CRITICAL NOTES.—
Genesis 1:14. Lights] “Luminaries:” Heb. me’ôrôth, sing, mâʼôr, not ’ôr as in Genesis 1:3: Sept. phôstêr here, phôs there. There was “light” before the fourth day
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Genesis 1:14-19
THE HEAVENLY BODIES
As we have seen, light had been created before; and now the heavenly bodies are introduced into the complete exercise of their light-giving purpose.
I. The heavenly bodies were called into existence by God. “And God said, Let there be lights in the firmanent of the heaven,” &c. On this supposition only, that the heavenly bodies were called into space by the word of God, can we account for their magnitude, variety, and splendour?
1. Their magnitude. Only a Divine voice could have called the great worlds into being which people the realms of space. They would not have yielded obedience to the command of man had He spoken never so loud and long. True, magnitude is not always associated with power, but sometimes with weakness; yet the vastness of the great heavens above us is such as we can only connect with the voice and power of God.
2. Their variety. There is the sun, moon, stars. The sun to rule the day. The moon to rule the night. The stars to be the bright attendants of the midnight Queen. The star-light sky is the very emblem of variety, as to magnitude, number, and beauty.
3. Their splendour. What artist could put the splendour of the evening sky upon his canvass? What speaker could describe the glory of the midnight heaven? The stars, shining out from the violet deeps of night, are as brilliant lights in the dome of our earth-house, and are as the bright carpet of heaven. Before this unrivalled scene all human effort to attain grandeur is feeble, all the achievements of art or science are powerless to imitate it; yet one tone of the Divine voice was sufficient to bid the heavenly bodies move into their spheres and work, in which they will continue until the same voice bids them halt in their celestial course.
1. The call was Omnipotent. Man could not have kindled the great lights of the universe. They are above his reach. They are deaf to his voice. They ofttimes strike him with fear. The sun-light has to be modified before he can use it. The moon is beyond the control of man, or he would never permit her waning. The brighest seraph, whose whole being is aglow with the light of God, could not have flung these celestial orbs into the heavens. Cherubim shed their lustre in other spheres, and for other purposes. They cannot create an atom. How the power of God is lifted above that of the most dignified creature He has made. His voice is omnipotent, and is therefore sufficient to call the sun, moon, and stars to their work. Only Infinite Wisdom could have uttered this behest to the heavenly bodies.
2. The call was wise. The idea of the midnight sky, as now beheld by us, could never have originated in a finite mind. The thought was above the mental life of seraphs. It was the outcome of an Infinite intelligence. And nowhere throughout the external universe do we see the wisdom of God as in the complicated arrangement, continual motions, and yet easily working and harmony of the heavenly bodies. There is no confusion. There is no disorder. They need no re-adjustment. They are alike the admiration of art and science. In their study the greatest genius has exhausted its energy. The great clock of the world never needs repairs, nor even the little process of winding up. The midnight sky is the open page of wisdom’s grandest achievements.
3. The call was benevolent. The sun is one of the most kindly gifts of God to the world; it makes the home of man a thing of beauty. Also the light of the moon is welcome to multitudes who have to wend their way by land or sea, amid the stillness of night, to some far-off destination.
4. The call was typal. The same Being who has placed so many lights in the heavens, can also suspend within the firmament of the soul the lights of truth, hope, and immortality. The sun of the soul need never set; our thought and feeling may be ever touched by its beauty, until the light of earth’s transient day shall break into the eternal light of the heavenly Temple.
II. The purposes for which the heavenly bodies are designed.
1. They were to be for lights. There had been light before. But now it is to be realised; it is to become brighter, clearer, and fuller, more fit for all the requirements of human life. Hence, at the command of God, all the lamps of the universe were lighted for the convenience and utility of man. They are unrivalled, should be highly prized, faithfully used, carefully studied, and devotionally received. These lights were regnant:—
(1.) Their rule is authoritative.
(2.) It is extensive.
(3.) They were alternate.
(4.) It is munificent.
(5.) It is benevolent.
(6.) It is welcome. A pattern for all monarchs.
2. They were made to divide the day from the night. Thus the heavenly bodies were not only intended to give light, but also to indicate and regulate the time of man, that he might be reminded of the mighty change, and rapid flight of life. But the recurrence of day and night also proclaim the need of exertion and repose, hence they call to work, as well as remind of the grave.
3. To be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years. The moon by her four quarters, which last each a little more than seven days, measures for us the weeks and the months. The sun, by his apparent path in the sky, measures our seasons and our years, whilst by his daily rotation through the heavens he measures the days and the hours; and this he does so correctly that the best watch makers in Geneva regulate all their watches by his place at noon; and from the most ancient times men have measured from sun dials the regular movement of the shadow. It has been well said that the progress of a people in civilization may be estimated by their regard for time,—their care in measuring and valuing it. Our time is a loan. It is God’s gift to us. We ought to use it as faithful stewards. We shall have to give an account of its use. “O Lord, so teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom” (Psalms 90:12). “Evening, and morning, and at noon, will I cry aloud; and He shall hear my voice.” Thus the solar system is man’s great teacher, monitor, and benefactor.
III. A few deductions from this subject.
1. The greatness and Majesty of God. How terrible must be the Creator of the sun. How tranquil must be that Being who has given light to the moon. How unutterably great must be the Author of that vast solar system. One glance into the heavens is enough to overawe man with a sense of the Divine majesty.
2. The humility that should characterise the soul of man. “When I consider the heavens the work of Thine hand,” &c. What great thing is there in man that Thou art mindful of him? Man, a little lower than the angels, should rival them in the devotion and humility of his soul. Under the broad heaven man must feel his littleness, though he cannot but be conscious of his greatness, in that so grand a curtain was spread out for him by the Infinite Creator.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Genesis 1:14. God has placed the lights above us:—
1. As ornaments of His throne.
2. To shew forth His majesty.
3. That they may the more conveniently give their light to all parts of the world.
4. To manifest that light comes from heaven, from the Father of Lights.
5. The heavens are most agreeable to the nature of these lights.
6. By their moving above the world at so great a distance, they help to discover the vast circuit of the heavens.
The heavenly bodies:—
1. Not to honour them as gods.
2. To honour God in and by them. (Psalms 8:1; 1 Timothy 6:16; Isaiah 6:2.)
The place and use of creatures are assigned unto them by God:—
1. That He may manifest His sovereignty.
2. That He may establish a settled order amongst the creatures.
3. Let all men abide in their sphere and calling.
(1.) To testify their obedience to the will of God.
(2.) As God knows what is best for us.
(3.) As assured that God will prosper all who fulfil His purpose concerning them.
The highest creatures are ordained by God for use and service:—
1. Men of the highest rank should apply themselves to some employment for the good of others.
2. They are ordained for it.
3. They are honoured thereby.
4. They are bound thereunto by the law of love.
5. They will be rewarded hereafter.
6. Christ has set them an example.
The night is a Divine ordination:—
1. To set bounds to man’s labour.
2. To temperate the air.
3. To allow the refreshing dews to fall upon the earth.
4. To manifest the comfort of light by its removal.
The stars a sign:—
1. Of the providence of God.
2. Of the olden folly of men.
3. Of the changing moods of life.
These luminaries are sometimes made by God amazing signs of grace and justice.
These luminaries have natural significations at all times.
Power and influence, as two causes, God hath given to the luminaries.
Genesis 1:15. Light:—
1. Its speed.
2. Its profusion.
3. Its beauty.
4. Its joy.
The excellencies of creatures are not of themselves, but are the gift of God:
1. Because all perfections are originally in God, and therefore must come by way of dispensation from Him.
2. That the honour of all might return to Him alone.
3. Let men acknowledge all their abilities as from God.
4. Seeking all at His hand.
5. Enjoying them without pride.
6. Giving thanks to Him for them.
7. Using them to His glory.
What it was that carried the light about the world before the sun was made is uncertain; only this is evident, that when God had created the body of the sun, and made it fit for that use, He planted the light therein; and then that other means ceased, whatsoever it was. So that where God provides ordinary means, there He usually takes away those which are extraordinary:—
1. Because God makes nothing in vain, and consequently removes that for which there is no further use.
2. Lest other ordinary means should be dispised.
3. Let no man depend upon extraordinary means.
Though the planets are so far distant from us, yet this does not interrupt their light and influence. So distance cannot hinder us from receiving the benefit of God’s care.
1. Though God’s influence be in heaven, yet His eye beholds the children of men.
2. Let no man’s heart fail him because God seems so far off.
3. Let not distance, either in place or condition hinder our desires for the good of others.
Genesis 1:16-19. God proportions the abilities of His creatures according to the uses in which He employs them:—
1. Thus is the natural outcome of the Divine wisdom and sufficiency.
2. Necessary to make the workman equal to his task.
Men must make use of light to guide and direct them in all their employments.
Though all the creatures are not furnished alike, yet none of them lack that which is necessary for their use and employment:—
1. Let no man repine at his condition.
2. Let no man envy another.
3. All degrees of men are useful.
4. We cannot enjoy true happiness without attention to the meanest duties around us.
5. We know not to what the meanest may be advanced hereafter.
God provides for the government of the day as well as of the night:—
1. He can do it, as light and darkness are alike to him.
2. He must do it to keep the world in order.
3. The night cannot hide our sins from God.
These lights were good works of God. These glorious works must lead to Creator.
SUGGESTIVE ILLUSTRATIONS
God in Nature! Genesis 1:14. The heavens declare the glory of God. But not the heavens ONLY. There are many sources whence we may derive some faint glimpse of the divine glory. Yet we must be inside to see clearly. Standing within a cathedral, and looking through its stained and figured windows towards the light, we behold the forms and colours by the light. Standing outside and gazing at the same windows, we see nothing but blurred and indistinct enamelling. And so we must stand within the temple-pile of nature if we would see the glaring hues of divine glory, especially in the outburstings of noontide splendour, in the silent pomp of the noiseless night, in the moon walking in her brightness like some fair spirit wading through the opposing clouds of adversity in the starry garden of the firmament, those flowers of the sky budding with hopes of immortality. Thus worshipping reverently within nature’s cathedral, we see that
“The heavens are a point from the pen of His perfection;
The world is a rosebud from the bower of His beauty;
The sun is a spark from the light of His wisdom.”—Sir Wm. Jones.
Sun! Genesis 1:15. Dr. Hayes, the arctic explorer, graphically describes the return of the sun after an absence of long cold months. For several days the golden flush deepens until the burning forehead of the “King of Day” rises above the horizon to circle round it half the year. The inexpressible delight with which the morning glory is hailed almost makes one cease to wonder that the sun has had devout worshippers.—
“Most glorious orb! thou wert a worship, ere
The mystery of thy making was revealed!
Thou earliest minister of the Almighty,
Which gladdened, on their mountain tops, the hearts
Of the Chaldean shepherds, till they poured
Themselves in orisons.”—Byron.
Sun and Moon! Genesis 1:15. We consider the sun the type of Christ, and the moon as the type of the Church. It is remarkable that at the crucifixion the sun was obscured, and the moon was at the full. But though she has suffered many an eclipse, yet like the moon the Church of Christ emerges from them all by keeping on her path of obedience:—
“And still that light upon the world
Its guiding splendour throws;
Bright in the opening hours of life,
But brighter at its close.”—Peabody.
Tides! Genesis 1:16. The influences of the Holy Spirit upon the life of the Christian Church has been likened to that of the moon upon our earth. The return of the tide twice every day is owing to the attractive influence which the moon exerts upon our world, and especially upon its great movable fluid the ocean. What a mysterious page of nature does this fact open, when we thus behold ourselves linked as it were with a distant world by an invisible chain figure that wonderful power by which the life of the Church and her true members is kept motion, purity and holiness! Well may that moon be called the “Queen of Heaven”—
“Who, from her maiden face
Shedding her cloudy locks, looks meekly forth,
And with her virgin stars walks in the heavens,
Walks nightly there, conversing as she walks
Of purity, and holiness, and God.”—Pollok.
Starlight. Genesis 1:16. Those bright and beautiful stars are witnesses for God. They tell us that He is—that He is very great and good. This was the impression upon the mind of a man of God in the olden time, when he sang how the heavens proclaim the glory of God. Not many years ago, during the terrible French Revolution, when godless men murdered their king and princes in France, an attempt was made to obliterate all trace of God. Bibles were burnt, churches were shut up, sabbaths were abolished, and Christians were cruelly slain. One of these revolutionists accosted a pious countryman with the jaunty assurance that he was going to pull down the “village church” in order that there “might be nothing left to remind you of God or religion.” To this the pious peasant responded, “Then you will have to blot out the stars, which are older than our church tower, much higher up in the sky—beyond your reach.” Yes, it is not the unwearied sun only which displays the Creator’s power, it is not the man only which publishes to every land the work of an Almighty hand; but—
“All the stars that round her burn,
And all the planets in their turn,
Confirm the tidings as they roll,
And spread the truth from pole to pole”—Addison.
Sunlight! Genesis 1:17. There is a good story told about a certain missionary and the sun. He was talking one day with a heathen man, who said:—“I go to the place where you worship, but I never see your God.” The missionary, stepping out of the house into the open air, bathed in the brilliant beauty of the noontide sun, pointed up to it, and said to the enquirer, “Look at yonder sun.” The man tried to look but instantly turned away his face, and covered his eyes with his hands, exclaiming, “It blinds me.” And the man of God quickly responded by telling him that yon sun was but one of the numerous retinue of his God, and stationed merely on the outside of God’s palace. “If you cannot bear to look at one of His servants, how can you expect to see the master of that servant—the great God who made him.”
“God spake, and on the new-dressed earth
Soft smiled the glowing sun,
Then full of joy he sprung aloft,
His heavenly course to run.”—Krumacher.
Sun-Rule! Genesis 1:18. The sun is like the father of a family with his children gathered round him. A good father always governs his children well; and the better they are governed, the happier and more useful they will be. The sun is such a father—governing well those different worlds which are like children about him. He keeps them all in the places which God wants them to be in, and at the same time he sees that they are all going round—each in his own path, just as God wants them to do. This power he enjoys from God. Through Him
“His beams the sea-girt earth array,
King of the sky, and father of the day.”—Logan.
Sun-Good! Genesis 1:18. The sun is the fountain of light to this lower world. Day by day it rises on us with its gladdening beams. All nature seems to own its influence, both for light, heat, faithfulness, and beauty. Christ is, says Trower, to the moral world, what the sun is to the natural world—the source of life and loveliness, health and happiness. He rises with healing in His wings—scatters the mists of ignorance and sin—calls forth the fruits of righteousness—and arrays them in splendour, outrivalling the brilliant beams of the rainbow. And as the natural sun retains his strength undimmed though ages have rolled past, so the Divine Sun remains at His sacred, high, eternal noon. And
“As the sun
Doth spread his radiance through the fields of air,
And kindle in revolving stars his blaze,
He pours upon their hearts the splendour of
His rays.”—Upham.
Moonlight! Genesis 1:18. All the beauty of the moon is but the reflection of the glory of the sun. She has no light of her own, and shines only by reflecting or giving away the light which she receives from the dazzling orb of day. When a piece of looking-glass is held in the sunshine, it causes a bright light to dance about on the opposite wall. This is exactly what the moon does; she catches the beams of light which it receives from the sun, and throws them down. The moon hangs in the sky, and becomes as much like the sun as it can by reflecting the light which that orb gives it; just so when we become Christians, we not only learn to love Jesus, but try to be like Him. And when we do this we are reflecting the light that Jesus gives us; just as the moon, the queen of the midnight hour, and for ever beautiful, softly and silently pours
“Her chasten’d radiance on the scene below;
And hill, and dale, and tower
Drink the pure flood of light.”—Neele.
Two Suns! Genesis 1:19. There is this difference between the Sun of Righteousness and that in the sky—that, whereas the latter by his presence eclipses all his satellite-attendants, the Former, though radiant with a much brighter splendour, will by His presence impart glory to His saints. When Christ, who is our Life, shall appear, then shall we also appear with Him in glory. So that the saints are not like stars which the sunshine obscures and makes to disappear; but they are, as Boyle defines it, like polished silver, or those vaster balls of burnished brass upon the cathedral dome which shine the more they are shone upon, and which derive their glittering brightness from the sun’s refulgent beams
“Made hereby apter to receive
Perfection from the Sun’s most potent ray.”