Year 4, Day 1: Genesis 1

Theological Commentary from 1st cycle of study: Click Here 

Daily Discipleship Focus: Semi-circle, Rhythm

• Rhythm: We are designed to work from rest, not rest from work.  God has created us to be a people of rhythm in which we rest (abide), grow, work (bear fruit), and prune.  The better we understand this natural rhythm in life, the more satisfied we will feel in life and the more we will be able to be in tune with succeeding in what God desires our life to be about.

Genesis 1 is all about rhythms of life.  Obviously, we know the six days of creation and that God rested on the seventh day.  Unfortunately, we hear that and our minds translate that into a “rest from work” mentality.  We see the weekend as our time to recuperate from the hard week of work we just finished.  But remember, mankind was created on the 6^th day.  Our first full day of creation was actually the day that God rested!  So we see that God actually created us to rest first, then work!  This is why we believe that human beings are better off resting and then working out of that place of rest.  This is why we say we rest to work, not rest from work.  Or you could say we work from rest, not rest from work.

However, this is not the only rhythm we see in this text.  Notice that there is the rhythm of the day: evening then morning.  Of course, this is why the Jews organized their day to begin at sunset.  For the Jew, their day begins with rest and ends with work.  What a wonderful way to remember that we rest to work rather than resting from work.

Finally, notice the order within each day.  God speaks, creation happens, creation is named, the day is summarized.  God intends for our days to have rhythm as well.  We are to rest.  We are to prepare for the work.  We are then to bear fruit and get the job done.  Then we are to prune ourselves back so that we can rest at the start of the next day.

As disciples of Christ, we need to follow these rhythms of life.  Rest to work.  But these rhythms need to be daily practices that grow into weekly habits that grow into seasons of obedience to God.  The disciple of Christ is obedient out of the rhythms of life.

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