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Creation To New Creation - Empire

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Creation To New Creation - Empire

Prologue

  • This teaching is about the kingdom of God, which formed the core of Jesus’ life & teaching.
    • From that time Jesus began to preach and say, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Matthew 4:17
    Now after John had been taken into custody, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” Mark 1: 14-15
    When day came, Jesus left and went to a secluded place; and the crowds were searching for Him, and came to Him and tried to keep Him from going away from them. But He said to them, “I must preach the kingdom of God to the other cities also, for I was sent for this purpose.” Luke 4: 42-43
    Too long, please open your Bible John 18: 36-37
  • Across the gospels, we see that the kingdom of God is heart of Jesus’ purpose.

Creation & Fall (Genesis 1-3)

  • In Genesis 1, we have the account of God creating man on the sixth day
    • God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them; and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” Genesis 1: 26-28
  • God created mankind with the unique capacity & responsibility to steward God’s creation.
  • The implication of being made in God’s image is that mankind rules as king. This is the first indication we have of a kingdom (of God). God, the King, installs His deputy on earth to steward creation.
  • Man’s vocation would require judgement (as is expected of a king) - deciding what is good and what is evil. Man however rebels against God by defining good & evil on their own terms. Humanity essentially begins an alternate kingdom.
  • Man’s rebellion sets the stage for the plot conflict of the rest of the Bible; what will God do to restore His kingdom to earth in light of man’s rebellion?

The development of human kingdoms (Genesis 1-11)

Cain’s city

  • In Genesis 4, we’re told of Cain who repeats his parents’ story; he redefines good & evil. He yields to beastly influence, murdering his brother.
  • God banishes him, and he goes ahead to build a city to protect himself. This is the first city we read of in the Bible.
    • Then Cain went out from the presence of the LORD, and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden. Cain had relations with his wife and she conceived, and gave birth to Enoch; and he built a city, and called the name of the city Enoch, after the name of his son. Genesis 4: 16-17

Cities In Scripture (side note)

  • In scripture, a city usually refers to a region (of homes) that’s walled and fortified, with a leader who was referred to as a king; Salem, Sodom (Abraham meets them in Genesis 14)
  • Cities in scripture were not the same size as what we have today.
    • So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh according to the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, a three days’ walk. Jonah 3:3
  • Jericho could be walked round in a day
  • Cities were usually surrounded by small unwalled towns referred to daughters, and they depended on the mother city for commerce, protection, and justice.
    • 1 Chronicles 18:1 (BBE) And it came about after this that David made an attack on the Philistines and overcame them, and took Gath with its daughter-towns out of the hands of the Philistines.
  • Cities were the host for military, temples/shrines, resources, e.t.c
  • What determines a city was whether it was walled, and if it was a source of resources for the smaller hubs around it
  • Cities are a contrast to Eden, God’s original idea for mankind in the following ways:
    • Walls were designed to keep resources in, while Eden was unwalled, with a river that flowed out of it to bring life to the nations.
    • Walls were designed for security, while God secured the garden.
      • And said to him, “Run, speak to that young man, saying, ‘Jerusalem will be inhabited without walls because of the multitude of men and cattle within it. ‘For I,’ declares the LORD, ‘will be a wall of fire around her, and I will be the glory in her midst.’ ” Zechariah 2: 4-5
  • Violence becomes a part of the culture of Cain’s city
    • Lamech said to his wives, “Adah and Zillah, Listen to my voice, You wives of Lamech, Give heed to my speech, For I have killed a man for wounding me; And a boy for striking me; If Cain is avenged sevenfold, Then Lamech seventy-sevenfold.” Genesis 4: 23-24
  • Humanity’s story develops, with the earth being full of violence
    • Now the earth was corrupt in the sight of God, and the earth was filled with violence. Genesis 6:11
  • God resists man’s rebellion by destroying the earth with a flood, and He restarts the project with Noah and his family, but that didn’t solve the problem. Humanity was fundamentally broken.

Babel

  • The decadence of mankind climaxes when a violent king decides with his people to:
    • build a tower that reaches heaven
    • make a name for themselves (in contrast with Abraham) and settle there (in contrast to God’s command to fill the earth)
      • They said, “Come, let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top will reach into heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name, otherwise we will be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.” Genesis 11:4
      And I will make you a great nation, And I will bless you, And make your name great; And so you shall be a blessing Genesis 12:2
  • Babel (or Babylon) at this stage isn’t a very large kingdom, but it is established at this point as the archetype of violent oppressive societies built on violence and the influence of the beast.
  • In scripture, Babylon became a type and not just a physical location. Other places and empires were only Babylons. Egypt, Assyria, Persia, Rome, e.t.c were only offsprings of their ancestor, Babylon.
  • God resists the Babel project by confusing their language.
    • So the LORD scattered them abroad from there over the face of the whole earth; and they stopped building the city. Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the LORD confused the language of the whole earth; and from there the LORD scattered them abroad over the face of the whole earth. Genesis 11: 8-9

God is rejected

  • Out of that scattering comes Abram, through whom God decides to start the human project. God’s desire was that through him and his family, humanity would be restored.
  • Abraham’s family became a nation, and they found themselves in slavery to a ruthless empire; Egypt
    • Too long, please open your Bible Exodus 1: 7-22
  • God delivered the children of Israel from Egypt by might acts of power, and the song they sang after their deliverance gives us the first explicit description of God as king, confronting the evil empires of this world.
    • Too long, please open your Bible Exodus 15: 1-2, 14-18
  • This is what it looks like for God to be King; He liberates His people from and confronts evil
  • God made a covenant with the people, and that covenant was to be a reflection of His governance, making them distinct from other nations.
    • Too long, please open your Bible Deuteronomy 4: 5-8

God’s people reject God as king

  • After their settlement in the land, the people of Israel, demanded that they wanted a king like the nations, thereby rejecting God’s kingship.
    • Too long, please open your Bible 1 Samuel 8: 4-9
  • Their kings failed woefully at leading them in God’s way, even though there were some successes as well.

Bringing God’s garden to the city (or not?)

Jerusalem

  • Even though the children of Israel had rejected God, Go in His sovereignty still worked out His will for & through them in choosing David as their king.
  • David chose Jerusalem to be the capital city, and it became known as The City of David . When David brought the throne of God’s presence (ark of the covenant) to the capital, Jerusalem became an image of God’s garden-city.
    • Too long, please open your Bible 2 Samuel 6-7:1
  • Everything goes well until David commits adultery and murders Uriah, to take his wife.
  • This begins the tragic story of Jerusalem’s corruption during the reign of kings from David’s line.
  • David’s son, Solomon, even though he built the temple and expanded the borders of Israel, went against God’s commands, gave himself to idolatry, and made Jerusalem further look lie Babylon.
    • Too long, please open your Bible Deuteronomy 17: 14-20
    Then Solomon formed a marriage alliance with Pharaoh king of Egypt, and took Pharaoh’s daughter and brought her to the city of David until he had finished building his own house and the house of the LORD and the wall around Jerusalem. 1 Kings 3:1
    Now King Solomon levied forced laborers from all Israel; and the forced laborers numbered 30,000 men. 1 Kings 5:13
    Now this is the account of the forced labor which King Solomon levied to build the house of the LORD, his own house, the Millo, the wall of Jerusalem, Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer. 1 Kings 9:15
    Now the weight of gold which came in to Solomon in one year was 666 talents of gold, Now Solomon gathered chariots and horsemen; and he had 1,400 chariots and 12,000 horsemen, and he stationed them in the chariot cities and with the king in Jerusalem. 1 Kings 10: 14, 26
    Too long, please open your Bible 1 Kings 11: 1-8
  • The kingdom is split, both kingdoms deteriorate till God uses Assyria and Babylon to judge them as promised
    • The sons of Israel walked in all the sins of Jeroboam which he did; they did not depart from them until the LORD removed Israel from His sight, as He spoke through all His servants the prophets. So Israel was carried away into exile from their own land to Assyria until this day. 2 Kings 17: 22-23
    At that time the servants of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon went up to Jerusalem, and the city came under siege. 2 Kings 24:10
  • Seeing that God’s people have rejected God’s governance, what hope is there now?

Hope for God’s city

  • Israel’s prophets insisted that one day, God would still reign as king and establish His kingdom among men
    • Then the moon will be abashed and the sun ashamed, For the LORD of hosts will reign on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, And His glory will be before His elders. Isaiah 24:23
    Too long, please open your Bible Isaiah 52: 7-10
    Too long, please open your Bible Joel 2: 31-32
    Too long, please open your Bible Zephaniah 3: 9-10

Jesus & the Kingdom of God

  • In Jesus’ day, Jerusalem was ruled by Herod, and once again, God’s city resembles Egypt, Babylon and all its successors For example, Herod murdered children (just like Pharaoh) when he thought his rule was threatened.
  • Jesus came to announce that the kingdom of God has come. All of Jesus’ teaching about the kingdom of God reflected this hope of God coming to rule
    • From that time Jesus began to preach and say, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Matthew 4:17
    “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. “Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven. Matthew 5: 14-16
    He says, “It is too small a thing that You should be My Servant To raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved ones of Israel; I will also make You a light of the nations So that My salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” Isaiah 49:6
  • Jesus showed the reign of God in healing, but also in other surprising ways
    • Too long, please open your Bible Matthew 4:23
    Too long, please open your Bible Matthew 5: 38-48
  • The religious leaders of the day decided to use the instruments of power to kill Jesus for His preaching & teaching. However, on the way to being executed, He affirmed that He was king, and His death would be His enthronement as king
    • Too long, please open your Bible John 18: 36-37

Kingdom today

  • All the teachings of the Apostles were not only to announce that God’s kingdom has come, t\but they also give us the implications of what it means to live under God’s rule.
  • We are also charged with this responsibility to reflect the rule of God into the world while we wait for a final revealing of God’s kingdom
    • For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ; who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself. Philippians 3: 20-21
  • We see that the new heavens & new earth is the full realization of man & creation’s restoration to the original plan.
    • Too long, please open your Bible Revelation 21: 1-5, 22-24
    Too long, please open your Bible Revelation 22: 1-6

The New Jerusalem

  • We see that the new heavens & new earth is the full realization of God’s kingdom reign
    • Too long, please open your Bible Revelation 21: 10-17
    Too long, please open your Bible Revelation 22: 1-6, 14-15