Storyline Biblical Theology 04 - Genesis 4 - "Murder One: Murder, Lies, and Life in Christ"

When the call came through the police scanner, I immediately knew our joyride turned into a very serious matter of life or death. I had a close friend who was a Tuscaloosa Police sergeant when I was in my mid-twenties (which was longer ago than I like to admit!). After signing some releases, I rode around in his cruiser with him during the 11pm – 7am shift. The kicker – it was January 1, 2001. The call came in that a murder had just taken place somewhere deep in the ghetto. My friend told me I could either stay in the police car and risk getting shot, or come investigate the crime scene with him and…risk getting shot. Since I wouldn’t get a gun either way, I went with him to investigate the 1st murder of the millennium in T-town.

Genesis 4 records the first murder in history. We must understand the storyline here. God has created everything for Christ and all humanity in His image to rule over the creation. Adam and Eve submit to the serpent rather than to God and they become cursed with sinfulness. Immediately, we see the effects of the curse being displayed in a dramatic way – murder. The sons of Adam and Eve are also born in God’s image but with the curse as well. As the Bible jumps later into their lives, we see Cain as a crop farmer offering a sacrifice to God and Able as a shepherd offering his sacrifice to God. Cain nor his crop offering were acceptable to God, but God was pleased with Abel and his blood offering. Cain thinks, “I am the older brother with the inheritance of my father, but my little brother is accepted by God over me?!” Cain is ticked-off! God warns him by saying that if he won’t be a man (God-imager) and rule over his sin, then his sin will rule over him. But filled with anger from the curse welling up within him, Cain takes his little brother out into the field and kills him. Later on in this passage, there is a distant descendent of Cain who sings a song (and remarkably sounding like a gangster rapper of today) that boasts to his two wives (he got girls) about how he kills anyone who merely wounds him (ain’t nobody messin with him). Why is the curse so strong right off the bat? It’s because of the source behind the curse – Satan. A younger brother triumphing over a sinful older brother, sons being killed to stop the bloodline (Pharaoh and Herod), God only accepting a blood sacrifice with a sincere heart…these aren’t just coincidences here in Genesis 4. Rather, this is proof that there is a specific personality and purpose behind the evil rebellion throughout human history.

Jesus speaks about this person who is behind it all from the very beginning (John 8:42-45). He is telling the Jews here that, from the very beginning, Satan is a murderer and liar who opposes the Truth. We certainly saw the lying and murdering of Satan in Genesis 3 and 4! Why does Satan do this? Because he opposes the Truth of God, and the Truth of God is Jesus Christ. This is why Jesus says that if you don’t believe in Him and follow His commands, then God is not your Father. Your father is the Devil, and you obey his will. Satan is the father who gives scorpions to his children who asks for eggs and serpents to his children who ask for fish (Luke 11:11-12). He is not out for our good, but for our harm. He is filled with deceit and death. Jesus says that if we don’t love living His Word, then we know who our father really is – the Devil.

Satan has a very specific rule over people: his reign of death (Hebrews 2:14-15). His “power of death” gives every human being a “fear of death” which controls them do what he wants. This is much like this group in Uganda who call themselves the Lord’s Resistance Arm. They kidnap small boys from their village homes and command them to kill their family on the spot…or be killed. This “army” rebelling against their government uses death as their power of persuasion. If we’re not careful, we may think that as long as we’re not killing anyone then we’re okay with Genesis 4. But Jesus says that people who hate others are just as liable to His judgment as murderers. Hate and murder have the same power behind the scene – Satan. Who do you hate? Through hate, we may be witnessing the power of death we practice over each other without even entering a ghetto, but Jesus is offering us a life of love through faith in Him!

Framework Systematic Theology 03 - Doctrine of Jesus Christ - His Humanity

Some may see the opening video as sacrilegious, but that’s the point! From what I understand, a youth ministry made that voice-over video to show the stereotype of how we often picture Jesus as a human. “The little Lord Jesus, no crying He makes.” Did Jesus cry when He was a baby? Or when laying in the manger was He thinking to Himself, “Okay, this hay feels a little rough, but soon the shepherds will be here. Later on, the wise-men will arrive, and we’ll be headin’ over to Egypt. Then, I have to get my game on for the temple when they’ll leave me”?

There are several of these false ideas about Jesus being human. First, “Docetism” says that because all matter is evil and God is holy, Jesus only really appeared to be human…like a ghost. “Apollinarianism” says that Jesus has a real human body but with a Divine mind. Therefore, He is really just “God in a bod.” Eutychianism says that Jesus’ deity is so vast that it swallows up the human side of Jesus like a drop of coke in the Pacific Ocean. Jesus didn’t just appear to be human; He was fully human! He had both a human mind and body! Jesus was both fully human and fully God! We must believe those facts to understand His humanity.

It’s not just that Jesus was fully man, but Jesus IS fully man. Luke tells us, “Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man” (2:52). Jesus learned when He was growing up, but He learned as a boy who was not under the curse of sin. Jesus learned Hebrew, He grew in wisdom in the Scriptures, and I believe He even learned who He was from reading the OT probably early on. When thinking about Jesus being human, we can’t view it as He put off some of His Divine qualities like some say from Philippians 2. “Pouring Himself out” or “making Himself nothing” isn’t speaking of Jesus losing any attributes of Deity, rather those phrases are speaking of His death on the cross. If Jesus can lose His omniscience, then could He also lose His holiness? Rather than losing any Deity, Jesus gained a human nature. It’s like a brand-new, shimmering Corvette being taken on a test drive through a mud field. The glory of the ‘Vette is still there, just underneath all the mud. This explains passages like Jesus being fully God and omniscient but yet not knowing when the 2nd coming would happen.

Jesus relived the life of Old Testament humanity. This is one significant aspect of Jesus’ humanity that I missed as I was growing up. To reverse the curse and become a proper sacrifice for humanity, its not just that Jesus had to stay out of sin. Jesus also had to obey the commands and covenant of God where it was broken...everywhere! Jesus relived the life of Adam by being fruitful and multiplying with all those God had given Him, by exercising dominion over all aspects of creation, by imaging God perfectly, and by crushing the head of the serpent (Gen 1:26-28, 3:15). Jesus also relived the life of Israel by such things like being led into the wilderness by the Spirit of God, being tempted by Satan in the wilderness with food, and going through the Jordan river in baptism. He was the covenant-keeper of God. Also, Jesus relived the life of David as He was the Shepherd-King who was anointed with the Holy Spirit and led into the wilderness to fight against God’s arch-enemy in order to save His people.

Even Jesus’ names point to His humanity. The name Jesus means that He would “save His people from their sins” (Matt 1:21). Only through a righteous-human sacrifice could God justly save the sin-cursed world which came through humanity. The name Christ means “the One anointed with the Spirit of God” (Acts 10:38). There were many christs (anointed ones) before Jesus, but Jesus was the final Anointed One who would be forever Anointed with the Holy Spirit. Jesus claimed to do all of His miraculous works through the power of the Holy Spirit and for the will of God. Therefore, Jesus brings meaning to our humanity. To be human doesn’t mean to be sinful, that’s what it means to be cursed. To be human means to be created in the image of God, to live in the power of the Holy Spirit, and to look to the perfect human – Jesus. I am longing for the day that I will be even more human than I am now (Philippians 3:21).

Biblical Theology 03 - Genesis 3 - Reverse the Curse!

Something I’ve always wanted is a talking pet. Have you seen those cats and dogs that can talk by mimicking their owners by saying something like “I love you.” That is really cool to me…but it also freaks me out! Their voices sound so different than their normal pet noises.

When thinking about the scene in Genesis 3, we can’t imagine this speaking serpent as simply some “copy cat” (pun intended!). Rather, this snake is slithering right past Adam towards Eve with an evil mission. Queen Eve carries on a conversation with the coiling serpent who twists the Word of God which Adam had communicated to her. The serpent was hissing false claims about God’s commands and doubtfulness regarding God’s goodness in them. In fact, the serpent was following his method of temptation (3:6) that He later tried on Jesus at His temptation, and that also was exposed in 1 John 2:16: good for food (lust of the flesh), delight to the eyes (lust of the eyes), and to be desired to make one wise (pride of life). The woman not only listened, but she also submitted to the serpent. The man submitted to the woman. And no one submitted to God. When Adam was to be exercising headship over his wife, and both of them were to be exercising dominion over the creation, they disobeyed every command of God.

Something instantly changed when they rebelled. They felt very different. And worse yet, they heard God walking towards them (3:8). Never before feeling shame, they tried to hide among the garden’s tree from the all-seeing God. What had drastically changed was the one thing that everything depended upon…their unity with God. The sin-curse damaged the relationship between God and man. We no longer are born into a natural relationship with God, but because of the curse we are born separated from Him and in need of a Unifier.

When God began to ask them questions about what had happened (much like a parent watching their child take a cookie and allowing their child to fess up), Adam blamed it on the woman and worse yet – God, and the woman blamed the serpent. It was obvious to them that their relationship together had changed as well. The sin-curse damaged the relationship between humans. Humans no longer naturally and continuously love each other. We fight and argue.

After the blame game finally ended, God began to spell out the consequences of the curse which came with their rebellion. Notice it wasn’t God punishing them and saying if you rebel against me then I’m going to make life hell (literally) for you. Rather, God is announcing what has happened now that they have chosen to separate themselves from the life-source: Himself.

First, God says to the serpent that he is cursed above all beasts, he will be on his belly, and he will eat dust. But the most important part of this curse is the fact that God puts hatred between the children of Eve and the serpent. In fact, so much so that a Son of the woman will come who will crush the head of the serpent while all the serpent will be able to do is bruise His heel. This is the first mention of the saving gospel of Jesus Christ in Scripture (Genesis 3:15).

Second, God announces to Eve that the curse of her rebellion will be specifically applied to what she was created to find pleasure in most: being a mother and a wife. The reason women today are opting out of having children is not so much because of a change of culture but more so because they are listening to the ancient serpent and acting out of the original curse. Likewise, women who seek to control and manipulate their husbands don’t simply suffer from a stronger personality, but they are seeing the female curse act itself out right before their eyes.

Third, God describes to Adam the curse he and his male offspring will experience. The sin-curse damaged the relationship between humanity and creation. By Adam’s rebellion, all creation was cursed to rebel against him rather be under his dominion. The ground became hard, and work became difficult. The reason men today suffer from laziness is not merely because they are bored, but it is because they are not working to reverse the sin-curse in their lives. Christ has become the curse for us (Galatians 3:13). We must live as men and women for Christ!

Biblical Theology 02 - Genesis 1-2 - Being Human Rules!

Humanity rules! Napoleon Dynamite is a fictional movie character that is known for his jeans tucked into his ski boots, teased and curly red hair, and hilarious movie lines that were adored and quoted by teenagers across our entertainment riddled country. When Napoleon took a liking to something, he brought back one of the ever popular retro sayings by exclaiming something like, “Tater tots rule!” The same can be said for humanity by looking at Genesis.

Is humanity something far more than we’ve thought if we’ve used phrases like: “I can’t help that I’m forgetful, or sinful, or full of mistakes. I’m only human. Gosh!” What does it really mean to be human? How did God originally intend humanity to be and live? If we want to live for God in our skin, bones, eye balls, etc, then we must know what God has commanded from us from the beginning! Please read Genesis 1:26-2:25.

Previously, we’ve seen that God created everything out of nothing ultimately for the glory of Christ. How does humanity fit into this key storyline of Scripture? First, humanity was created as the image of God (Gen. 1:26-27). The “Let us” there is not God speaking to the surrounding angels or God talking like the Queen of England…“We will have our tea now.” God is talking with Himself as our one God is three Persons. We must remember that God has created us to project His image and not our own. Clothes, exercise, talents and humor are a few ways that we can live to point people to our own image and not the Image we were created for.

Second, humanity was given very specific tasks – to rule over all of the earth, to make all things fruitful, to fill the earth with more images of God, and to exercise kingly dominion over it all (Gen 1:26, 28). God is ultimately Sovereign King over all things, but His plan from the beginning has been to rule over His creation through a human mediator who was Adam in the beginning. Adam was to rule over all the earth in order to bring glory to God.

Third, all humanity was created as either male or female (Gen 1:27). Genesis 2 certainly goes into greater detail as God parades all of the land beasts, flying creatures, and sea monsters before Adam to name them and exercise his dominion. After naming them, Adam was a bit depressed for not having anything on earth quite like him. God fixed that problem and made woman out of Adam’s rib. Adam was overjoyed and announced that she was just like him. Edmund Clowney writes that God was establishing His pattern and pleasure for exclusive love.

Watch how Adam, his life, and his calling ultimately points to Christ! First, God creates Adam in His own image so that Jesus Christ would be THE image of God (Col 1:15). Why do we normally assume that God created humanity and then decided that Jesus would become human? Isn’t God sovereign? Couldn’t God have first purposed Christ to be in His image and human, and that be why God created Adam to be human -- His image? Second, God created Adam with specific tasks of ruling so that Jesus Christ could ultimately be the human being Who would rule under God as Mediator-Human-King over the cosmos (Col 1:16-17). Third, God created Adam to have an exclusive love with Eve as a pre-picture that pointed to the mysterious perfect union of flesh between Jesus Christ and His bride, the church (Gen 2:23-24, Col 1:18).

Where Adam failed to obey God in each of these areas, Jesus perfectly fulfilled them as the perfect human. In fact, Jesus Christ is what it really means to be human! Want to be more human? Seek to grow more in God’s image, to rule over sin more in this world, and to be more exclusive in your love as you grow in the knowledge in the image of our Creator, Jesus Christ (Col 3:10). Not only images and loves, but also…humanity rules – through Jesus Christ!

Systematic Theology 01 - Doctrine of Jesus Christ - The Storyline

Have you ever thought to yourself that what you learn in church is difficult to remember? If you worship with the church in Sunday school, Sunday morning worship, Sunday evening worship, Sunday evening Discipleship Training, and Wednesday evening worship, then you may feel like its impossible to really remember everything you hear. If you think that, I’m with you! That is why there needs to be one central, overarching point to every message, sermon, and lesson just like there is one central theme in the Bible.

What is the Bible really all about? What is its central theme? Some would say it is a story that ultimately points to God and how God is working everything out for His own glory. This is a God-centered theology. The 15th century John Calvin said the central theme of the Bible is the glory of God. Others would say that the Bible ultimately points to God’s love for man. God created the world because He loves us, He sent Jesus to die for us, and He’s waiting for us in heaven. This is a man-centered theology. I don’t think we need to choose between the two. If we have a Christ-centered theology which the Bible is pointing to, then we have both a God and Man-centered theology! The point of Scripture is the Kingdom of Christ (Col 1:13-14).

Is Jesus really God’s point for all Scripture and all time? Let’s move through the storyline of Christ and see! First of all, the creation of the universe was all about the glory of Christ. When God created everything, He created it all through Jesus and for Jesus (Col 1:15-17). That is to mean that His purpose was for Christ to have dominion and rule over it all. Everything was originally put under Adam’s dominion, but he gave it all up to Satan when he fell into sin. It was given to Adam so that Christ would ultimately have it all in the end. This is why all of the stories, the people, the positions, the purposes, and the covenant in the OT point to the coming Messiah, Jesus Christ. Christ’s Kingship was God’s purpose for creating everything.

Secondly, the incarnation (Jesus becoming human) was all about His glory (Col 1:18-19). Jesus took on human flesh to be the second Adam and overturn the curse. We see His dominion over creation through things like His miracles, His healings, raising people from the dead, etc. His incarnation was also necessary to be a proper human sacrifice for human sin against God.

Which brings us to the third section of Christ’s storyline: the cross of Christ was all about His glory (Col 1:18-19). We normally hear messages about how Jesus died for us and how He “thought of me above all.” It is true that Jesus died for us and that He thought of us, but God’s ultimate reason for the cross of Christ was so that He would be the firstborn (greatest) from the dead…resurrection! The cross is about Jesus getting the glory from His own victorious death.

Fourth, the church is all about the glory of Christ (Col 1:18). Paul says that Jesus is the head of His body. Well no duh! Then it also should be a no-brainer to us that He is the Head (the point) of the church as well. When we come to church, we should definitely think about worshipping God. We should definitely think about fellowshipping with each other. But those and everything else is for God’s glory: His Son being glorified by His people of faith.

Lastly, the consummation (eternity) is all about the glory of Christ. What will eternity be like? Will we be staring into a bright light? Will we be singing in choir rows every second? Will we be cloud hopping? Or is eternity a fulfillment of all history? Will eternity be us enjoying a renewed earth creation with a human Jesus Christ, worshipping Him through His death, together with all of His people (the bride), under His rule and reign forever and ever?

If we’re looking for a common theme in everything we’re learning with our church, we must look no further than the completed storyline within the Scriptures. The Kingdom of Christ is our focus as we must learn how to submit to Christ as our King, serve other Christians as our brothers and sisters, fight the enemy, and await the coming fullness of this Kingdom when Christ returns. Our view of the eternal Kingdom gives us insight as to how we are to live today.

Biblical Theology 01 - Genesis 1 - The Secret God Kept For Thousands of Years

If I wanted you to know more about me, I’d take you to my home. Not my house here, but I would take you to my old home in Tuscaloosa. I’d show you my house, where I used to shoot basketball for hours and hours during the summer. I’d show you my room where I played video games with friends all night long. Taking you to my home, my church, and my school where I grew up would give you a better understanding of why I am the way that I am. Moses is doing the exact same thing with the Israelites in Genesis. Genesis was written during the Exodus as God is revealing who He is as the Creator-Covenant God and who they are as His people.

Genesis is a book that is ultimately about God. As this series stemming from Luke 24:12-49 seeks to understand how all the Scriptures are speaking about Christ (specifically Luke 24:27, 44), we must never lose our understanding of God as Trinity. God the Father is always spoken of as Creator and Authority within the Trinity. The Son of God is not only spoken of as submissive to the Father, but also the very glory of the Father (John 17:24). The Spirit is spoken of as submissive to the Father and the Son (John 16:12-15). When we seek to understand Christ’s central place in all of Scripture, we should only do so in a Trinitarian framework.

The sovereign God is creating everything out of nothing. Moses repeats himself over and over by saying “And God said” (Gen 1:3, 6, 9, etc). Everything started with God’s authoritative Word. In order to understand anything about the universe, we first must understand God as Sovereign Lord over all. As God creates everything out of nothing, He has a specific system to it. He creates and divides in the first three days, and then He creates by filling on the second three days. Such as, on day 1 God divides the light from the dark, and on day 4 he fills with the sun, moon and stars. On day 2, God divides the waters from above and below, and on day 5 he fills them with birds and fish. On day 3 God divides the waters from land, and on day 6 He fills with land-animals and man. This theme is not uncommon to Scripture either. God divides humanity at the Tower of Babel in order to fill the earth. Jesus divides the bread and fish in order to fill the 5,000 listeners. God may even divide you from your church or your pastor from your church in order to fill another church to be used to glorify Christ. God’s dividing is to fill!

Genesis 1 tells us everything we need to know in order to understand Who created (God), what was created (everything), and how it was created (Word). But there is something very important that is missing. Moses didn’t know it. God kept His secret for thousands of years. In the midst of the many “And God said,” there was something God didn’t say! Listen closely.

It is crucially important to understand that God spoke creation into existence instead of blinking, twitching his nose, or even merely thinking. God created through His Word! Not until around 4,000 years after God created the universe does He reveal His purpose for doing so. After 33 A.D., John picks up the exact language of Gen 1 when he writes, “In the beginning was the Word” (John 1:1). John writes on to say that God created everything through His Word, Jesus Christ. Further, the writer of Hebrews says that God created the universe through Jesus Christ so that Christ would inherit all of the cosmos that was made. This is exactly why Andrew created our CBSM logo the way it is. It is to represent how Jesus is the exact image of God, how everything revolves around Him as He is the nucleus of God’s purposes (Christocentrism), and how the entire universe is created so that He upholds it and rules over it as Lord and King.

John says that Jesus is the “Word” (John 1:1). Jesus calls Himself THE Truth (John 14:6). If God creates everything through His Word who is Christ, then we as Christians must be careful to continually listen to the Word, Message, and Truth of God…the Gospel of Jesus Christ. There are many competing messages (worldviews) in the world that we allow into our lives through education, books, movies, the media, and music. I wonder if we hear the Word of Christ as much as we hear the world’s words? What are the words of your music teaching you?