Introduction
The Bible is the most trusted Christian reference book in which issues concerning creation, life, death, worldly things, and many other pertinent issues to the human life are found. The book of Genesis has in-depth information concerning the “natural world, human identity, human relationships, and civilization”.
The book begins by underscoring the source of life in terms of the creation of the Earth and the development of human relationships as well as civilization in terms of ruling over the land. Despite the fact that the Bible was penned many years ago when human relationships and civilization had not developed significantly, the lessons learnt from it are of great importance and highly relevant to the modern life.
Biblical worldview
By looking into human life from a psychological perspective, it becomes clear that human beings live in accordance with some innate values that are acquired from religion, culture, and society. Hence, Christians live according to their Christian values that are acquired from religious teachings based entirely on the Bible.
This assertion implies that a Christian lives in accordance to biblical teachings since such precepts form the basis of his or her innate human values from which self-judgments are based. Therefore, the Bible shall continue to have a great impact on human life for as long as Christianity exists to determine the level of human identity, relations, civilization, and relationships.
In the book of Genesis from chapter 1 to chapter 11, many lessons emerge concerning the “natural world, human identity, human relationships, and civilization”. On the natural world, the reader learns many issues about the nature concerning its creation, purpose for its creation, and its relevance to life. From Genesis chapter one, God created the natural world where He began by creating heavens and the Earth. On the Earth, He created land mass by pushing the water bodies aside.
From thence, He created the lively world creatures, which depended on the Earth for their survival. After reading the book of Genesis, it becomes apparent that God has power over everything that He created and thus He can destroy everything at will as stated in Genesis chapter 6 verses 7.
However, the purpose of the natural world is to sustain life for plants and animal creatures, and God has power over the natural world since He is the one who controls the natural events, which bring either death or sustainability to human life. For instance, in Genesis 7, God used rain to cause floods on the Earth when He found that people had become iniquitous and thus He had to destroy them.
In the contemporary life, Christians acknowledge the power of God over the natural world, which they have no control over although some humans, through their knowledge, claim to have control over some natural events, but the in reality, God has the supreme power over life and the natural world.
On human identity, the book of Genesis describes human as a supreme creature, which was created in the likeness of God before receiving power over all other creatures on the Earth. God loves human beings and they have power over every living creature that was created by God.
The original love of God for human beings did not last for long until when Adam and Eve committed a sin by breaking the first law of “not eating the forbidden fruit and they were chased away from the Garden of Eden”. However, God’s love for Adam and Eve did not fail even in their sin, but He gave them more responsibilities and induced death in the package.
The third element is relationships as stipulated in the book of Genesis. Human beings are social beings and after the creation of man and every good thing given to him, God found out that he was unhappy and lonely and thus woman was created. Apparently, man was lonely due to lack of another human being to interact with at the beginning.
Hence, human relationships have their roots in the creation era. However, other dimensions of human relationships are found in the book of Genesis that came about after Adam and Eve had been chased away from the Garden of Eden. From Genesis chapter 4, Adam and Eve bore two sons, viz. Cain and Abel, whose relationship as siblings led to the murder of Abel by Cain courtesy of jealousy.
Jealousy is an element of human relations even in the contemporary life and it has its roots in all aspects of human relations beginning from siblings to workmates, and it is often the root of human evils against each other in the daily life. In addition, human beings had a common language, which unified them until they decided to build the tower at the Babel.
God realized that the common language strengthened human relations and enabled them to do nearly everything that they agreed with ease, and thus He decided to stupefy their language by introducing other languages before scattering them away in different parts of the world as explained in Genesis chapter 11.
In the modern life, language is the main barrier to major developments in the world, since language determines the place of belonging and human character in the eyes of others. However, the introduction of a common language plays a major role in enhancing human developments in the contemporary life.
Lastly, the history of civilization runs back to the beginning of human life in terms of human relationships and interaction with the Earth. After Adam and Eve were chased from the Garden of Eden and cursed by God, in Genesis chapter 4, they had their first-born son, which marked the beginning of human procreation in the world.
Through the usage of common language and vocabulary across the entire Earth, human beings attained great social developments until God introduced many languages that caused confusion in order to halt their progress. Through civilization, some people acquired the status of rulers such as Noah whom God gave the authority to build an ark before He blessed his family and ordered them to fill the Earth after the deluge.
Conclusion
Biblical worldview of Genesis chapter 1 to chapter 11 is an important exercise from which one learns the origin of the natural world, human identity, human relationships, and civilization. From the beginning, the gradual development of human relationships and civilization had close relationship with the natural world, which humans had no control over.
In the contemporary world, human beings have developed vastly through the acquaintance of common languages that God had once broken. However, humans have little control over the natural world. Hence, Christian values remain strong in the contemporary life by acknowledging God to have power over all aspects of life.
Bibliography
Griggs, Donald. The Bible from Scratch: The Old Testament for Beginners. Louisville: Presbyterian Publishing Corp, 2002.
Hindson, Ed, and Gary Yates. The Essence of the Old Testament: A Survey. New York: B&H Publishing Group, 2012.
Mathison, Keith. From Age to Age: The Unfolding of Biblical Eschatology. Louisville: Presbyterian & Reformed Publishing Company, 2009.
Westernman, Claus. Genesis 1-11: A Continental Commentary. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1994.