our daily bread

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Dexu Xia

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Nov 14, 2017, 10:20:17 PM11/14/17

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The Good Earth

God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so. . . . And God saw that it was good. Genesis 1:9–10

While orbiting the moon in 1968, Apollo 8 astronaut Bill Anders described the crew’s close-up view of the moonscape. He called it “a foreboding horizon . . . a stark and unappetizing-looking place.” Then the crew took turns reading to a watching world from Genesis 1:1–10. After Commander Frank Borman finished verse 10, “And God saw that it was good,” he signed off with, “God bless all of you, all of you on the good Earth.”

The opening chapter of the Bible insists on two facts:

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 1:1

Creation is God’s work. The phrase “and God said . . .” beats in cadence all the way through the chapter. The entire magnificent world we live in is the product of His creative work. All that follows in the Bible reinforces the message of Genesis 1: Behind all of history, there is God.

Creation is good. Another sentence tolls softly, like a bell, throughout this chapter. “And God saw that it was good.” Much has changed since that first moment of creation. Genesis 1 describes the world as God wanted it, before any spoiling. Whatever beauty we sense in nature today is a faint echo of the pristine state God created.

The Apollo 8 astronauts saw Earth as a brightly colored ball hanging alone in space. It looked at once awesomely beautiful and fragile. It looked like the view from Genesis 1.

O tell of His might, O sing of His grace, whose robe is the light, whose canopy space; His chariots of wrath the deep thunderclouds form, and dark is His path on the wings of the storm. Robert Grant

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 1:1

美好的地球

上帝说：“天下的水要聚在一处，使旱地露出来。”事就这样成了。……上帝看着是好的。-创世记1章9-10节

在1968年，当阿波罗8号环绕月球飞行时，机组人员拍摄到月球的特写，太空人威廉．安德斯如此描述月球：“一个阴森……苍茫荒芜的地方。”接着，三位太空人对全球电视机前的观众，轮流朗读创世记1章1-10节。指挥官弗兰克．博尔曼读完第10节：“上帝看着是好的。”之后，他总结道：“愿上帝赐福与你们，所有住在美好地球上的人们。”

创世记1章强调两个事实：创造是上帝之工。整章以“上帝说”贯穿全文。我们所居住的浩瀚世界，是祂以无限的巧思所创造的。接下来，整本圣经都不断强调创世记1章的信息：在历史的背后确实有一位上帝。

受造物是美好的。“上帝看着是好的”这句话贯彻全章。创世记1章所描述的世界是未经任何破坏，上帝原本创造的风貌。但世事变迁，沧海桑田。今日我们所欣赏的美丽大自然，只能稍微反映出上帝原始的完美创造。

阿波罗8号太空人看到的地球，是光辉灿烂、多彩多姿，悬挂在太空中的星球。它看起来璀璨夺目且美丽精致，这正是创世记1章描写的景象。

主权能慈爱，我们当颂赞，光辉是主袍，穹苍是主幔，满布雷电密云，当作主车乘，
弥漫暴雨风狂，深藏主路径。