio” which is creation out of nothing as opposed to creation out of something. In verse 2, it seems that God was starting with something – at least where we are let in on the story. Remember that we are looking at Genesis 1 as a place to meditate on characteristics revealed about the Creator so we do not want to expend much energy on theological arguments, but there is an interesting literary technique that works with these two words “tohu” – formless “Boho” – void. In days 1, 2 and 3, God creates forms and in day 4, 5 and 6 he fills the forms so that they are no longer empty and void. Out of the chaos represented by the water, God brings order – creating forms and filling them with life. Consider the chart below:
Sharing: Consider your own life. Can you see areas of your life where God has turned chaos into order? Can you see where God was much more patient with the chaos than you were? Jot down some areas of your present life that seem a bit chaotic and out of control? What might God be teaching you through these times?
GOD CONQUERS CHAOS GOD CREATES FORMS “Tohu” is reversed
GOD FILLS THE FORMS “Bohu” is reversed
DAY 1: Realm of Light DAY 4: The Bodies of light DAY 2: Realm of the water under
and the water above DAY 5: Creatures of air and seas
DAY 3: Realm of the land and the vegetation DAY 6: livestock, man / Vs. 30 green plants
Now it is time to thing about creativity and our fear of making mistakes. When it comes to leading ministries or looking for creative solutions to difficult situations, if we don’t think we have the “right solution”, we are afraid to try. But one lesson to draw from these verses in Genesis is that great things can come from what initially appears to be a big mess or very little to work with. Trusting in God’s creative light within us means being willing to be wild and free with our ideas and thoughts. Don’t let the mess bother you, because something new can be birthed from it! Exercise: Take a large piece of paper and some pastels, crayons or coloured pencils and fill your piece of paper with colour. Do not think about creating anything specific and don’t press too hard, but fill the page with shadings of colour. Once your page is full, look at it for a while and see if anything emerges from the mess of colour. Do you see the potential for a tree or flower? Mountains? Animals? Water? Now take your supplies and see if you can add lines and colours to help that image come forward. Remember, it is not the product but the process! Share your pictures with one another. Sharing: Consider one area of your 1) ministry 2) church as a whole 3) family life 4) career – where you need to allow some chaos and let go of control in order for something new to be birthed? Chaos and Worship: The danger of worshipping inside four walls of a church is that we think we can contain God within them. When we have the opportunity to worship God in creation – there are no limits to our focus – we are also unrestrained in what draws us to his presence. Even the weather is unpredictable – will God come to us in the warmth of sunshine or a drenching rain; a soft breeze or blustering wind? Do we want to control our emotions in worship – do we always come to a sense of peace? Perhaps desires, emotions and creative urges will suddenly surge up from out depths like whirlwinds. Our religious traditions have almost exclusively sought out the gifts of peace and calm for our soul, while neglecting the inner stirrings of creative wildness. It is more often that change and movement comes from restlessness, not contentment. If God wants to move us to do new things, he stirs the air. We cannot have creativity without turbulence. Sharing: Consider your approach to worship, both corporately and privately. What do you long for and desire in worship? How much do you try to control your worship experience? How open are you to something new happening in your corporate worship experience? Do you accept any chaos in your worship? Water is such a wonderful image in this study, for water is very unpredictable and yet vital for all of life. Our bodies are made up of 61.8% water. We cannot survive without water. We love the feeling of a warm bath, the beauty of a running stream, but can also know the terror of raging floodwaters or a sudden violent storm. The beauty and the chaos of water reside together. God separates the waters and what is the result? Sky – the beautiful vast expanse. There is such openness and freedom when we embrace the wildness of God allowing Him to work in our lives. Exercise: in a group try to write a fairytale of something wild becoming something beautiful – or something hidden becoming revealed. Have fun with the process and don’t worry too much about the outcome, but see if you can uncover some truth about God’s love for us as he brings beauty out of chaos. Pray together in closing.
Week 3: The Fruitfulness of God Read about Day 3 in Genesis 1: 9 – 13 and consider the theme of abundance verses scarcity. Which word best describes God’s design on creation and why? Also Read Psalm 104. Name all of the character traits of God revealed in this psalm and what is your personal response – what emotions come forth upon it’s reading. Celebrate together some areas of your life where you have felt fruitful (don’t be modest!) and how God has encouraged the bearing of fruit in your life. Also share how God has provided for your needs with abundance. As we think about God’s creation and the part that the seed plays, we see that God intended life to continue to expand and grow. There would always be seeds to multiply and expand the plant life and diversity of God’s design. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. At the center of life is the Word. Jesus compared God’s Word to a seed being spread in abundance across all kinds of soils. There is never a shortage of the seed – God wants his grace and mercy to touch every life, but not every soil is able to receive the seed for maximum harvest. God is never stingy when trying to reach out to his beloved creatures and he wants to provide every good and perfect gift to meet our needs. As God’s children, we are also called to be as generous and open as our God is to those around us. Sharing: What kind of soil is your church or faith community? In what ways to you recognize it as a community of generosity and abundance as it reaches out to share God’s blessings? Are there ways that the resources get stuck within the church and are not used for blessing the greater community? Do resources ever “shrivel” because of fear that there will not be “enough”? Does your church believe in God’s abundance or fear the scarcity of resources for the task at hand? To go with the seeds are the streams of water that flow underneath the soil to nurture the plants. Without nourishment and refreshment, it is easy to become withered and brittle in our faith, especially as we endeavor to reach out to others in care and ministry. What causes you to feel dry and withered in your faith? What feeds and nourishes your soul? Do you view God as a God of great abundance or do you fall into the trap of believing that there is not enough to go around? Exercise: Take your paper and colour tools and draw some flowers. Name the flowers according to the resources that God has given you to share. How full can you make your paper! God’s goodness is fruitful – it produces and expands. His goodness is not quantified or static. Even the difficult things bring forth fruit and goodness. “I have grown chrysanthemums in the dung of God” is an old Celtic quote. Abundance, generosity and resources – all are available to our ministries. We are not hard up –but planted in fertile soil. “If goodness were entirely removed from life, nothing would remain.” “Goodness does not come through essence, but essence comes through goodness.” Evil is NOT creative or fruitful, it is destructive. Goodness brings something out of nothing. Evil tries to make nothing out of something – to corrupt things so that they are not what they were
created to be. Evil is a movement toward meaninglessness. It becomes false. We are called to an awareness of the fathomless mystery involved in the mere existence of a pebble. Everything in God’s world is full of meaning if we take time to perceive it. In Celtic tradition, all ground is holy for within it is the goodness of God. Walking barefoot was a discipline to become more in touch with holy ground – remove your shoes and feel the earth to become part of it all – not separate and removed. When everything is seen as connected and meaningful, it is so much harder to be destructive or stingy and fearful. Goodness trumps evil when we see God’s beautiful hand providing for all. An act of pruning will not be seen as destructive, but cutting away what is hindering abundance and growth. Share: How do we explain the inequities of life and the unfairness that seems to abound. Some people are deemed beautiful while other unpleasant to look at. Some people live in lands plagued with drought and few resources? Some are gifted with intelligence and strength while others carried great handicaps. If God brings rain on the just and unjust alike, then why is there so much inequity in the world? The Celtic mission’s practice of sharing its gifts with the poor rather than amassing wealth for itself stood in sharp contrast to the increasingly rich and powerful Roman church that grew in prominence in Ireland. How does our generosity help to balance the injustice of some having more than others? If God is generous in creation, how can we not be generous with one another? Practice positive acts of goodness rather than only endeavoring to restrain from evil. Hospitality: We often think of hospitality as welcoming people into our homes, but the theology of hospitality is far deeper than serving tea. It is the ability to make others know that they are welcomed in this place – that they are delighted in as God’s child and that there will be every effort made to ensure their needs are met to the best of our ability. Hospitality is a very high value in Ancient Eastern Culture, even today, but as we have become more individualized and private in our personal lives, we have lost some ability to offer true hospitality. Quote by Walter Brueggemann: The Bible starts out with a liturgy of abundance. Genesis I is a song of praise for God's generosity. It tells how well the world is ordered. It keeps saying, "It is good, it is good, it is good, it is very good." It declares that God blesses -‐-‐ that is, endows with vitality -‐-‐ the plants and the animals and the fish and the birds and humankind. And it pictures the creator as saying, "Be fruitful and multiply." In an orgy of fruitfulness, everything in its kind is to multiply the overflowing goodness that pours from God's creator spirit. And as you know, the creation ends in Sabbath. God is so overrun with fruitfulness that God says, "I've got to take a break from all this. I've got to get out of the office." Psalm 104, the longest creation poem, is a commentary on Genesis I. It is a liturgy of generosity and the myth of scarcity -‐-‐ a contest that still tears us apart today. How would an attitude of generosity and fruitfulness change the nature of our homes and our churches? NOTE: Capitalism thrives on the myth of scarcity – creating demand because there may not be enough to go around. How does this counter God’s truth? Read together 2 Corinthians 9: 6 – 15. Either share as a group or write out your own personal response to Paul’s writing to the Corinthians. What might your own prayer be to trust more in the abundance of God rather than the myth of scarcity?
Week 4: The Harmony of God Read Genesis 1: 14 – 19 on Day 4. As you read this passage a few times, look for examples of harmony and balance. How does the sky reflect God’s desire for balance? We think of light as good and dark as bad, and yet there is a need for the night? Talk about the benefits of day and night and what they offer. Balance in nature: We have fallen out of a conscious relationship with gifts of the lights of the sky. We don’t depend on the moon’s light to guide us and our work hours are not guided by the sunlight in the sky. City lights dim the starry skies – we spend far too much time with a roof over our heads. Our daily rhythm is no longer dependent upon the rhythm of the earth. Can you think of ways that we lose a natural rhythm with our unnatural sources of light? What can we learn about God’s nature from the sun – how about from the moon? The stars? Read Psalm 8 and name some of the contrasts or paradoxes mentioned in it. Balance in gender: We think of God most often as a male and use the “he” pronoun although in Hebrew, the pronoun “El” was the primary reference to God, which is neutral in gender. It is also good to remember that God is beyond gender – that gender is a human trait more than a spiritual trait. Yet, as God created both male and female in his image, we understand that both aspects of our masculine and feminine natures are part of the Trinity. Discussion: Create a table with two columns on a piece of paper and label one column masculine and one column feminine. Fill under the columns with character traits that you best think fit under those columns. For example: brawny might be considered masculine and tender might be more feminine. No trait is exclusive, but decide which column they typically fit. Then consider which traits best describe the nature of God. It is also good to remember that each person is also a mix of the masculine and feminine, although some of us have more of one column than the other. Everything has a balance and each is good, so we should not consider the sun better than the moon or masculine better than feminine. The moon in Celtic times was a feminine image. Women related to the 28-‐day cycle and the pull of the tides. In fact, the reason that #13 is an unlucky number is that there are 13 28 day cycles relating to our feminine menses. Anything related to the feminine was disparaged. Celtic traditions were more egalitarian in recognizing the unique powers within women such as intuition, and bearers of life. Sometimes it took a pagan twist in being connected to fertility rites, but for the most part, there was an honoring of both male and female. When the Roman Christianity overruled Celtic spirituality, women lost their place of honor and recognition. Share with one another which traits you consider as part of your personality makeup and how that creates balance in your own life, no matter which side of the columns you draw from. Celebrate each other by sharing one thing that you appreciate about the other person and how those traits minister to your group as a whole. We often talk about the majesty of God and we relate the grand and marvelous to God. We use huge words like omniscience and omnipotence to describe the greatness of our Creator for these words help us to believe that God is in control of everything and his purpose will be accomplished. We seem to put big and powerful together in the same thought, but we often forget that there
can be greatness in the tiny, intricate details of life. There is as much majesty in the wing of an ordinary housefly as there is in Mount Everest. In our prayers and meditations, it is good to include all aspects of creation and see God’s hand in the tiniest detail as well as the grandeur of life. So to in our own lives, we may feel more success in our big accomplishments and ignore the tiny daily actions that make up more of who we are than the major events. Activity: If possible, go outside and find something very small and study it very carefully. What does it tell you about God’s nature? If it isn’t practical to head outside, try to bring a small object or picture of something and try to draw it, putting in as much detail as possible (even if it isn’t accurate!) Secondly, consider something large and grand and what does it reveal to you about God’s nature. Again, you can bring a picture or draw something to represent the majestic. Share: Read Psalm 148 and consider one way that together you might offer your praise and worship as a group to God. You might want to sing a song together or offer some sentence prayers or simply read the Psalm in different ways as an act of worship. Unleash some of your creative energy and create a worship experience that honors the feminine, the masculine, the greatness and the intimate intricacies of the nature of God.
Week 5: The Creatureliness of God Read together Genesis 1: 20 – 25. After you’ve read the passage, have a bit of fun with your coloured crayons or modeling clay and create some of your own animals or birds. See what you can come up with and share your new creations! We marvel at the incredible inventiveness of creation. The color, strangeness, exotic, wild and weird! Madeline L’Engle feels that the image of God within each of us is the element of creativity. Quote: “In our society, at the age of five 90% of the population measures “high creativity” but by the age of 7 that has dropped to 10% and by adulthood, 2%. We are diminished so that we are less than we know.“ Share: What are the reasons that our creativity gets so undermined by life? What stops us from seeing potential in everything and anything causing us to be so bound by rules and structures? L’Engle continues: “Creativity opens us to revelation, and when our high creativity is lowered to 2%, so is our capacity to see angels, to walk on water, to talk with unicorns. In the act of creativity, the artist lets go of the self-‐control that we normally cling to, and becomes open to riding on the wind. Something almost always happens to startle us during the act of creating, but not unless we let go our adult intellectual control and become as open as little children.” Consider Matthew 18: 1 – 5. What do you think it means to become like little children? In the words of Paul Wadell in his book Becoming Friends: Worship, Justice, and the Practice of Christian Friendship the church must be challenged to move from the “destructively familiar to the creatively strange”. He sees this particularly in the area of injustice – that we become so used to the way things are that we do not see how things could be any different and end up participating in the injustice, rather than seeking to correct or change society’s ills. Share: In what ways did you have to let go of your inhibitions in order to create some new creatures in the opening exercise? What made it difficult for you to be as creative as you would have liked? What keeps the church from becoming more proactive in speaking out against injustice or seeking creative solutions to poverty or other societal problems? We talk about the loss of innocence as we move from childhood to adulthood as if something that has been lost can never be found again. But loss does not necessarily mean dead and gone. It can mean that it is simply misplaced and can be found again. Remember our definition of repentance as “return” (shoob in Hebrew). Is it possible to return to that child-‐like creative imagination planted within each of us? Share: What are some ways that we can encourage our creative roots – to rediscover what God has planted in us from the very beginning? What fears hold us back? With the creatures comes the creation of the five senses – now creation can be tasted, touched, smelled, seen and heard. Name the five senses and share together own each of those senses can be used to experience nature. Which senses do you tend to rely on more than the others and how might you increase the use of the senses that you tend to ignore?
Consider the typical worship service. Which of the five senses are most used? Which are most ignored? When you think upon the history of Christianity, when people could not read, the Church worked much harder at involving all of the senses in worship. There were many paintings and stained glass works to help tell the stories of Jesus for the people. Incense was used to awaken the sense of smell. Bells rang out to call the people to worship and wonderful masses and oratories were written to sing the life, death and resurrection of Christ. God was wise in inviting us to share in the Lord’s supper, using the elements of bread and wine so that we can taste and see the goodness of God and remember the sacrifice of love every time we shared those flavours. One church I know set up bread makers before communion so that people would be drooling for the bread of life from the delicious smell by the time they shared the Lord’s supper together. Read Exodus 30: 34 – 38. Why was God so fussy about the recipe for incense in the temple? Smell is one of the strongest agents of memory. Certain odors will take us back to a moment in time and recall not only the events but also the emotions associated with it. Once when I was a teen, my pastor’s wife whom I adored gave me her scarf at a youth skating event. The fragrance of White Linen was infused into the scarf and beautiful to me ever after. I loved that perfume because it rekindled my affection for the person who mentored and cared for me through my teen years. God wanted this one fragrance of incense to be associated with worship and worship alone. He did not want it to be used for every day life, but reserved – set aside as holy for the temple. The scent would bring them into the presence of God and their love of God would pour forth with that sweet fragrance. Share: Reminisce some of the smells that you have vivid associations with and the stories that go with it. Also consider what are some specific things that you associate with worship and bring you into the presence of God? As we reflect on the creatureliness of God, we are reminded that God created us as physical beings as well as spiritual beings. We should not distain the flesh or the needs that accompany our desires but delight in the fact that we can feel so much with our bodies and awakening our senses can only help us to be more alive and creative in the way that God envisioned when he created us. And if our desire is centered in knowing and loving God first and foremost, the wrong desires of the flesh will be kept in check. Galatians 5: 16 – 21 warns us of the desires of the flesh, as does Colossians 3: 5 – 11 and other writings of Paul as well. But we do not want to become overly fearful of our physical reality for this is the way that we were made and for this present time, we dwell 100% within the body of flesh and God declared it very good! Share: What is Paul cautioning us about and what keeps the balance in our lives of the physical and spiritual so that we live fully in both realities? We have another sense – our 6th or spiritual sense as the Spirit of God indwells, guides and directs our lives. As we awaken our 5 physical senses to better creative resources, we also need to awaken our 6th sense to God’s presence in our lives. We do this through worship and our own personal spiritual disciplines. Name those practices with one another as a way to become more aware of what you personally to keep fresh and alive in the spirit. Try to close your time together in prayer in a way that might physically awaken your body, such as kneeling or standing or holding hands or laying prostrate before the Lord. Thank God for your body and how it is fearfully and wonderfully made and ask for his guidance on how you might be more creative in approaching the challenges of your life.
Week Six: The Image of God Read Genesis 1: 26 – 31
1. Consider all of the differing ideas of what it means to be created in God’s image and share those ideas with one another and what they reveal about our relationship with our Creator.
2. What is the difference between “dominion” and “domination”? How have we misinterpreted our calling on earth and caused more harm than good?
3. What is the primary “good news” that you see in these verses? Consider God’s gifts to us and define what are our responsibilities? How well have we carried forth those responsibilities?
4. If one idea of being made in the image of God is that we are to be as creative as God is creative, then what are some creative ways to fulfill the responsibilities you names in question 3?
Writer and Theologian George MacDonald said: We are not created out of nothing, but out of God’s own endless glory. Everything that we’ve considered through these studies -‐ light, water, fruitfulness, harmony, creatureliness are all part of what make up humanity. There is woven through us the thread of royal nature, the removal of which would be total disintegration. What is deepest in us is of God and God is good. At the heart of who we are is the love of God; the creativity, imagination and wildness of God. What cannot be known about our selves is far deeper than what can be known. No one is to be regarded merely as an object, for at the heart each woman and man is a holy mystery as seen in the Trinity The first person of the Trinity, God as Father in whom all things have their origin reflects the essence of our being as mothers and fathers who bear life. The expression of our being reflected in God’s son is that we are each a child of God who is the utterance of love. And the operation of our being and capacity for creativity and new beginnings reflects the Spirit who in the beginning stirred forth life from the darkness of the waters. Sin has distorted the image of God, but not erased it. This is so key to remember! The failure of our lives and the falseness of what we have become do not have the power to undo what God has woven into the very fabric of our nature. Redemption therefore, is about recovering the treasure that is buried deep in the field of our lives. In the midst of our own inner confusions we sometimes catch glimpses of our true nature. These glimpses beckon us to return to ourselves (shoob as repentance). The book of Genesis describes God as ‘walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze’ and calling out ‘where are you?” The garden is our human nature that was made in the image of God. God still walks in the garden of our souls searching for us. “For if you had not eaten the forbidden fruit perhaps you would not fear the voice of your Creator as he walks within you, nor flee from His face, nor have become aware of your nakedness which you lost when you sinned. . . Where are you? Why have you lost confidence in the naked beauty of the image in which you have been made? “ The more we forget that the image of God is the deepest reality within us, the less we delve into those inner depths for the gifts of God. The less we make use of the spiritual resources implanted at the heart of our being, the more we believe they are not there. If I don’t believe they are in me, I don’t believe they are in you resulting in a loss of respect and trust. This is not “self-‐reliance” but utter dependency upon God. Too often we
live out of our sense of failure and unworthiness, rather than finding our true worth in the image of God within. Sin is leprosy of the soul, which distorts the image of God within. Sin is not “human nature” but “inhuman nature”. Christ restores our memory of what it means to be the image of God of what our true nature is to be. He is our epiphany. “We have been given the gospel not to tell us that there are flaws and spots in our humanity, for we more or less know that about ourselves. Rather we have been given the gospel to tell us what we do not know about ourselves, or what our souls have forgotten. Deeper than the failings of our lives is the blessing of our nature. It is to that blessedness that we are being called to reconnect. Christ liberates by showing us God’s true self and our true self. In the light of truth, we see the falseness we have become. We must not fear the light, for it will find the truth of goodness within. SHARE: There is a lot of content in the paragraphs above to digest. Talk about the implications of the image of God within you that can never be destroyed. How does that affect how you think about yourself and how you think about others who appear to be more evil than good? Phillip Newell says that “Everything which is true is totally indestructible”. Do you agree with that statement or disagree and what are the implications? One spiritual practice, which can help us to focus daily on God’s image within us is called The Examen. A good way to learn this practice is to work through Psalm 139 with a journal. Work this through as a group – reading the passages aloud, but privately answering the questions in your journal. At the end of the practice, you may choose to share with each other what you feel comfortable sharing. The Examen is a way to reflect upon your day before going to sleep to see where you recognized God’s presence and felt him working through you. The more aware we become of God’s work and presence, the more we tune our heart to his moment by moment. THE EXAMEN Read through Psalm 139 in sections as below – Reflecting on the past day or week. Read Verses 1 – 6 “You search me and know me.” Ask: God, you know me so well – what do I need to know about myself? Read verses 7 – 12 “Where can I flee from your presence?” Ask: Reflect upon the past week. What were its highs and lows. Where did you sense God’s presence in the activities or in the relational connections that you made? Read verses 13 – 18 “I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” Ask: What is it that you love about yourself! Read verse 19 – 22 “Do I not hate what you hate” Ask: What did you struggle with in the past week? What is your dark side and how did it show up? Read verses 23 – 24 “Lead me in the way everlasting” Ask: What sin do I need to confess, what change would I like to make and what words do I need to hear to feel forgiven. As we are being made into the image of Christ, again we are recovering the image of God planted deep within us. Jesus is our human model. The Spirit of Jesus is at work within us, bringing forth that which was always there – our naked beauty that sin clothed in shame. Imagine that you are looking in the mirror and instead of your eyes, you see Jesus’ eyes shining through. Feel that good about who God made when he made you!
Week 7: The Stillness of God Read Genesis 2: 1 – 4a If there is one way that society has undermined our walk with God, it is in the area of Sabbath. We have been sold back into slavery where every day is run by commerce, not by personal or spiritual health. We have mistaken recreation for rest and lost the ability to simply be still. Share: How do you understand God resting and what are the implications for you in your life? What does it take for you to rest from the “doing” that you build your life around? Remember that the story of Creation is not a chronological account – God is constantly bringing light – bringing order out of chaos, bearing fruit and bringing harmony – displaying his image within us . . . and so also, ever present within the work of God is his stillness – his restfulness. Creative activity and a restful spirit can abide together at the same time. Night is followed by day, sleeping by waking – winter -‐ spring – natural rhythms of life are waves of action and rest. The liturgical characterization of creation in Genesis 1 culminates in Genesis 2:1-‐4a with the authorization of Sabbath as a God-‐given, God-‐practiced, God-‐commanded observance. The day of cessation from work declares that God’s creation is, at root, an un-‐anxious environment for life that is not defined by energetic productivity or self-‐preoccupied consumption, but is defined by the peaceable-‐ness that has confidence in the reliability of the world as God’s creation without excessive exertion on the part of God or of humankind. Thus Sabbath is the discipline of pause that celebrates the world as God’s good place for life, and that relishes the human role in creation as “image of God.” The Sabbath became a primary mark of Jewish life even as it continues to be. Sabbath became a distinctive mark of Jewishness in the exile when faith was practiced in an alien or hostile cultural environment. Today, Sabbath as the “rhythms of cessation” shows great trust in the Creator and constitutes a mighty alternative to the frenzy of production-‐consumption that marks society. It is a powerful witness to trusting in God’s ability to provide for our needs when we offer one day a week to him. Share: How can our observance of Sabbath, of learning to be quiet and still, of ceasing from production be a witness to our society? How seriously do you take your Sabbath? Have you considered it as part of a witness or is it too connected with past legalism? Have you thought of Sabbath as a time to trust in God’s provision – there is nothing you have to do -‐ all is well? There are three aspects of Sabbath Rest to consider 1. THE GIFT OF THE SABBATH:
The following are Hebrew root words to Sabbath. Consider that rest is not a command so much as a gift from God to his people. What was God communicating to his Creation? What does that tell us about our own needs, physically, emotionally, spiritually?
Shabath: To repose, desist, to cease, let be, put away. Sha-‐an: To lean upon – rest upon Shamat: To fling down, let alone Shaqat: To settle, rest, be still Shakan: To lodge, reside, abide
Exodus 16: 21 – 30: The first thing God did for the children when he brought them out of slavery, he gave them a day off. How was God using this observance to set the Israelites apart? Again, what was he communicating to them? Luke 2: 23 – 28: In light of what we have already discussed, what was Jesus telling us about God’s intention and desire in modeling the Sabbath? Leisure vs. Rest: There is only one reference to “leisure” in the Scripture in the KJV. Defined as ease and convenience, relaxation, the North American Culture is driven by the goal of leisure. “Freedom 55” or the lottery commercials convey the desire to be totally free from work. Rest, in contrast, sees value in work – Rest is a key or tool to enable one to work more effectively and wisely.
2. THE HOLINESS OF SABBATH:
Exodus 20: 8 – 11: Holy can be defined as “something other”. God as Holy is something other than we can ever begin to imagine, dream, or wrap our finite little minds around. Rest as doing “something other” than what we always do. The number seven seems very significance in terms of rest. Every seventh day, we are to rest; every seventh year, the land was to rest; every 7th cycle of 7 years, the economic structure was to rest – the year of jubilee. Even our bodies seem to lag at the 7th hour – if you wake up at 7:00 a.m., how many of you feel tired and lacking energy around 2 p.m. in the afternoon? Wouldn’t it be nice if every 7 weeks we could take a break and do something other than we always do? I believe we would be much less stressed and dragged and much more productive. Is it just a number or has God programmed his creation to a cycle of 7? What evidence, if any, do you see in your own 7-‐cycle that would confirm or deny its significance?
3. SABBATH AS A SENSE OF COMPLETION:
“God saw all that he had done and it was very good.” There is a sense of accomplishment and completion. It is finished, Jesus said from the cross. His work was completed and he was prepared to “shamat – to fling down” to “shabat – to let it all alone” and to enter “shakan – his eternal rest”. Rest can only truly come in basking in the joy of a job well done – a checking off of the list. It is the heavy sigh that says, finally I can put that aside – I can fling it down – I can let it alone and I can abide here in this place of completion now. It is good to establish an evening discipline of reviewing your day and saying, I was able to accomplish this and this, and it is good. Tomorrow is another day and I will not think on what needs to be done in it – for now I am at rest. It is finished.
Share: Which idea of Sabbath do you feel most positive toward? Do you appreciate the gift of Sabbath, the “something other” of Sabbath or that celebratory sense of completion. How would you find stillness and rest in your life if you became more conscious of the three aspects of Sabbath? Are you a worrier? How might the practice of Sabbath help you break that pattern of behavior and enable you to better “fling down” your concerns? If possible, sing together “I come to the Garden alone” as a celebration of God’s peaceful presence.