Intelligent Design in the Bible: The Seven-Day Metanarrative

In Intelligent Design in the Bible, I referenced a seven-day metanarrative model in the Bible. The details of this model are laid out below.

The Initial Creation / Creation Zero

The first sentence of the Bible is seven Hebrew words and refers to the initial creation, when God created the bright and populated heavens He dwells in, as well as a formless and lifeless earth that was in darkness and under the surface of the water. Note that the second sentence of the Bible begins first with half of the sixth Hebrew word of the first sentence and then with the seventh Hebrew word of the first sentence. This begins a pattern of each new creation returning to halfway through the previous creation’s sixth day as the starting point of a new narrative.

The First Creation

The first sentence of the Bible also serves as an introduction to the creation narrative of Genesis 1:1-2:3, which I call “the First Creation.” Continuing with the second sentence, we see a narrative pattern that is repeated throughout the Bible:

Summary (Genesis 1:1): In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
Problem (Genesis 1:2a): The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep.
Preparation (Genesis 1:2b): And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
Creation (Genesis 1:3ff): Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light…

God’s six days of work and one day of rest were a response to the condition of the earth in the initial creation.

The Second Creation

The major covenants of the Bible recreate the seven-day creation narrative of Genesis 1:1-2:3 on a larger scale, which I call “the Second Creation.”

Why this narrative would have been hard to create artificially:

Most of Genesis could very plausibly have been fabricated from whole cloth, having only a tenuous connection to the real-life cultures referenced in the text. Therefore, anything “interesting” in the text could have been the composition of a clever mind. Past that, however, the text begins to intertwine with history and archaeology. While many of the stories in Scripture could have been made up, there was without question a nation called Israel in the Near East that existed in roughly the time periods referenced in the later Old Testament books. We know Israel had a kingdom, and we know that some or all of the kings of Assyria, Babylon, Persia, etc., did exist and did interact with Israel.
The Old Testament books were definitively extant before the writing of the New Testament.
Many of the major players in the New Testament most definitely existed, and we have archaeological evidence about much of their chronology.
The First Jewish-Roman War that lasted from AD 66-73 is historically factual.
If this metanarrative is not purely coincidental and illusionary, then there must have been intention behind it. However, responsibility for weaving it into future Scripture would have had to be passed down through invasions, exiles, the splitting of Jewish Talmudic thought between Babylon and Jerusalem, the splintering of Jewish religious ideologies amongst the first-century factions (Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, etc.), the expansion of the Gospel to the Gentiles, the persecution of the church under Nero, the transfer of the faith to Gentiles after the Third Jewish-Roman War (the Gentiles being entirely new to the handling of Jewish Scripture), and the branching of power in the church amongst multiple locales (e.g., Constantinople, Rome).
Moreover, despite the incredible effort required to continue this metanarrative through generations and all the upheavals the people of God endured, all trace of it has since been lost to history, especially the eschatological component, to the point where many modern Christians reject the implications of the model I’m laying out.
The Jews had to compose the metanarrative with great leaps of faith that future events would fit the model. Did they have a backup plan for days 6 and 7 in case there were no Gentile empires or a Jewish Messianic figure with a massive following in the first century?

The Paradigm

Every day in the metanarrative follows this pattern:

God creates a new covenant that embodies the quality of the current “day” of creation.
Man sins in a way that mirrors that quality.
God judges man. These judgments, while significant, tend not to represent utter destruction or wiping clean of a slate (unless there are no-sub covenants and therefore only one judgment in that day).
Depending on the day, God may add sub-covenants to the covenant.
For each additional sub-covenant, man sins in a way that mirrors the essence of the sub-covenant and is judged.
At the end of the day, God institutes a major judgment, clearing the way for the next day’s covenant.

I will point out the falls and judgments for the first several days in this analysis.

Each day is also introduced with the previously mentioned narrative pattern, which is easy to see at first, but gets more difficult to find as the Bible narrative gets richer and more complex (I will also only include the first few in this analysis).

Finally, each day carries forward the important aspects of the previous day’s covenant, slowly building a complete model that is able to endure forever, with Jesus as the eternal covenant head.

Introduction – Genesis 1:1 – Genesis 1-2:3

The introduction to the Second Creation is Genesis 1:1-2:3 itself, the story of how God created the world in six days and rested on the seventh.

Day 1 – Genesis 1:2-5 – Adam and Eve

2:4: Summary
This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens
2:5 Problem
before any plant of the field was in the earth and before any herb of the field had grown. For the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was no man to till the ground;
2:6 Preparation
but a mist went up from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground.
2:7 Creation
And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.

Adam was the first “light of the world” (compare John 8:12). Humans were supposed to bring light to the world by living in obedience to God and fulfilling the dominion mandate.

Eve was taken out of Adam’s side, thereby separating the two (Genesis 2:21-22), like light from darkness.

Minor fall and judgment: Adam and Eve sinned, thereby replacing light with darkness. Adam was therefore replaced as covenant head by Seth.

Major fall and judgment: The intermarriage of Sethites and Cainites represented the mixing of light and darkness (via an improper coupling of men and women). The Flood wiped out this unholy mixture.

Carry-forward: Animal sacrifice carried forward to Day 2.

Day 2 – Genesis 1:6-8 – Noah and His Sons

6:9-10 Summary
This is the genealogy of Noah. Noah was a just man, perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God. And Noah begot three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
6:11-12 Problem
The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. So God looked upon the earth, and indeed it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.
6:13 Preparation
And God said to Noah, “The end of all flesh has come before Me, for the earth is filled with violence through them; and behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
6:14ff Creation
Make yourself an ark of gopherwood…

During the Flood, the world was full of water (Genesis 7:11). At the end, the waters were separated vertically, and Noah was between them (Genesis 8:1-2). This kind of vertical separator (“expanse”) between the lower waters of the earth and the higher waters of heaven represents kingly authority. Indeed, we see capital punishment (a civil sanction – Genesis 9:6) and kings (Genesis 10:10) appear after the Flood.

Note that the warning against a king in 1 Samuel 8:10-18 does not apply to kings in general, but Saul specifically (the Israelites did not sin by requesting a king, but rather by not waiting for God to appoint a king over Israel in His own good timing). God promised kings to Abraham as a sign of His blessing (Genesis 17:6), and David described a just king as a blessing (2 Samuel 23:3-4). Furthermore, the Mosaic Law explicitly authorized Israel to set a king over themselves if done so in faithfulness (Deuteronomy 17:14-17). Moreover, Saul’s failure did not lead to God abolishing the failed kingdom, but merely replacing the failed king with a man after God’s own heart (1 Samuel 13:14).

Day 1 separated two distinct things (man and woman), but did so “horizontally,” indicating equality in the separation. While the man is the “leader” of the family, this is not a position of authority, but rather a statement of responsibility. The man is not superior to or in charge of the woman. On Day 2, however, similar things (waters and other waters) were separated vertically, implying authority of one over the other.

Major fall and judgment: The Tower of Babel represented man trying to cross the expanse and reach the heavens (Genesis 11:4). Therefore God judged man with the division of tongues, knocking him down and scattering the nations across the earth.

Possible interpretation: Noah’s judgment of Ham and Canaan (Genesis 9) replaced the initial setup of a single vertical expanse with a series of vertical expanses (in Genesis 1:1, “heavens” is plural – see also 2 Corinthians 12:2):

God
Noah
Shem
Japheth
Ham
Canaan’s brothers
Canaan

In Babel, the Hamites (Nimrod) and Shemites (family of Joktan) were collaborating to go high enough to reach God, thereby attempting to collapse all the vertical separations. God scattered the people to counter this attempt.

Carry-forward: The concept of a divinely ordained king carried forward to Day 3.

Day 3 – Genesis 1:9-13 – Abraham, Isaac and Jacob

Day 2 mentioned waters above waters. The waters below (i.e., seas) represent the nations (the non-Abrahamic nations are called “Gentiles” in the New Testament, but just “the nations” in the Old Testament).

Day 3 Part 1

Part 1 of Day 3 was the appearance of the earth. Abraham’s story is about God calling him out of the nations to perform a special function of being a connection point between God and the scattered nations. Abram was called to wander the “land” of Canaan (the Promised “Land”), which his descendants would later possess. When his descendants did inherit the land in the days of Moses, their job was to enter the land and exterminate all its inhabitants, thereby removing the “waters” of Canaan and leaving it dry. Furthermore, the covenant of circumcision amongst the descendants of Israel outwardly showed the mark of the land by physically recreating Genesis 1:9 in the male private part.

The scattered nations could only connect with God via Abraham (Genesis 12:3). Gentiles who feared God poured blessings on Abraham’s descendants (e.g., Joseph’s Pharaoh, Melchizedek, Hiram of Tyre, Cyrus the Great, etc.). Gentiles could absolutely be saved – they just couldn’t experience God’s presence apart from their relations with Israel.

Importantly, the mark of circumcision was invisible in normal life, so they would only truly be known by their righteousness (thus they were not supposed to lord over others by showing some visible privilege – they had to confirm their role through their conduct). When they acted like the nations around them, they were ignoring their true purpose.

Note: In the original creation, the geography of the world was that of a single large “supercontinent” surrounded by a single global ocean (this is called “Pangea” by secular scientists). After the Flood, the trauma from the “fountains of the great deep” probably caused the splintering of the lithosphere into tectonic plates, which would eventually have resulted in the formation of the multiple land masses we have today.

An important consideration in this scheme is that just because the earth originally had one ocean does not mean it only contained one sea. Technically all the oceans today are connected, so there is still really only one ocean, but for argument’s sake let us assume that the water is divided into multiple oceans by the continents. Within each ocean there are still multiple water formations that are called seas, even though they are not fully separated by land masses. In the same way, the original creation had one ocean surrounding one continent, and within the ocean there were multiple seas.

Possible imagery: In the original intended geography of the First Creation, Eden would have been at the top of a mountain on the supercontinent, and water would have flowed from the top of the mountain to the land below, then to the seas, only to be picked back up into the sky and returned to the top in the form of rain. Likewise, Abraham would have been the earth in the spiritual version of this, flowing down the “rain” of God’s spiritual blessings to the surrounding nations. Members of the other nations would then bless the Lord, returning His blessings upward, completing a spiritual water cycle.

In the Mosaic Law, we see rings of holiness reflecting the same model:

Priestly family of Aaron in the Sanctuary – Garden of Eden
Semi-priestly tribe of Levi – Mountain
Other tribes of Israel – Dry Land
Gentile nations – Seas

Note also that Abraham’s calling represents the elevation of something originally below to something above. Like other similar calls (Israel out of Egypt, Saul, David, Jesus, etc.), it was a call to ministry. It was not a call to lord over others, but to serve them for their good. The Jews and Gentiles were separated as distinct things because they served complementary purposes: without Israel, Gentiles had no witness. Without Gentiles, Israel had no purpose.

Note that in Revelation (and other prophetic texts), the “earth” is a reference to Israel, while the “sea” represents the Gentiles.

A final aspect of the imagery here is the references to the “new heaven(s) and new earth” that God promised to bring about with the coming of Jesus the Messiah, to replace the one established after the Flood (2 Peter 3:5-7; see Isaiah 65:17, Isaiah 66:22, 2 Peter 3:13 and Revelation 21:1). Connecting this to the metanarrative, we can see that Noah symbolically represented a new heaven, and Abraham represented a new earth. Just like with the heavens of the First Creation, the population of the world with Noah’s descendants is brief (all occurring in Genesis 10), whereas like the earth of the First Creation, the story of Israel from Abraham to Joshua is one of formation, growth, and structured ordering.

Minor fall and judgment: The first failure of Day 3 was Abram and Sarai getting impatient and having Abram impregnate a Gentile (the Egyptian Hagar), thus compromising the separation of Earth and Sea. This led to the persecution of Isaac by Ishmael (Galatians 4:29).

Day 3 Part 2

Part 2 of Day 3 concerns the seed-yielding herb and seed-yielding fruit that yielded fruit according to its kind, whose seed is in itself. The seed-yielding herb is Isaac: Abraham’s offspring are labeled literally as “seed” in Genesis 12:7, and in Isaac Abraham’s seed would be called (Genesis 21:12). Jacob is a fruit tree, bearing 12 different fruits (like the tree of life in Revelation 22:2), each of which had its own kind of seed in it (the 12 tribes each developed as separate lineages).

Indeed, the primary theme of the section of Genesis containing the stories of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is the struggle to establish offspring: the birthing of sons to barren women (Sarah, Rebekah, and Rachel), the establishment of inheritance (Ishmael vs. Isaac, Esau vs. Jacob, the blessings on the tribes), and the planting of Israel’s sons in the fertile land of Goshen (Genesis 47:6), where they could flourish and bring forth fruit like a tree planted by the waters of the Nile (see Psalm 1:3).

Symbolically, Abraham’s offspring, the herbs and fruit plants, sprung up in the land of Abraham’s inheritance. Note that grain (seed-yielding herb) and wine grapes (seed-bearing fruit) are used to make bread and wine, the elements of communion.

Minor fall and judgment: The second failure of Day 3 was Isaac attempting to bless (make fruitful) the wicked Esau, who was intermarried with Canaanites (thereby mixing land and sea), instead of Jacob, whom God had ordained to be his fruitful offspring before his birth (Genesis 25:23). As a result, Jacob was separated from Isaac and became fruitful away from Isaac, such that Isaac did not get to see the fruitfulness of his true heir.

Major fall and judgment: The third failure of Day 3 was the attempted murder of Joseph by his brothers. This would have been an attempt to snuff out a line of seed and also reject his prophesied authority over them (and by extension God’s plan). God’s major judgment was the famine, which stripped the earth of all fruitfulness and seed (grain).

Genesis, however, ends with Israel being planted in Goshen, to multiply over the next several hundred years. Also, in Joseph’s lifetime, the Jews brought God’s word to the Gentiles (Egypt in particular) and converted many of them.

Note also that when God planted Israel in the Promised Land after the Exodus, they were symbolized as a fig tree (fruit tree), which according to Matthew 21:18-22 and Luke 13:6-9 was no longer bearing fruit in Jesus’ day.

Carry-forward: The concept of a special nation intended to minister spiritually to the Gentiles carried forward to Day 4.

Day 4 – Genesis 1:14-19 – Moses and David (Tabernacle Judaism)

Israel’s placement in the Promised Land spiritually represented the placement of heavenly lights in the firmament. Consider:

Joseph’s prophetic dream in Genesis 37:9-10 symbolized the sons of Israel as stars.
Israel is connected directly to stars in Genesis 15:5, Genesis 22:17, Genesis 26:4, Genesis 37:9-10, Exodus 32:13, Deuteronomy 1:10, and Deuteronomy 10:22.
The twelve tribes of Israel represented a figurative zodiac.
James B. Jordan’s Biblical Horizons Open Book Occasional Paper No. 3: The Censuses of the Book of Numbers and Babylonian Astronomy, by M. Barnouin. 1985.
“A translation of Barnouin’s essay in Vetus Testamentum (1977), this is a highly technical [emphasis in original] essay arguing that the census numbers in the book of Numbers correspond to the synodical periods of the planets (the numbers of days it takes for the various planets to return to the same place in the sky), so that the censuses show that God’s people are a heavenly people.”
Genesis 1:14-15 indicates that the lights were for:
- Signs: The Law pointed forward to Jesus (Luke 24:44).
- Seasons/Festivals: The Law defined both seasons and festivals for Israel to observe.
- Days and Years: The Law provided lots of guidance about Sabbath days, Sabbath years, Jubilees, etc. The perpetual and rhythmic observation of the laws and the festivals/days/years (the spiritual rhythms of life) was meant to ingrain the symbolic foreshadowing of Jesus’ sacrifice in the minds and hearts of both Jews and believing Gentiles. They also provided spiritual stability in the same way the consistent orbits and rhythms of the stars and planets provide stability in agriculture and human psychology. In nature, the regular behavior of the sun, moon, and stars grounds us and gives us continuity throughout time and between generations. By keeping the rhythmic requirements of the Law, the Jews provided the same grace spiritually for the world.
- Giving light on the earth: Deuteronomy 4:5-6 references an important role of Israel. By following the Law, they were to be a “navigational system” for the Gentiles, like stars guiding ships traversing the seas.

The Sun and the Moon represented the king of Israel and the Aaronic high priest respectively. Like Adam and Eve, these two roles worked together, with the king serving in the realm of man and the high priest serving in the realm of God.

Note that in the creation story, God’s day starts in the evening and goes through morning (and is thus night-focused or lunar), while man’s day starts in the morning and goes through evening (and is thus day-focused or solar). The moon operates under the shroud of night, and thus the Tabernacle sacrificial rituals were conduced almost completely in the shroud of a tent, whose internal glory was largely concealed to the outside observer (the outmost covering of the Tabernacle was animal skins, and only priests were allowed to see the beauty inside). By contrast, the sun operates in the glory of day, and the king of Israel lived in a palace and adorned himself in outwardly visible riches. There is poetic imagery that reinforces this paradigm, such as 2 Samuel 23:3-4.

Continuing the parallel with Adam and Eve, a figurative element of the priesthood is that as the lunar component, the priests were the feminine side of the king/priest relationship. The priests were tasked with responsibilities traditionally reserved for the wife: cooking the food (sacrifices), setting out the bread, arranging the furniture, keeping the lamps burning, etc. Unlike in our modern view, keeping the household is an important and highly valued role in a marriage in God’s eyes.

Both roles of king and high priest pointed forward to Jesus, but the king was the head of the religious system (“greater light”), as during the times of the later kings of Judah, righteous kings would re-establish proper worship and organize priestly activities.

While the high priest position was filled at the time of the giving of the Law, the king position was authorized but not filled (Deuteronomy 17:14-20). God himself filled in as King, later installing Saul as king only at the premature urging of the people (1 Samuel 8:7) and finally replacing Saul with the righteous king David and his sons.

The idea of God as King leading to man as high priest, which then leads to man as king reflects the natural order described in 1 Corinthians 11:12.

Note also that as High Priest and King, Jesus is described as replacing both the sun and moon in heaven (Revelation 21:23).

Carry-forward: Israel in the Holy Land and the roles of king and high priest carried forward to Day 5.

Day 5 – Genesis 1:20-23 – Prophets and Gentiles (First Temple Judaism)

The dedication of the First Temple ended the time period of the Judges (2 Samuel 7:10-11), and “Solomon reigned over all kingdoms from the River to the land of the Philistines, as far as the border of Egypt” (1 Kings 4:21). When Solomon dedicated the Temple, he prayed that foreigners who came to the Temple would have their prayers answered (1 Kings 8:41-43). Moreover, the First Temple contained a Sea for priests to wash in (2 Chronicles 4:2-6). All these things indicated that God was increasingly drawing the Gentiles nearer to being in His covenant.

During the time period of the kings of Judah and Israel after Solomon, the prophets were symbolically the birds that traveled across the earth (Israel), teaching the Law and prophesying in the Lord’s name (see the ravens feeding Elijah in 1 Kings 17:4-6 and the itinerant nature and “nesting” of Elisha in 2 Kings 4:8-10). Although prophecy went back to Abraham, Elijah and Elisha represented a new covenant with God and an enhanced role for prophets in Israel’s historical narrative. They also eventually formed the remnants that would survive the judgments and exiles to come at the end of Day 5. The prophets also strived to spread the faith to Gentile God-fearers (Luke 4:25-27), who were the aquatic life in the Gentile “seas.”

Note: Birds scoop fish out of the water and eat them. In the Bible, eating indicates incorporation. Therefore, the eating of fish by birds symbolically indicates that God was beginning to incorporate the Gentiles into Himself (via the prophets) without actually bringing them onto the land yet (which the Holy Spirit later did by creating a single church out of both Jews and Gentiles).

This idea is picked up in the New Testament by Jesus, who calls fisherman to be his disciples, promising to make them “fishers of men.” In the Gospels, Jesus primarily referred to Jewish believers as sheep (land animals), but the fishing aspect foreshadowed that they would eventually bring in Gentiles as well.

This was also hinted at in John 21:10-11: Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish which you have just caught.” Simon Peter went up and dragged the net to land, full of large fish, one hundred and fifty-three; and although there were so many, the net was not broken.

As James B. Jordan has pointed out, 153 is the triangular number of 17 (1+2+3…+16+17), which symbolizes the 70 nations (17 = 10 + 7; 70 = 10 x 7). Hence, this refers to the Great Commission and the witness of the apostles (led by Simon Peter) to the Gentile nations.

Note that at the time of Jesus’ coming, the Gentiles were a ripe harvest, primed and ready for conversion. In the Gospels and Acts, there are Gentiles who already fear God, Gentiles who have bankrolled synagogues, etc. The sowing of the seeds of widespread faith in the Gentiles began with the prophets in Day 5 and continued through the Jewish missionary work of Day 6.

Also, Genesis 1 says that the birds were to fly above the earth “across the face of the expanse of the heavens.” If the expanse represents kingly authority, this would connect to the interplay of prophets and kings in this section of Scripture. The kings were supposed to put prophets into advisory positions, listen to their prophecies, and communicate them to the people. This was a kind of endorsement that would allow the prophets to share in the kingly authority for the benefit of the people. Righteous kings submitted to this model, while wicked kings drove out godly prophets.

Finally, Day 5 speaks of sea monsters, the only creatures mentioned in Genesis 1 that were not indicated to be under the dominion of humans in Genesis 1:28. Likewise, the Gentile mega-nations of Assyria and Babylon were the sea monsters who conquered Israel and Judah and were never under their control at any point, unlike most of the other Gentile nations that interacted with Israel and Judah.

Note: Unfaithful Jonah was swallowed by a great fish (Jonah 1:17 – not the same Hebrew word as for sea monster, but conceptually similar) and held in its belly until he repented. This paralleled symbolically the swallowing of Israel by Assyria (the empire that consumed other nations) until it repented, thereby connecting the notion of a symbolic sea monster to the Assyrian empire.

Carry-forward: The idea of prophets as witnesses to Israel and evangelists to Gentiles carried forward to Day 5.

Day 6 – Genesis 1:24-31 – Gentile Empires and Jesus and the Church (Second Temple Judaism)

Daniel 7 uses the imagery of land animals to describe the Gentile empires that would rule Israel during the time of the Second Temple. Daniel 7:3 indicated that these animals would come from the sea (i.e., Gentile nations). The spiritual sovereignty of Gentile empires over Israel and the nations around it began with a grant of authority to Nebuchadnezzar in Jeremiah 27:4-7. Cyrus the Great conquered Babylon and took over the mantle of authority for Media/Persia, which lost it to Greece under Alexander the Great. After Alexander’s death, the Ptolemaic and Seleucid Greek kingdoms contended for control of Israel until the Maccabees successfully fought off Antiochus Epiphanes and eventually established a fully autonomous Jewish kingdom (the Hasmoneans). Finally, Rome conquered Israel and later replaced the Hasmonean kingdom with the Herods before Jesus was born.

During the time of these Gentile world empires, as mentioned previously, the Jews were witnessing to the Gentiles around them (although they did not fully understand what was to come in the form of Jesus and the Church). Being scattered across the earth but also under the protection of a powerful worldwide government made this much easier, and the existence of a visible king of kings for half a millennium also prepared the Gentiles to accept Jesus as the divine King of kings. This missionary work was later fully consummated when Christ’s sacrifice broke down the wall between Jews and Gentiles (Ephesians 2:11-18).

Towards the end of Second Temple Judaism, Jesus the Messiah was incarnated. 2 Corinthians 4:4, Colossians 1:15, and Hebrews 1:3 describe Jesus as “the image of God,” harkening back to Adam and Eve as being made in the image of God (Genesis 1:26-27). 1 Corinthians 15:45 describe Jesus as “the last Adam” (God breathing life into dust to make Adam is similar to God breathing the Holy Spirit into Mary to make Jesus).

The Church is Jesus’ female counterpart (see the mystery described in Ephesians 5:22-33 and the marriage of Jesus and the Church in Revelation 21:1-2). Romans 8:29 indicates that Christians are to be conformed to the image of the Son, implying that the Church also is “made” in the image of God (via being born again and then progressively sanctified by the Holy Spirit).

All dominion was given to Jesus and the Church (Matthew 28:18, Colossians 1:16, Ephesians 1:22-23), as it was given to Adam and Eve (Genesis 1:28). The New Covenant also consummates with the Tree of Life in the New Jerusalem (Revelation 22:2), a fruit tree, corresponding to the food (including fruit trees) provided for man and woman on Day 6 (Genesis 1:29).

The New Covenant is the greatest covenant and the only one that lasts forever, much as God declared all previous days “good” but His completed work on the second half of Day 6 “very good.”

Day 7 – Genesis 2:1-3 – The Last Days

There were exactly 40 years between Jesus’ first cleansing of the temple during Passover of AD 30 and the return of Jesus during Passover of AD 70 (I explore eschatology fully in the The Enigma of the End Times), when Titus besieged Jerusalem during the First Jewish-Roman War (the siege ultimately resulted in the sacking of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Second Temple). These 40 years were “the Last Days,” and during the final 38 of them (Jesus having been crucified during Passover of AD 32), Jesus sat at the right hand of God while God made His enemies His footstool (Hebrews 10:12-13; Acts 2:34-35; compare Psalm 110:1).

Note that if read together, Hebrews 3 and 4 connect the 40 years in the wilderness to the time the readers of the epistle were living in, as well as the concept of a Sabbath rest (Hebrews 4:9), even explicitly mentioning the seventh day of creation in Hebrews 4:4-5. Therefore, the 40 years of the Last Days (i.e., the “last days” of the Old Covenant) were the Day 7 of the Second Creation.

Note that Matthew 24:34, Mark 13:30, and Luke 21:32 connect the Last Days with a generation, which is 40 years in the Bible (Numbers 32:13).

During this 40-year period, Jesus gave the apostles the Great Commission, just as He gave Adam a task on the seventh day of the first week of creation, to guard the garden (Genesis 2:15), and left to see how they would do in His absence. Jesus talked about this investing of responsibility numerous times (for example, the Parable of the Talents, Matthew 25:14-30). Then, He returned to judge the living and the dead according to their deeds (according to 1 Peter 4:5, Jesus was “ready” to do so at that time Peter was writing). As the First Jewish-Roman War approached, the writer to the Hebrews said that “yet a little while and He who is coming will come and will not tarry” (Hebrews 10:37).

As the end of the Old Covenant approached (Hebrews 8:13), more and more nominal members of the Christian church became impatient, lost faith, and scoffed at the earlier promises of His coming (2 Peter 3:1-4). Those who were truly in Christ and had sought to pursue His will went down one path, and those who were never truly in Christ (called antichrists in 1 John 2:18) began to pursue their own lusts and lead others astray (1 Timothy 4:1-3; Jude 1). This led to the division of sheep and goats described in Matthew 25:31-46, AKA the separation of wheat from tares in Matthew 13:24-30. As described in Hebrews 3-4, only the faithful would enter God’s rest, the rest of Day 7.

The rapture/resurrection and judgment of the first century church happened when Jesus returned in AD 70. At that point, the Sabbath rest ceased, Jesus became king of the nations (Revelation 11:15), and Titus began the siege of Jerusalem that resulted in the destruction of the city and the temple and thus ended Second Temple Judaism.

Note: The pre-millennium resurrection of saints in Revelation 20 occurred later at the beginning of the Third Jewish-Roman War (Bar Kokhba revolt), while the final resurrection and judgment of Revelation 20 is in our future.

The Third Creation

With the New Covenant permanently in place, the seven-day symbolism plays out again after the resurrection of Jesus in terms of the growth and development of the Church in the New Covenant era. I call this “the Third Creation.” I will lay out a rough sketch of how I think this might be playing out, although I have not yet deep-dived church history to validate it.

As mentioned previously, all seven days of the First Creation are described in Genesis 1:1-2:3, with the book of Genesis then going back to the second half of Day 6 of the First Creation to begin the narrative of the Second Creation. Similarly, the second half of Day 6 of the Second Creation was the story of Jesus and the Church, and the Third Creation begins there as well.

Introduction – The Old Testament and the Synoptic Gospels

The synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) finish the seven-day covenant narrative by providing a detailed description of Jesus and the Church as a new Adam and Eve, then briefly referencing the Sabbath rest of the Last Days at the end of the three gospels.

John 1:1-5 is similar to Genesis 2:4-6, in that it connects the entire story of the covenant history of mankind to the Church age, during which Jesus is working through the Church to transform the world. The Gospel of John presents a new look at Jesus in this context, before Acts continues the Bible narrative with a focus on the activities of the Church.

Day 1 – The Apostolic Age

Jesus and the Church are the new Adam and Eve (note Jesus as a gardener in John 20:15). Jesus is the “light of the world” (John 8:12), the “light to the nations” (Isaiah 49:6). The antediluvian era (i.e., from Adam to the Flood) was marked by an original heavens and earth (2 Peter 3:5-6), in which many physical aspects were different than they are now (for example, men living almost a thousand years, the earth being one land mass, massive dinosaurs roaming the earth, etc.). Similarly, the first-century Church had certain spiritual elements no longer present today, such as miracles on demand and certain gifts of the Spirit like prophecy, knowledge, and tongues (1 Corinthians 13:8-10). The apostles were the New Covenant “mighty men” of renown (Genesis 6:4).

In Day 1 of the Second Creation, there were no kingdoms. Similarly, in Day 1 of the Third Creation, the apostles did not seek to establish Christendom yet.

Jesus connected the judgement of Israel in the First Jewish-Roman War and His Parousia to the Flood under Noah (Matthew 24:37-39; see also Daniel 9:26). Thus, the Second Coming, the destruction of the Second Temple, the crowning of Jesus as King of kings (Revelation 11:15), and the complete replacement of the Old Covenant with the New Covenant mirrors the transition from Adam to Noah in the Second Creation.

Just like the Flood, the destruction of Israel also inaugurated a New Heaven and a New Earth. The New Heaven (described in Revelation 21-22) was populated by resurrected saints, was immediately perfect, and is the dwelling place of God. The New Earth, by contrast, is developing over time during the Church age until it becomes the mature state of happiness described in Isaiah 65:17-25.

Day 2 – The Apostolic Fathers

After the Flood, mankind began organizing into kingdoms and nations, resulting in the Table of Nations of Genesis 10. Similarly, the Church began organizing systematically and hierarchically after the death/rapture of the apostles. The final judgment of Jerusalem during the Third-Jewish Roman War ended the special role of Jerusalem in the Christian church and scattered the Jews across the world, thereby making the Christian faith predominantly Gentile-based. This corresponded to the judgment at the Tower of Babel.

The Apostolic Fathers carried down the faith as taught to them by the apostles and dealt with early heresies and controversies in this time period.

Day 3 – Later Ante-Nicene Fathers and the Conversion of Rome

After the devastation of Judea during the Third Jewish-Roman War, God turned the focus of the Church from establishing itself in the wake of the Parousia to preparing for the conversion of Rome. The Church Fathers who witnessed within the Roman Empire, suffering persecution and dealing with controversies as needed, filled the role of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the new Canaan.

Eventually, much as Joseph converted Pharaoh, the Christians of the early fourth century converted Constantine, who legalized Christianity and began the process of making Rome explicitly Christian, as Christianity spread through Rome the way Judaism took hold in Egypt between the times of Joseph and Moses.

Day 4 – Medieval Christianity

After Rome collapsed, the popes became the high priests of the Western church. The crowning of Charlemagne as Holy Roman Emperor corresponded to David’s anointing as king of Israel. In this way, the institutional church and the Christian state became analogues for the priesthood and the kingdom of ancient Israel. The Carolingian Renaissance corresponded to the development of the Psalter and the Wisdom Literature.

Day 5 – Late Medievalism and the Protestant Reformation

The Great Schism of 1054 that divided eastern and western Christianity corresponded to the division of Northern Israel and Southern Judah.

The doctrinal errors that gave rise to the Crusades, the tyrannical Inquisitions, false worship in Western Catholicism, and corruption in the Western Catholic Church represented the idolatry that the split kingdoms of Judah and Israel descended into under the influence of Jezebel.

The Protestant Reformation corresponded to the reforming efforts of Elijah and Elisha.

Day 6 – Global Expansion

The colonialism and imperialism that followed the Protestant Reformation allowed for the spread of Christianity globally, as well as a succession of nominally Christian empires (similar to the world empires of Day 6 of the Second Creation). The last Christian empire is America, which is modelled politically after the Rome that conquered Israel prior to the birth of Christ.

Just like the Rome of Jesus’ day, America is not explicitly following Christ but will probably not be physically destroyed. However, it is likely to soon lose the divine mandate of Christendom and see a revival of genuine Christianity that finally expunges the persistent trappings of Western Christendom that are inconsistent with the Bible, especially its paradigms of church and state.

Day 7 – 120 Years of Final Conversion

In my chronology studies, I determined that the 120^th Jubilee from creation, 5881, began in spring of 1992, following the 120^th Sabbath of Sabbaths in 5880. I suggest that there may be numerological significance to the 120^th Jubilee being the first of 120 years between the year 5880 and the year 6000 (which will run from spring of 2111 to spring of 2112), which could symbolically begin a “Sabbath millennium” reflecting the connection between creation days and millennia (see 2 Peter 3:8). Thus, I believe that we may be in the cycle of 49 years (which started in 1992) that includes the conversion of all Israel to Christianity (Romans 11:25-27).

After that cycle, the remainder of the 120 years might be the lead-up to the final Satanic assault of Revelation 20:7-10. This would probably represent the Sabbath of the Third Creation.

The final state of the converted Jews in the earthly Israel is described in Isaiah 66.

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