Creation as Trust

I. Why Call God Creator?
Nicene Creed: God is "maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible."
Creation names a set of relationships that show the universe to be the work of our trustworthy God.
Affirming creation is a trusting response ("all things ... invisible", Heb 11:3).
The traditional proofs of God's existence articulate rather than "prove" these relationships.
These relationships are Trinitarian: the Father creates through and for the Son, by and in the Holy Spirit (Gen 1, Ps 33:6, John 1, 1 Cor 8, Col 1, Irenaeus, Nicene Creed).
They are also complex, ordered, and coherent,
yielding what rivals and alternatives cannot: what Christians mean by faith or trust.
II. "formless and void" (Gen 1:2): creatio prima/immediata
God caused the universe from nothing (creatio ex nihilo: Gen 1:1-2, Gen 2:4b-6).
Israel's being, deliverance, and life all owe to one God (Deut 5-6).
Alternatives to unmediated creation:
1. Polytheism and dualism: The universe has many causes and powers (generally violent: Enuma Elish).
2. Pantheism and atheism: All is God (or there is none); the universe is absolute and self-realizing.
3. Platonism and process theology: God forms a pre-existing universe (and must respect its limits).
III. "finished, and all their array" (Gen 2:1): creatio segunda or creatio mediata
God has ordered, formed, and detailed the universe in specific ways (Gen 1:3ff, Gen 2:7ff):
 
"tohu" (formless)
"bohu" (void)
 
1
light / darkness: day / night
day-light / night-light, stars;
to rule
4
2
water / sky
water-creatures / sky-birds;
to increase
5
3
earth / seas, vegetation
earth-creatures / adam;
to increase, be ruled or rule, eat
6
 
finished
arrayed
  
 
7 (shabbat): rest and blessing
 

God delights in creation's manyness, otherness, ordered relationship (Wisdom), and responsivity (Word).
Israel's complex life and structure all reflect its location in God's created order.
 
Alternatives to mediated creation:
4. Gnosticism: As "first cause," God only causes inferior, mediating creators; the world is essentially evil.
5. Renaissance/Ciceronian natural law(?): Specificities are arbitrary, owing entirely to governing scientific or moral rules and principles.
(Does evolution imply this? Moral, not scientific, reasons drive most arguments against it.)
This climaxes in the creation of humanity "in God's image" (Gen 1:25-26).
This implies unique roles within and over creation (Ps 8)
(images: Sistine Chapel, National Cathedral, Santiago de Compostela Cathedral, and a modern Pantocrator).
How do we image God? Theology has supplied a number of answers:
Having souls (metaphysical dualism, versus physicalism).
Our human appearance (cf. Finis Jennings Dake, who heretically inferred that God is physical).
Powers of reasoning or speaking (Athanasius), through our human mind (Augustine).
Specifically human community (Barth; cf. Gen 2:18): gendered families (tribes, tongues, and nations) rather than soul-receptacles (or other animals' social structures).
Vocation: cultivation of creation (Gen 1:26, Gen 2:15, Ps 8, Gen 9:6) as God's earthly representatives (Childs).
Israel's covenantal fellowship with God, cosmic authority, and holy likeness ...
through Jesus Christ, image of the invisible God (Calvin, Barth, Ps 8:4, Eph 4:22-24, Col 1:15, 3:10, Heb 1:3, Rom 5:12-21, 1 Cor 15:49).
The imago dei grounds our special relationships with
God, each other, the rest of creation, and ourselves (Kuyper).
The imago dei allows and describes the specific patterns of faithful divine-human interaction
(examples: "royal priesthood," Christian mission, worship, prayer, confession, etc.).
IV. "I will make a helper" (Gen 2:18): creatio continuata
Providence is God's continuing renewal, maintenance, and care for the creation.
Providence identifies God as creator with God as redeemer and perfecter (John 1:2-3, 6:35, Col 1:16, Irenaeus).
Providence relates Israel to God actively, as God's beloved, free, and ever newly grateful beneficiaries — "sons" (Hosea 11:1, Matt 2:15).
Alternatives to providence:
6. Fatalism: Beings are manipulated and unfree (rather than God being "with" them).
7. Deism: Like a watchmaker, God maintains no continuing active relationship with his creation.
(Does evolution demand this? Can rejecting Deism defuse moral objections against it?)
V. "It was very good" (Gen 1:31): The Point of Creation
Against all these (mistrusting?) alternatives, Israel affirms all three claims.
The universe is thus creation — the sign-ificant work of a loving, involved God (Gen 1:14-19, Ps 104:19; Gen 1:21, Ps 104:26-27).
Goodness names the purposefulness of the work of God's willed and shared love (Gen 1:31, Mark 10:18).
VI. "The way to the tree of life": (Gen 3:24): creatio nova
The purposeful creation points forward to its end (telos), not merely back to its beginning.
Christians alone affirm that the new creation has arrived, in the risen Jesus (2 Cor 5:17, Col 1:18, Rev 1:5).
The Son's incarnation, atonement, and exaltation bring creation and God profoundly together (Col 1:15-20):
The Son is the means and form of the Father's creation, enacted by the Spirit.
Only here can we accurately explain God as omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, and the like.