God Created! by J. Vernon McGee

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. (Genesis 1:27)

This is one of the great statements of the Word of God. I cannot conceive of anything quite as wonderful as this. What does it mean? Well, man is like God, I think, as a trinity. Immediately someone is going to say, "Oh, I know what you mean. Man is physically, mentally, and spiritually a being." Yes, I believe that is true. Paul, in 1 Thessalonians 5:23, says that very thing: "And I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." Although this is true, it actually means more than that. I think that it refers to the fact that man is a personality–he is self-conscious, and he is one who makes his own decisions. He is a free moral agent. Apparently that is the thing which is unique about mankind. I believe this is what is meant by God creating man in His own image.

"Male and female created he them." These verses do not give to us the details of how man was created and how woman was created. We won't find that until we come to the second chapter. That is the reason that I say that God did not intend to give us the details concerning the creation of this great universe that we are in or He would have given us another chapter relative to that. But He offers no explanation other than He is the Creator. This puts us right back to the all-important truth which we find in the eleventh chapter of Hebrews: "Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear" (Hebrews 11:3).

Things we see today were made out of things which did not even exist before. The creation was made ex nihilo, out of nothing. Somebody says, "Explain that." My friend, I can't explain it. And evolution doesn't explain it either. Evolution has never answered the question of how nothing becomes something. It always starts with a little amoeba or a garbage can or a little piece of seaweed or an animal up in a tree. Our minds must have something to start with, but the Bible starts with nothing. God created! This is the tremendous revelation of this chapter.

From Edited Messages on Genesis by J. Vernon McGee