Have you ever created something with just a few supplies or things or resources?

We just celebrated the life of a long-time member, Jim Goostree, this past Wednesday. Jim was a modern-day MacGyver. Granted if you didn’t live in the 1900’s you might not know who that is. But MacGyver, as well as Jim, could take a few supplies (especially duct tape) and make anything. One story of Jim’s was that he made a tailpipe out of pvc, because that was what was available to him. His motto was, “why buy parts from a store when you can find a solution or some way to fix the problem using something found in the garage.”

Let’s see how that plays out with God, because as we zoom in on creation notice how God took what he had and created, or formed you. Notice what he does with humanity.

Read Genesis 2:7-8, 15- 7 Then the LORD God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. 8 Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed... 15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.

Notice that word “formed”, God formed man from the dust of the ground. I love that imagery. God was an artist, a craftsman, he was creative in nature. If we can bridge the first intention, that God gave life through water and now He formed us of dust, can you see the
parallel where God took water and dust, like clay and formed us into a being. He took what was before him and he formed us.

Now does this mean we were made of dust? Even the passage that said from dust to dust, born of dust and to dust you will go.

I like how Tim Mackie and then John Walton share it. “Literal meaning of the statement that humans are formed of dust is that humans are from the realm of death and mortality – of non-eternal life.” He is saying that because of the status by which humanity was created in chapter 2, in the midst of desolation and dryness, of non-life. Which means to have eternal life, something needs to happen. (More on that next week.)

John Walton continues the thoughts. “Being formed from the dust is a statement about human essence and identity, not our substance. In this, Adam is an archetype.” Which means that Adam is an example of what it is, as a mortal man, in need of eternity, not a prototype. Which also means, for all of humanity, this begins a series of patterns of what happens here will be a pattern going forward.

Adam was a real person and an archetype for the rest of scripture and humanity.
That pattern is God’s formation at creation was with purpose and for a purpose. Because Adam is an archetype, what we see God do with Adam is a model for us. God’s formation at creation was with purpose and for a purpose.

Take a moment with this song and see how it can begin to apply to your life. Water and Dust by Cory Asbury