The Justice of God: Race, Gospel, and Ultimate Justice

Acts 17:22–31 ESV

22 So Paul, standing in the midst of the Areopagus, said: “Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious. 23 For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription: ‘To the unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. 24 The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, 25 nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. 26 And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, 27 that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, 28 for “ ‘In him we live and move and have our being’; as even some of your own poets have said, “ ‘For we are indeed his offspring.’ 29 Being then God’s offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man. 30 The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, 31 because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.”

Introduction:

Men of Athens

Epicureans

The whole system had a practical end in view, the achievement of happiness by serene detachment. Democritean atomism banished all fear of divine intervention in life or punishment after death; the gods follow to perfection the life of serene detachment and will have nothing to do with human existence, and death brings a final dispersion of our constituent atoms. The Epicureans found contentment in limiting desire and in the joys and solaces of friendship.

Stoics

Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible Stoics, Stoicism

The earliest Stoics were primarily concerned with cosmology, that is, the study of nature’s origin and its laws. They were materialists, who held that all things both come from the one basic element of fire and will eventually return thereto in a vast cosmic conflagration. They therefore had a cyclical view of cosmic history, such that one universe after another arises and is destroyed. Both the orderliness of things as we know them, and this cyclical pattern of history, were ascribed to the organizing and sustaining power of a pervasive force known as the Logos that is sometimes regarded as divine. Its laws were the laws of nature to which all creatures must conform. It gives to all things their essential nature and so gives life and reason to men. In fact the Logos is in man, taking the form of the human soul. Hence, to live according to reason is to live according to the natural order of things, and this is good. Conscious obedience to natural law liberates a man from fear and concern about external circumstances over which he has no control, but which are still ruled by nature’s laws. The good life, then, is one in which reason, not passion, rules, and peace of mind and harmony with nature consequently prevail.

Athenians and foreigners

Areopagus

In the first half of the 7th century B.C., still at the height of its authority, the Council of the Areopagus was the main governing body of Athens, with far-reaching and undefined religious, judicial, censorial, and political power

I. The Unknown God (Acts 17:24-25)

The Creator of everything

Lord of Heaven and earth

Doesn’t live in manmade temples

He has no need of human hands to serve Him

He gives all mankind life, breath, and everything

II. Man’s true origin (Acts 17:26-28)

God made from one every nation living on the earth (V. 26a)

(#1) Creation (Genesis 1-2)

Scripture (Gen 1:1; 26-27; 2:1-3) doesn’t begin with people evolving from apelike creatures. Genesis records that Adam and Eve were specially and intimately made by a supernatural act—the first humans, both male and female, created in God’s image on day six of creation week. If Adam and Eve were the first humans, then all their descendants have also been fully human.

(#2) Corruption - The Fall of Man (Genesis 3)

Scripture shows in Genesis 3:1-6 that mankind rebelled by disobeying God’s prohibition to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen 2:16-17)

(#3) Catastrophe – Noah’s Ark / Flood (Genesis 6-8)

The genealogies in Genesis reveal the real history of the human race. People multiplied from Adam and Eve and with them their sin nature. God saw the tremendous wickedness upon the earth and told a man named Noah to build an ark because God was sending a global flood. Noah and his family alone were spared, along with the animal kinds that boarded the ark. All other humans and land animals were destroyed in the global catastrophe. Since Noah and his family were the only humans preserved from the judgment, our genetic diversity can be traced back to those eight people on the ark.

Notice what God says to mankind after the catastrophe (Genesis 9:4–7)

Don’t eat flesh with blood in it. Why? (v. 4)

I will require a reckoning for your lives (v. 5)

from beasts (v. 5a)

from man (v. 5b)

from his fellow man (v. 5c)

by man will his blood be shed (v. 6a)

God made him in His image (v. 6b)

Be fruitful and multiply and increase in the earth! (v. 7)

(#4) Confusion - Tower of Babel

After the global catastrophe, Noah’s descendants multiplied, and they became increasingly sinful. At the tower of Babel, humans once again rejected God’s Word by building a tower and refusing to spread throughout the world (Genesis 11). Seeing humanity’s disobedience, God confused their language. Entire groups suddenly struggled to communicate with each other. As these language groups isolated themselves into different parts of the world, they formed small gene pools with less genetic variation. Each group had a different mix of genes for various physical features, and because of the small gene pools, specific characteristics like skin shade and eye shape became dominant.

Race? What Race?

Melanin – Just the facts!

a dark brown to black pigment occuring in the hair, skin, and iris of the eye, responsible for tanning of skin exposed to sunlight (see Melanin in the Concise Oxford English Dictionary)

Everyone (and even animals) have a skin pigment called melanin.

National Center for Biotechnology (NCB) says, “It has been traditionally believed that skin pigmentation is the most important photoprotective factor, since melanin, besides functioning as a broadband UV absorbent, has antioxidant and radical scavenging properties. Besides, many epidemiological studies have shown a lower incidence for skin cancer in individuals with darker skin compared to those with fair skin.” (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2671032/)

If the world’s original human settlers all came from Babel, why do modern geneticists claim that the first population came out of East Africa? “Out of Africa” is an interpretation based on certain starting assumptions. Basically, geneticists interpret geographic origin as the place where we find the group with the most genetic diversity. Where they live today is assumed to be the geographic origin of that diversity. This assumption is not necessarily correct. Given how often people move around, where a group lives now is not necessarily where the diversity originated. The real geographic origin of all modern humans is Babel, according to Scripture. The high variation in African DNA probably means that the majority of human families coming out of Babel went south and settled in Africa. To be sure, other families settled in other locations, as the Table of Nations indicates (Genesis 10), but the majority of DNA diversity in that Babel population went south. (see https://answersingenesis.org/noahs-ark/four-women-a-boat-and-lots-of-kids/)

Letters to a Birmingham Jail Letter from a Birmingham Jail

“Follow this decree because integration is morally right and because the Negro is your brother.” In the midst of blatant injustices inflicted upon the Negro, I have watched white churchmen stand on the sideline and mouth pious irrelevancies and sanctimonious trivialities. In the midst of a mighty struggle to rid our nation of racial and economic injustice, I have heard many ministers say: “Those are social issues, with which the gospel has no real concern.”

God divided and separated out their dwelling places (v. 26b)

to seek God (v. 27a)

to feel their way towards Him (v. 27b)

to find Him (v. 27c)

God is not far from each of us. (v. 27d)

In him we live, move, and have our being (v. 28)

Aratus was a disciple of Zeno who put a famous astronomy textbook, the Phaenomena, into verse. His poetic rendition eventually replaced the original textbook because it was much easier to remember. Since astronomy controlled the calendar, the Hellenistic world came to know Aratus as well as it did Homer (Ferguson, Backgrounds, 356). Paul’s quotation of Aratus was a clever appeal to the well-known pride of Athens’ philosophers. However, even while appearing to affirm the Stoic concept of the kinship of deity with humanity, Paul subverts it, claiming that humanity did not create the deities in its own image. Rather, God created humanity in His own image.

Mankind is God’s offspring so we shouldn’t think that He is like:

gold

silver

stone

any image formed by man’s imagination

III. Man’s sinful predicament (Acts 17:29)

God overlooked our ignorance in the past.

God commands all men to repent.

(#5) Christ

(#6) Cross

God has fixed a day of judgment (justice!?). (v. 31)

God will judge the world by one man. (v. 31a)

(#7) Consummation

God appointed this man. (v. 31b)

God assured mankind of this man’s appointment by raising Him from the dead! (v. 31c)

IV. Closing

Acts 10:38–43 ESV

38 how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. 39 And we are witnesses of all that he did both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree, 40 but God raised him on the third day and made him to appear, 41 not to all the people but to us who had been chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. 42 And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead. 43 To him all the prophets bear witness that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”