Week 1 - New Year in Genesis

Tim White, who serves as the chaplain for Brindlee Mountain Fire Apparatus, begins by addressing the new year and taking the audience back to the beginning of time as recounted in the first two chapters of Genesis.

The speaker paraphrases the creation story, noting that creation started with God:

  * God created light.

  * He separated the waters from the heavens and the earth.

  * He created land and all the vegetation, including an estimated half a million named plants, with scientists believing millions more have yet to be discovered and named.

  * He created the sun, moon, and stars. The speaker mentions there are roughly 200 billion trillion stars that can be seen. The Bible, in Psalms 147:4, says God numbers and names every single one of them, and Isaiah 40:26 also mentions God creating and naming them.

  * He created fish, with approximately 30,000 known species.

  * He created animals, with roughly 1.5 million known species, and scientists estimate another million species are unknown.

  * He created birds of the air, with roughly 10,000 known species.

All of these creations were spoken into existence by the creator.

The last thing God created was man. Unlike everything else, God did not speak the first man, Adam, into existence. Instead, God "took his time and he lovingly formed him from the dust of the earth". The speaker emphasizes that God painstakingly, with his hands, personally crafted man, getting all the features just right. Every part of the human body has a purpose and a reason for being created the way it was. After Adam was formed, God breathed life into him, and Adam became a living human being. God then created Eve from a rib taken out of Adam because he knew Adam needed a helpmate. A helpmate means she was created to be a "complimentary partner and a counterpart for him".

Tim explains that the reason for discussing the beginning of creation at the start of the new year is that "you and I were created to have a relationship with God". There is a void inside everyone that longs to be filled, and God is the only one who fits that void.

The speaker encourages the audience to make a point of getting to know God better, especially since he created people so lovingly and patiently. For those new to Christianity or needing a fresh start, the speaker recommends creating a habit of spending time with God. The suggestion is to:

  * Read the Bible for five minutes a day. If new to the Bible, the speaker recommends starting in the New Testament, perhaps the Gospels, because the Old Testament can be "a little bit heavy".

  * Spend about five minutes in prayer, which is simply having a conversation with God.

  * Add about five minutes of praise and worship, suggesting finding Christian radio or worship music on Spotify.