Let There Be Light – Genesis 1:3-5

Visible light is electromagnetic radiation, and can be analyzed as both waves and particles, a property unique, in physics, to light.  The speed of light (186,282 miles per second) is one of the basic fundamentals or constants of creation.  Our earth and our solar system sit in one of the most lighted sections of our universe, enabling us to see that there is so much more to our universe than we would otherwise know.  God has given us light for very important reasons.

3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day. (Genesis 1:3-5, ESV)

	Day 1	Day 2	Day 3	Day 4	Day 5	Day 6
Announce	And God said	And God said	And God said	And God said	And God said	And God said
Command	Let there be light	Let there be an expanse	Let the waters be gathered and the land appear, Let the earth sprout	Let there be lights in the expanse	Let the waters swarm and birds fly, be fruitful and multiply	Let the earth bring forth living creatures, let us make man in our image, be fruitful and multiply
Report	And there was light	God made the expanse and it was so	And it was so	And it was so	And it was so
Evaluate	God saw that the light was good		God saw that it was good	God saw that it was good	God saw that it was good	And it was good, and it was very good
Execute	God separated the light from the darkness	God separated the waters under from waters above	The earth brought forth	God made the two great lights and the stars	So God created	So God made the creatures, God made man in His image
Name	God called the light Day and the dark Night	God called the expanse heaven	God called the land earth and the waters seas
Date	The first day	The second day	The third day	The fourth day	The fifth day	The sixth day

 

You can see that the creative work of God, Elohim, is in two phases, corresponding to and in contrast with the earth being unproductive and uninhabited.  Days one through three make the earth productive, days four through six make it inhabited.  The first is necessary for the second.  The reporting of these days is mostly the same, but with some variation, as the chart shows.  No naming takes place on days four through six.  We will see that Adam names the creatures.  It is not apparent, and it does not say God called humans “man,” but the Hebrew word for man, adam, becomes the name for the first man, Adam.  Adam is “man,” and though Eve is technically “man” also, the term is not made into a personal name for her.

The first day makes up for the darkness that was covering the surface of the watery depths of verse 2.  The light had to be coming from a fixed point, not generally suffused throughout the entire planet, because as the earth rotated, something Genesis does not describe, it ends up experiencing a period of light, called Day by God, and a period of darkness, called Night by God.  Inherent in this light was also heat, in order to prepare the earth to become productive, though this is not specifically mentioned.

Darkness is overcome by light on day one.  It is a life-giving gift to our planet.  It becomes the metaphor throughout Scripture for life.  Jesus says, “I am the light of the world,” and says we, too, are the light of the world (John 8:12; Matthew 5:14).  Paul says, “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6).  Receiving salvation life is like receiving God’s light shining in our hearts.  Light is life.  Were the light to disappear from our world, it would die.  If our light does not shine in this world, it will spiritually die.

The “god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:4).  But God will not let His church fail in its mission of being light to the world.  Whereas individual lights among us may go out, we collectively will continue to shine until Jesus comes back.