God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day. Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array (Genesis 1:31-2:1).

And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2:9)

Yesterday Marge and I took a short trip to southeastern Michigan to attend a funeral.  We started in the midst of a thunderstorm and drove quite a while through some significant gully washers.  In fact, storms on the leading edge of a warm front drenched much of the state—sending most creeks and small rivers over their banks and making nearly every low spot in field, meadow, and woodland a pond.  By late afternoon, the precipitation had settled down to a gentle mist.  Finally as we headed home a couple hours before dusk, the sun began to break through and warmer air flooded in over the cool earth and standing water—creating a haze of high “relative humidity.”

Since my fascination with the “wonder of creation” has long been considered a driving hazard by Marge, she was at the wheel.  Her keenness on the road is akin to that of a NASCAR driver—meaning that I could enjoy the scenery with a sense of security (so far justified!).  I was soon mesmerized by the landscape transformed by storm and spring.  Winter wheat is already a foot tall but still short enough to resist being knocked flat by heavy rain.  The rich deep green of wheat fields stands in contrast to the plowed corn fields where y-shaped sprouts are just emerging out of the brown.  The tan marshes where last year’s cattail leaves and fluff-tipped stalks still dominate provided their own contrast to the multi-hued woodlands and meadows that were looking much like the palette of an artist who works only in shades of green.  Delighting in all of this were the birds, especially red-winged blackbirds, ducks, and geese.  As the scene darkened, deer emerged from the cover and began to feast on the spring-fresh and newly washed vegetation (also putting us on the alert for those that would soon begin to cross the road—Michigan commonly recording over 60,000 car/deer collisions each year!).
[LIFE photo source]

My reaction to this spring celebration was feeling that this is good—very good.  From that feeling I received motivation to write about the biblical concept of goodness for today’s devotional. When you do a study of biblical words, it’s helpful to use time-tested commentaries.  But commentaries are sometimes noted for their lack of scope: “exhaustive” is not always the case for those described as such.  Then you need to turn to lexicons, which examine the nuances and meaning of biblical words in their original language and then render them in English.  It was in a lexicon that I was able to find the comprehensive meaning of the Hebrew word for “good”: towb

It was surprising to me how so many biblical commentators seemed to overlook or give little attention to the use of  “good” in the first and second chapters of Genesis.  In fact, one scholar concluded that the word is used almost exclusively in reference to God and people.  Yet the initial, and I feel highly significant, use of the word is in reference to the entire creation.  Further, the foundational Genesis occurrences give us the first word about the character of God.  The creation was good because goodness is in the very nature of our Creator.  Here are the nuances of the word according to one Hebrew lexicon: pleasant, agreeable (to the senses), excellent (of its kind), rich, valuable in estimation, appropriate, becoming, providing gladness and happiness, benign, right (moral and ethical), of benefit to the creatures, providing prosperity, welfare, and bounty.

Now that’s a comprehensive depiction of the earth fresh from the hand of its Creator!  Some Bible scholars have concluded that because of mankind’s Fall, the earth can no longer be considered “very good” because it too is fallen.  I see little biblical justification for that conclusion.  Because of Adam and Eve’s rebellion and their gaining knowledge of and experiencing evil, God place a disciplinary curse on three entities: on the serpent regarding its place and destiny in creation, on Eve regarding pain in childbirth, and on the ground, which will resist mankind’s effort to easily wrest the soil to godless and self-worshiping desires.  Because soil is the foundation of life, this curse would impact all of creation.  The apostle Paul elaborates: “The creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God” (Romans 8:20-21).

So the changes to earth’s goodness that occurred with the curse were primarily in its no longer being benign—meaning that the land can bite back and cause unpleasantness.  Further, its bounty and welfare would often come only through mankind’s hard labor.  So the earth we dwell on is no Eden, but we can’t say it is no longer good.

In the days to come I’d like to think more on the meaning of earth’s goodness to us in our present circumstances.  In the meanwhile, be sure you get out and experience as much of that goodness as you can: TGIF!