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So this morning, as you heard, we’re continuing our series with the Bible stories from childhood. And today we have that story of David and Goliath. This is a story of unforgettable courage and And it’s just the beginning of a story of a man who literally became world famous. David’s story is told in the Bible, in the Torah, and in the Koran, the holy books of three major religions.

David’s name is known by more people today than it was back then. But on the day that this battle took place, David wasn’t famous yet. In fact, he was anything but famous. David had been secretly anointed by the prophet Samuel to be the next king, but nobody knew that yet, apart from David’s immediate family.

Nobody knew yet that David would become the most famous king Israel ever had. Nobody knew yet that David would write some of the most moving worship songs ever written. And certainly nobody knew yet that one day there would be a Messiah who would be called the son of David. At this point in time, David was just the youngest son of the eight sons of Jesse of Bethlehem.

Bethlehem in Hebrew, Beit Lechem, which means the house of bread. This city would also one day be the birthplace of the bread of life, Jesus. But back then, Bethlehem was just a small town. And as in so many ancient cultures, in Jesse’s family, the oldest son was considered the most important.

The oldest son received the larger inheritance. It was his job to take care of the family after the patriarch passed and Being the youngest son like David was, it didn’t get a person very far in that culture. David’s three oldest brothers were at that time serving in the military. They were fighting the Philistines while David was back home in Bethlehem taking care of the sheep.

So David was outdoors most of the time, sleeping under the stars, getting to know each sheep by name, helping the ewe lambs give birth, protecting the sheep from predators, and most of the time it was pretty quiet. It gave David the chance to pray, to get to know God well. It also gave David the time to practice the harp and learn it well. And the fields where he sat around a thousand years later would be the same fields where shepherds would hear angels singing about the birth of the Messiah.

David never heard any angels singing in that spot, but he did experience God’s presence and God’s power, especially when he used his slingshot to kill bears and lions who attack the sheep. The life experiences of a shepherd helped to shape this young man into the kind of leader that would make a good king. Ironically, back in those days, shepherds were not all that welcome in polite society. Apart from the fact that David was the youngest son, which put him behind the eight bowl to start with, People had, back then, had mixed feelings about shepherds.

They admired shepherds for the hard work they did, but they also felt that shepherds were socially awkward because they spent so much time alone. And besides that, shepherds smelled very strongly of sheep, right? And considering that back then nobody used deodorants, that was a pretty bad smell. So on the other hand, in David’s case, David was already starting to build a reputation for himself. So.

.. Shortly before our story took place, David had been introduced to King Saul. And the reason was that Saul was a deeply troubled man.

And nobody knows the exact nature of Saul’s difficulty, but he was in trouble both mentally and emotionally. And that trouble started after Saul had disobeyed a command from God, which was given to him by the prophet Samuel, at which time God removed protection from Saul. Now, what exactly that meant and what exactly happened, we don’t know, but we don’t know. He may have been suffering from PTSD.

He may have had anxiety or bipolar episodes. We just don’t know exactly what was troubling Saul. All we know for sure is that these episodes of anxiety interfered with Saul’s ability to lead and be an effective king. So the king’s servants suggested to Saul that he bring in a gifted musician to lift his spirits.

And they found David, who played the harp very, very well. And so whenever David played, King Saul’s spirits were lifted and he was able to rule as a king. But the effect would only last for a little while. So David was a fairly frequent visitor to King Saul.

The rest of the time when David was not playing for King Saul, he was home watching the sheep. And I imagine he liked the job, I imagine he enjoyed having time to talk to God, practice his harp, giving names to all the little sheep, all that kind of stuff. And every now and then his father Jesse would say to David, Take some supplies to your brothers on the front lines. The armies back in those days were not fed by the government, they were fed by supplies from home.

And so David would load up breads and cheeses and whatever else was on hand, take them to his brothers, they said three of whom were in Saul’s service, and he also brought food to their commanding officer to share with the men. So the day that David met Goliath was one of those days when he was bringing food to his brothers. David was in the camp when Goliath the giant came out from the opposing Philistine army, and he said, among other things, ‘I defy the ranks of Israel. Give me a man that we might fight together.

The victor will make his nation victorious, and the other nation will surrender.’ And Goliath said other things too, things that made fun of Israel’s army and made fun of Israel’s God. And this had gone on for 40 days before David’s visit. Now, a little background on Goliath.

Okay, first, historians say, believe that Goliath was a true giant. How exactly how big he was is debated. But a giant in the scientific sense, as they say, a hereditary pituitary disorder causing familiar gigantism. In other words, it ran in his family.

It has been documented that Goliath also had a brother and three sons who were also giants. Now exactly, like I said, exactly how big is debated. Big enough is the important thing, right? And whenever Goliath made his challenge, Israel ran for the hills. No one had the courage to stand up to Goliath.

So David heard the men of Israel talking amongst themselves and they were saying, the king will give great riches to the man who kills this giant. He will give the man his daughter in marriage and he will make his family free in Israel. In other words, they would never have to pay taxes again. Can you imagine that? No taxes.

So David asked a few of the men if this was actually the case. Was this, it sounded too good to be true? And the men answered, yeah, this is the truth. This is what the king will do. And David’s older brother Eliab overheard these conversations, and he got ticked off at David.

He said to David, why are you here? Who’s taking care of those sheep of yours in the wilderness? You have evil in your heart, and you’re only here to watch the battle. And David’s reaction hints that this was not the first time the two of them had had words. David answered, What have I done now? It was only a question, he says. And having heard the whole story, David was mightily ticked off that this uncircumcised Philistine, as he called Goliath, had been getting away with ridiculing God’s people and God’s army.

So David goes to King Saul and says, let no one’s heart fail because of him. Your servant will go and fight with this Philistine. And Saul objects, how could a teenager like David, who has never held a weapon of war, take on this huge man who’s so well trained in battle? But David already had it worked out in his mind. He says to Saul, Your servant keeps sheep for his father.

And he tells him about killing lions and killing bears and rescuing sheep out of the mouths of these animals. David says, this uncircumcised Philistine shall be just like one of them. He has defied the armies of the living God. See, David’s offended because this Philistine is insulting the one true and living God, and David is not having it.

Now David, of course, is not your perfect hero. He does make mistakes, sometimes really big ones. But the one thing we can say about David is that he loves God. He loves God with everything he is and everything he has.

David’s whole heart is in God’s hands. And we can hear this in the Psalms that David wrote, The Lord is my shepherd. I shall want for nothing, he says. And God says that David is a man after God’s own heart.

And we see this in spades as David offers to defend God’s honor with his own life. But this makes Saul uneasy. And Saul tries to talk David out of it. And David reassures him.

And then Saul offers David his armor and David tries it on, but he can’t walk in it. So he takes it off. And David instead takes his shepherd’s staff and his sling, and it says, Five smooth stones from the wadi, a wadi being a river that is dry part of the year and wet part of the year. And so he would have found in that riverbed some nice smooth stones that would serve his purpose.

And armed only with these things, David approaches the giant. Now Goliath looked at David, all young and handsome, and Goliath hated him. And Goliath cursed David and gave him an earful of trash talk. But David was not intimidated, and he came back at Goliath with the ultimate trash talk, David said, And then all it took was just one stone guided by God’s hand.

That stone went straight to Goliath’s forehead. The giant fell face down and then David grabbed Goliath’s own sword and cut off his head. And that sword was David’s from that point on. When the Philistines saw this, they ran, and Israel chased them all the way to Gath, which was Goliath’s hometown, and the Israels plundered their camp.

David, meanwhile, picked up Goliath’s head, totally gross, and brought it to Jerusalem, and Abner, the commander of the army, brought David to King Saul, while David is still carrying his head around, and David kept Goliath’s armor. At the end of the story, the author of Samuel writes, When David had finished speaking to Saul, the soul of Jonathan, Saul’s son, was bound to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul. And thus begins one of the most famous friendships in history between Prince Jonathan and the shepherd David. David also married Saul’s daughter, Michael, became the son-in-law to the king.

And one would expect this story to end and they all lived happily ever after. But that’s not how things turned out. Saul’s troubled episodes would become worse, and eventually David would have to run for his life. Somewhere around 15 years later, Saul and Jonathan would die in battle.

But those are stories for another day. For today, we want to look at David and Goliath. Because this story has been called a rags-to-riches story, or a victory for the little guy’s story. I’m not sure I see it that way.

David was called and gifted by God from a very young age. And I think David’s story is an example of what God can do when a person is fully committed to God, a person who loves God with all of his or her heart. God can call anyone and does call anyone into God’s service. God can prepare anyone.

The most important thing is willingness to say yes and then to take it one step further to use the best that God has given us in service to God. So when we look at David, we have no idea what his IQ was. We have no idea what kind of education he had, if any. We do know that David, when he was young, spent a lot of time surrounded by God’s creation and singing praises to the Creator.

Bottom line, nothing God gives us is ever wasted. David’s time on those hillsides, alone with the sheep, playing the harp and singing songs to God was not wasted. David’s time when he wasn’t famous and was known only by the members of his family was not wasted. And like David, whenever we face a giant, whether that giant be sickness or family troubles or financial issues, whatever they might be, the same God who provided for David will provide for us.

So remember David’s question, Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God? In the same way we can stand up with confidence in the name of God whenever God’s people are in trouble. We are not all called to be heroes on the battlefield. In fact, most of us aren’t called to be heroes. But we are called to be faithful.

and we are all called to be courageous, and we are all called to put everything we have on the line for God. And when imperfect people are faithful and courageous for God, good things happen, not just for us, but for all of God’s people. Amen.

We’re in place. Okay, well, good morning. This morning we’re continuing our sermon series on Bible stories we learned as children. And today’s story is Joshua and the Battle of Jericho, which you just heard.

And like so many Old Testament stories, the events described in Joshua chapter 6 happened a long time ago. So we’re going to need to have some background on this. If I could have slide two, please. There we go.

First off, I wanted to show where exactly we’re talking about. This is a modern day map showing…

The lighter brown area, this and this, that’s Palestinian territory right now. And the dark orange area is Israel. This would have been sort of all differently owned, shall we say, or differently managed back in those days. But you can see Jerusalem is here, and Jericho is almost due east of it.

And there’s Bethlehem, so it’s sort of northeast of Bethlehem. So that’s kind of where we are. And the people of Israel had approached this, coming up around this side and into Jericho. So that’s where we are.

Also wanted to point out one other thing on here, and that’s Tel Aviv up here. That’s where the international airport is now. But I wanted to point out the name of that place, Tel Aviv. I know you all have heard of that.

But the word tell is kind of like the word mountain, Mount Washington. Okay. A tell is not a mountain, but a tell is what I guess started out as a mountain, but somehow the top got flattened. And so a tell is a mountain with a flat top, which is.

.. Really, really helpful, especially back in those days, how handy that would have been because people could live on top of the tell, they could build on there, and it would be really easy to defend. So Tel Aviv, great place to put an airport, isn’t it, on top of a flattened hill.

Same thing, same basic idea. The biblical city of Jericho, slide three if you would please. There we go. I’ll talk about that in a moment.

The biblical city of Jericho today is called Tel Es Sultan. So Jericho itself is also a Tel. You can see that this mountain is essentially flat on top. Now this particular picture, this is modern day photo of where this location is, but I notice this north is downwards, okay? This is basically upside down, but when I tried turning it right side up, all these crevices, you could hardly see them, which is kind of a weird little something that kind of fakes your eyes out.

But anyway, these crevices are where archeological digs have been right along in here. So you can see that, okay, we have this, it’s essentially a flattened top, Mounted on all sides. We have a modern day road here, modern day roads all the way around. Of course, those roads were not there, I think, except for sort of a footpath on this side, on either side at the time.

This Helltop was also back in biblical days, was well fed by streams and underground water. There’s all kinds of water around here, so they had no problems getting water up the hill. Very nice place to live, right? That’s biblical Jericho. And this also, this Jericho had two walls, not one, but two walls around it.

And if I get the next slide up, there we go. This is right side up now, okay. And so we have an upper wall right here. And the inside of this, like I said, was essentially flat.

That’s where the houses would be. That’s where the farmland would be. All of any cattle or sheep or whatever would all be living up inside this upper wall. And then the outer wall was there for protection.

So the upper wall basically just as a way of setting aside people’s properties and the lower wall for protection. And then there’s this sort of this pinkish area in between, which would have been very steep and, People went in there, but not for very long and not for very often. What would you do with some steep, rocky material? So that’s where we were. You can see again, this is where the modern day road is now.

And also this is where the reservoir is right now. Okay, that’s one of the water supplies that was there for the city. So that tells you a little bit about Jericho, just what it looked like, what it was like back then. So the walls were there to defend both the city and to protect the food and water supply.

And up to this point, everything I have said is basically common knowledge and can be found in any history, encyclopedia, archaeological record, any of that kind of stuff. But as with many ancient stories, both biblical and otherwise, archaeological studies raise some questions and the archaeological digs at Jericho are no exception. So I wanted to share some of what modern day historians and archaeologists have to say. When we look at the historical record, it is clear that there have been people living here for a long time.

In fact, there was more than one civilization here. According to Wikipedia, Jericho is one of the oldest cities in human history. There’s evidence of people having lived on this tell as far back as 10,000 BC. There were people there throughout the Neolithic era, which goes up to 6500 BC.

They have found artifacts from the Bronze Age and the Iron Age. And because of all this history, different archaeologists find different things when they go digging. They find things from different eras, from different time periods, and from different cultures. And for this reason, some archaeologists think the story of Joshua is a myth, and others think the story is entirely possible.

It depends on what you hit when you dig. And as one archeologist I read put it, when you start digging, whatever you want to believe is probably what you will find. So, which is true of so much of life, but at any rate, in this case, after having looked over the evidence myself, I don’t see any reason why the biblical story would not be true. There is no disproof in any of the arguments or in any of the history.

So having said all of this, let’s turn now to the Bible and hear God’s word. We’ll keep that up for a little bit for reference purposes there. So back in Joshua chapter 2, before the reading that we heard today, As the people of Israel were traveling from Egypt in the south up into the Promised Land, Joshua sent spies ahead of the people and told them to look around and see what was on the road ahead. And Joshua said to them, Pay special attention to Jericho.

When the spies came to Jericho, they entered the house of a prostitute named Rahab. They probably did this so that anybody who saw them coming in would think they were there for a good time and wouldn’t think twice about it. But this didn’t work. They were noticed.

And Rahab was questioned by the authorities, and when they came to search her house, she hid the spies up on the roof under some flax that she was processing, and she told the authorities, Yes, they were here, but when they left the city, when the city gates closed for the night, if you’re fast enough, you might catch up to them. So they left in search of the spies. And then Rahab said to the spies, I know the Lord has given you this land. Everyone here is afraid of you.

We’ve heard about how God dried up the Red Sea so that you could walk through it. The Lord your God really is God. So since I have dealt kindly with you, swear to me that you will deal kindly with me and my family. And the men answered her, Yes, our lives for yours.

So Rahab helped them to escape, by letting them down through a window in her house because her house was built into the city wall. All right, the estimates for people who’ve dug around, they say that she probably lives somewhere around down here, which makes sense because you would have been able to kind of get out into the countryside very quickly from that spot. So, the men gave her a crimson rope to tie in her window to let the Israeli soldiers know where she was and told her to gather all of her family together in her house for safety. And a few days later, maybe a week later, Joshua and the Israelites arrived at the walls of Jericho.

Joshua says, The city of Jericho was shut up inside and out. The people were afraid, and the gates and the walls were closed, locked, and guarded, and no one was going in or out. Meanwhile, God gave Joshua a game plan, one that relied on the faith of God’s people. For this plan to succeed, the whole nation of Israel had to trust God and do as God said to do.

God said, Jericho is yours for the taking. Here’s what you need to do: get your warriors together, get your priests together, get the Ark of the Covenant which held the Ten Commandments and some of the manna from their journey, put the Ark in the middle of the priests, put the priests blowing trumpets around the Ark, put the soldiers around the priests, and have the people follow. and march around the city one time today and one time tomorrow. Not saying a word, not saying a word, blowing the trumpets, but not saying a word.

And this would have taken, they estimate, it would have taken a little bit more than an hour to walk around the city. So that’s what they were doing once a day. Now the city of Jericho was not heavily populated. The scholars estimate there were between 1,500 to 2,000 people in this city.

So imagine what the people at the top of the hill were thinking as they saw this army with trumpets marching around the city. and all the people following in silence. And they saw the Ark of the Covenant, which was obviously a religious thing. They didn’t know exactly what it was, but it had angels on the lid.

They knew it was surrounded by priests. So they knew that both God and soldiers were marching around the city. And this went on every day for six days. Now, one of the things the Bible doesn’t tell us, and a lot of the history books lead this out too, is that Jericho sat, and still does sit by the way, on a fault line, kind of like California.

And because of this, there were a lot of earthquakes in the area. Now, is it possible that all that marching and trumpet blowing shook some things loose? We don’t know. We can’t prove that one way or the other. But speaking as a musician, I know what sound can do.

I expect it had an effect. And then on the seventh day, the army of Israel and the priests and the Ark marched around the city seven times. Seven being the number of completion or perfection. just like the world had been made in seven days.

And God told the people after the seventh time, shout a mighty shout and then go straight up the hill and devote the entire city to God. Now, the phrase devote the city to God was a euphemism for kill everyone and burn the city to the ground. Leave nothing behind. This is a horrific order.

And it’s an order that God rarely gave. And whenever the order was given, it was always and only about cities or regions where the people were so corrupted by idolatry, And it’s an order that God rarely gave. so taken by the worship of lies, so wrapped up in evil that they needed to be removed from the land. There was no other solution.

Think about this. I mean, the only person that God chose to save out of all the people in Jericho was the city’s lady of the evening. So she was the best of them. Right? So we talk about day seven.

Let me, before we talk about that, can we move to the next slide, please? Okay, this is a side view of what the walls would have looked like. Now this one’s a little bit inaccurate ’cause this should be flat on this side. This would have been the top of the tail. But that’s the upper wall.

People would be living over here. This is the lower wall. When the walls fell, and the archaeological evidence bears this out, the upper one crumbled and sort of rolled down the hill. The lower one, however, fell, as it says in Scripture, flat.

Right? In the whole piece. So the kind of attack that they were doing was what was called a siege. I’ve talked about a siege before and usually what they would do in a siege would be lock up all the city gates and basically starve the city to death, right? Okay? And while you’re doing a siege, you would also be building a siege ramp up into this if you were attacking people, building a siege ramp up into the city so that you could get into it at the end and get all the stuff. In this case, they didn’t have to build a siege ramp.

The siege ramp built itself. flat down. So it literally says in the scriptures, they went straight up from where they were standing, straight up the hill. The walls were gone.

So that’s how that kind of worked out. What happened here really was a miracle. When the army stopped marching, and the trumpets blew, and the people shouted, the upper wall collapsed and crumbled, the bottom wall fell straight down, creating that ramp, and they walked in. At God’s command, the army of Israel, captured all of the city’s treasures of gold, silver, bronze, and iron, which were put into the Lord’s treasury, and everyone else and everything else was destroyed, And except for Rahab and her family.

Everything else was burned to the ground, which explains why archaeologists have found jars full of burnt grain uneaten. in the houses. Because during a real siege, they would have run out of food. But these people didn’t run out of food.

There’s evidence of massive food everywhere that was burnt. Tells us exactly this is what happened. And on top of this, Joshua cursed the city and said that anyone who rebuilt it would do so at the cost of their children’s lives. He said, Cursed before the Lord be the man who rises up and rebuilds this city, Jericho.

At the cost of his firstborn shall he lay its foundation, and at the cost of his youngest son shall he set up its gates. So this hill stood empty for hundreds of years. People knew the curse. They left it alone.

But much later, during the reign of King Ahab, who was known for not listening to God, a man from Bethel rebuilt Jericho. His oldest son died during the laying of the foundation, and his youngest son died when they put up the city gates, just like Joshua had said. So that’s how the land on which Jericho once stood became part of the nation of Israel. And Jericho, what was left of it, was given to the tribe of Benjamin.

And, There is a newer city named Jericho, which is built near the ruins, but it’s not actually up on the tell. That tell is still empty, as you saw that very first picture, or the picture of the archaeology, that’s what it looks like today. It’s just a dirt with a bunch of holes in it, that’s it. So the story of Joshua and the Battle of Jericho is a story of great faith, and it’s also tragic.

It’s a story of a city that couldn’t be saved or wouldn’t be saved. Its people were so wicked that God had to wipe them out, and Israel obeyed God when he told them to do so. When I read stories like this, They remind me of a movie I saw as a kid. Some of you might remember this maybe.

Remember Joan of Arc? The original one starring Angry Birdman. It goes back, it’s an old 1940s black and white movie. Some of you are going, I don’t think so. Anyway, great movie, it’s a wonderful movie.

But Joan’s courage has always inspired me. But in this movie, when she leads the French to their first victory, as a leader of their army. The soldiers are celebrating, but Joan is found on the battlefield weeping. And one of the soldiers asks her why, and she answers, I thought victory would be beautiful, but it is an ugly, bloody thing.

That’s how it was in Jericho. It’s a sad story. It’s a bloody thing. The city, having been destroyed, plundered, and burned to the ground, was not resettled.

The ruins were left as a warning to passersby. It had been a place of great evil, and the evil had to end. The people of Israel, after this battle, moved on. They crossed the Jordan River and then into Jerusalem.

Their future was just starting. And as for Rahab, God never forsakes his own. Rahab was faithful to God, and we remember her words. She said, The Lord your God really is God.

And Rahab ended up marrying a man named Solomon, and they had a son named Boaz. And Boaz grew up and met and married Ruth, and they had a son named Obed, and Obed had a son named Jesse, and Jesse had a son named David. So Rahab was King David’s great-great-grandmother. God saved the very best of Jericho, and that best still lives on in David and in Jesus.

So what can we take away from this story? I have six thoughts to share. Take them as you will. Number one, and most important, God will deal with idolatry. God takes idolatry very seriously.

Commandment number one says, you shall have no other gods but me. You shall not worship anything else or anyone else. This may be, there may be important people in our lives, important things in our lives, but God wants to be number one. above them all.

If there is anything or anyone that we love more than God, that’s an idol, and we need to take it down off its pedestal. Our first loyalty needs to be to Jesus, both for our sake and for the sake of others. Number two, just like the city of Jericho and its walls, God knows where the weak spots are. We may not know how to attack a problem, but God does.

Who could have guessed that a week of marching and some trumpet blasts would bring down city walls? but God knew where the weak spots were, and God still does today. So as we bring our prayers and our concerns to God, allow God to get into the weak spots of life. Allow God to do some healing. I’m calling.

Number three, trust God and do what God commands. God will never steer God’s people wrong, keep following even if the journey seems impossible, and especially when the journey seems impossible. Four, God’s timing is always right. If Joshua had attacked the city too soon or too late, the results might have been different.

So trust God to know the right time. Number five, stay together. We are the family of God, and we need to move together like Israel did, in unity, not uniformity, but in unity. We are not all the same, and God designed us to be different.

So our differences are healthy, but we need to move together as the family of God. And last, finally, the way that God dealt with the people of Jericho is a rare exception. We should never assume that God wants to wipe out certain people groups. Almost always, we should welcome strangers, share with others, and communicate what we believe.

Violence should be avoided unless God specifically commands it. So that’s the story of Joshua and Jericho. May God bless it to our understanding and to our living. Amen.

Well, we have something new and different starting this morning for now and through the rest of the summer and probably well into a little bit of September as well. Pastor Dylan and I have taken a request. Dylan was asked for a sermon series on the stories in the Bible that we all learned as children and what they mean for us now as adults. Stories like the Tower of Babel, David and Goliath, Noah’s Ark.

And what can we learn from all these today? And Dylan and I both, this is a fantastic idea, so we’re going with it. So like I said, from now through September, and today I’m going to start at the very beginning with the story of creation. And so we’ll take a look at this. Now in the book of Genesis, there are actually two creation stories.

There’s Genesis chapter 1 and there’s Genesis chapter 2. The first one in chapter one is very familiar. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and that chapter one goes on to describe how God created light and darkness and sky and sea and the moon and the sun and the earth and the stars. Genesis chapter 1 is like listening to a grand symphony or watching an epic movie.

It’s a sweeping canvas of light and sound and life. And when we look at it in detail, it’s really too much for our minds to take in. It’s just gorgeous. But in chapter 2 of Genesis, there’s another telling of the same story, but in a little bit more down-to-earth.

Chapter 2 focuses more on the living things, the creation of plants and animals and man and woman. And then in Chapter 3, we meet the serpent and we find out how evil came into the world. But that story is not for today. Today, I want to spend some time in the garden.

in the Garden of Eden before the fall. I’d like to take us there as much as it is possible for we imperfect humans to go back to that perfection. So come with me on the journey. And actually before our bus takes off to this journey, there are a couple points of history to know before we get there.

First off, the first book of Genesis, even though it’s the first book, well, the whole book of Genesis, even though it’s the first book of the Bible, was probably not the first book to be written down. Much of what we have in the first few books of the Bible was passed down verbally from generation to generation and then written down later. This does not in any way change its truthfulness. People down through the ages in all cultures memorized books in order to preserve the knowledge, and our contemporary society doesn’t develop those memory skills anymore because we don’t need to.

We have books. But most of human history, people did not have books, so they memorized and they were good at it. So the actual writing down of Genesis chapter 1 is believed to have happened when Israel was in captivity in Babylon, about the same time as the events of the book of Esther, as you recall that story. The reason for this is because Babylon is the location where the human race began.

In other words, Mesopotamia, y’all remember that from history class, right? Mesopotamia, the cradle of civilization, birthplace of human beings. In between the Tigris and the Euphrates, which is between the rivers, that’s what Mesopotamia means, Meso-Middle-Potamia rivers. So in between the rivers..

. That’s where civilization started. And so while the Jewish people were in Mesopotamia, they wrote down the history of that region, which included God’s creation. Genesis chapter 2, on the other hand, is believed to have been written down much earlier, during the reign of King David, and this version of creation is more down to earth, like I said, focused on relationships.

God creates the things of earth using the dirt of earth, which God then shapes into plants and trees and animals and finally a human being. So chapter 2 shows how we, as human beings, are physically related to the earth and everything else on earth. In fact, the name Adam is taken from the Hebrew word for dirt, Adamah. So in our time in the 21st century, a lot of people debate the truth of these first two chapters of the Bible and they say the theory of evolution is the reality and that evolution disproves what’s written in these two chapters.

Personally, I believe that evolution is just one of many tools in God’s toolbox. And the concept of a day in Genesis chapter 1 is not a 24-hour day. It can’t be because the sun and moon weren’t created until day three. So Genesis chapter 1 is better understood like poetry rather than history.

The important thing in chapter 1 is that when God spoke, things happened. Where there once was nothing, now there was something. In fact, there was a lot of something. And the point is that God’s Word is powerful.

God’s Word makes things happen. And God’s Word is enough to change the world and enough to change our lives. And so the one last thing that’s important about Genesis 1 is that God made humankind in our image, as God says. And the word our implies that there’s more than one personality in the Godhead.

This is our first introduction to what we will come to know as the Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. People were created to be like God. Not to be God, but to be like God in that we also can create and build and enjoy relationships and work and rest and communicate. So many of the things that God does, we do.

So that’s the foundational background that we need before taking off on this journey. Back to the beginning. And I should also mention that most of the time when pastors preach on creation, they preach chapter 1 because it is so beautiful. Okay.

But today, chapter 2, because there’s a lot of good things going on here that are often missed because chapter 1 is so nice. All right, so Genesis chapter 2 starts on the seventh day and then recaps what’s happened so far. So on the seventh day, God rested. And we’ve talked about the Sabbath before and how important that is, so I won’t recap that now.

At this point in time, God has created the earth and the heavens and the stars and the moon and the sun and all the water on the earth and the dry land and the earth. But at the beginning of Genesis chapter 2, the living things haven’t been fully defined yet. So the creation story sort of starts over again with a different focus, this time on life. So imagine the earth when it was brand new.

Huge ball of dirt with oceans and now in this chapter, rivers to water the earth. Okay, and by the way, I should mention when you read things in chapter 2, they’re not And now in this chapter, rivers to water the earth. necessarily in chronological order. So I’m going to try to put them in chronological order today so those of you who are following in scriptures, this won’t be in order.

All right, so first God created Eden, which is a large garden, to be home for the animals and for the people that God’s about to create. God makes rivers to water the garden, the four rivers which God gives names to. Pishon and Gihan, we don’t know exactly where those two are anymore. In spite of the descriptions that are given in chapter 2, people have not been able to identify them.

But the last two rivers, the Tigris and the Euphrates, the cradle of civilization, we know where that is. And so they are there to this day in the country of Iran. That’s where human history started. God then created out of the dirt grass and trees and plants, some of the plants that produce food.

It’s interesting that God creates all these things out of the dirt. And when we look at what plants are and what animals are, what people are made of, we’re all made of the same stuff. God designed this creation so that everything living is intimately connected to the planet that we came from. God then creates a man and puts him in the garden.

And God tells the man that his assignment is to till and keep the garden. In other words, take care of the plants. And God is there to help as the man is figuring out how to do this. Do these plants need water? Amen.

Do they need more sunlight? Do they need to be moved? Do they need to be trimmed so that they can grow back some more? God teaches the man all these things about how to take care of creation. And the man enjoys doing all these things. Imagine for a moment what life would be like if we had never lost that innocence and that connection with the earth. We’d spend our days basically being gardeners and also caring for animals, but that’s still to come yet.

This is not the same thing as farming. There is no need in those days for barns. There is no need to bring in a harvest. The garden produced fruits and vegetables and different kinds of grains all year round.

So the man would just go out and pick what he needed and then take care of the rest, take care of the plants. So the plants depended on the man for their survival, and the man depended on the plants for his survival. And as we extend this into human history, the survival of the human race has always depended on taking care of the land and the water, and then the animals when they came along. But again, it didn’t feel like work back then.

any more than having a backyard garden feels like work today. It’s like something we’re created to do. And as I’ve often said, when we discover and do what God designed us to do, life is sweet. Life is good.

So this assignment to the first man has never been taken away. Taking care of creation is still our job today, given to us by God and inspired by God. And in that very first garden, God gave the man just one word of warning. He said, Don’t eat any of the fruit of the tree for the knowledge of good and evil.

Anything else in the garden you can eat, just not from that tree. And for a long time, nobody did. For a long time, creation was perfect. And then God said, Well, it’s not good for this man to be alone.

And so God knows, because God is never alone. God has Father, Son, Holy Spirit, so God is never alone. God knows it’s not good for us to be alone. So God created us to join in this life of love and be part of it.

So God starts creating animals. And as God creates each animal, he brings it to Adam, and Adam gives the animal a name: monkey, hippopotamus, horse, sheep, dog, cat. I mean, can you imagine Adam’s delight with each new animal, looking at it for the first time? Aardvark! Alligator, looking into the eyes of another living being, petting its fur or its scales or its feathers, whatever it has, depending on what kind of animal it was. How amazing to get to know each animal.

And think about the relationships we have with animals today. Many of us here have pets or have had pets, and we also give names to our animals. In fact, it’s the first thing we do when we get an animal is give it a name. So we’re still doing Adam’s work even today.

And when we do this, we are doing what God created us to do. And the love between a person and their animal is one of the deepest and purest loves that life has to offer. And that’s why it hurts so much when we lose them, because they don’t live as long as we do. So I wanted to say a few words of comfort to those of us who’ve lost beloved animals.

First off, it is not crazy and it is not weird to love an animal this much. That’s how God created things to be. And second, for whatever it’s worth, the voices of the experts, my theology professors at Oxford, the author C.S.

Lewis, and John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, all agree that we will see our animals again. Animals are part of God’s kingdom. And I don’t know about you, but I find that tremendously comforting. And given that I’ve had cats all my life, since like the age of five, I’m going to be covered in cats in the next life.

Heaven indeed. So three things that we’ve learned so far about creation of the animals. Each relationship with each animal is different. Something that human beings learn as we get to know them.

Secondly, God is relational, which is why God gives us so many relationships. God enriches our lives with other living beings. And third, the order that living beings are created in does not imply hierarchy. In other words, if a hippopotamus was created before a lion, and I don’t know that it was, I’m just saying if, That does not mean that the hippo is better than the lion because it was made first.

Remember that if you ever get into an argument with a fundamentalist. Anyway, moving on, after Adam has met all the animals and has given them names and learned how to care for each one, he’s still alone in a very profound way because there’s only one of him. So God puts Adam into a deep sleep, takes a rib and some flesh, closes up the wound and heals it, and makes a woman out of Adam’s flesh. Now remember, Adam and all the animals are created out of the earth, out of dirt.

But woman is made out of man. And God brings the woman to the man, and Adam is delighted. He says, This at last is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. I name her woman because she was taken from man.

In Hebrew, by the way, the names are ish and ishah, very, very similar. And both Ish and Isha are naked and not ashamed. Why should they be? They don’t know they’re naked. They’ve never seen clothes.

Shame didn’t exist yet because sin hadn’t been brought into the world yet. Now chapter 3 of Genesis is where Adam and Eve get mixed up with the snake, and chapter 3 is where death enters the world, both through the sin and through the killing of animals to make clothing for the naked people. The fact that we kill animals for food, for clothing, is the result of sin. Amen.

It is not meant to be that way from the beginning. Now having said that, I don’t think that this means we should all be vegetarians. Vegetarian diet is very healthy, okay? But I don’t think it’s a sin to eat meat, so long as the animals are not mistreated while they’re alive. And the Apostle Paul seems to agree with that in the New Testament.

He cautions people against eating meat that have been sacrificed to idols. But Paul says nothing about avoiding meat altogether. Having said that, I’m going to leave Genesis chapter 3 for another day. Back to Genesis chapter 2.

So today I wanted to focus on and imagine the Garden of Eden. What it might have looked like, what it might have smelled like. all fresh and new with dewdrops on it, berries and peaches and all kinds of fruit for eating, a place where a lion or a cheetah might have strolled up to you and purring and looking for petting, where a monkey might have swooped down out of the tree and taken a bite of your peach, Imagine strolling through this place in the twilight, with the sun going down in a gentle breeze, no deadlines to meet, no doctors to see, no office to work in. And the work that we do there, caring for the plants and caring for the animals, is a pleasure and a joy.

We sleep when we’re tired, wake up when we’re not. There’s a perfect partnership between the man and the woman, and there’s no laundry to do. So God designed life to be full of beauty and mystery and discovery and cool relationships with each other, with animals, and with all of creation. The Bible says Adam and Eve used to walk with God in the garden in the cool of the evening.

And this inspired a song we’re going to sing in a moment called In the Garden. This is how life was meant to be. And while we don’t have the power to recreate that perfect garden, anything we do in this life to help restore that beauty and that harmony is doing God’s work. And when Jesus returns, all of this will be restored.

not destroyed, not replaced, but put back the way it was meant to be. God did not create a world without knowing how to fix it when things went wrong. And things have gone wrong, but God has the last word. So we can bring our troubles and our concerns to God and give thanks to God.

And while we wait for God to make that final move, our calling is to get the work started. Where we see suffering, ease the pain. Where we see hunger, bring food. Where we see someone sick, help bring healing.

Where we meet a stranger, offer friendship. At the end of the book of Revelation, after all the battles are fought and all the enemies are defeated, the Apostle John describes our new home. I saw no temple in the city, for the temple is the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb. and the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God is its light and the lamp is the lamb, and the nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it.

I saw no temple in the city, And the angel showed me a river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and the lamb through the middle of the street of the city. On either side of the river is the tree of life with its 12 kinds of fruit producing its fruit each month, and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. So we begin in a garden and we end in a garden. A famous Christian author said recently that the words, I believe in God Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, is the foundation of everything.

God calls us to be a part of His new creation, and in Revelation, God brings us back to where it all started and heals all the pain and everything that’s gone wrong. So one day this beautiful creation will be restored. And until then, we keep our eyes on Jesus and honor God’s creation. Amen.