WIPED CLEAN

    I treasure the metaphor of a clean slate in regard to the New Year and its beginnings.  I must experience my life, my "slate" being wiped clean so that I can receive and experience what God has in mind for me for the New Year.  I know that I will have a real mixture of emotions this month as I relive yet celebrate the home-going of a son..passing the one year marker.

I begin anew with a fervor for my daily reading from Genesis 1-3.  This is not a new reading for me,  yet every time I begin my routine of "reading through the Bible", I marvel at the fresh thoughts, I receive. The thoughts are Not profound, but are meaningful to me.

From chapter 1-3:
1.  "God said":  the spoken word aloud.
2.  "And it was so":  When God speaks, the action follows.
3.  His response to what He created:  "And God saw that it was good."
4.  God's spoken word to man, "Be fruitful, increase in number, fill the earth and subdue it."  Rule over every fish, bird, and every animal on the ground. 
5.  As God eyed the complete heavens and earth, God saw and said, "It was very good."  
6.  God gave to Adam the responsibility to call the animal a name (mark of individuality). (How different Adam from an infant...full grown and with full intelligence.  Amazing!  No progressive learning.)
7.  Adam also called God's creation given to him as a help-meet, woman.  In chapter 3, Adam names her Eve.
8.  I wonder who interjected the statement: "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh." Adam had no blood parent...phenom insight if it is his statement. It could have been Moses since he was the author of Genesis.
9.  The snake (the evil one) speaks to Eve:  How did he know what God has set as a boundary for Adam?  Did Adam relate the boundary to Eve?  As the snake is engaging Eve in conversation, Adam is present with her, why does he not intercede to take authority?  Eve is enticed by the snake's statement "to be like God".  (Aren't we all?)
10.  All of God creation, man, woman, the snake (evil one), and the earth are cursed for rebellion against the stated boundary God had given Adam.  
11.  Messiah promised:  "and I will put enmity between you (evil one) and the woman and between your offspring and hers; HE will crush your head and you will strike HIS heel."  Messiah inferred in the verse.  
12.  God makes garments of skin for Adam and Eve from animals which He had to kill.  
13.  In creating man, God speaks, "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness..." and He again speaks, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil.  He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also for the tree of life and eat, and live forever".  Inferences to the Trinity, Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit active in creation. 

Holy Spirit of God, speak anew and afresh what you would have me to glean from Your Word and appropriate into my daily life.  God, Elohim, You are the Source of all life and I want to experience all that You have purposed for me.  Forever learning.  In process.  Thank You for new beginnings.  #IHAVETHREESONS.