The Story of Reality: God
Notes
Transcript
In the beginning: God
In the beginning: God
It’s been a couple weeks since we have met, but lets recap what we have been talking about.
We have been looking at the story of reality and really comparing different worldviews and how really now matter what worldview you are looking at or what lense your looking through it all boils down to four main questions. Does anyone remember those four questions?
How did we get here?
What is the problem?
How can it be fixed?
What is the result/end?
If you remember Pastor Jared took us through this and even showed us how every good story works through these questions.
Let’s take a quick example: who has ever seen Finding Nemo?
What is the beginning of the movie? It sets up where they are, that they are about to have all these kids, what to name them, etc.
What is the problem? Well everyone but Nemo is killed and soon after Nemo is separated from Marlin
How can it be fixed? Marlin has to find Nemo. (Nemo doesn’t know help is on the way, he is unaware that his dad is searching the whole ocean for him)
What is the result/end? They are reunited, he is found and saved
Obviously a silly example but a quick example of how those four questions are the crux of the plot line, its a good movie because it works through all four of those
Well what is the biblical view of these questions?
How did we get here? Creation
What is the problem? Fall
How can it be fixed? Redemption
What is the result/end? Restoration
We see these same story line is threaded throughout the bible. You can study the bible and know every nook and cranny but at the end of the day, it boils down to these four main topics. Creation: God created everything including us out of nothing. Fall: man sinned and now are separated from God, harmony and union with God was broken and death and decay is upon us. Redemption: prophets foretold of a coming king who would live as a suffering servant, tempted in all ways but without sin and would die on the cross for our sins, and then defeat death and raise from the dead and ascend to the right hand of God the father. Restoration: Jesus will come back again for his bride the church, making all things new; there will be a new heaven and new earth.
And so this morning we are actually going to look at the first question or the first part of the worldview: how did we get here?
Creation, turn with me to Genesis 1
The very first words of our story begin with this,
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
What is the first thing you notice about this? I’m going to take you back to school here, what is the first noun you see? (Person, Place or Thing)
God—it begins with a person, God existed before anything existed and he was creator of everything. Before anything else, God was there.
the story starts with a person—God
He is an everlasting Spirit—there is no beginning or end
Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God.
Before anything—the mountains or the formation of the earth and the world
From everlasting (ever-always lasting-survive or endure) always enduring, from everlasting (Always) to everlasting (always) you are God!
If you are going to understand this story we have to start with the beginning; this is the foundation on which the whole story is laid upon.
God is the very first piece of the Christian story because the Story is all about him.
2. The story is about him!
Who in here has ever been told: “Caleb, the world doesn’t revolve around you.”
Guess what, its true! This story isn’t about you! The world literally revolves, is sustained, is upheld but God, its all about him!
This is the reason so many people are depressed, including Christians. They think the story is about them!
“They thought the story was about them—their happiness, their comfort, their personal prosperity. Then they wonder what went wrong when things go in another direction. “How could God let his happen to me?”
We think we have God in our lives now everything will be fine. We think we should be happy, carefree, prosperous. We think the story is about us!
God has a wonderful plan for your life! We have heard that before right?
3. In this story, everything belongs to God!
The Story is not about God’s plan for your life but about your life for God’s plan!
In this Story, everything belongs to God. Since God made everything out of nothing, it all belongs to him. That includes us!
Now we have studied and talked about that we belong to God but in a different way that other things in creation belong to God. We are made in the image of God and are precious to God, but we still are made by him and belong to him.
God—>man—>creation
4. God is distinct from the rest of creation
Nature is not God. The sun, the moon, the stars, animals—they are not beings to be worshipped. They have names, functions—they are things not gods.
We do not respect nature. That sounds harsh I know, but stick with me here. You respect the person who made nature but caring for it. You respect the people you share nature with—caring for it, tending to it, being respectful as to now leave a mess and leave the world unpleasant and unsafe. This is how we love our neighbors and love God—but we don’t respect nature as a thing.
All of this to say the Story has a theme—whats this all about? What’s the point?
Well we can sum up the entire bible in one single concept—God created the heavens and the earth
The Story starts with a Sovereign who creates a domain. The idea that god owns everything and has proper authority to rule over everything he has made is the main point.
It’s not about love or redemption or forgiveness or even relationship. It’s about God as creator and sustainer
Now we would say that whole story is about Jesus right? We just spent all of summer camp talking about Jesus being from eternity past to eternity future, its all about him! I’m not contradicting here. Think about this—the story of Jesus, the story of hope or redemption, its still about God as creator.
God created everything and there was a problem—sin, and there is a solution—Jesus.
God in his creation gave us his son in human flesh to showcase God as creator and sustainer. What’s the whole point of the story, whats the end of this story? Restoration. The story of Jesus, the story of the church, the story of redemption is all to get back to the way it was meant to be. Its about restoring the kingdom, the creation as it was intended. Its all about the glory of God!
Before we move on I want to point out one more thing: the world has not always been broken. It started out with everything in its proper place—it started out with order. Everything God made as good—and one day that order will be restored.
Quickly there are two common objections to this storyline:
Who created God? No one—God was here before everything, he is an eternal being.
That is a miracle—How can God create something out of nothing? We’ll if God could create something out of nothing, couldn’t just as easily turn water into wine, heal the blind, raise the dead, part the waters, calm the sea? And visa-versa. We have non-biblical accounts of the life of Jesus and the things he did including conquering death. If this Jesus can calm the wind and the waves—if he can speak to creation and it listens even though it doesnt have ears to hear to minds to process, and this Jesus can conquer death—couldn’t this God also create all things? Why do they wind and the waves obey him—he is their master
This story has two main components—mind and matter—and they are two very different things. God is maker and sovereign over everything else. And yet we find competing storylines in the world.
The first is that all that exists is matter. The only things that are real are physical things in motion governed by natural law. In the beginning were the particles. This is where the story begins and this is where the story ends because there is nothing more. No God, no souls, no heaven or hell, no miracles, no morality, just molecules.
To many this sounds enticing. Well there is no standard, there is no problem, there is just stuff and thats it. At the end of the day the world is nothing but mindless mater in motion, but where does that leave us?
If the world is just eat or be eaten, where does it leave us?
How does this answer our questions?
See everyone agrees that something has gone wrong. You would be hard pressed to find someone who really believes that this is how it is meant to be, that there isn’t a problem. We call it the problem of evil, but no matter how you phrase it, there is a problem. But there can only be a problem if there is a right way, a way it’s meant to be. There has to be a purpose. But matterism says there is no mind, no cosmic force, no plan and no purpose.
They would argue that each individual person comes up with their own purpose. Here is the problem with that—no individual purpose would be better than the other. You have limitless variety and none are greater than another. That would mean Jimmy the pastor has equal purpose with Johnny the drug dealer. Suzie the missionary has the same level of value as Stanley the sex slave trader.
Now I understand we are all one in Christ, but there is some sort of benchmark we are trying to live up to—Paul says follow me as I follow Christ! There is a standard, but in matterism there is no benchmark, nothing to try and reach.
There is another storyline and that is mindism. Mind is all that exists. In the beginning—mind. This is where the story ends. There is nothing more.
God is in everything because he is everything. Everyone is free to make their own choices, make their own path, you are a “god”.
This sounds enticing—I can make my own path and live my own life doing whatever I want and will get to the destination that I want.
If this is true, then Jesus is wrong, Mohammed is wrong, Moses is wrong.
CS Lewis said this was “All the thrills of religions and none of the cost.”
If you are the master of your own fate, your own “god”, then you are responsible for any anguish, tragedy, disaster that comes upon you.
The danger with this and matterism is they have a lot the same puzzle pieces, but they are being force into the wrong places to try and make the picture that isn’t correct, it doesn’t work.
This also leads to despair—what’s the point? If I can make my own way and Micah can make his own way they both can’t be right, one of them is wrong. And what’s the end goal—there is nothing to even strive for or reach for.
In the Christian story, who is the creator and sustainer of the universe? Who is lord, the master of the universe? Who is all powerful? Who is the creator of the universe? God—God is completely distinct from the rest of creation.
In this other story of reality, who is the creator and sustainer of the universe? Who is the Lord, the master of the universe? Who is all powerful? You are—thats why you are the center of universe.
If you are the center and you make all things and you decide your own fate then their cant’ be a problem of evil, matter of fact their can’t be any problem at all and so their is no solution and their is no end result.
Let’s try and bring this together: so why are we here?
Either 1) someone is behind it all (God), 2) some thing is behind it (Mindism) or 3) there is no one or not thing behind it all (matterism).
Which one makes the most sense? I would argue there is a one question that we must ask that will eliminate two of the three.
What is the point? What is the purpose? Or to put it another way: what went wrong?
It should be a lot better than it is. This can’t be how it was intended. Death & disease. Just this week I got word a guy I went to school with; a kind and compassionate man who dedicated his life to nursing and actually got pretty popular as a nursing advocate, died from cancer. He was in his early 30’s. He had to fight to get here to the states from Africa and get through school. This can’t possibly be how it was meant to be?
If there is only matter than this is no purpose, so there can’t be something more, there can’t be a solution because there is no problem.
if there is only mind than that is not just center stage its the whole stage. Any variation from this single, perfect unity, any distinction between good and evil, or from how it should be and how it is are just illusions.
Neither of these address the issue of what is wrong.
The biblical story line does. We will see in the coming week how each of these four questions is addressed.
The first puzzle piece is God—its all about him. He is creator of everything and sustainer of all things. We are his lawful subjects. There is a purpose and a order to his creation. We will see that his order has been broken but also that it can be restored.
