The AudioBook, Before Genesis Chapter 1, Verse 1, Authored By David Abankwah Through The Inspiration Of God
Chapter 5
Main Heading: Before The Beginning
Bible Verse: Romans Chapter 1, Verse Number 20
And I Quote
For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse,
Everyone who seeks to know the beginning of important things in life is wiser. If you find yourself in an already established institution and you are privileged to work there, your work ethics develop when you know certain information.
You realise that those who usually have prominent positions in such an institution are mostly the people who have been around before the institution was established. Such people are the founding members who usually form the executive board of directors.
As we think mainly about the things that pertain to life, our attention shifts from faith to fear and we cannot trust the God who provided for our humble beginnings. The God who took care of your beginning when you were in the womb can also take care of you till your end comes in the grave.
The most important thing to help us become more faithful to God is the placing of our hope in Him who was in the beginning and before it all happened.
Bible Verse: Genesis Chapter 1, Verse Number 1
And I Quote
IN the beginning…..
Everyone knows the favourite quotation of Genesis chapter 1 verse number 1 which reads…. in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, but do we search for the deeper revelation why it was written so? Looking at the sentence, we can see the word ‘IN.’
‘In,’ means: ‘immediately after a period or showing an order or arrangement.’ From this meaning, we can get the understanding that the word ‘in’ actually contains the idea of preceding events. So, the first word ‘in,’ which God placed in the Bible as the first word of the Bible, unravels all the mysteries and answers to the questions concerning what was before the beginning.
One of the things many people argue on is that there was no beginning. Others also think otherwise and at worse, others too think that it is ambiguous to go beyond that and say something existed before the universe was made.
It is all good to have the interest of having a stance for or against something because of your belief, but there is one thing that matters and that is why this book is centred on: TRUTH.
Consider the universe and its entirety: the landscape, the animals, the plants, and humans alike. What comes into your mind in the first place? Is there anything that prompts you to think that all these things came into being without an entity fashioning them? When you desire to have results concerning something you earnestly seek to know, surely your goal will be achieved.
Subheading: My Curiosity As A Child
When I was a child, I had so many things to ask God. I remember one time when I left home to pay a friend a visit. As I was walking by his house, I thought: Who is God? How is He like? Is He like humans? Does He have the body parts as humans do?
I wanted to know more about God, but I didn’t know how to ask my questions well. As I thought about all these, I waited for a while behind my friend’s house, pounced on imaginations of God, dragged my feet a while and then I knew that, that was not enough. I needed to get back to it.
I thought I was the only one who had these thoughts running through my mind, but my mates, too. After one of our lessons, one mate asked a question: ‘who created God at all?’ One then answered, ‘if you try to know who created God, you will be mad.’
We had this superstitious belief that anyone who wanted to know more about God than expected will go nuts. As we hoped we could know more about God and all that, we were diving into something more than just the beginning of the universe. We wanted to know the things that happened before Genesis 1, 1.
For me, it was an unfinished business knowing more about the Creator. I was less spiritual and less matured to understand certain things at that time. As a child, I knew that, there MUST have been a world before what we see now; a world of eternity in which God was dwelling in before He decided to make the universe.
Subheading: The Wisdom Of The Word And The Wisdom Of The World
I never got the answer to my question and my curiosity kept on piling up until God led me to write this book. Now that I have grown up in the Lord to discover the truth about before the beginning, I have become wiser.
Growing old doesn’t mean that you are wise or you will automatically be, but the fear of the Lord is what can set you up for the wisdom you need even when you don’t have it now as an oldish.
You see, what would have been normal for many people is that, the aged should speak and those who have length of years should sit us down and impart knowledge that will eventually fetch us wisdom, but that is not the case when it comes to the wisdom of God.
This is because it is not the aged who are wise, but those who fear God. A younger person who fears God is wiser than an elderly person. There are many elderly people who are very experienced in life, but they don’t have Jesus Christ, who is the wisdom of God as seen in Proverbs chapter 8:22 to 36 in their lives.
Bible Verse: Job Chapter 32, Verse 7 to 9
And I Quote
I said, ‘Age should speak, And multitude of years should teach wisdom.’ But there is a spirit in man, And the breath of the Almighty gives him understanding. Great men are not always wise, Nor do the aged always understand justice.
The more you age, the more experienced you become. Increase of wisdom is not correspondent on ageing. You may have wisdom of the world, which is called experience, but you may lack the wisdom of God, who is spiritual. Anyone who doesn’t have Jesus Christ in his life is a fool!
I have come to realize that, if someone tells you that you are a fool, the person is indirectly saying you don’t know Jesus Christ. This is because if you knew Jesus Christ, you wouldn’t have said what you said or behaved how you behaved.
So don’t be angry when you are rebuked of folly. Everyone who has Jesus Christ in Him is wise. Even a Pastor who is seen as foolish by the world is wiser than a President or ruler who doesn’t know God. Why am I saying this?
This is because the Pastor contains in him the wisdom of God, who is the Word of God – Jesus Christ. Jeremiah adds to this in Jeremiah 8:9 that, since the world has rejected the wisdom of the word, then what can the wisdom of the world do for them?
Bible Verse: Jeremiah Chapter 8, Verse Number 9
And I Quote
The wise men are ashamed, they are dismayed and taken. Behold, they have rejected the word of the Lord; so what wisdom do they have?
Subheading: God Questions Job
A certain man lived upon the face of the earth. In the east, he was the greatest of all the people. This man was pure and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil. This man had seven sons and three daughters.
His possessions included 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, and 500 female donkeys. Besides this, he had a very great household. Job was his name.
One day, Satan accused him before God that it was for nothing he feared God for. Satan said that if God could extend His hand and strike everything he had, he would curse God to His face.
God indeed gave him the chance to strike everything he had. Job then lost everything he had and was also afflicted with a malignant ulcer from the sole of his feet to the top of his head.
Bible Verse: Job Chapter 38, Verse Number 21
And I Quote
Do you know it, because you were born then, or because the number of your days is great?
After Job suffered this fate for several days, his three friends: Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite came to pay him a visit, thought it was a sin he had committed that brought about such a dilemma. They even came to worsen the case.
Then Job tried to vindicate Himself by telling God the history of his good deeds. God answered him in the whirlwind and gave us a clue concerning events before the beginning. These were the very words of God the Father.
Bible Verse: Job Chapter 38, Verse 4 to 6
And I Quote
“WHERE WERE YOU WHEN I LAID THE FOUNDATIONS OF THE EARTH? Tell Me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements? Surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? To what were its foundations fastened? Or who laid its cornerstone,
Subheading: Before Genesis 1:1
One evidence of events that happened before the beginning was the encounter between God and Job. God questioned Job if he had knowledge about the events that happened before the beginning.
We know that in the beginning was when God created the heavens and the earth, but God still questioned Job that, ‘where were you when I was laying the foundation of the earth?’ Where were you before that time to see what I was doing?
Though one will say, God wanted Job to know that he wasn’t there in the beginning when He was creating the universe. Another suggestion that nears the question that God asked Job is that, before Genesis 1:1, where were you, Job?
Though foundation is part of the building, it is a hidden thing. When the building is there, we don’t see the foundation. The foundation too is done before the principal building is put on it. Genesis 1:1 didn’t say God made the foundations of the earth, but said He created the earth.
Before the beginning that God created the heavens and the earth, He had already prepared its foundations. Jesus Christ used this to speak a parable in Matthew 7:24 and Luke 6:48 which literally says the same thing concerning a house built upon a rock.
Bible Verse: Luke Chapter 6, Verse Number 48
And I Quote
He is like a man building a house, WHO DUG DEEP AND LAID THE FOUNDATION ON THE ROCK. And when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently against that house, and could not shake it, FOR IT WAS FOUNDED ON THE ROCK.
God is the foundation on which the universe was established on. Before the universe was built on God as the foundation and the Only One present before the beginning, there was no man or any other entity present to witness such an event. This was why God had to ask Job such a question, so He would know that it was Him alone who was the beginning before the beginning begun.
Bible Verse: Revelation Chapter 22, Verse Number 13
And I Quote
I am the ALPHA and the OMEGA, the BEGINNING and the END, the FIRST and the LAST.
Indeed, no mortal can still answer the question God asked Job, because we were not present before the beginning, but God, who is the same as the Word, can still enlighten us through this book concerning what happened before the beginning.
David Abankwah 