GOD’S WORD FOR YOU
GENESIS 1:11
11 God said, “Let the earth produce vegetation: plants that produce seed, and trees upon the earth that bear fruit with seed in it, each according to its own kind.” And it was so.
The difference between “vegetation” and “plants” here is that vegetation seems to stand for all plant life, and “plants” for those growing things that mankind can eat. In other contexts, the first word (‘desheh’) often means grass or green grass: “He makes me lie down in green pastures” (Psalm 23:2), “God is like the brightness after rain that brings the grass from the earth” (2 Samuel 23:4). The other term (‘eseb’) can also mean grass or leaves (“God’s favor is like dew on the leaves,” Proverbs 19:12) and what is edible to man: “I give you green plants to eat” (Genesis 9:3).
The third item here is “trees upon the earth.” I think that the qualifier, “upon the earth,” is a hint to us that other growing things were also placed in or under the sea at this same time. So the lotus, cattails, papyrus, kelp, water lilies, and all of the many underwater things were produced here as well. But the main focus of Moses’ attention is on those plants that grow on land and are useful to most of mankind.
So the Lord produced all the growing things: grass and other things that are good food for cattle, sheep, and the wild animals, and herbs and vegetation that are good food for man and many of the crawling things that happily help themselves to our beans, peas, berries, and other garden plants before we gather them up for our tables, and the water plants for the good of the fish that were yet to be made as well as the wading birds and the wallowing amphibians and reptiles, and also the trees upon the earth.
The trees, like the other plants, produce seed so that they can reproduce themselves. But God adds a qualifier to his creative command: Trees that “bear fruit with seed in it.” Today at least, not all trees bear what we would think of as fruit. Did God’s creative command mean that in the beginning, trees were different, and abundantly productive of fruit? Or should we understand this as a qualifier, that among other trees (which might be included in “plants” at the beginning of the verse), there would be certain special trees that would bear fruit. This fruit was an important and delightful part of the food for Adam and Eve in Paradise. They could simply walk along, feeling a bit hungry, and pick what wanted as they went: apple, pear, peach, banana. They could learn in time that some unlikely-looking things were also delightful: coconut, pineapple, pomegranate and many others. Many trees have edible things we would not classify as “fruits” today (walnuts, pistachios, and so on) but we should not make the mistake of thinking that Moses meant exactly what we mean when he said “fruit.” We will re-visit this rule of interpretation when we consider what is meant by “fish and birds” in the fifth day.
All of the good plants were commanded and brought forth by the word of God. Someone who reads these verses aloud will perhaps be tempted to read the repetitious phase “each according to its own kind” rapidly, or even edit the words out when teaching this account. But we should do the exact opposite. God emphasizes that even the plants were made “each according to its own kind.” They did not evolve; they did not all stem from the same slimy amino acids during a lightning strike, or whatever other origin story is popular in public school textbooks this year. God made a cherry tree bearing cherries. God made an apple tree bearing apples. God made an orange tree bearing oranges. And so on and on. Now, within those kinds, it is true that man has mixed and matched similar fruits, so that the ancient world did not know the Granny Smith apple as we do today, but they certainly knew and ate apples. In the same way, the ancient world knew wolves, but not all the varieties of dogs that we have today, although there were some dogs that were bred as companions for people even in some of the earliest accounts of the Bible (Exodus 11:7; 22:31; Job 30:1).
Obviously mating different kinds of animals to produce new breeds was known in the ancient world, or else God would not have forbidden the practice for the Jews (Leviticus 19:19). That command, like all of the civil and ceremonial laws, no longer applies today except where secular governments have taken some of them up– and when this happens, obedience falls under the Fourth Commandment rather than the First. But there is nothing immoral or ungodly about breeding new varieties of apples or puppies today. I can buy either Comic Crisp or Braeburn apples to supply myself and my sons with good fresh fruit. But let us return to the point we made even when considering the appearance of light in verse 3. Light did not evolve from anything; it was brought into being by God. So also with plants, grasses, fruits, berries, nuts, trees, and the soft swaying things that thrive beneath the waves of the water. They were made by God on this third day of creation each according to its kind; the sort of evolution proposed by modern philosophers is simply contrary to the Word of God.
I hope I have made this point clearly. Martin Luther taught: “A sure proof that the creation is not fortuitous (meaning accidental) but the exclusive work of divine foresight is the fact that similar plants are brought forth from similar plants in uninterrupted sequence. Thus from wheat is produced nothing but wheat, from barley nothing but barley, and from rye nothing but rye. Perpetually the same inherent character, the process of development, and the nature of the individual kinds are preserved unimpaired.”
Notice the statement that proclaims the truth of this, for the Holy Spirit himself says: “And it was so.” This has all the force of a thunderclap, like the booming strepitous on Good Friday or the resounding and echoing gong in the finale of Act 1 of Turandot when the prince takes up the challenge to win the hand of the princess or die trying. This is the truth: “It was so.” It is not a “perhaps,” but an “Amen.”
Luther makes an analogy about creation that is well worth taking to heart. The world was brought forth by God like a house. God made “a most elegant roof, the heaven, though this was not yet fully adorned” (the sun, moon, and stars were as yet not created). “Its foundation is the earth. Its walls on every side are the seas. Now God also makes provision for our sustenance, so that the earth brings forth herbs and trees of all kinds.”
This day of creation shows God’s love for us, and his work of preservation as well as creation. He stocked the pantry of the world with good food, such that if we have the wisdom, we can find excellence in rice out in the pond, the delights of carrots and potatoes that are just inches under our feet. And the apples and peaches are still just hanging there, waiting to be picked, and to remind us that our God loves us. He loves the animals as well: “Be not afraid, O wild animals, for the open pastures are becoming green. The trees are bearing their fruit; the fig tree and the vine yield their riches” (Joel 2:22). He blesses all who dwell on the earth. “The seed will grow well, the vine will yield its fruit” (Zechariah 8:12), and the trees with “beautiful leaves and abundant fruit provide food for all” (Daniel 4:21).
“I believe that God still preserves me by richly and daily providing clothing and shoes, food and drink, property and home, spouse and children, land, cattle, and all I own, and all I need to keep my body and life.”
In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith
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Archives at St Paul’s Lutheran Church https://splnewulm.org/daily-devotions/ and Wisconsin Lutheran Chapel: www.wlchapel.org/connect-grow/ministries/adults/daily-devotions/gwfy-archive/2026
Pastor Smith serves St. Paul’s Lutheran Church, New Ulm, Minnesota
God’s Word for You – Genesis 1:11 each according to its own kind