The sermon titled 'Day 2 Into Day 6 Of Creation' by Jason Dohm delves into the biblical account of creation as described in Genesis 1:6-25. The speaker emphasizes that the creation narrative is about God revealing Himself and His power. The sermon covers the creation of the firmament, the separation of waters, the establishment of dry land and seas, the creation of plant life, and the establishment of celestial bodies. It discusses the importance of understanding the Hebrew word 'yom' as a literal 24-hour day and refutes the theory of evolution by underscoring the biblical phrase 'according to its kind.' The sermon highlights God's faithfulness and the reliability of the natural world as a reflection of His order and design. It concludes by encouraging believers to trust in God's provision and presence, using the majesty of creation as a means to confront fears.

The title of the message this morning is Day 2 into Day 6 of Creation Week. But I'm sort of dissatisfied with the title because God's not in the title. And this is about God. This is about God revealing who He is to us. So, think of something good and tweak the title.

Put God in there. Genesis is the book of beginnings. And It is the beginning of God's revelation of himself. Who is God? He's starting to tell us who he is in Genesis.

And God's revelation of truth to mankind. In week one, we looked at verse one. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. So in the beginning before anything was made, God is there, has been there from eternity past, he's fully ready to create a universe, the universe. Last week, verses 2-5, we saw the heavens and the earth in their most basic unadorned states.

The earth existed, God had made it, but it was empty and uninhabitable. And the heavens existed, God had spoken them into existence, but they were empty and without light. By the way, that's not a problem for God. We talked about that last week. Light and darkness are the same to him somehow.

It's not an obstacle to him at all. He sees the same in light and darkness. Then God said, let there be light, and there was light. And God observed what he had created and he observed that it was good. That was day one of creation week.

So that brings us up to where we are. God, I thank you for the time that's before us. This text that really does put Your Majesty on display. Don't let us come and go from it too quickly, missing Your Majesty. We want it to hit.

We want it to land so that our breath is taken away at the God who has made all of these things by the word of your power. We come to the text to worship the God who gave us this revelation. In Jesus' name we pray, Amen. Well, the subdivisions are easy. We'll just go day by day.

So let's start with 6 through 8. Hopefully your Bibles are still open to Genesis chapter 1. Follow along as I reread verses 6 through 8. Then God said, let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. Thus God made the firmament and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament.

And it was so. God called the firmament heaven. So the evening and the morning were the second day. Here we have day two of creation week. And God creates a firmament or an expanse, the NASB and ESV translated, expanse.

God called into existence, it wasn't, but he called it into existence, an area, an expanse, to divide waters below from waters above. And of course this is exactly what we experience. There are clouds, excuse me, there are waters in liquid form here on Earth. And there are waters in vapor form, clouds above us. And there is an expanse between them, separating the, this water in liquid form here at our level, at the level of our feet and water in vapor form way above our heads.

There is this expanse. Like day one, God as the creator claims the right to name. So he makes something and then he says here's what to call it. I'm naming it. In day one God called the light day and the darkness night.

He created, so He named. Here in day two, God calls the firmament, or the expanse, Heaven. And it should be noted that the Hebrew word that is translated Heaven here includes the home of the sun, moon, and stars in verse 15. So in verse 15 you have Heaven. It's where the sun, moon, and stars are.

And it is also the place where the birds fly in verse 20. So you're going to see the phrase, the firmament of the heaven, where the birds are flying in verse 20. The closest English equivalent in common use, I don't use expanse much or firmament much. So the closest English equivalent in common use is sky. It's everything we see when we look up and beyond where the sun, moon, and stars are.

As I said last week, the Hebrew that we see as three words, let there be, is one single Hebrew word. And It is in the imperative, meaning it represents a command. So it's not just a description. It is God commanding, speaking. And we could translate it, exist firmament.

So a command for the firmament or the expanse to exist. And it came into being. It began to exist. God spoke and it was so. Whatever God decrees, come to pass.

He can say, exist, and the thing that didn't exist obeys him and comes into existence. So that's hard to imagine how that can be, but this is actually what's set before us in Genesis 1. It's wonderful because God is wonderful. So the evening and the morning were the second day. Was it a 24-hour day?

Yes, it was a 24-hour day. Moses, the author, very clearly intended for us to understand it as a normal day. So that's something you should actually get to the bottom of. Can you tell what the author intended for you to understand? And the answer to that question in this instance is a resounding Yes, I quoted Alan Ross from his commentary on Genesis creation and blessing Last week I'm going to give you the same quote again because I think it's so important.

And it gives you the footing for this understanding that this is a very determinate period of time, it's a day as we understand a day. And Moses, the author, meant for us to think of it that way. Here's what Alan Ross says in Creation and Blessing. The word normally means a 24-hour day. In this chapter, it must carry its normal meaning.

Support for this view includes the following. So it gives us three reasons why Moses meant for us to understand it this way. One, elsewhere, whenever Yom, the Hebrew word, is used with a number, it means a 24-hour period. So you can look across the Old Testament and this Hebrew word yom is used a lot of times with a number and in every other instance, including many in the Pentateuch, also written by Moses, in every other instance it clearly means a 24-hour day. Two, The decalogue, what's the decalogue?

It's the Ten Commandments. The decalogue, the Ten Commandments, bases the teaching of the Sabbath day on the six days, 24 hour days of creation and the seventh day, a 24 hour day of rest. So if you want to make creation week six ages, then I guess we should work for six ages and take an age off. We know it doesn't mean that. The Ten Commandments actually interprets it for us.

Three, From the fourth day on, there are days, years, signs, and seasons suggesting that the normal system is entirely operative. In other words, nobody wants to mess with days, years, signs, and seasons and say that means something other than the normal meaning of those things. It's a whole system that's entirely operative and there's no clue that any of these things are other than what they normally mean. He concludes with this sentence, it seems inescapable that Genesis presents the creation in six days. To that I say a hearty amen.

One final point before we move on. God never says that's good on day two. So it's the only day that's like that. Every other day, he's going to say, that's good. He's going to look upon what he's created and say that's good, but he doesn't do it in day two.

Now why is that? There are several views, but the one that very naturally makes sense to me is that there is about to be a second division with the water, And that happens before God observes them to be good. So what you're going to see in the next day is God's going to say, that's good twice. He's first going to make another division with water. So on day two, The water is under the firmament and the water is above the firmament.

In the start of day three, it's dry land from the seas, and he's going to make that second division with waters, and then he's going to say, that's good, and then he's going to make other creation and say, that's good again. So I think that's a very reasonable explanation. In day two, he's only made one of the two separations of water that he's going to make. And when he finishes that second one, he says, that's good. So I think that's it.

All right, next section, verses 9 through 13. Then God said, let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear. And it was so. God called the dry land earth, and the gathering together of the waters, he called seas. And God saw that it was good.

Then God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit, according to its kind, whose seed is in itself on the earth. And it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed, according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. So the evening and the morning were the third day.

So here in verses 9 through 13, we have day three of creation week, which begins with the gathering together of the waters. So that now there are distinct areas of dry land. Separate from distinct areas of water. And the distinct areas of dry land, God names earth and the distinct areas of water, God names seas. One of the things that I said in last week's message was, think of a lump of clay and a potter then going to work on this lump of clay.

God has brought forth this lump of clay and he's about to go to work on it and make something amazing out of it. This fits right with what we see all through these days of creation. God created the heavens and the earth. He has his lump of clay and he's going to work on it like a potter would go to work to make something amazing out of it. And we're seeing this progressive shaping and filling that fits this notion.

Another observation of the entire text, not just this subsection. There is a very observable sequence where each day God is making things ready for his creative works on the days to come. So it's actually in a very logical progression. He made the heavens and the earth. He starts and he has this lump of clay and then he makes light because light is going to be needed by things he's going to make on successive days and then he makes land because his creations are going to need land but they also are going to need water but they need them both to be separate so they both have a good function.

There's a very observable sequence where each day God is making things ready for his creative works on the days to come and especially for mankind. You can go day by day and say, we need this, we need this, we need this, we need this. By the time we get to day six where mankind is created, the things that we need are there. He's made the world ready for his image bearers, progressively ready for his image bearers. We need dry land for vegetation and we need bodies of water for aquatic life.

Those things are about to be created, so he makes dry land. And he makes water, and he separates them. God makes the separation between the dry land and the seas, And he looks at it, he sees it, and he acknowledges that it's good. Now there's dry land, and God creates all kinds of plant life. He commands the earth to bring forth grass, plants that yield seed, and fruit trees.

And now we encounter a very important phrase. So here's a phrase that we're encountering for the first time, and it's really important. According to its kind, What does that mean? It means that God has created an amazingly orderly universe where there is an orderly succession from like to like. Grass From like to like.

Grass produces grass. Azalea bushes produce azalea bushes. Apple trees produce apple trees. One of the great failings of the theory of evolution, thanks for nothing Charles Darwin, is that it assumes change over time from one kind to another kind. Only you can't prove it at all from the fossil record.

From bacteria to aquatic life. From the kind of bacteria to a new kind, aquatic life, to a new kind, flying animals, to a new kind, mammals, to a new kind, humans. But that isn't God's created order and that isn't what we see. We observe variation within a kind, but never a transitioning from one kind to another. This is such an important point.

We see variation within a kind. What does that mean? That means if you leave a group of people along the equator for several hundred years, their skin will get a lot darker. You'll adapt to your surroundings. That means when there are a kind of moth, there will be some that are easy pickings for birds and predators.

And they'll be in small numbers and may disappear. But the kind that look like tree bark will flourish. That's variation within a kind. We do see that. And that is, in a way, natural selection.

I don't love that term. But we do see variation within a kind. But what we don't see is one kind transitioning into another kind. There will always be a missing link. Okay.

Then I'm going to find the missing link. Because one kind does not transition into another kind. You can have a trillion billion zillion billion trillion years, I don't know how many that is either, how many zeros would fill the room, And one kind is not going to transition to another kind because of God's created order. Jesus simply said it this way, for every tree is known by its own fruit. For men do not gather figs from thorns, nor do they gather grapes from a bramble bush." Now he's not actually talking about fruit and trees there, he's actually talking about people, but he's drawing on something that is true from what we observe in the world that God created that a million billion times out of a million billion times fig trees produce figs and thorn bushes don't.

Never ever ever ever ever. So God has made kinds. Like producing like. And we think of this as quote unquote natural. This is our vocabulary for it.

Well, that happens naturally. Apple trees produce apples with apple seeds, and if you plant one you get another apple tree, that happens naturally. But it is really just God making the world that is reliable in this way and many other ways. It's really just an example of the faithfulness of God. And so it's not necessarily wrong to use the word this is happening naturally, but don't rob God of the fact that it actually just means that he's faithful.

He's created this reliable world that is predictable in so many ways and wow does that help us. Do we need that? God commanded it to be so and so it is so and it will remain so until Jesus returns and there's a new heavens and new earth. You don't have to wonder how these things are going to work. They're going to keep working this way because God is faithful.

He created that way and it is that way and it's going to remain that way. Here's what John Calvin says. Calvin says, we acknowledge the first cause is self sufficient. So you can't see what I'm saying. In my notes, first, the F is capitalized and cause, the C is capitalized.

The first cause. That means he's talking about God. God is the first cause. The first cause is self-sufficient. And that intermediate or secondary causes, little s, little c, nothing about God in the secondary causes, things that he's created, have only what they borrow from this first cause.

So all the secondary causes are just borrowing. When we say, oh, that's the natural way things happen. You're just watching something borrow from the first cause, which is God. Calvin says, God acts through creatures not as if he needed external help, but because it was his pleasure. That's the explanation.

It was his pleasure, So he made it that way. What is Calvin saying? There is no Mother Nature, there is only God the Father. And God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, three in one. Mother Nature?

No. Father God? Absolutely. Again, we notice that on this day, day three of creation week, God is making things ready for His creative works on the days to come, and especially for mankind. So, did we need dry land?

Yes. How long can you trade water? Did we need plant life? Yes. God is already setting these things in place, making everything ready for his image bears.

Listen to Psalm 104 verse 14. Psalm 104 verse 14. God causes the grass to grow for the cattle and vegetation for the service of man, that he may bring forth food from the earth." So the psalmist actually answers the question, why is God making vegetation for the cattle and vegetation for the service of man, that he could bring forth food from the earth. Or Hebrews 6 verse 7, listen to Hebrews 6 verse 7, for the earth which drinks in the rain that often comes upon it and bears herbs useful for those by whom it is cultivated receives blessing from God. So God blesses the earth, sends rain on the earth, so that it will bear herbs, plant life, that is edible for us, that is useful for those by whom it is cultivated.

God saw that it was good. So the evening and the morning were the third day. Moving to verses 14 through 19. Day four of creation week. Follow along as I reread verses 14 through 19.

Then God said, let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night. Let them be for signs and seasons and for days and years. And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth. And it was so. And God made two great lights, the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night.

He made the stars also. God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth and to rule over the day and over the night and to divide the light from the darkness and God saw that it was good. So the evening and the morning were the fourth day. This is the fourth day of creation. God creates lights in the firmament of the heavens or in the sky.

On day one of creation week, way back in verses 3-5, God had spoken light into existence. Light had never been, it wasn't. And God said, light come into existence. And it was so, God spoke it into existence. And for three days now, there have been evening and morning each day.

Last week, I quoted Revelation with the glory of God and the lamb are the light of heaven. So, there actually won't be sun, moon, and stars in the new heavens and the new earth. God will be its light. The glory of God will be its light. The lamb will be the light of heaven.

So it irks some scientists, But it shouldn't irk Bible believers that there were three days with a morning and an evening before God created the sun, moon, and stars. Not a problem. If you believe that God can speak things that don't exist into existence, these other things are not a problem. So, let those scientists who are irked be irked. Here in day four of creation week, God establishes lights in the sky.

And a clear purpose is communicated. So we're not left wondering why the lights in the sky. These lights divide the day from the night. Give us signs and seasons and days and years. And they give light on the earth.

Again, just like the first three days of creation, God said, Let there be, and it was so. So we keep seeing the repetition of this. God speaking, let there be something, and then there is that something. God's speaking things into existence. God made two great lights.

One is greater to rule the day, One is lesser to rule the night. This is clearly the sun which emits light and the moon which reflects light. What does it mean that the sun rules the day and the moon rules the night? I believe it simply means that the sun is the dominant feature of daytime. Making day, day.

How would you know it's day without the sun? When does day start? When the sun comes up? When's the day over? When the sun goes down?

It is the dominant feature of the day and the moon is the dominant feature of the night. I feel like the sun being the dominant feature of the day needs no explanation. Have you ever had a sunburn? I was going to shout out the oars, the fair skinned people, but they're not here to defend themselves. Okay.

Riley, you are a fair skinned person. The way to shout out over sunburns. You can damage your eyes by looking at it. It is the dominant feature of the day. But this is also true of the moon and the night.

When the moon isn't visible or is barely visible, we need our own light source, or we're stumbling around, right? When the moon is full, it's like we're under a streetlight. You really don't need more when the moon is full and it's a clear light. It's the dominant feature of the night. Our days and years are determined by these things.

We have both a solar calendar, the earth traveling around the sun once a year. Through spring, summer, fall, winter, always spring, summer, fall, winter, our four seasons, and a lunar calendar, a moon calendar based on the monthly phases of the moon. Then we have my favorite little sentence of our text. Here's my favorite sentence. He made the stars also.

Almost as an afterthought. He also made the stars. As we get more advanced in understanding just a little more of what God has actually done. You know that's all we're doing. We're just learning about what God has actually done.

And the more we learn, the more we find out, oh, that leads to 10 other questions and we don't have the answer to any of them. So we get more advanced in understanding just a little more of what God has actually done. We're learning how astounding this is. That our sun, which God made to rule the day here on earth, is just a very ho hum star. I mean, God wouldn't have us worshiping any of the stars, but if he was going to, it wouldn't be our son.

Oh, don't worship that one! It's not worth a mention! And listen to Genesis 15-5. So this is Abraham, God speaking to Abraham. Genesis 15-5.

Then God brought Abraham outside and said, look now toward heaven and count the stars if you are able to number them. And he said to him, so shall your descendants be. God knew Abraham was going to be out. No city lights to dim it. And he was only going to have visibility of half the sphere.

But if he tasked them with counting what was in just the half that he could see, it would be an exercise in futility. Maybe you'd lose count at 1, 000 or 2, 000 with just having covered that much of the half you can see and have to start over again. Look now toward heaven and count the stars if you are able to number them. So even without advanced telescopes, this is an astounding thing. And what I'm saying is we don't need to be in the modern day and know what we know to have this phrase, God made the stars also, be astounding.

It was astounding even then, even without advanced telescopes. But Reformation Heritage gives us a little information about being alive in the day with advanced telescopes. Listen to this note from Reformation Heritage study Bible. There are an estimated 200 billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy alone. Okay, So our sun is a ho-hum star in our galaxy, and our galaxy is a ho-hum galaxy among the galaxies.

But in our little ho-hum galaxy, there are an estimated 200 billion stars, most of them more consequential than our sun. There are an estimated 100 billion galaxies in the universe. Those of you who are laughing, we should all be laughing. Because it's all lost meaning to us now. I don't know what 200 billion stars means, but that's in our little galaxy and there are a hundred billion of those.

So now we're multiplying the numbers that we don't understand by each other. Then the Reformation Heritage Study Bible says, the stars are the work of his fingers. Psalm 8 verse 3. Just listen to Psalm 8. I'll read verse 1 and then verses 3 and 4.

Psalm 8 verse 1. Oh Lord, oh Lord, how excellent is your name in all the earth, who have set your glory above the heavens. Verse 3. When I consider your heavens the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have ordained, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you visit him? Here's a psalmist who was going out on a star-filled night where it was clean, the air is clean and crisp, and you can see it all without city lights, and the psalmist says, what am I?

God, your name is so excellent on the earth. Why would you even think of us? But he does think of us. This should both take our breath away and humble us. That's what it did for the psalmist.

It took his breath away. Look at all this. You did all this. You have the most excellent name. And it humbled him.

Why would you even think of me? This should have this effect on us. Listen to Psalm 147 verses 4 and 5. Psalm 147 verses 4 and 5. God counts the number of the stars.

So 200 billion in our galaxy times 100 billion galaxies, or whatever. Actually, God knows the exact number. Did you hear that? He doesn't round to the nearest zillion. God counts the number of the stars.

He calls them all by name. Great is our Lord and mighty in power. His understanding is infinite. This is what we should be drawing out of Creation Week. Great is our Lord and mighty in power.

His understanding is infinite. This is what we should be drawing out of Creation Week. Great is our Lord and mighty in power. His understanding is infinite. His power is infinite.

He can do all of this in a week's time. He didn't need the whole week. He's setting a pattern for us. His understanding is infinite. Here's the bottom line.

Creation, as God has spoken it into existence needs light. He made it to need light. And God has given us these dependable sources of various levels of light. Some with a lot of light, some with less light. When we need it all, it's good actually for us.

Listen to Jeremiah 33 verses 20 and 21. Jeremiah chapter 33 verses 20 and the first part of 21. Thus says the Lord, if you can break my covenant with the day and my covenant with the night, so that there will not be day and night in their season, then my covenant may also be broken with David my servant." So at the time of Jeremiah, David has long since come, lived, and died. So when he's talking about David his servant, he's actually shorthand for the son of David. And he's saying, if my faithfulness fails in making day and night come and go, then my faithfulness in sending the Messiah, the son of David, will also fail.

And It's not going to fail. The day and night aren't going to fail. And we know the sending of the Messiah has not failed. These are all just signs of God's faithfulness, steady provision, and faithfulness. It just becomes the baseline for us and we need to guard against that.

It's just another day. Is it? If it is, It's just because God's faithful. Now the nations around Israel worshiped these created things. The sun, moon, and stars.

But Israel was taught by God that all of them were simply creations. They weren't worthy of worship, they were made just like you were made. Spoken into existence ex nihilo. This is a Latin phrase that means out of nothing. The reason I bring it up is if you read about creation, theologians will use that term a lot.

Ex nihilo, it's just a Latin phrase that means out of nothing, from nothing. God spoke these things into existence. God told his people, don't do that, don't worship created things. Worship me the creator. Israel got into all kinds of trouble on this.

But It wasn't because God didn't warn them, He did warn them. The things that I have made are so remarkable, you're going to have an impulse to worship them because they're that great. But don't worship them, I'm that much greater, I made them. Psalm 19 verse 1, the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows his handiwork. We look into the sky and see all these marvelous things.

We shouldn't worship them. We should say, God, These things are declaring your glory. These are just your handiwork. Just the stars, the work of your fingers. Like that was back in Psalm 8, the stars of the work of his fingers.

Romans 1, 19 and 20, Paul writes, what may be known about God is manifest in us. What may be known about God is on display in us, Because God has shown it to us. For since the creation of the world, God's invisible attributes are clearly seen being understood by the things that are made. You can look at the things that are made and understand about the invisible attributes, the eternal invisible attributes of the God who could do this. Even his eternal power and Godhead so that they, so that we are without excuse.

So even If you never had a Bible, you had a sky. I didn't have a Bible. I have an excuse. Nope. You had a sky.

You don't have an excuse. Surely, you should have known that there was a God that must be worshiped. Look at the sky. Consider the God who did that and worship him. Find it.

This is your homework. Find a good cloudless night and get away from the city lights and look up and worship God. You have six months, go. God saw that it was good so the evening and the morning were the fourth day. Verses 20 through 23.

Then God said, Let the waters abound with an abundance of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the face of the firmament of the heavens. So God created great sea creatures and every living thing that moves with which the waters abounded according to their kind. And every winged bird according to its kind. God saw that it was good and God blessed them saying Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters and the seas and let birds multiply in the earth. So the evening and the morning were the fifth day.

This is day five of creation week. On day five, God fills the waters with an abundance of living creatures and the sky with flying creatures, the birds. He created great sea creatures, great white sharks, and blue whales. You've been to a football game, between the gull lines there's a hundred yards. A blue whale can be a hundred yards.

It can go from gull line to gull line, a blue whale. This is a great sea creatures. This is an aside. I think I have time for it. Just read a book that is the real account of what the fictional account Moby Dick was based on.

And it was a real account of real people who were really out in the middle of the ocean wailing for sperm whales and the great bull of this pod of whales because they were attacking His family members attacked this ship and sunk them in the middle of the ocean. In the book is about them trying to get home thousands of miles on land within just these little whaling boats. Fascinating. They estimated that the sperm whale that sank this ship by battering it, by ramming it, was 80 feet long. So Jaws, the mythical great white shark, was supposed to be 25 feet long.

So you would have to triple that and add 10 feet to get to the size of the sperm whale that sank a ship in the middle of the ocean. Amazing. That is a great sea creature. And giant squid. And even megalodons and plesiosauruses.

If you look at pictures of what they think the mythical Loch Ness monster is, that is what a plesiosaurus looks like and they're in the fossil record. We know about megalodons and the plesiosauruses, they've gone extinct But they were here, they're in the fossil record, they're great sea creatures. And God created trillions and trillions and trillions of smaller fish. I do believe, how many fish are there in the world? If Google ever goes down early on a Sunday morning, I'm sunk, I'm sure of it.

How many fish are there in the world? Here's what Google says. The best estimate is 3.5 trillion. I don't know how you estimate that, but that's the estimate. And that's a lot.

There are 35, 000 known species of fish, and they're finding hundreds of new species every year. So 35, 000 distinct different kinds of fishes, and they keep finding them and counting. Verse 21 says that God created every single one of them. So God created great sea creatures and every living thing that moves with which the waters abounded, according to their kind, and every winged bird according to its kind." So here we go again. According to its kind.

According to its kind. Google thinks that there are more than 11, 000 different species of birds. How many distinct kinds of birds are there? Well, of the ones that we've been able to name and catalog, we think there are 11, 000 and counting. So there's tremendous variation and tremendous beauty.

Some birds are just funny little creatures to watch. Bird watching is a thing, right? It's because it's wonderful. Some of them are terrifying. We have a hawk that comes to our backyard and I thought, what must it be like to be a squirrel in this world?

This terrifying beast is after you. Now we see something that we haven't seen on the other days of Creation Week. God blesses the aquatic creatures and the birds. God said, be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters and the seas and let birds multiply on the earth. God blessed them with the ability to reproduce and multiply.

Like reproducing like within a kind. These are the first living creatures as the Bible conceives of it. So this is the first time the Bible has talked about something God created and says, that's alive. It's with the fish and the birds. And they are blessed with the ability to reproduce and multiply.

Here's what Matthew Henry says. Matthew Henry says, fruitfulness is the effect of God's blessing and must be ascribed to it. The multiplying of the fish and fowl from year to year is still the fruit of this blessing. So thousands of years later they're still multiplying. It's just the fruit of God's blessing.

Google thinks there are 35, 000 species of fish. Google thinks there are 11, 000 species of birds. Not a bad day's work. What's on your to-do list? So the evening and the morning were the fifth day.

Finally, verses 24 and 25. Then God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature according to its kind. Cattle and creeping thing and beast of the earth each according to its kind. And it was so. God made the beast of the earth according to its kind.

Cattle according to its kind and everything that creeps on the earth according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. This is the beginning of day six of Creation Week. We'll split this in two because mankind as image bearers deserves its own message. So we'll break that off for next week.

At the beginning of day six of creation week, God commanded the earth to bring forth the living land creatures, cattle and creeping thing and beast of the earth. I'm not sure how much or little to make of these distinctions. Here's a note from the Reformation Heritage Study Bible. The beast of the earth, wild animals, Cattle, animals subject to domestication. I would add from looking at the Hebrew word livestock.

Every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, reptiles like crocodiles and lizards as well as insects that crawl on the ground. All the land creatures are made on the sixth day. How many species of animals live on land? Meaning how many distinct types of land animals. Current estimates range from 5.5 to 6.5 million species of land animals.

Not 5.5 to 5.6 million land animals, 5.5 to 6.5 million kinds of land animals. I find that hard to believe. That's what Google says. And then there's another estimated 6 million species of insects. I can actually believe that.

I think most of those are on my property in the summertime. Again, not a bad day's work. Great day's work, God. All that variation, all those species, as with the fish and birds, Scripture describes these as living creatures. So we get the exact same phrase again here, living creatures, as opposed to plant life.

So that's what I put in my notes and then I thought, I called it plant life. That's how we think of it. We think of plants as alive, but as the Bible defines it, the Bible makes a distinction. So they have characteristics of life for sure. The Bible is calling fish, birds, land animals, insects as living creatures.

When we get to the history of the global flood months from now, in Genesis chapter 7, we'll read this in Genesis 722. All of whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life, all that was on dry land died. So it's talking about what died in the flood, and the definition was all in whose nostrils was the breath and the spirit of life. So they breathe and they have this spirit of life. This something that's not tangible can't bring you a cube of the spirit of life.

It's not tangible, but it's something that makes things alive. The second after something dies, all the chemicals are the same, all the substances are the same, but this intangible thing is gone. Applications, I'll give you three. Number one, God is way ahead of your every need. He's so far ahead, he's an eternity ahead of your every need.

God is many steps ahead with our needs. He's going to create man, He's setting all these things in place before man ever needed it. Water, dry land, but they need to be separate. There needs to be water below and water above. Takes care of all of that before man has a day on planet Earth.

He knows them all. He knows all of your needs, all my needs, and sets things in motion to supply what we need before we need them. And very often, before we even know that we need them. Do you remember our time in the book of Esther? Esther is wonderful, because God is setting in motion the salvation of the Jews before there's ever a threat to the Jews.

They don't even know that they need salvation. God is putting a Jewish in the palace. They're not even in trouble yet. God's like that. God's way ahead of you.

You don't have needs that are catching God by surprise at all. He knows about them all. He's already set things up. We should cultivate this mindset. God, I have these needs.

I have no idea how you're going to go to supply this need, but I'll bet God you set the supply of my needs in motion a long time before I ever knew I was going to need this. We have a right. Christians have a birthright to think that way based on Creation Week. And, and, and, and, and, that's the message of scripture. God's ahead of us.

Two, everything God made was good. Good, good. He looked on it. He made it. He looked on it.

He said that it was good. He saw that it was good. We ruined it and we are ruining it to a certain extent. There are some places and times where you say, this is the ruined version? Because it's so magnificent.

This is the ruined version. This is what it is after we've ruined it with sin and rebellion. We ruined it and are ruining it to a certain extent with sin and rebellion against God. Here's what Matthew Poole says, God saw that it was good. This clause is so often added to show that all the disorders, evil and hurtful qualities, that now are in the creatures, are not to be imputed to God, who made All of them good but to man's sin which has corrupted their nature and perverted their use.

Amen. I'm so glad. God made it. God looked at it and saw that it was good. And again, step and repeat.

And repeat, and repeat, and repeat. So that we know the problems that we're experiencing, that's not to be imputed to God. We did this. Okay, three, finally. Turn Creation Week loose on your fears.

Let's turn it loose. We're learning about the God of Creation Week. What He can do in six days. Millions and millions of species separating land from seas, lights in the heavens, 200 billion stars in our galaxies and 100 billion galaxies. We don't even know, we're just guessing.

My guess is That's low. Set what we're learning in creation week loose on your fears. I want to end by reading Isaiah 43 verses 1 and 2. Isaiah 43 verses 1 and 2. But now thus says the Lord, who created you, O Jacob, and who formed you, O Israel, fear not, for I have redeemed you.

I have called you by your name. You are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you. And through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, nor shall the flame scorch you.

The God who formed you, the God who formed everything you see around you, is with you in all the hardships and all the things that you're afraid of. The God of Creation Week is with you. He says, don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. I'm with you.

Turn creation week loose on your fears. The God of creation week is with us in the things that we're afraid of. We actually don't have to be afraid. He's so faithful. He is present with his people.

Let's pray. God, this is glorious. And the Implications of it are such a comfort. So I pray that we would see the majesty of what you did in that week and It would take our breath away, but I think I pray that the implications of it wouldn't be lost on us And when you tell us don't be afraid that we would believe in our heart of hearts, that the God of Creation Week is at our right hand. Thank you God for being present with your people so we don't need to be afraid.

In Jesus' name, amen.