Christ's Busiest Week: Part 4

Allen Webster

Topic(s): Evidences, God, Jesus, Science

Links to this entire series:

• Christ's Busiest Week: Part 1
• Christ's Busiest Week: Part 2
• Christ's Busiest Week: Part 3
• Christ's Busiest Week: Part 4

Jesus is an inventor extraordinaire! Leonardo DaVinci, the world’s most famous dyslexic, couldn’t come close. Galileo, who despite losing a plea bargain with the Inquisition, and later going blind, was still inventing at age 77, is not in the same class. Orville Wright, whose “housekeeper only let him have an ice box because she said if he had a refrigerator “He’d only take it apart,”[1] was small in comparison.

Day 6: Jesus made land animals, insects, and man (Genesis 1:24–31). Jesus’ creations just got better as the week went along!

Land animals. Think of all His inventions on Day 6: Elephants, rhinoceroses, zebras, buffalos, squirrels, rabbits, horses, cows, dogs, cats, dinosaurs, sheep, yaks, lions, tigers, panthers, giraffes, hippopotamuses. It is interesting to notice that Jesus chose to be born in a stable among these animals rather than in an inn among sinful people (Luke 2:7). He also rode a lowly donkey in triumph into Jerusalem on that great day of the feast (Matthew 21:5)

The Bible names over 120 species of animals. As may be expected, the more common an animal was in Palestine, the more frequently it is mentioned. However, some animals that evidently once were common in that part of the world, no longer are. For instance, the wild ox totally disappeared about the time of the Babylonian captivity. The wild ass and the lion long ago became extinct in Palestine. Some species alluded to in the Bible are now extremely scarce.

Still, the variety of animals spoken of in the Bible is remarkable. In the waterless districts around Palestine, ostriches and camels are mentioned with the roebuck and deer of the wooded mountains of Lebanon. This variety, greater probably in Palestine than in any other country in the same latitude, is attributed to the great extremes of elevation and temperature in this small area.

The Bible records at least one occasion when God spoke through an animal (Numbers 22:28–33). The peaceable nature of God’s kingdom is described in animal terms (Isaiah 11:6–9). “Praise the LORD from the earth, ye dragons, and all deeps: fire, and hail; snow, and vapour; stormy wind fulfilling his word: mountains, and all hills; fruitful trees, and all cedars: beasts, and all cattle; creeping things, and flying fowl” (Psalm 148:7-10).

Animals are also often mentioned in connection to Bible symbols. The Holy Spirit is symbolized by a dove (John 1:32; Matthew 3:16). The Bible describes the angels around God’s throne as having features and characteristics like those of a lion, an ox, and an eagle (Ezekiel 1). God Himself is likened in Scripture to a lion, a leopard, a bear (Hosea 13:7–8), and an eagle (Deuteronomy 32:11). Jesus is described as “the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29) and as “the Lion of the tribe of Judah” (Revelation 5:5). He is prophesied to return in glory riding on a white horse (Revelation 19:11).

The Bible says much about God relationship to His animals:

•    God created all the animals (Psalm 104). “The works of thy hands...all sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field” (Psalm 8:6–7).

•    All animals belong to God (Psalm 24:1; 50:10–11). He also wants us to care for animals, although we are allowed to use them for food and work. The wise man said, “A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast: but the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel” (Proverbs 12:10).

•     God cares for the animals (1 John 4:16; Matthew 6:26; Psalm 147:9). Animals matter to God; the animals in Nineveh were mentioned as a reason for God’s mercy in not destroying that sinful city (Jonah 4:11).

Insects. About 1 million different kinds of insects have been described. There are many that have been collected but have yet to be named by biologists. They are preserved in museum collections and await the naming process. Estimates of the total numbers yet to be discovered vary from 2.5 million to 25 million. Biologists are concerned that the true figure may never be known since there are not enough people to study them, and many insects will have become extinct before the task can be achieved.[2]

Man. What an invention! After Christ made man, He pronounced the entire creation “very good” (Genesis 1:31). Since Christ made man in His own image, we are the “offspring of God” (Colossians 2:9; Acts 17:28), made in His “image” and “likeness” (Genesis 1:26). Neither image nor likeness refers to man’s body, though. Since God is a Spirit (John 1:18; 1 Timothy 6:16), He is neither male nor female, although designated “He” as the Begetter of life. These words have to do with man’s intellectual ability, his freedom to choose, and his ability to feel guilt over wrong-doing. No other creature is made in God’s image.

At the same time, it is logical to assume that the body which Jesus gave man is a worthy tabernacle for that spirit which bears God’s image. The psalmist said,

I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well. My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them (Psalm 139:14–16).

“Curiously wrought” comes from a Hebrew term denoting something “woven or embroidered.” It was used of the beautifully embroidered tabernacle curtain-door (Exodus 26:36). We are “woven together” by the great God of heaven. How anyone familiar with the human body could say that it happened by chance does not make sense to sensible people.

There has never been a week like the first one. It will be topped only by the last day when Jesus will destroy all that He made, except for mankind (2 Peter 3:10–12). Praise Him!