The creation story in Genesis chapter one is old, so old we don’t know how old it is. It pre-dates writing and thus comes out of an oral tradition that goes back farther than we can ever know. Before we dive into it, it is important that we revisit where it comes from and why it is vitally important to our lives, our community and our future and is foundational to our faith.

This passage is not scientific. Science continuously develops knowledge that fuels progress in every human endeavor (what happened, how it happened, what could possibly happen), but it is confined to its realm of facts. It can never approach what something means. It can never tell us why something should happen or why something should not happen. For example, science can discover the portion of our brains and the biochemical processes that house and process our feelings, but love is the province of poets and artists. We can’t measure it in a beaker, yet when it comes down to it, what is most important? The people we love. Serious exploration of love as the most important thing to human life requires philosophers and theologians to consider the implications of radical statements like, “God is Love.”

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Children: Let’s pretend we are out camping and we want to build a fire. How do we do it?

Well, we start off small, right? A little dry tinder. A few twigs. Then a spark or a match becomes a small flame. We add to it, and we nurture it until it’s burning nicely, right? Then we tend and feed the fire, keeping it going in its place.

But what if there are others around you in the dark? What if they don’t have any matches or they don’t know how to start one?

Maybe they’ll see your light and come and ask or light a stick from yours. Or maybe you could walk over and offer a flame from the fire you already have. That is what we are doing here, helping everyone to get the flame, to be touched by God’s Holy Spirit and to share it.

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The end of May is graduation season. We have a number of high school graduates this spring and a couple of them have earned their Associate of Arts degrees through dual enrollment. We intended to honor them all a couple of weeks ago, but we are still waiting to find a time when we can do that properly. Waiting has become a big part of our lives. Disruption has become a big part of our lives. Uncertainty has become a big part of our lives.

Thus we – and the whole world – are in a transitional time, like the time between high school graduation and starting whatever comes next.

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