for food are said to be created by God (1 Tim. 4:3), and the word ktisis,

'creation' is used once of man, in the words of Peter, 'every ordinance

(literally "creation") of man' (1 Pet. 2:13).

It will be seen by these brief comments, that while we understand the

meaning of the term 'create' in general, yet the moment we look more closely

into it and examine its connotations and all that the word implies, we become

conscious that:

'At present we only see the baffling reflections in a mirror'

We know and are sure that creation is a fact, a stupendous fact, but the how

and the why elude us.  For one thing there is no language known among men

that contains terms which would adequately express what is implied by the

explanation offered 'to make something out of nothing', and if we say that

'all things are of God', we shall have to examine ourselves closely, lest we

be found advocating pantheism.  It may be that the present visible world is

but the expression in the realm of the manifest of the invisible thought and

ideas of the infinite God, but even so we have neither language nor ability

to put into words what such a conception of creation implies.

Let us turn from the concept 'create' to the One Who is the Creator.

We call Him 'God'.  We are believers, and God is our salvation, and our

Father in Christ.  To Him we pray, and to Him we can bring matters that we

could not discuss with our dearest friend.  For His sake we endure, we suffer

loss, and to Him our lives and service are dedicated.  We can and do confess

that we know Him.  Yet we also have to admit that we have never heard His

'voice' nor seen His 'shape'.  We are sure that God is at least a Person, yet

how a 'person' can be here, in this room where these words are being written,

in Australia where some dear fellow believers are at this moment praying to

Him, and at the same time in the remotest recesses of the universe, so far

from this earth that the distances must be computed in light years, this is

beyond our understanding.  The word 'God' has no connection etymologically

with the word 'good'; it is derived, so far as we know from a primitive root

word that means 'what is invoked' and 'what is worshipped by sacrifice'.  The

Scripture uses the word 'god' for those objects of worship that were either

demons or idols 'as there are gods many, and lords many' (1 Cor. 8:5), and

Christ Himself referred to the Scriptures on this point saying, 'Is it not

written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?  If He called them gods, unto whom

the word of God came, and the Scripture cannot be broken; Say ye of Him,

etc.' (John 10:34 -36).  Here then once again we must face the fact that we

see by reason of a mirror enigmatically.  God, we read, is spirit, but even

though we ponder this revealed statement long and deeply, what do we actually

know about the world of 'spirit'?  What laws obtain in that realm?  Does the

law of gravitation hold there?  Do spirits feel heat and cold, do they see

what we see? when they move do they travel as we do from place to place?  Is

a spirit limited by time and place as we are?  What are our answers to these

and a hundred other questions?  Our answer must be that we simply do not

If we now turn our thoughts to heaven that was created in the

beginning, what do we know about it?  We understand that heaven here means

something other and beyond our atmosphere, something beyond 'the blue sky',

something beyond the untracked paths of stellar space, but what?  Has heaven

a floor?  Is it bounded or unbounded?  Is it visible or invisible?  We simply

do not know.  Then again, what do we understand by the opening words, 'in the