Bible in One Year: The Beginning
Yesterday a number of the young people in our Church, along with youth leaders and even the not-so-young began reading through Soul Survivor’s ‘Bible in One Year‘. I’m really excited about this opportunity to read through the written word of God together with so many others. It’s been great to see so many other people excited about spending time reading the Bible.
I really want to encourage you to join us in reading through the whole Bible this year. You can purchase the Bible here, and the readings will be posted on the project’s website here each day.
I don’t intend to share thoughts on the site here every day, but as yesterday marked beginning of it all, I just wanted to share some of my thoughts on the first day’s readings (Genesis 1:1 – 2:17, Matthew 1:1-25, Psalm 1:1-6).
“ He also made the stars” (NIV).
It’s almost like an afterthought. There’s no hint of effort or of the true grandeur of that feat.
Our sun is so big that it could fit 109 earths in it. It could fit all of the planets in our system in it. It accounts for 98% of the total mass of our solar system. Yet it’s not even a particularly big star relative to others. There are at least 200 billion stars in our galaxy alone (a conservative estimate), and there are at least 125 billion galaxies in the universe.
And He also made the stars…
Amazing.
This God is then also the one who comes to be known as Immanuel – God with us, in our form, amidst us, saving us (Matthew 1:23). Incredible.
It reminded me of 2 Corinthians 4:6 –
“For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.”
In creation we see a foreshadowing of the new creation God brings about in us when we become Christians. God speaks life into our dead souls in the same way that he spoke light into the darkness.
It is not hard work for God to change people. He does it with a word. No one is beyond salvation!
Good news on the very first day! I’m looking forward to what the rest of this year will bring.