Jesus, our beginning and end God

Genesis 1:1: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” (NASB)

The Bible is all about Jesus and the redemptive work He did for us on the Cross. He gave us the opportunity to not only have the lives we can now live but even more so, to have access to the gift of eternal life. Throughout the Bible He is hidden in names, prophesied about and typified through various objects and the lives of people in the Bible.

We will start at the beginning in the book of Genesis where we find the story of Creation. We read that God created the heaven and earth. Many translations translated God as Elohim, meaning Almighty God. But do you see Jesus hidden in verse 1?

In the original Hebrew text of the Bible, the fourth word has been omitted by the English translation and the reason being most probably because the Hebrew word missing here is not a real word. But this word reveals Jesus in a way no other word can.

The word omitted consist of two letters, which are the first and the last letters of the Hebrew alphabet, “Alef” and “Tav”. Are you beginning to see Jesus in this verse?

What is the significance of Alef – Tav?

If we do a direct translation, Genesis 1:1 should have read, “In the beginning the A-Z (beginning and end) God created the heaven and the earth. The God of the beginning and the end, the Author and Finisher of our faith was there when the world was created.

Jesus also calls Himself the “Alpha” and “Omega”, which is the beginning and the end in Revelation 1:8. This is however the first and the last letters of the Greek Alphabet, but it still confirm the presence of Jesus as the A and Z in everything. God is in fact revealing to us who is Creator of the heaven and the earth; the world that we live in – Jesus.

Other references that supports Jesus’ presence at the creation are:

John 1:1-3: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being” (NASB) ~ Jesus is the Word referred to here. Jesus was the Word of God and He created ALL things.

Colossians 1:16-17: “For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities-all things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.” (NASB)

Jesus is the beginning of the creation of God, the Creator and Sustainer of everything.  He was there in the beginning and He will be there in the end, our A-Z God. He has the first say and He will have the last say.

Maretha Retief

Illustration by Jeanne de Villiers