Now we come to the next question: How? How did it all come into being?
I have a paper from one who wrote, "Genesis 1 tells us that God did it, but Genesis 1 one does not tell us how God did it." His error is that he quit reading too soon. Genesis 1:1 tells us that God did it, but the rest of the creation record (chapters 1 and 2) tell us exactly that. The rest of the text is a detailed account of how God did it. How did God create it all? Note Genesis 1:
3 Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light.
6 Then God said, "Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters."
7 And God made the expanse, and separated the waters which were below the expanse from the waters which were above the expanse; and it was so.
9 Then God said, "Let the waters below the heavens be gathered into one place, and let the dry land appear;" and it was so.
11 Then God said, "Let the earth sprout vegetation"... and it was so.
14 Then God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens"... and it was so.
20 Then God said, "Let the waters teem with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly"... and God saw that it was good.
24 Then God said, "Let the earth bring forth living creatures after their kind"... and it was so.
26 Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness" We read about man for the next several verses to the end of verse 30, "...and it was so."
Now read verse 31:
And God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good.
Did you get it? What does the chapter say about how God created the heavens and the earth? In every case and on every day, God said ... and it was so.. and it was good! To be "good" it must have been created just as He had said.
Now note briefly other passages:
Let them praise the name of the LORD, For He commanded and they were created (Psa. 148:5).
By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, And by the breath of His mouth all their host (Psa. 33:6).
The gospel writer, John, also identifies the Christ as God, the Creator. ..and he does it by calling him the Word (logos)!
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being by Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being (Jn. 1:1-3).
You can no more separate the how of the process of creation -- that is, Deity speaking into existence all things -- than you can separate the creation process from the One "who became flesh and dwelt among us" (Jn. 1:14).
The problem with men -- natural men, carnal men -- is that we keep trying to put natural processes and natural law into God's doings which are, and which were, separate from natural processes.
It is not just that we (especially we who are scientists), are incapable of explaining, by natural processes, the how's of what God did to create. It is simply that God did not use natural processes; so therefore, natural processes cannot explain at all. I could as easily explain how Hezekiah's sundial backed up, how Jesus turned water into wine, or how Jesus said to Lazarus, "Come forth," and it was so, as to explain how "God said... and it was so" scientifically.
Let us study carefully this naturalistic error (the error of looking for natural explanations of God's actions) in another text and on another subject.
Some of the Christians in Corinth had rejected the idea of a general resurrection. In the first of 1 Corinthians 15, Paul makes his arguments -- including the vanity of their faith and the apostles being false witnesses of Christ if the dead are not raised. The problem was that Paul was teaching a general resurrection; but some of the Corinthians didn't believe in it. In verse 35 we read of their objection, "But someone will say, 'How are the dead raised? And with what kind of body do they come?'"(1 Cor. 15:35).
It's a great question, if you are a naturalist! How do the bone fragments and dust in the grave or a few ounces of ash from cremation come to life again -- naturally? How does the resurrected body come from the dust? You see, they thought, since they had no natural explanation whatsoever, then the doctrine of the resurrection must have been false. Read the Holy Spirit's answer:
You fool! That which you sow does not come to life unless it dies; and that which you sow, you do not sow the body which is to be, but a bare grain, perhaps of wheat or of something else. But God gives it a body just as He wished, and to each of the seeds a body of its own. All flesh is not the same flesh, but there is one flesh of men, and another flesh of beasts, and another flesh of birds, and another of fish. There are also heavenly bodies and earthly bodies, but the glory of the heavenly is one, and the glory of the earthly is another. There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for star differs from star in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead" (1 Cor. 15:36-42).
The resurrection of the dead is like the creation of things. So the creation of things was like the resurrection will be. Who among us would argue for a naturalistic or evolutionary resurrection day?
When God made men -- and beasts, birds and fish -- even the bodies of stars different from each other, and the sun different from the moon, God made each one to be "just as He wished" (v 38). The stars are not different because of different distances from earth, or different ages. The stars differ because God gave each a body just as He wished. God gave them their diversity. They are different because God made them different from each other. The fish, the birds, and beasts are not different in body because of different evolutionary paths, but because God made them with differing fleshes -- just as He wished.
Dear reader, you can no more assign a naturalistic (evolutionary) explanation to differences in the stars or the animals than you can explain how God could raise the dead on the last day by some natural process!
How will God raise the dead on the last day? God will give each a body just as he wishes! And that is the answer to how he made all things in very beginning.