Genesis 1:3 is not the beginning of creation — it's the beginning of restoration. What we call the creation account is actually a re-creation account: six days not of originating matter from nothing, but of rebuilding a ruined world and repopulating it with new life after Lucifer's catastrophic fall.

Last time we saw that angels once governed this earth under Lucifer's rule and that his rebellion brought the first world to ruin. Now we watch God respond — not by abandoning the ruined planet, but by remaking it. This is the story of Genesis 1:3 through 2:25.

The biblical evidence we covered in Lessons Five and Seven should automatically clear up questions that naturally arise from a wrong understanding of the creation story. Questions about the original creation of the heavens and earth before the flood of Genesis 1:2, the pre-Adamite world, the chaotic period, where demons came from, how old the universe is, where Lucifer's kingdom was located and why he fell, and the cause of sin on earth — all these have been fully answered.

Now we can turn our attention to how and when the present creation was made. The time of re-creation was during the six days of Genesis 1:3-2:25. Let's look at the main points of this remarkable story.

I. Are the Six Days of Gen. 1 Literal Days?

The six days of Gen. 1 were literal 24-hour days, just like the days we've known ever since. Scripture makes this very clear. Here's why:

1. The word "evening" comes from the Hebrew ehred, meaning dusk, evening, or night. It's translated "evening" 49 times and is never used in a figurative sense. The word "morning" comes from the Hebrew boker, meaning dawn, break of day, morning, or early light. It's translated "morning" 187 times — again, never figuratively.

This shows us that "day" and "night," or "light" and "darkness," are literal periods regulated by the sun, moon, and stars, just as Scripture describes elsewhere Genesis 8:22Psalms 19:2Job 38:12Jeremiah 31:35-37Jeremiah 33:19-26. There's no hint anywhere in Scripture that day and night ever came from a different source, or that we should understand them symbolically.

2. It's true that the word "day," used 2,182 times as a literal day, can sometimes refer to a longer period when qualified as "the day of the Lord" or "the day of God." However, when it's used with qualifying words like "evening" and "morning" to mark its beginning and end, it can only be understood literally.

This is further proven by the numbering of each day — first, second, third, and so on — just as you'd naturally number literal days. No symbolic period is ever numbered in Scripture.

3. Exodus 20:8-11 and 31:14-17 definitely state that God made (not created) the heavens (the firmament, not heaven where God dwells) and the earth in six days. Man was told to work the same length of time it took God to do the work of Genesis 1:3-2:25: "Six days shalt thou labour... For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth."

Think of it like this: it would be just as logical to argue that man was supposed to work 6,000 years or six indefinite periods before resting as it would be to argue that about God's six days of work. The exact same words are used in both passages referring to the same kind of days.

Personal interpretation of identical words to prove two different ideas can't be a valid basis for claiming literal days are meant in one case but not the other. No one argues that the six days of Exod. 20 are long periods of time, yet they don't even have the clear qualifying words "evening" and "morning" and "first," "second," "third" that the days of Gen. 1 have.

From the standpoint of plain language and common sense, the days of re-creation are just as literal as man's work days. Everyone knows work days for man couldn't be indefinite periods — days in Moses' time were as long as days now, and the same was true of the days of re-creation in Adam's time. Where would anyone get the idea that Genesis days aren't ordinary days? It couldn't come from the plain language of Scripture, and we must reject any other source.

4. Remember our fundamental principle of Bible interpretation: take the Bible literally wherever possible. When the language can't be literal or when it states otherwise, then the passage is figurative.

On this basis, we have to take the days in Genesis as literal. Couldn't God do this work in six literal days just as easily as in 6,000 years? If He can, and if the Bible says so, then let it stand and don't change it.

5. Some might argue that Genesis days couldn't be literal because the sun, moon, and stars hadn't been created yet to regulate day and night. But we've already seen that they were created originally in the beginning when God created the heavens before the earth Genesis 1:1Job 38:4-7.

If the earth existed before day 1 (as is clear in Genesis 1:2), and if the heavens were created before the earth, then the sun, moon, and stars also existed before day 1. This means the light of the first three days came from the same source it has come from every day since.

There had been days and nights throughout Lucifer's reign, just not during the total darkness of chaos while the earth was cursed and the lights were withheld from it Genesis 1:2Jeremiah 4:23-26. The work of day 1 was simply the restoration of day and night as it had been when Lucifer ruled.