Allow me to share something you might not be used to considering. While Scripture is sacred, the chapter breaks and verse numbering system are not. Stephen Langton, in the thirteenth century was a Catholic Cardinal and Archbishop of Canterbury, is most credited with dividing Scripture into chapters. Rabbis had similar systems, but Langton’s divisions were quickly adopted across Jewish and Christian communities. In the sixteenth century a printer by the name of Robert Estienne, known as Stephanus, organized the chapters into verses. Jews and Christians quickly adopted Stephanus’ system due to its ease of use.

To this day we day we have no idea why two highly intelligent men divided Genesis chapter 1 they way they did. When Moses laid out his work it logically ended in what we now call Genesis 2:3. The next verse, Genesis 2:4, clearly marks the start of Moses next chapter. We know this because Genesis 2:4 has begins with a toledot – that is Hebrew for these are the generations – a writing style that Moses maintains throughout the book of Genesis. As Hughes aptly puts it, “They flat out blew it.”

Chapter 2

v1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.

v2 And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done.

v3 So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation.

Day 7

God rested and blessed this day.. He created a world where the cycle of rest is is given as a blessing, yet we often struggle to embrace it. On a global scale, few people truly enjoy and practice the Sabbath. Rest, especially with sacred intent, is “holy.” Rest is not laziness, it is a blessed good.

Sabbath In Context

1. Moses penned these words in the wilderness. Every Israelite understood the context, the Sabbath pre – dates the laws of Moses.
2. This pre – Mosaic law is called a Creation Ordinance, meaning God established certain rhythms at creation and those rhythms are imbedded in the foundation fo the world.
3. The Creation Sabbath instructions are surprisingly simple and vague.
4. The Sabbath cuts across both Old and New Covenants but does alter course a bit as it does so.
5. God rested to celebrate. He is All Powerful (Omnipotent), so he was not exhausted, he was excited.
6. The first thing God wanted to enjoy was Adam and Eve.
7. There is no phrase morning and evening.
8. The phrase seventh day is repeated three times.
9. The day is now holy, and is deeply sacred.
10. The Sabbath has past, present, and future implications.

Moses’ Sabbath In The Old Testament

Moses recorded two different version of the Sabbath and each beautifully reflects God’s nature and plan. In Exodus 20:8-11 some time after crossing the Red Sea, Moses pens the fourth commandment, which is should be noted, is written by the finger of God.

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

The emphasis here is to celebrate God as creator, and to adore his good works. At the end of Moses’ ministry, he repeats these lines but gives them a different emphasis. In Deuteronomy 5:15 Moses speaks about redemption.

You shall remember that you were a slaves in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the LORD your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.

So according to Moses, on the Sabbath the creator is worshipped and salvation and deliverance are celebrated.

Jesus’ Sabbath In The New Testament

Jesus obeyed the Sabbath in a biblical way, but he actively disobeyed what men had made of it. This tension plays out in the gospels.

Jesus is eternally God, keeping such perspective in mind is helpful in understanding his teaching and behavior about the Sabbath. For brevity, I’ll only cite three incidents below.

Jesus Sabbath #1 – Matthew Chapter 12

In the first 8 verses, Jesus allows his disciples on the Sabbath to pluck grain because they are hungry. This is before MacDonald’s, Starbucks, and my beloved In N Out. The Pharisee’s accuse Jesus of breaking Moses’ Sabbath law. Jesus will use 3 biblical references and 1 over arching truth to show the Pharisee’s they are wrong.

1. King David was legitimately hungry and ate the bread of the presence, which normally applies only to the Priest (1 Samuel 21:6). Why was David not guilty in the eyes of God? Answer: David’s legitimate hunger need is God’s greater concern.
2. The Priest violates the Sabbath, why is God okay with that? Answer: The people’s legitimate worship need is God’s greater concern.
3. God’s heart desires mercy is for his people, not bondage (1 Samuel 15:21, Hosea 6:6). Answer: Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath, and will now clarifies it as a blessing for man to enjoy.  Additionally, mercy, Jesus emphasizes, is a foundation stone of the Sabbath – this is what the Pharisee’s missed. 
4. Now for the truth: Regarding the Son of Man reference, Jesus clearly communicates – I am God, and I show you how things are, not the other way around. They got the point, and wanted to kill him for it.

To this Jesus says in verse 6 “Something greater than the Temple is here.” His next statement is a great example of his deity, “For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.” God made the Sabbath, he is the only Lord of it, as strong a claim to deity as found in Scripture —The only Lord in Scripture is God himself. Jesus’ behavior models how far they have strayed from his Sabbath design.

Jesus Sabbath #2 – Mark 2:27-28

Jesus makes an important comment in Mark not found in Matthew. Jesus said, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.” The Sabbath is a grace God sets upon us so we can receive grace and mercy, upon our health, friendships, worship over every part of our lives.

In Mark 2;27, “Man” is anthropos, generic for man. The phrase “Was made” (from ginomai) takes us back to creation, when God originated the Sabbath Frame 557). Jesus is modeling the original design and intent of the Sabbath, going all the way back to when Adam was the first person to enjoy the blessing of it.

Jesus Sabbath #3 – John 5:1-17

In this passage Jesus heals a man on the Sabbath, and tells him to take his things and go for a walk. The Jews claim this violates the Sabbath, so Jesus make another claim to deity, “Where my Father is working, i am working.” Jesus claims the right to do whatever God does, in a way that no other man can say. For our purposes, I simply wan to illustrate how much Jesus models that the Sabbath is to be a blessing, and our actions toward one another are to be loving and merciful – a blessing and not a curse upon God’s people.

The Lord’s Day and Practical Matters

Strictly speaking, the Sabbath is not necessarily Saturday. Any seventh day works. Historically it’s been understood and practiced on Friday/Saturday sequence, but that is not what the Genesis text teaches.

After the resurrection, Sunday became the Lord’s Day, a New Covenant application of the Sabbath. The first few hundred years was an era of global persecution. Rare would be the New Testament church taking a whole day to Sabbath for such reasons. The ancient world was an agricultural world, and in that setting no one  takes a whole day off and does nothing, minimal chores are a daily necessity in order to keep animals and others alive.

John Frame produced a nice summary of Sabbath duties, outlining it around three principles: The need to find rest. The need to worship God, and the need to give and receive mercy (DCL, Frame 574).

Inside Eden

Genesis 2:4-3:24

First Things First 

v. 4 These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens.

v. 5 When no bush of the field  yet in the land and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up—for the LORD God had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to work the ground,

v.6 and a mist was going up for the land and was watering the whole face of the ground —

v.7 then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.

Verse 4 Parallelism

Both Hughes and Matthews note verse 4 in the Hebrew text is independent, and contains a Hebrew parallelism:

A – the heaven and the earth

B- when they were created

B’ – when the Lord God made

A- the earth and the heavens

Hughes, Genesis, 50 – Matthews, Genesis, 191

What is a Toledot?

The Hebrew word for toledot is often translated as “These are the generations.” Throughout Genesis, this phrase acts as a narrative marker, signaling the beginning of a new section. It helps reader track the flow and structure of the text.

Each time you encounter the phrase “These are the generations,” it may point to ancient scrolls that originally made up the text of Genesis. Some scholars propose an intriguing theory: these scrolls might have been preserved on Noah’s Ark and later found their way into the hands of Moses by divine providence. While this theory is unverified, it offers an interesting perspctive on how the text may have been transmitted.

Beyond any academic theory, toledot serves an important function in the book of Genesis. it introduces key moments in the unfolding story of creation and humanity. With each new toledot , something new is created, a threat arises, and God intervenes to bring resolution (Matthews, NAC, 29).

For example, the toledot in Genesis 2 introduces several pivotal events: the Garden of Eden, the creation of Adam and Eve, the fall of humanity in Genesis 3, and the story of Cain and Abel in Genesis 4. Each of these moments is essential to understanding God’s unfolding plan for salvation.

Understanding Yahweh-Elohim

In Genesis 1, God is known as Elohim—the great Creator God. However, in Genesis 2:4, Moses introduces us to God’s eternal name, something he will not fully clarify until Exodus 3. Yahweh-Elohim is translated as “Lord God,” and many translations use all capital letters for LORD to indicate this reference. Yahweh-Elohim is God’s eternal, covenant-keeping name (Genesis 15:7, Exodus 3:14-15).

Thoughts on Yahweh-Elohim:

1. Yahweh, the Lord, is God’s declaration of Himself as the one true God. He alone is worthy of our absolute love and allegiance.
2. Yahweh is the name of a person, revealing God as a deeply personal being. All scientific principles–whether of matter, time, or energy–ultimately point to Yahweh, the personal, covenant-keeping God fo scripture. Science exists because God personally upholds it with his power.
3. Yahweh–the Holy One. Yahweh is profoundly holy, and His presence manifests holiness. For instance, when Moses encounters the burning bush, God tells him that he is standing on holy ground. The ground itself was not holy, it became holy because God’s presence was there, manifesting His glory.

(References: Frame, Doctrine of God, 21-31. Some portions are direct quotes from Frame.)

No Bush No Plant

This most likely is a reference to Genesis 1:1, as a reference toward the actual beginning, when the earth contained nothing.

About The Mist

The Lord God had not yet brought rain on the earth. Notice the repeated use of the word “no” in this passage: no bush, no plant, no rain, and no man to work the ground (Hughes, Genesis, 51). The English Standard Version (ESV) offers an alternative reading in the margin with the word “spring.” If the mist mentioned in the test is understood as water coming up from the ground, this suggests the presence of large subterranean oceans or rivers. These would spring up from beneath the surface, forming a thick mist. “Spring” seems to be a stronger and more fitting translation for this context.

David Guzik offers additional insight, explaining that when God first created vegetation on the third day (Genesis 1:11-13), man had not yet been created to care for it, and there was no rain. The water vapor canopy created on the second day (Genesis 1:6-8) eliminated the need for a traditional rain cycle. Instead, a rich system of evaporation and condensation produced a heavy dew or ground fog that sustained the earth (Guzik, Enduring Word, Genesis 2).

This passage reveals God’s intentionality in creating man. Adam wasn’t just an afterthought; his presence was necessary. In the order of creation, man was essential for cultivating the earth, bringing glory to God as he carried out the work God had prepared for him.

How God Made Adam

v.7 then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.

God’s Intentional Creation of Man

As we see with Adam, man is the intentional creation of God –His crown jewel. man exists as a product of divine craftsmanship. The word “formed” in Genesis 2 emphasizes purposeful design. While in Genesis 6:5 this same word carries a negative tone, here it underscores a vital truth: God deliberately created man. He also designed the world with perfect conditions, allowing man to thrive and live abundantly in communion with him

Adam and Jesus; A Divine Comparison

The Apostle Paul, in 1 Corinthians 15:47, draws a profound comparison: “The first man (Adam( was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man (Jesus) is from heaven.” This highlights a core reality— man’s physical form must be compatible with the earth. God created Adam from the dust of the ground, giving him authority and connection to the very world he was meant to rule. Without this bond to the earth, man would live as a outsider, not as a king.

Formed from Creation

The dust of the earth–the raw material of creation—was place in God’s hands as He formed man from the ground. This act of creation was not merely physical but foundational, establishing man’s unique place within the created order.

The Breath of God

Unpack the Hebrew word for breathe.

Glorious Eve

work through the implications of Eve being take out of Adam physically.

Our Black Father

When God made Adam, he made a black man or some form of a black man. The Hebrew word for Adam gives reference to a reddish black man, which makes perfect sense since he was made from the dust of the ground, and the entire human race finds it’s ancestral heritage from Adam’s blood and DNA.

Every biology student knows that it is impossible for a white man to produce a dark-skinned baby, but a black man can produce a white skinned child. Biology moves from black to white, not the other way around.

Adam was a black man with a strong red pigment in his skin, and he is the father of the human race.

Eve was taken out of Adam’s flesh and made by the craftsmanship of God. The glorious couple faced each other, and Adam proclaimed deep satisfaction with his wife, he was no longer alone. Eve was now his “help meet,” a ruling partner on earth, and in sacred marriage, one flesh with her man. The virgin couple “were naked,” and lived a life without shame.

Click Here For Genesis Chapter 3