"Tardiness often robs us opportunity, and the dispatch of our forces."
Niccolo Machiavelli
Lets back this thing up to a big story overview kind of thing from a bird’s eye view. Not a 10,000 or 20,000 foot view but like an 85,000 foot view. The big picture. I hope you have a profound moment and go ahhhhhh and all sorts of lights come on. There are some things that I hear people say throughout the week, especially by believers that contradicts Christianity all together. Yet it is their deepest understanding of their faith and what is believed to be correct. I hope this makes all sorts of lights go off and opens your eyes to a larger broader sense of God.
This is my central premise. Where and how you begin the story and where and how you end the story shape and determine what the story even is. If you are reading this and consider yourself a Christian you usually say just tell me the story in 2 minutes. Just give me the short version in 1 minute. Quick. Just kinda give me the overview. The points. The highlights. You will so often here Christians say “Oh, you are just telling the Jesus story.” I think we all now have a sort of “Which Jesus story?” That is because in our present culture there are various Jesus stories floating around. I am going to take a bit of time, (well a pretty long time so go grab something to eat and drink because this one might take you awhile to get through) and ask, “Where does this story begin? How does the story end? And, what are the implications for how we understand what the story even is?”
Genesis chapter 1, verse 1 is very rhythmic. It has a cadence. A flow. Some even say it is a poem. I don’t believe this to be true. I see both sides of the question but I don’t speak nor read in Hebrew minus the words I look up as I go so I cannot form a legitimate opinion. It certainly has a meter and a sort of groove to it though. If you have never read it, it is in the Bible all the way to the left. It is easy to find, don’t worry.
In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth. Verse 3 and God said. Verse 6 And God said. Verse 9 And God said. Verse 14 And God said. Verse 20 And God said. Of all the ways to speak about the creation, the writer uses this unique figure of speech. He wrote about God speaking because words create worlds. They create possibilities. You hear somebody say something to you and all of a sudden a whole new world opens up. Perhaps you were sent all sorts of destructive messages about who you are and how you’re unworthy, dirty, defile, and you were violated. Then somebody spoke a fresh new clean word of “Oh no, you are beautiful. You matter.” and those words created a whole new world. The whole thing is about God speaking.
Then in chapter 2 things change in form a bit. The writer uses this figure of 7 days of creation. Remember this 7 day thing…it is important! In chapter 2 it goes from this rhythmic creation of God speaking into a story. There are significant ways were the chapter 2 story of the event is similar to chapter 1 and there are ways from which they differ. 2 different approaches to some of the same events. Chapter 2:4 is the account of Heavens and the Earth and when they were created. Then it kind of retells this rhythmic passage about the garden. It is very vivid. The garden has these rare gems and it has a river and head waters. Then verse 18 God said “It is not good for man to be alone. Somebody has to show him what to wear.” Chapter 2 involves this relationship. Verse 25, then man and his wife were both nekked and they felt no shame. Couple of key words. Notice Chapter 1:11, “Then God said let the land produce vegetation.” The word produce is sometimes translated as sprout. Creation is endowed by its creator with the ability to create life. It is not just that the creator makes a tree. The creator makes a tree that is loaded with the ability to make more trees. You could say God makes all the trees or you could say God makes the trees that make more trees which would be equally true. Built into creation is this nuclear, life-giving ability to create more. Maybe you could call this progressive generativity. It is progressing somewhere. It is going to grow and sprout. It is going to leaf and create more. You know this because of the weeds growing in the cracks of your driveway. If you take a picture of creation one day, then come back a week later and take a picture and then do it again the week after you will have 3 different pictures which show the growth. If you are standing perfectly still in the midst of creation it will not look the same tomorrow. If you abandoned the house you live in and came back 20 years later you will say things like “It is overgrown.” It is loaded with the ability to create more. Creation is going somewhere. It is a dynamic reality, not a static one. THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT! The Garden of Eden is not perfect. We often import our understandings of things that aren’t there. The word is not perfect. The word is good. “God says it is GOOD!” By perfect I simply mean static and unchanging. When we say perfect what many of us mean is static and unchanging. It is frozen in its perfection and it will not change. In Genesis 1 and 2 it is going to change because it is going to grow and sprout and change. These people are placed in the midst of it and given work to do. Go to Genesis 1:26, Then God said “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea.” Verse 28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. God gives these people responsibility and stewardship. God places these folks in the midst of the creation that is going somewhere and says take care of it. Do something with it. Make things. I just made all of this and now I am putting you in there to co-create with me. Let’s do something with it.
Those of you who are compulsive landscapers or designers and always have a shovel in hand, doing something with it are great examples of this. Those of you in music who want to take the chords and melodies and want to do something with them are as well. Those of you who love shape clay. Those of you who love words. Those of you who have an impulse within you to arrange it. To guide it. To massage it. To support it. To come along side of it. To nurse it. It is all there in Genesis 1 and 2. We were made to take it somewhere. There is a harmony here, and this is huge within hierarchy. God creates these people; these people are then given responsibility over creation. There is a strict hierarchy and everything knowing its proper place within the hierarchy is where the peace and harmony comes from. If these people begin to worship the creation instead of the creator then it is out of whack with the proper life giving hierarchy. If these people decide they are going to play God, and do not submit to a higher being then they are essentially messing with the hierarchy.
An addiction, in particularly of a substance is looking to that which comes from the earth to satisfy a deep need of the soul that can only fully be satisfied by the creator. A substance abuse is not a proper harmony within hierarchy. That is where the peace, or shalom comes from. Notice verse 28, God blessed them. These people are co-created and partnering with God proper stewardship in healthy relationships with each other and submission to God, this God blesses. Working with wood, God blesses. Growing crops and making sure everybody has enough food, God blesses. He said this, this is good. This is what I intended. Yes. Well done. God smiles and celebrates.
Watch this…Now; soil and spirit here are united. There aren’t 2 realms. A realm of the physical everyday sort of stuff and then somewhere out there a realm of the spiritual heavenly kind of stuff. Everything is deeply interwoven and connected. Soil and spirit are connected. Another way to think about it is that Heaven and Earth is the same place. In Genesis 1 and 2 Heaven and Earth is the same place. There isn’t somewhere else that we go when we die. A) Because there is no somewhere else and B) Because we don’t die. Are you with me? Stay here a moment. In Genesis 1 and 2 the goal is not to escape from here to some other more spiritual realm where God is. God is here. There is no higher realm. There is just the realm. Heaven is the realm to which God intends them to be in Genesis 1 and 2.
Pull back a second…let’s go to a higher bird’s eye view. Whatever it is that we love about life and taps into your sense of this is why I am here…"Oh I could do this forever”...and calls out deep into your spirit, “I was made for this.When I do this or observe this or appreciate this or interact with this it pulls out of me this sense of what life is all about." Whatever that is for you can be found in Genesis 1 and 2. Ascetics. Beauty. The appreciation of form. All in there. The food on the tree was pleasing to the eye. It’s beautiful. It’s not “It is beautiful so that…” No, it is just beautiful. It is stunning to gaze upon and that is its point. There is no larger point other than it just is. Ascetics. Making things. Take creation for instance, it is going somewhere, do something with it. Perhaps you have a woodshop in your garage and you have to go out there after work because you just have this joy when you carve stuff and make doorstops or whatever wood shop people make. Oh yea, pencil holders and stuff. If that is what you do then great! That is Genesis 1 and 2. Perhaps for you it is kids. You just love kids. Educating kids. Shaping young minds. All Genesis 1 and 2. Relationship, partnership, worship, exploration, organizing, naming, learning, responsibility. Maybe you are the kind of person who if we were to see your sock drawer it would be frighteningly organized. Or how about that drawer in the house near the back door that has things like duck tape and jumper cables and passports and markers and rubber bands and staples and paper clips and computer speakers, super glue, tweezers, a mouse trap, and a ruler. In everybody else’s house it is that drawer of junk that you have to shuffle things around just to get it to close but yours somehow is perfectly organized and labeled. That impulse to organize, to sift and sort, is all Genesis 1 and 2. That is you Mona. You are in Genesis 1 and 2. If you instinctively in every situation think how can I bring order to this? It is in there too. Maybe you are the kind that thinks don’t put me out front, I don’t want any attention drawn to myself…just give me a task where I can help plan the details. Let me do that and that is what I love. What is it? A Genesis 1 and 2 instinct. Obviously things like painting, drawing, art, and the common good are Genesis 1 and 2. Maybe you have a profound sense of justice. How about you want make sure everybody on Earth has enough food. 1 billion people don’t have enough drinking water in the world and you want to do something about it. Where does that impulse come from? Proper organizing and stewardship of creation is where. Whatever you love and makes you feel alive. Whatever makes you think you are tapped into something bigger, I guarantee can be traced back to its fundamental essence in Genesis 1 and 2. A story starts here. If someone says to you what is the Jesus story, the Bible story, the Christian story, it starts here in Genesis 1. Again, it is located all the way to the left in your Bible.
Now on to the end of the story, Revelations 21. It is all the way to the right in your Bible. The story ends here. Let’s ask a similar set of questions about the end of the Bible. Revelation 21 and 22.
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.
So if heaven is the place where things are as God intends them to be the story ends. It ends with Heaven essentially crashing into Earth and God now dwelling in the midst of people. Notice Chapter 22. The heading in my Bible says Eden restored.
Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb 2down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month.
See! San Antonio is in the Bible! A city with a river flowing in the middle! Amazing huh?! Ok, that’s ridiculous. Verse 5. There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign *BTW the Greek word for reign means to participate with* with God for ever and ever.
We will participate with God forever and ever! How cool is that?! River, cities, trees, fruit. The healing of the nations. Proper healed relationship participating with God in ordering, stewarding and guiding creation. Sound familiar? The story starts there and ends here in the same way. Hmmmm. Just a side not, cause I love those…if you were to take sin out the Bible you would have 4 short chapters. Genesis 1 and 2 and Rev. 21 and 22. Quick read right?
Chapter 1 and 2 is about a garden, and Rev. 21 and 22 is about a city. If you took sin out of a city you get a large collection of gardens. You would still have a progression. A movement. If you have a garden and it keeps growing and it is properly cared for, eventually there will be enough gardens connected to each other to make a city.
Go back to the left of the Bible in Genesis 3. This chapter introduces something else to the story. We find the first people. The story is told that these people have an experience in which they violate the boundaries God has made for them. The way that it is told is a picture of a tree that if they eat from this tree it will be exploring outside the boundaries God has created them for. They eat from this tree. And they experience a disruption in the peace, shalom and harmony of Chapters 1 and 2.
Genesis 3:8-Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the LORD God called to the man, "Where are you?"
Does the creator of the universe have a difficult time finding 2 nekked people in a garden? “I have no idea where you are?” No! Where are those naked people running around? I can’t find you crazy kids. Marco….Polo…Marco….Polo…No. Well, you could read it that way if you wanted to…but no. Perhaps you could also read it like God is saying, “Where are ya?” “Where are ya now?” “You have violated our relationship. You weren’t satisfied with the world I placed you in and decided to create a reality outside of the one I created you for. You weren’t ok with the hierarchy. You didn’t like me on top. You wanted to be on top. So you chose to explore outside the boundaries you were created for. Where did that get you? Where are you? How is that working out for ya? How are things now? Where are you? Where did you end up with that decision? Is that what you wanted? Are you pleased?” You can read it sorts of ways.
How do you understand Geneses 3? Often times it is referred to as the fall of man. Are there ways to explore what sin is and the fall that might be a bit more helpful and obviously Biblical?
First off, sin is a disruption. One definition is simply the disruption of shalom. God created us to have peace with our maker, with each other, with the earth and with ourselves. Sin would be any way in which I have acted to disrupt shalom. Is this the shalom God intends for everything? Is this true to the beautiful picture God intends us to have and do or have I violated hierarchy and boundaries? Disruption. Sometimes it is defined as rebellion. I don’t like this setup with Him on top. I am rebelling against the order of things. I am rebelling against the world I have been brought to and God who made it, or, participation in the old order and way of death. Remember, Genesis 1 and 2 is active and dynamic…not static. It is moving so sin is a way in which I am taking it in an improper direction.
Here is an example. Tonight roughly 800,000,000 people will go to bed hungry. Right now in our world. That should shock and offend you. What experts are saying is that there actually is enough food in the world to feed everybody in the world. 6,000,000,00+ inhabitants of the world and there is currently enough food to feed everybody. Almost 1/6th of those people will not eat today not because there isn’t enough food to feed everybody but because the food hasn’t been properly distributed. The earth has produced but we have not properly ordered, managed, and stewarded creation so that everybody’s needs are met. We have disrupted the shalom God has intended for everyone. We have rebelled against the hierarchy and participated with creation in a way that is not the way God intended for us to participate. Sometimes the word Het translated from Hebrew is an archery term that means missing the mark. Genesis 3 introduces sin by showing us how we missed the mark.
You could perhaps say it this way, Genesis 3 is not how the story begins and Genesis 3 is not how the story ends. When people talk about sin, or you sinner!!! “TURN OR BURN!” wait wait wait…the story doesn’t begin with Genesis 3 and it doesn’t end with Genesis 3. When we tell the story we need to be very careful that all of the points in the story and the plotline are the plotline of the actual story. A few thoughts then on our participation in this realm.
1. Confession
It is a Hebrew word you should have learned from Seinfeld. Yadi yadah. It means our recognition, admission, our declaration and our agreement that we have participated in the other way. We have participated in the old world order and furthered the death and not the life that God intends for us. Confession is my realization that I have been caught up in, participated with and suckered by and I needed to see that and call it what it was.
2. Repentance
Confession is followed often by repentance not far behind. The Hebrew for that is Teshuvah. It means to turn or return. Confession is when we are brought to our senses and I now want to return to the true way. The way that I was made for that restores peace.
What then is the Jesus story? Let’s go to Matthew 19 and find out. At the center of orthodox, historic, Christian, faith has been telling the Jesus story how it begins one way and ends one way and in between there is this massive disruption in it, this could bring some depth, texture and body to the Jesus story.
Notice in chapter 19:28 Jesus said to them, “I tell you the truth, at the RENEWAL of all things, when the Son of Man sits on the throne.” So Jesus speaks about a renewal of all things. Turn to Acts 3 you have on one of the first Christians giving a speech. His name is Pedro. He is Spanish. Joking…it is not really his name. He is speaking to a crowd about the Messiah and how he has come. He believes Jesus is Messiah and has been appointed to rescue people from the old order and way of death. Acts 3:21 Heaven must receive Him until the time comes when God RESTORES. Jesus spoke of it as the renewal of all things and Peter here talks about God restoring everything. Colossians 1. Another one of the first Christians…a dude named Paul speaks of the cross and what exactly was going on up there on that cross. For him the cross is far larger than a good Jewish Rabbi being executed for subversion. For him there is a cosmic dimension to the cross. It extends as wide as the universe. He says in Verse 19, For God was pleased to have all of His fullness dwell in Him. (In Jesus). And through him to RECONCILE to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross. He speaks of the cross as a massive universal wide movement. All things in Heaven and on Earth pretty much sums it up. A peacemaking act on God’s part to reconcile to Himself all things. Jesus speaks of the renewal of all things. Peter speaks of the restoration of all things. Paul speaks of the reconciliation of all things.
The Jesus story is then about the God who wants to put it all back together. This has HUGE implications for the story we are telling. If you begin the story in Genesis 3 then the primary issue becomes the removal of sin. People are sinners, how are we going to get rid of the sin problem. How are we going to get this out of the picture because it really messes things up? The dominant story begins with the how do we get rid of sin; well Jesus gets rid of sin. There. Done. You can see the bumper sticker “Christians aren’t perfect, just forgiven.” That’s it? Once we are forgiven then what? Is that all Jesus is capable of? Get you forgiven? If you begin the story in Genesis 3 then that is what you are left with. This is what Jesus does…He gets rid of the problem. But! If you start telling the story in Genesis 1, it becomes about the restoration of shalom. This obviously includes the removal of sin but also extends to the very ends of the cosmos. Are you with me now? Ok…get ready because I am going to dump it all out on you now. First, take a bite of the food I told you to get before you started. I need you brain working for this. Thinking caps on.
If the story begins in Genesis 3 then the fundamental posture towards people is to make sure they know what they aren’t. You aren’t good enough. Holy enough. Not reading the good book enough. You aint sanctified! Amen! You aren’t trying hard enough. If you begin the story late then you may be telling people what they aren’t. If you begin in Genesis 1, you will tell people what they are. YOU ARE A DAUGHTER, YOU ARE A SON OF A LOVING HEAVENLY FATHER AND FROM THE BEGINNING OF TIME THIS FATHER HAS HAD UNCONDITIONAL, ALL EMBRACING LOVE FOR ALL OF CREATION. This God is a creator who makes things and says Awwww that is good! ONE OF THE THINGS GOD MADE THAT HE SAID IS GOOD, IS YOU! You are made in the image of this God and you contain the divine spark. You are created to be a co-creator. To be a partner with God in moving creation forward in ever increasing dimensions of shalom. You know this deep in your bones. You have participated in the way of death. You have rebelled. You have disrupted shalom and now your loving, heavenly father is standing in the driveway on His tippie-toes, arms wide open saying “I am inviting you to return home.”
It is fundamentally different. How do you tell people the story? A Genesis 3 type of person always has the chance that your posture may become I need to go up to strangers on the street and I need to convince them how wretched, depraved and sinful they are. If I can get them feeling bad enough about themselves I may be able to whip out a pamphlet and get them in. We wonder why it is hard to keep those converts. Maybe it is easier to understand the story when we start in the beginning because then it is more helpful to understand how we got where we are. If your story begins in Genesis 3 it is very easy to become about disembodied evacuation. It is about how to get somewhere else. It becomes an evacuation theology. Here is what you need in order to get out of this place so that some glad morning you too can fly away. It then locates the center of God’s redemptive activity somewhere else. What can then sink in is that the real point of this story is somewhere else. Then we have to use words like relevant to try and have it make sense now. It is very easy to sink in to the subtle belief that the real action is someplace else. If you begin the story in Genesis 1 it becomes about co-creating participation. God is looking for partners to help repair and restore the world. People who are so overwhelmed with the gift of rescue freely given in Christ that we can’t imagine anything but partnering with God to do our humble bit to see that through and come into existence.
It would be interesting to survey people, especially Christians about heaven. My experience has been when people are in a safe place they can be honest about their religion and you can really push them with questions on what they really think about Heaven. To them it sounds a bit boring. They don’t hold pitch real well singing. Maybe you feel this way. I can’t sing for crap. How am I going to sing in Heaven with the angels? Do you know how lame Heaven would be for the listeners? Perhaps it is you that when you truly truly think about Heaven, one of your questions is that you don’t know what it is going to be like in Heaven and what we will do for eternity. It actually sounds a bit boring. Well if your story is rooted in Genesis 3 and the goal of it is disembodied evacuation then it is a flawed view of heaven. I don’t know we will be in clouds strumming harps. I have no experience with harps. But if the story is about Heaven and Earth becoming one again and ends here then Heaven starts to make a lot more sense.
What are those moments now that I am most alive? Who is it that when you are with them, you feel like you would rather be right there than anywhere else in the world? When you lose track of time. When my soul flourishes and soars like ahhhh I could do this forever. Sometimes I find people who are really really passionate about a particular thing and because of their faith they feel guilty about it. “I just love to be out in the woods and I know it is not very spiritual.” But what is Genesis 1 and 2 and what is Heaven and the Earth other than the exploration of the world that God has created and declared it is good? Therefore sometimes it is possible for religion to actually produce in people this sort of guilt complex with the very things in which they can most find their creator. They somehow feel bad about it. Follow? Does the story begin in Genesis 1 or Genesis 3?
Is there a way to talk about this that transcends some of the stale categories that perhaps we have picked up over the years? We can go to the Bible and find out. How do the writers who first told the Jesus story talk about all of this. Let me show you something that when you see it will ping your head a bit.
I am going to get into in one second but let me first mention I have been studying a great deal lately on how to interpret the Bible. The main thing I learned from this is you can’t take the Bible only for what it says. You should try to understand the culture, the background, the people, the point, the language, the words used and many other things to fully get the point and context of its meaning. I am not saying that inspiration and the Holy Spirit can’t really hit that spot needed at that moment, but that is a different essence of the Bible. This has drastically helped me get a much deeper than surface level of how amazing God is and the word of God too.
A little background on Jewish writers. They would often write on multiple levels. They would tell a story and plant within that story very subtle and delicately clever language. Unless you were paying keen attention you would miss it but if you were paying attention you would notice they were telling a story stacked on top of another story with a hint of another story. It was a very prized Jewish ability to be able to tell a story and at the same time tell all these other stories just around the edges.
John 2. Pay very very close and precise attention to the words John uses. Jesus as His first miracle changes water into wine. If you are going to start somewhere that is a really great place to do it. Verse 11. What Jesus did here in Cana from Galilee was the first of the signs. (keyword in John’s Gospel, he loves this word signs) It was the first time to reveal His glory and His disciples put their faith in Him. Water into wine, not bad. The prophets spoke of wine as a symbol not only of God’s new world but of the blessing and favor of God. Wine for a Jewish reader would have triggered “that is like new creation…new Heaven and Earth sort of stuff and this is the also blessing and favor of God.” Jesus produces wine. See why understanding culture helps make the picture in a bird’s eye view so much more profound? It is not Jesus just doing a nice thing to help the ceremony not get spoiled.
Notice in John 4:44, Jesus heals the royal officials son . In verse 54 John adds, This was the 2nd sign Jesus performed after coming from Judea to Galilee. I hope when you read this you notice a trend. I would hope that you are instantly thinking and racing to find out what the 3rd sign is. What is he doing here? Why is John numbering things?
The 2 things that he has numbered we might call miracles. A healing is a demonstration of how things are supposed to be in God’s world. If Heaven is the realm where things are as God intends them to be and God does not intend for sickness and disease, then what Jesus is doing in a healing is not demonstrating some sort of freaky new condition for this kid. He is displaying how things always were and how things will be. If you take this word signs you start to wonder what else you can find. Chapter 5 begins with a healing at the pool. He healed the paralytic which is the 3rd sign and then in Chapter 6 you have a couple of speeches and he feeds 5,000 men. You may have studied this before that in crowds, men are the ones who were counted. That is not including the women and children. Who knows how many truly ate from 5 loaves of bread. Not bad, because people should have enough food to eat. 4th sign. Then verse 16 Jesus walks on water and demonstrates a sort of command of creation. Well done. 5th sign. Then you have a speech. Then you have people visiting Him. Then He goes to a feast. Then He teaches. Then there is some division. Then there is the unbelief. Then there is the dispute. Then there is another dispute. Then He claims some things about Himself. The next sign or miracle happens in Chapter 9. What is the heading in chapter 9? Jesus heals the man born blind. He heals. Then the big one in chapter 11 there is a guy named Lazarus that dies. In verse 43, When He had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus! Come out!” The dead man came out, his hands wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them “Dang fool! You stink dude! Take off the grave clothes and let him go.” Wait wait. 1,2,3,4,5,6. Raising a man from the dead is the 7th sign. You take the 7 signs that start with wine (a new creation and blessing from God), which is a pretty cool party trick and by the 7th sign people are rising from the dead. It is sort of a climax. People rising from the dead. After that in chapter 12 there are no signs. 13 nada. 14. Nope. 15. Guessed it…nope…16, 17, nothing. 18 arrested, put on trial, convicted, crucified, killed. Apparently once He has raised somebody from the dead, if you don’t believe now, then there is not much more He can do. More wine isn’t going to help. Maybe, but probably not.
It is interesting when you take a story like that and zoom out so you can see a higher altitude of the story it opens perspective up. Hopefully by now something happened for you when the signs were being counted. How many signs were there? 7. In Jewish consciousness is there anywhere in the story where the number 7 is kind of big? Genesis 1. It begins with the giant number 7 because in the creation 7 played heavily in to it. What might John be saying? Raising Lazarus from the dead is not really the last sign or miracle because at the end of the book John tells you about Jesus doing what? Resurrection. What might John be saying? Jesus does a miracle or sign for each day of the first creation and then the 8th sign which would make it "Sunday" of the 2nd week He resurrects from the dead, inaugurated, not an old creation but a "Monday", the first day of a new creation. Amazing!
What is John saying? He is telling this epic story as a way of saying resurrection is the start of a whole new creation. Let’s walk this through.
1. The story is about Jesus resurrecting and beginning a new creation right here in the midst of this one.
2. The story of the resurrection is about God restoring goodness of creation. God does not beam people up like Scotty to some other realm. God comes down in the midst of this creation, takes all of the death, destruction, and disruption upon himself to the grave, leaves it there and announces I am making all things new. This world was good when I made it and it is still good.
Let's make sure we make this distinction clear. There is a distinction between materiality and rebellion. This is HUGE especially if you grew up around religion. Materiality refers to the material realm. Physical things. Nowhere in the story is the material realm declared bad. The story is about human rebellion. Human rebellion is a different issue than trees, rocks, and wine. What has happened for many people is their tradition confused rebellion with materiality and said because humans have rebelled all of creation is in some way fallen, depraved, dark and bad. What this creates is physical bad, spiritual good. Do you know what I am writing about? The work is to separate those two. Scriptures speak of human rebellion that has deeply affected creation. In fact it is in a sort of bondage. The writer Paul speaks of it by saying it is a sort of pangs of childbirth, the redemption of all things. But nevertheless, for many people rocks and soil and whatever got imprinted in their brain to them that this Earth is bad but if we can just get out of here we will be ok. The resurrection is about Jesus reaffirming the goodness of creation. The story is about anticipating when Heaven and Earth are one again. Right now the realms are split. Earth and then there is a realm where things are the way God intends them to be. There are moments when the 2 seem awfully close. They interlock, and dance and hold hands and kiss but that isn't a good realm. The story, the resurrection, is the anticipation when God makes dwelling on Earth and Heaven the same place again like they were at the start of the story. Are you with me now?!
Moving to logical and practical uses…let’s get into business, art, and justice.
1. Business
If Genesis 1 is about the proper ordering of creation and making sure everybody has what they need, it is proper stewardship. If Genesis 1 and 2 is about making sure the earth produces food and is distributed in a way that everybody is not hungry it is proper stewardship. If it is about proper hierarchy and harmony, then what do you think business is? Business provides a good or service at a fair price so that people can take and consume or use that good or service and have their needs met. It is the exchange of goods and services for the betterment for the common good. That is what business is. It is taking what the earth is creating and properly organizing it and distributing it at a fair price so that people can have what they need. Business is a very Genesis 1 and 2 occupation. That impulse is right there. If your story begins in Genesis 3 and how people aren’t saved and begins with disembodied evacuation then what can happen is business people in that story are made to feel second class. "Well, ya know, I am not a pastor. I am just a business person but I can make a lot of money and give it to spiritual things." If you start the story in Genesis 1 and 2, your task is already sacred, holy and profound. We need you to do your work in a Genesis 1 and 2 way. Your work is not 2nd class and there plenty of other spiritual people who have been called to help get the message (or wrong message) out so they can evacuate someday. Your work is already holy. It is a divine calling like any other divine calling to properly work for the common good. A lot of destructive messages have been sent to business people. All you do is make money. Wait wait wait. The fair and proper exchange for goods and services is only about making money? We need that. We need you.
2. Art
Couple thoughts. If creation is producing, sprouting, and growing it is only natural then that we would creatively organize it. We would shape it and bring form to it. We would appreciate line, curve, and dimension. Art then is capturing those creations in a way that reflects the infinite creativity of the creator. Co-creators created by a creator who create. Art in Genesis 1 and 2 is declared good and God blessed them. This impulse is already blessed. Obviously you can create things that aren’t a reflection of the peace, healing and shalom of God. Obviously it is possible to make things that steer the project in a destructive direction. But the fundamental primal impulse God blessed. This is why black and white, overly simplistic classifications of art and asking whether it is Christian or not will always fail. When we need a Christian label to validate something we are trying to validate and bless something God already blessed. Let God do it, God is better at it. This is why for a lot of people, including me, a Christian sub-culture with Christian music or movies and Christian books and Christian coffee cups and Christian stickers produce a deeply confusing concept. No matter how things are labeled, you can endlessly find things in the non-Christian category that are humming with life and Godliness and Holiness. You can also find things with the Christian label that are TERRIBLE. Don’t get me started. Don’t feed the bears because this is my most touchy and biggest pet peeve about Christians. If it is a wonderful song and evokes a great sense of love, inspiration, joy, and happiness then there is not one single thing wrong with playing it in church. A lot of this work and effort and discussion about are they a Christian or is so and so a Christian band is rooted in a misunderstanding of Genesis. Those questions come out Genesis 3. You start the movie late and a bunch of stuff is not going to make sense. Don’t start the movie late! You start at the beginning of the movie you might get it.
3. Justice
Last one. This profound sense we all have. Again. 1,000,000,000 people in the world don’t have drinking water. That is not right. Illiteracy rates in the San Antonio are horrific. How many 6th graders can’t read? 9th graders? Seniors in high school? Here is a scary thing I just learned. 67% of black students are dropping out and the trend is now with the kids just entering school this year that 9 out of 10 black students will drop out. We have to do something about it. That sense of that isn’t right, that holy anger that rises within you when you think that is not right, the sense when you know people are deprived, oppressed, and somebody needs to help them…that sense of justice is Genesis 1 and 2. It is the proper ordering of God’s world. When people don’t have enough to eat it is not the proper ordering of God’s world. When basic education hasn’t been given to people it is not the proper ordering of God’s world. Your longing for justice is all right there in the beginning.
There are endless debates within the Christian community about is our message what we say or is it what we do? Is our message bringing people water or is it talking to people about forgiveness? Is our message rescuing people from slavery or talking to them about the state of their soul? When you find that sort of debate and discussion going on, after a while you find yourself thinking this is so old and so stupid, confusing and stale. When the question is it this or is it this. Maybe the answer is a great big hug with both hands. When you find people in the endless debate about the Gospel to either announce God's forgiveness through Christ or the Gospel bringing people water in Jesus’ name, I say group hug. Group hug. Everybody together. One giant group hug. When the question is, is it this or this you could think maybe, Jesus’ embrace is big enough for the whole discussion.
A couple more thoughts and then I am finished. A Christian can then continually insist that through the resurrection of Jesus a whole new world is bursting forth right here in the midst of this one and everybody, everywhere can be a part of it. Everybody everywhere! A Christian then is learning more and more how to see this new creation with their own eyes. I didn’t see it before. I was sleeping but now I am waking up. There are these people that I would have discounted but all of a sudden now I am planting within them the seeds of new creation. This is a situation where before I would have been angry, bitter, and would have filled me with despair but now I am waiting because I know that somewhere within all that cement, a flower is going to sprout. I am going to see it and I am going to call it what it is. Before I would have jumped all over that person and I would have said how dare you be so mean! Now I know to be a little patient. Show a little grace because a new creation may burst forth right here. A Christian then has hope not in escape but in engagement. The word hope. People can be talking about hope and they may mean waaaay different kinds of hope. Some say, "Well I have hope." What they may mean is that I have hope, because I have a ticket to Heaven and will get out of here at some point. My type of hope is rooted in engagement were God invites us into the muck and dirt and filth because in it we will find God working as God always is for a new creation right here in the midst of the old one. Our hope is rooted not in escape but in engagement. Not in evacuation but reclamation. It is not about getting out of here but about reclaiming it. Not in leaving but in staying and overcoming because through Jesus’ resurrection God is affirming the goodness of creation. Last thing. A Christian then is never surprised when grace, beauty, meaning, order, compassion, truth and love show up in all sorts of unexpected people, places and things because it always has been God’s world. It is God’s world and it always will be God’s world.
