Much contemporary evangelical exegesis of Genesis 1 starts with an acceptance of the basic tenets of materialism and preserves that world view from any final conflict with the revelation of God, showing no final challenge from the Word of God to the Word of Man and no opening of the path to the gospel by declaring that our creator and redeemer works through his word and is intimately involved with his creation. The great point of Genesis 1 is that Spirit (love, personhood, mind) is basic, and matter is not, it is produced by mind (God's mind).
In short it provides a view of Genesis 1 that leaves the materialist world view intact. So you've got to wonder at its credibility, and its evangelical effectiveness, because failing to effectively challenge an anti or non-theistic world view must be a marker of failure to adhere to biblical proclamation.
Rather, Genesis 1 can be a launch pad for challenge from both the real world and revelation to the notion that the world is somehow independent of God, marked in the assertive rhetoric which has as its aim, and result, the removal of God from the real world of our personal encounters. Indeed, it so amends the intent of Genesis 1 that it comes into conformity with the materialist impoverishment that stands diametrically opposed to it!
This exegesis removes any challenge to the materialist conceptualization of the world in an anti-prophetic move that denies the Spirit of God. Most materialists upon hearing such exegesis relegate it to fantasy, because they *know* that the cosmos exists on its own account and mind is a mere arrangement of matter. That most usage of Genesis 1 fails to dislodge this is the extent to which it submerges the gospel. It agrees that we live in a purely material world, and statements to the contrary are a mere gloss with strictly aesthetic appeal, and not post-Fall confrontations to its lunacy. They therefore offer nothing to a world lost in empty and self-obsessed consumerism, where things, image, impression, and sheer braggadocio displace inner growth and loving connection with the creator of all things, who is love.
