Born to rule! (Genesis 1)

Born to Rule

That was a cool video, and it said a lot of what I wanted to say, but I think we can dig a bit deeper. So let’s look at how God made us human beings.

Background: a good creation

But first, let’s talk about the background a little.

In Genesis 1 we encounter one of the most beautiful, powerful, and influential pieces of literature in human history. If I say, “In the beginning,” what does that make you think of? The first words of the Bible, right? These few words in the first chapter of Genesis have had a profound impact on our culture. Sometimes, though, we can almost forget what they say. So what do they tell us?

They tell us of a pre-existent God, who by his mere word, brings the universe and all its complexity and simplicity into being. They tell us of light and dark, land and waters, seas and skies. They tell us of teeming, fruitful life that fills the land, seas, and skies. They tell us of God speaking into existence the beauty that we glimpse as we walk a dappled forest path, or stand on a mountainside watching the sun rise or set.

The last words before God creates humanity are, “And God saw that it was good.” (v. 25b)

That is the context into which humanity was created.

Evidence of human difference

The account of human creation in Genesis 1 is notable for the way it highlights the importance of humanity. Let’s work through the account.

1. God chose to create us

First, God chose to create humanity—we weren’t an accident or a side-effect of something else.

Genesis 1:26 ESV

26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

God didn’t create us because circumstances drove him to it—he didn’t need us as servants or companions. God created us because he wanted us to exist.

2. God deliberately made us in his image

The next thing to note is that God made us in his image. The ESV here says “after our likeness.”

Scholars talk about two ways that we could be God’s image bearers. One way is to share some important characteristics of God in some way. The second way is in the way that, say, a policeman carries the authority of the state. Ancient kings bore the image of their gods in this sense—they carried their authority. We see the same image in Revelation where we bear the seal of Christ on our foreheads.

Revelation 7:3 ESV

3 saying, “Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees, until we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads.”

But there’s no reason why both these forms may be true, especially since in order to bear God’s image in the sense of carrying and executing his authority we need to share some of his capacities. And this is what most scholars, and I, believe to be the case. We are made in God’s image by sharing his characteristics in some measure and by being appointed by him to rule over this world. We were born to rule.

3. God spoke to us in blessing

Human beings are unique in the world in our ability to communicate. This is highlighted in Genesis when God speaks to mankind in verse 28. All of his previous blessings have simply been pronounced over the new creation. Yet here, “God said to them (Adam and Eve).”

You will often come across stories in the media about talking animals—a chimp that can sign, and so on. But never confuse this with the true ability to communicate that God has granted to humanity alone. Only human beings are capable of discussing our origins.

4. God made us to rule over the creatures of the earth

God commissioned humanity as his regents to rule over “every living thing that moves on the earth.” But what exactly does that mean?

Here in Genesis 1 God uses two words to describe this role: subdue and dominion.

The word translated “subdue” means to bring something under your feet, or under your control. This word study shows how such an act is so often distorted into a violent one in our world, but of course Genesis 1 has no hint of that. In the context, the word means only that humanity was designed and designated to be in charge, to be in control, under God’s guidance. Perhaps a word that better conveys that for us is “govern.” The word “govern” still has a hint of humility about it. A governor is responsible to a higher power, even though they control those below them.

The second word, dominion, simply means to rule. Humanity is designed, born, to rule, and so their rule over all the creatures, designed by a good God, can be a benevolent rule that causes all things to fill the earth and multiply.

5. God gave us food

A beautiful feature of the Genesis account of creation is found in verse 29 and 30.

Genesis 1:29–30 ESV

29 And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. 30 And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so.

Here we discover that God has not only shared his characteristics with us, and given us authority and responsibility for all creatures, but he has also provided food for us, and for our charges.

God created a paradise, where all the human work went towards making things better, rather than into the struggle to survive.

6. We were made “very good”

And finally, immediately after commissioning us, God looks at the whole picture, and pronounces it very good.

Genesis 1:31 ESV

31 And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

Now, you might suggest that this is only very good from God’s perspective, that parts of creation might themselves disagree. But that is not the picture we get. God is immediately able to rest. Why? Because he has made a creation that is harmonious and functions in symphonic unity. There is no strife, no trouble, no spanner in the works, no fly in the ointment. It is very good.

Our human story (according to Genesis)

So, let’s summarise this, what does Genesis 1 really tell us about ourselves? I want to emphasize two important points:

We are creatures created by a truly good and powerful God who made all things to work together in harmony. We owe our existence, our nature, our character, our purposes to God. We rule his creation not because we’ve fought our way to the top, but because he made us to rule it and then placed us there as his regents. This must always be foremost in our thoughts and our plans.

We were made to rule, we were made to bring all the earth’s creatures under our control. We have been equipped with the ability to do that, and charged with the responsibility to do that.

We’ll unpack how that affects us, today, in the 20th century in a moment. But first, I want to highlight how unique this view of humanity is. I want to look at the alternative views of reality, and see how they view humans.

The alternative views

In Ancient Near Eastern myths, the gods did often intentionally create humans, but their purpose was to have slaves. In one myth, the god Enki was reminded of how he was created, and mimicked this, creating humans out of clay to care for the gods. In another myth (the epic of Atra-khasis) humans are created out of the body of a murdered god for the same purpose. In the Enuma Elish, humanity is created from the blood of the murdered god Kingu, in order to do the hard labour the gods want to avoid.

So, rather than a harmonious creation where mankind is designed and placed in charge, fed and given purpose, we find a universe full of struggle and strife where mankind is enslaved to the gods in order to feed their insatiable hunger.

Eastern religion is not much better. For example, Buddhism claims that existence is suffering, and so to escape suffering we must escape existence. We have no purpose nor meaning, and our endless round of suffering merely leads us to yearn for a release from it all.

Our modern creation myth is very similar. Here is Richard Dawkins’s bracing evolutionary perspective,

The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.

From River Out of Eden, 1995, p 133.

All we can hope for is to enjoy the few brief moments of consciousness we have, though that enjoyment must be found without any pride in achievements, since achievement is impossible where there is no design, purpose, good or evil.

This sort of view leads to the terrible situation of people like Noa Pothoven, a Dutch teenager who has just starved herself to death because she saw no other way to end her “hopeless, unbearable psychological suffering.” Where the world offers no meaning, there is no reason to keep living through the tough times, no reason to work through the dark seasons of the soul.

Still born to rule

It has to be said, the world we live in is not like the world God gave to Adam and Eve, is it? Instead of a place of harmony, where people and animals live in peace together, and plants provide food for all, we live in a world where we tear one another apart, beast and human alike. Noa’s suffering was real, it came from being raped at a young age. And our suffering is real, too. We like to downplay suffering like a headache, or the flu, or plantar fasciitis, or arthritus, or a broken arm, or loneliness, or the betrayal of a friend, or a lost child, or a broken marriage, or the death of a loved one. But these things and more fill our minds with pain and touch everything with their bitterness. Buddhism is partly right: our current existence is suffused with suffering. Next week, Graham will unpack the cause of all this.

But for now, in the midst of this broken world, what has happened to our mandate to rule? It seems that, instead, we are ruled over. We’re ruled over by pain, by selfish and self-harming desires, by sickness and disease, by weakness, by fear, hatred, and hopelessness. Is our mandate still current?

Yes, it is. And here’s why.

Evidence of continued purpose

After Adam and Eve attempted their coup, God did not abandon them. In Genesis 3 we find God’s judgement on Adam and Eve. Just as Adam and Eve had squirmed out of God’s will, so too would the world reject their command. In fact, a large part of our suffering is that we still want to do what we were made to do, but the world has followed us into disobedience, and so we must spend so much time trying to force things into the pattern they should go. Weeds grow faster than the plants we want to cultivate. Mistakes infect our most beautiful creations and become the focus of attention. Children willfully reject our teaching. And so on.

But our purpose and design has not changed. And God has not abandoned us. Jesus came that we might be conquerors. He said

John 10:10 ESV

10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

And in 1 John 5:5, John writes

1 John 5:5 ESV

5 Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

Revelation, which as we’ve seen, deliberately echoes Genesis, talks about Christians using that same word: overcomer. In the ESV it is translated as conqueror. In Rev 21:7, in the description of the new heavens and the new earth, God says:

Revelation 21:7 ESV

7 The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son.

Our destiny has not changed: if we believe that Jesus is the Son of God we are still born to rule!

Ruling a garden vs. ruling in a city

There is a difference, though. In Revelation we find ourselves in a city, not a garden. And the focus shifts a little from tending a garden, to living in a city. That focus had already shifted long before.

While in Genesis 1 God told us to rule over the creatures, in the Gospels Jesus tells us two things: to love God, and to love our neighbour as ourselves. That first commandment is implicit in Genesis—it’s assumed given the context. But the second most important commandment has changed its focus—it no longer concerns animals, but other human beings. We have moved from a garden to a city.

Our ultimate destiny, then, is not to return to Eden, but to reign in Jerusalem forever, as joint heirs with Christ. And we’ve already started on that.

Environmentalism?

I want to make just a quick aside: given Judaism and Christianity’s focus on our relationships with God and one another, does this mean that our duty towards the creatures of the world no longer applies?

The answer to that is a clear “no,” we still have a duty of care towards the world. However, this duty is less important than our duties to God and our fellow man. In fact, just as we can’t express our love for God without loving our fellow human beings, so we cannot properly love our fellow human beings if we do not care for the creatures of the world. But as soon as we value other life beyond human life, or God, we have messed up our priorities and, like Adam and Eve, will make a mess of everything. That’s the core difference between Christian environmentalism and modern environmentalism. Christians love the world and care for it because they love God first, their fellow man next, and the rest of creation third. If we can get that balance right we’ll be fulfilling the mandate God gave our ancestors.

Our current reality

So what does our current reality then look like? What does it look like to be conquerors reigning in our lives here on the Gold Coast in 2019?

First, we need to remember that we cannot fulfill our destiny unless we are aligned with the creator of all. Remember how John put it?

1 John 5:5 ESV

5 Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?

So we do have to have the right relationship with God, accepting his Son and loving him with all that we are.

But what about after that? Well, Jesus shows us the way.

As Paul says,

Philippians 2:3–7 ESV

3 Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.

Like Jesus, we know we were born to rule, and like Jesus we don’t need to grasp at that—God has made us for it—so we can focus on being a servant of others. If we are truly secure in our identity in Christ--our identity as conquerors--then we are free to do whatever it takes to love others, to care for them, to draw them into Christ’s family. It is only when we are insecure that we will squabble for position, for honour, for recognition. If you ever see any of the leaders here in Renew squabbling for recognition, please take us aside and remind us that we are God’s children.

Paul has more specific direction, such as his words to children and parents, husbands and wives, and slaves and masters in Ephesians and Colossians. But he summarises these beautifully in

Ephesians 5:15–21 ESV

15 Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, 16 making the best use of the time, because the days are evil. 17 Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. 18 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, 19 addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, 20 giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, 21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Our lives can be lives of joy, not because we do not suffer, but because we are filled with the Spirit. We can give thanks always and for everything because we know that

Romans 8:28 ESV

28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.

And we can submit to one another because we love Jesus, and we see Jesus in each other.

At Renew, this is so important that it is the second of our three values:

Value 2: Gracious Community

So let us go and live that out. Let us fulfill our birthright to be conquerors, conquerors of sin and suffering. Let us love one another as Jesus loved us, and so show the world that we are his disciples.