Origins and the Mind of God

By mosessister, March 17, 2020

In Beth Moore’s new book Chasing Vines, she discusses the idea of people first, place second. She references Abraham, and the children of Israel as examples. God chose Abraham, then He chose Canaan; He chose Israel, then He chose the Promised Land.

At first blush, it doesn’t seem like the pattern fits the model of creation. God created humans on the 6th day, not the 1st day. But if you consider that humans pre-exist their physical presence in the mind of God, it makes perfect sense. (Cf Jer 1:5) God created a physical earth hospitable for the humans He created in His mind. Then, He created a physical body in which the humans dwelt in the physical earth. But the people came first.

Unfortunately, Beth does not make this connection clear. Beth is a gifted teacher, whom I admire. But she opens herself up to criticism frequently with weak articulation of theology. This is too bad, as this seems to cause the less-broad minded to label her heretical. But she is well worth reading, in spite of her flaws, and she is definitely orthodox in all her beliefs.

And she is correct in this instance: God created people first, then the place for the people. Just wanted to clear that up.

This reminds me. When my kids were small, they frequently asked, Where do babies come from? Until they attained the level of maturity required for a full and complete biological explanation, I would tell them that they came from the mind of God.

Once when we were visiting my parents, somehow we got on the subject of how best to answer this question for children. I told Nate to tell Grandpa where he came from. Grandpa looked a little startled, not to mention trepidatious. (My puritanical father often thought a lot of what I said was inappropriate.) What came out of Nate’s 2-year-old mouth was, We come from the mind of God! (Grandpa was speechless, for more reasons than one. LOL)

May we continue on the journey, never forgetting our origins: the mind of Almighty God. Amen.