Let There Be Lights in the Sky
to Separate Day from Night
1: 14-19
Let there be lights in the sky and separate day from night DIG: What happened on the fourth day of creation? What did the fourth day have to do with the first day? How did the sun and the moon and the stars come into being? What are the so-called “ten commandments of creation?” What has pop-culture done to the sun, the moon and the stars today? Why was there no need for anything to evolve?
REFLECT: How are you feeling about the Word of God meaning what it says? How does that affect your approach to the Bible? To life? How do you feel about the moral principles that Elohim has given us? Do you think just because the LORD has sent down moral principles, that He wants us to follow them perfectly? Why? Why not? What does He want us to do?
Science has always struggled to explain how all the stars and planets in the universe came into being. How does something evolve out of nothing? A fourth day gives us the answer. God made them all (to see link click Lw – The Witness of the Stars). He spoke them into existence. And when we realize this, it is perplexing and amazing that ADONAI has always had the human race at the center of the universe. David realized this when he wrote: When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him (Psalm 8:3-4)?
As we arrive at a fourth day we enter the second phase of the Creation week (to read more about his click – here). The purpose of the fourth day is to fill the work of the first day. Therefore, the light and the darkness of the first day are filled by the sun and the moon on the fourth day.
And God said (1:14a). There is no evolutionary process here; He creates instantly by His Word alone. He is Elohim, the God of Creation. When He speaks He creates something out of nothing. In the words of the psalmist: By the word of the LORD were the heavens made, their starry host by the breath of His mouth. He gathers the waters of the sea into jars; He puts the deep into storehouses. Let all the earth fear the LORD; let all the people of the world revere Him. For He spoke, and it came to be; He commanded, and it stood still (Psalm 33:6-9).
On the first day God had said: Let there be light (or). But on the fourth day He said: Let there be lights or light givers (ma-or) (14a). The Sh’khinah glory came first (see the commentary on Isaiah Ju – The Glory of the LORD Rises Upon You), and then the generator of light, the sun, and the reflector of light, the moon, came later. They are both light givers. This follows a logical order and the biblical order. The word light is used seven times on the fourth day.
God said: Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night (verse 14b). Ten times in this chapter we will find the phrase: Let there be. Some have called these “the ten commandments of creation.”29 And let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years (verse 14c). The sun determines our days. The moon determines our months. And the stars, sun, and moon all determine our seasons and years. Everything on earth is perfectly in sync to a twenty-four hour day and this reflects the design of a Master Designer who set things in their proper place and set them in motion.30 And let them be light in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth (1:15a). From this day on, sunlight became the main source of light and energy on the earth.
The fulfillment: And, as always happens when the LORD commands, it was so (1:15b).
The action: God made two great lights, the greater light, or the sun, to govern the day and the lesser light, the moon, to govern the night (1:16a). The rabbis teach that they were originally created the same size but the moon was reduced because it demanded greater power than the sun. Psalm 136:9 also says that Elohim made two great lights and set the sun to govern the day and the stars help the moon govern the night. The phrases the greater light and the lesser light are very similar in other Semitic languages and are the names of deities. The people of most Mediterranean religions worshiped the sun, the moon, and the stars. Cults developed to worship each of these. This is a rejection of that concept. The Bible says that these luminaries are not eternal; they are not gods, they were created and should not be worshiped. And by the way: He also made the stars (1:16b). The rabbis teach that the stars were created as satellites to the moon, to appease it for being diminished in size. The stars are mentioned here almost as an afterthought, most likely because of the emphasis on the sun and the moon. When we get to 3:15, we will see that the stars were set in place to give an account of the Gospel in pictorial fashion, but were distorted at the Tower of Babel (11:1-9).
There are three reasons why God set them in the expanse of the sky: first, to give light on the earth; secondly, to govern the day and the night (1:17a-18a), and thirdly, to separate light from darkness (1:18a). ADONAI still does that today. There are those today who ask, “How can I tell what is moral or immoral?” God has drawn that line in the sand of time. Elohim says what is moral because He puts down moral principles and gives us a conscience. Just as God separates the light from the darkness, He separates moral people from the immoral ones by their own choices. He did it in the beginning and He still does it today. He doesn’t want us to be perfect because He knows that is impossible, but He does want us to believe in the One who is perfect. Yeshua said: Whoever believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within them (Yochanan 7:38)!
The evaluation: And God saw that it was good (1:18b). Everything was exactly as He planned it. There was no need for anything to evolve because it was already good.
The numbering of each day: And there was evening, and there was morning – a fourth day (1:19). The rhythm of evening and morning continued as it had from the beginning, but now it was governed, as it has been ever since, by the setting and rising of the sun. Creation week was now passed the halfway point. And God’s glory and splendor were already being revealed in all that He had made. As the psalmist wrote: O LORD, our LORD, how majestic is Your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens (Psalm 8:1).31
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