How did life and the world come into existence?     

The simplest answer from the Bible is to quote Genesis 1:1 - “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

How did God create the heavens and the earth?

God created all things out of nothing by his spoken word.  To say that God created the world out of nothing means that God is distinct and separate from the universe.  From the biblical account the universe can be called creation, since the Bible reveals all things to have a point of origin, unlike God who is eternal.  “Out of nothing” also indicates that God did not use apart of himself in creating the universe.  Creation does not consist of the divine substance of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. 

Colossians 1:16-17 – “For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.”

Hebrews 11:3 – “By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.”

Concerning the spoken word of God as being the mechanism of creation, the first chapter of Genesis plays like a repeating record – God said, and it was, God said, and it was, God said, and it was, God said, and it was, etc., until the sixth day in which God created man.  The first chapter of Genesis doesn’t say that God spoke man into existence, but there is special care to record that God created man in the image of the Lord.  In Chapter 2 there is a more detailed account of man’s creation, in which the Bible reveals that God formed the first man Adam (whose name in Hebrew means dirt) out of dirt and then brought him to life by breathing into his nostrils! 

How long did God’s creation take?

God, being omnipotent, can accomplish anything that pleases him.  This means that creation could have taken place instantaneously.  The account in Genesis Chapter 1 says that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth in the first verse.  The second verse indicates that “the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.”  There is not a specified amount of time given for how long the earth removed formless and empty with only darkness over the surface of the deep before God spoke light into existence on what the Bible calls the first day.  What is revealed in the Bible is that God speaks order into creation across of span of six days, each day consisting of evening and morning.  On the seventh day, God rested.  

Note, that God first created the heavens and the earth in the beginning, and later at some point in time, gave order to the formless, void of his initial creation.  As he gave order to the heavens and the earth, he also created vegetation, sea creatures, birds of the air, land animals, and man.

There is great parallel to God’s order of creation with the 1^st-3^rd days corresponding with the 4^th-6^th days.  The following chart which has been replicated from Mueller’s Called to Believe illustrates the parallel order of God’s creative work and it also shows what God created and ordered on each day. 

On the seventh day, God rested from creation. 

Is a six-day creation period literal?