Fear No Fear

(All scripture from the World English Bible, ebible.org, all rights reserved)

“The earth was formless and empty. Darkness was on the surface of the deep and God’s Spirit was hovering over the surface of the waters.“

Genesis 1:2

Unformed and empty. Desolate and void. Such emptiness as would have caused us to be astonished and amazed. It was an emptiness beyond our concept of empty (Jeremiah 4:23). A chaotic space without the home of God’s presence (although God’s Spirit is there). It seems without end, like a trackless desert (Psalm 107:40). Earth existed, but only as ‘stuff’ (see Genesis 1:1). It was in a chaotic state. There were no FORMS made yet. This is all from a human point of view (Moses, the scribe, was being shown this). Throughout the creation account we are only shown/told of the phenomena visible to a human being. This chaotic and empty space is alluded to in Isaiah 34:11, when the Lord is signifying a total destruction or return of a kingdom to primordial disorder. It was like the image in the mind’s eye before you build something: potential unactualized.

Darkness is the next concept dealt with. Not simple lack of visible light (although that was also present), but almost an entity in itself (Isaiah 45:7). It is the absence of the home of the presence of God. It is NOT hell, a place of TORMENT from which God has REMOVED His presence (Matthew 8:12; 22:13; 25:30). But He does not dwell here. His Light is absent, but His Spirit is prepared. Darkness, in scripture, is often symbolic of ignorance or the lack of knowledge. Darkness was on the deep potential that was about to spring forth because there was no knowledge of God present, which us the direct cause of God’s presence not dwelling there. We need wisdom and revelation knowledge by His Spirit to enable the Word to dwell in us – which is His presence (Ephesians 1:17; Colossians 3:16; 1 John 4:13). So upon this deep ignorance of God’s glory, His Holy Spirit was hovering (see below).

Water is the first form mentioned in the Word. This particular word ‘mayim’ is plural and does not come in a singular form. It is dual in nature, both masculine and feminine – much like Adam when they were created and before they were separated (Genesis 5:2; 2:21-24). Later, there will be upper and lower water, but here a plural word is used to indicate they each contain elements of the other. They have not yet been separated. They are pregnant with their purpose.

It was over this water that Holy Spirit hovered, the Spirit of Messiah. Some sages take this to show that the Spirit was here functioning as an agent of creation. It’s assignment being to provide the neccessary motion over the waters and help them dry out (revealing the earth, as it were). But the words used are closely related to the preparation for manifestation that we see in Exodus 14:21. The root word for hovering means ‘brooding over’. It is a word picture of the motion a hen makes when hatching or fostering her chicks. It is a picture of Holy Spirit incubating the creation forms about to spring forth (Psalm 40:2), preparing them to receive the knowledge of the presence of God – preparing His future home (ultimately us – Romans 8:9).