What does the Church teach about the Father of Jesus Christ? Part Four

In today’s post, we will begin to look at God the Father as the creator of heaven and earth.   In this post, we will look at the initial creation of the world.   In the next post, we will look at how God the Father continues to guide creation through what we term divine providence.

What are the very first words of the Bible?  "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." (Genesis 1:1)   So the story of salvation begins with creation, and so our individual stories begin with our own creation.

It is critical that we examine creation because it helps answer some questions like “Where did the world including myself, come from?”, and “Where are we going?”  Creation helps us understand not just about our origin, but our end, as well. 

To this end, there are different theories about creation out there: for example we can hear things like:  

• the world is evil, a result of sin
• the world is God
• the development of the world is the development of God
• the world has always existed and is just material things, or perhaps
• God created the world, but then abandoned it to men 

It is human, the Catechism points out, to inquire about man’s origins.  It is a good thing to do so. We can, as we have alluded to, come to know God as creator through natural reason.   

However, as we have also stated, there is another order of knowledge, Divine Revelation.  Through Revelation, we come to know this Creator is Father, and we are confirmed in our knowledge of him as Creator.   One channel of Revelation, as we have spoken about, is Sacred Scripture. The first three books of Genesis (the creation of the world in seven days, the creation of man and woman, and the fall) are of prime importance in telling the truth about creation.

Going back again to those very first few words in Genesis, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."  , the Catechism in #290 notes that this sentence confirms three things:

1)      the eternal God gave a beginning to all that exists outside of himself

2)      he alone is Creator (the verb "create" - Hebrew bara - always has God for its subject)

3)      The totality of what exists (expressed by the formula "the heavens and the earth") depends on the One who gives it being

So our world (and the world to come) had a beginning, a beginning that was caused by God alone without any help, this world is not God, but rather a separate entity from him, and everything in this world and in the world to come, however, is caused by him. 

In the Trinity, it is indeed the Father who creates, but he creates by the Son.  "In the beginning was the Word. . . and the Word was God. . . all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made John 1:1-5.   So it is entirely appropriate that we are speaking about creation in this series on God the Father.

Why did God the Father create the world?  The Church teaches that God did so to show his glory, and share it.   This is an act of omnipotence, but more importantly, of love and goodness.   The act of creation was one of wisdom and love, not chance.   Since the act was wise, so the creation itself is necessarily therefore ordered and good.  God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good Genesis 1:31.   

But beyond just creating the world, he also sustains it.    We read in #301: With creation, God does not abandon his creatures to themselves. He not only gives them being and existence, but also, and at every moment, upholds and sustains them in being, enables them to act and brings them to their final end.

As we stated at the beginning, we will speak more about the ongoing process of creation in the next post.

Joseph, mode of artisans, pray for us.