Hence our theme for the year: If You Really Want to Know Jesus, Know the Old Testament.Therefore, with few exceptions, I hope to preach through sections of the Old Testament, learning as much as we can about God and his relationship with his people, the key to that relationship, Jesus Christ, and the hope that is offered to the world in both. When I made it to my first religion and theology class, my professor started with this slogan, “Where you begin in theology determines where you end up.”We often want to begin at the cross and resurrection, or we’re willing to expand it out to the incarnation at Christmas.If we’re really open we’ll consider beginning with the New Testament.After all, this is the chief witness to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, and the church he calls and forms, which has passed the gospel successively to us, today.But the Bible begins not with a God in a manger or on a cross, but with a God who creates.“In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth ….”Here then is where we begin. We believe that God is a creator, the Creator.We believe that God creates and then shapes and forms the world, and before God goes about doing this great work there was nothing else except God.Maybe the first act of God is to restrict himself, to make room for more than God.I like to think of God as a parent in this instance.There is a no more restricting reality on life than having a child.You are bound to that child, making room for that child, binding your life, your hopes, and your purpose to that child. The text says, “the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.”Could it be that this is a pictorial way of describing the “making room for creation” that God would do?Could this be the outcome of God restricting God’s self? I think it might be, and if it is, then the first act of God outside of God is an act of grace.You might say it is THE act of grace.Let me explain.I would like you to think of any person you know, anyone you can name, who is responsible for their own birth.Can you name anyone? I can’t name them either.To bring into the world someone who did not exist is a sheer act of grace—a free gift, “to exist” is a prize that cannot be paid for, or otherwise made to happen. Frankly, it is why that moment of birth is so overwhelming.Grace always overwhelms.Grace overwhelms the one who receives and the one who gives.And creation is THE act of grace, which binds the world together with the God who so gracious brings it into existence. This is the miracle of today’s text, not that creation is done with words or in seven days, or outside of scientific explanation … that belittles its grandeur.The miracle is that creation happens at all. We are bound to God in this act of grace.It is God, who chooses; God, who creates; God, who establishes this deep mystery of relationship and love.As the people of God, the text invites us to hear this good news, celebrate it, and proclaim it. Do you understand what this means? The text shows a new reality created by the act of speaking.Over and over, the text says, “And God said.”God speaks God’s Word and a new reality bursts forth—a reality that did not exist before God spoke God’s Word.That Word creates a new situation, a new possibility for the world, a new relationship between God and the world that redefines the world.It is a proclamation of God’s grace, a proclamation of something God declares is “Good,” even “Very Good.” What is this text then? A proclamation of news that is good for all, established in grace by the Word of God … this text, the very first text of the Bible is the Gospel. What is the Gospel?God and God’s creation are bound in a relation established in grace, assured by God’s love but at the same time delicate and precarious, for a gift can be rejected, an act of grace can be neglected. God and God’s creation are bound in a relation established in grace, sealed in the Word of God that first speaks forth light, a light that the darkness cannot overcome, a light that is good.It is a light, a grace, independent of the lights of the sky for the sun, moon, and stars do not exist.It is THE light of God, the light of grace that shines the way from the Word of God.This is the Gospel that shines from the beginning. So … What is this light?Who is this Word? If You Really Want to Know Jesus, Know the Old Testament.