~ Part 4~
The way of salvation

It is undeniable that human life is not the way it should be. Ever since sin entered in, relationships have been marred, lives have been ruined, the creation despoiled and God dishonoured.

We do not now find the creation to be as it was when God brought it into being. Human sin and rebellion against God has infected the entire creation, and drawn it away from obedience to its Master.

A Christian worldview sees the nature of the disharmony and corruption in the world differently to non-Christian worldviews. We do not seek the origin of our problems in genetic makeup, or social conditions, or evolutionary processes, or moral weakness.

The source of the problems in human life can be traced back to alienation from God, an alienation which came about because of rebellion against God - a desire to make our own decisions as to what constitutes right and wrong, that is, sin.

For the Christian worldview, the source of our problems is sin, not our environment, or our unbringing, or our lack of resources or our personality.

1. What does this passage teach us about personal responsibility for sin? Does it allow for any other source of sin in us?

   
   

2. Sin is most commonly seen as a violation of a moral code. But if this is the case, why did God give the Israelites commandments about issues which we would not see as "moral" issues?

   
   

Because sin is not a defect in the way we were made, nor does it come from any external source, we are in the fullest sense responsible for our own sin. We cannot pass the blame to anyone or anything else. In Genesis 3, Adam blamed Eve, who blamed the serpent. But God held them each accountable for their own actions. As a result of their sin, sentence of death was passed on Adam and Eve.

That may seem a severe punishment, but only if we see sin as a moral infraction or breaking of a rule. Sin is much more than that - it is the defection of the allegiance of the heart, away from God who is the only true Lord entitled to be given all honour, to serve some other lord - ourselves, an idol (a substitute godlet), or another person.

Since sin involves a change of allegiance and not simply a moral lapse, the re-orientation of the person towards an alternative lord is total, not partial. Alienation from the Lord of Life can only result in death!

Similarly, deliverance from sin means not a mere forgiveness for past or present infractions, but another re-orientation of the person, this time towards the one true God. Becoming a Christian therefore does not involve adding faith in Christ to our previous commitments, but a new commitment which radically alters all our existing commitments. It is not possible for Christ to save us unless we acknowledge his total Lordship over our lives.

1. Can anyone be saved apart from confessing Christ as Lord?

   
   

2. What does it mean to confess Christ as Lord?

   
   

3. To what does his Lordship refer?

   
   

1. The Lordship of Christ means that those who are saved come under his dominion, and become his slaves (1 Corinthians 7:22-23). How is this to function in our lives?

   
   

Salvation is not a matter of being delivered from hell after we die, but being made new in this life, so that we turn from the service of idols to the true service of God in everything. God is not engaged in some cosmic sport with the devil to see who can win the greatest number of human beings to beat the other's score before time is up! What would be the point of that?

Rather, God is seeking to bring human beings back to their true calling and purpose: to serve him in this world, caring for the creation he has made, delighting in it, exploring and unfolding it to see what can be made of it, in order to show forth the glory of God in what he has created, and in what we have made of it. Those who are faithful in this task will share the renewed earth with God forever once sin and death have been finally defeated, where we will continue to enjoy the creation and work with it, but freed from the encumbrance and corruption of sin.

The glorious future held in store for the children of God is far greater than we can imagine, but that is the kind of vision the Bible presents to us of what that future will be.

1. What does this passage indicate about the future for the children of God?

   
   

2. By what means has this future been brought into being?

   
   

3. What are the good works God has prepared for us to do?

   
   

The whole of creation has been corrupted by human sin, and our sin has known no bounds. Nothing is unaffected by that sin, and so the whole of creation must be redeemed.

In the previous study we read Colossians 1:15-20, which speaks about the supremacy of Christ in everything. Read this passage again to remind yourselves of what it says.

Christ has come not simply to save human beings from their sin, but to put right everything which has gone wrong as a result of sin. The whole creation has been disturbed, and the whole creation will be delivered from the effects and bondage brought upon it by human sin.

1. What is the bondage of creation that results from sin?

   
   

2. In what does the freedom of creation consist, and when and how will this freedom become a full reality?

   
   

God will not destroy this earth, although many think that is the fate awaiting it. God does not destroy anything he has made, but makes a way to redeem it and set it free from the power of sin. This applies as much to the creation as a whole as to human beings. Since it is the fault of human beings that the creation is in bondage to decay, it is hardly just for the perpetrators of that problem to be saved, while the rest of creation, an innocent victim, is simply destroyed.

Nor is it a reasonable response for God to destroy the earth because it has been contaminated by human sin. Even if we consider the enormity of what has happened as a result of our disobedience to God, the effects have touched only a minute fraction of the earth. The earth and its creatures are so vast that we cannot possibly completely ruin it! For God to destroy it because we have been irresponsible, is rather like a father setting fire to the family home because the children have drawn graffiti on all the walls! Would God also not rather redeem the creation he loves than consign it to the flames?

"God does not make junk, and he does not junk what he has made." Al Wolters, Creation Regained

This passage speaks about the destruction of the heavens and the earth by fire at the judgement. However, the former earth (at the time of Noah) was also "destroyed," yet we still live on that same earth. Note the marginal notes for v. 10 in various translations: the text is not that clear at this point, and this should instill caution in coming to conclusions about what it means.

1. What is it that will be destroyed in the judgement: God's good creation, or the sin and contamination which affects that creation and holds it in bondage? What inclines you to choose one way or the other?

   
   

2. Can the creation hope for release (Romans 8: 21) if that release is total destruction?

   
   

3. In what way will the creation be preserved to become the "new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness"?

   
   

The "new heaven and new earth" in 2 Peter 3 and Revelation 21 are not new in time, but new in quality. The Greek word for "new" here is kaine, which indicates fresh, or unworn, while the other word for "new" is neoj, which indicates new in time, the recent. Some examples of the latter are: Matthew 9:17 (new wine), 1 Corinthians 5:7 (new dough), Hebrews 12:24 (a new covenant), Colossians 3:10 (the new self). These are all new in the sense that they did not previously exist.

Some examples of the former use of kaine are 2 Corinthians 5:17 (the new person in Christ - you are not someone else, you are still who you always were, but made new!), Ephesians 2:15 (a new race of the people of God), Acts 17:19 (a new teaching).

While the "dictionary" meaning of a word is not decisive, there is strong indication that the creation will be refreshed, made new again, cleansed of its impurities, not discarded or destroyed. Thus the creation, and our tasks within it, take on new significance in the light of God's intention to refine and purify that which he has brought into being.

Our tasks on this earth are not futile because of their impending destruction, but intended by God for us to do [Ephesians 2:10], to show his glory forever, for if they are truly works of God, whatever they are, in the arts, education, child-rearing, housepainting, whatever - they can all be part of the riches of the new creation if in those tasks God is served and glorified, and our allegiance is to him rather than to an idol which supplants God as the source of meaning and purpose for our lives.

1. What does this passage teach us about the character of our work in this world?

   
   

2. If we build with gold, silver or precious stones, which will survive the cleansing fire of the Day of judgement, unlike the wood, hay and stubble, what will then become of what we build?

   
   

1. How could this distinction be evident in our current daily tasks?

The task of the tertiary student in learning is to take seriously the responsibility of study and to become thinking, knowledgeable people, able to understand and contribute to the society in which we live, but also able to interpret and critique the vision(s) underlying society that direct and shape it, and to suggest a distinctively Christian alternative vision.

This flows from the view put forward in these studies of the human calling in life. Each of us as a part to play in the human calling of caring for, developing and stewarding the earth, seeking out its treasures, unfolding its potential, repairing the damage from our predations. Some of the component tasks in the human calling require academic skills of a high order, and it is through our tertiary studies that we are introduced to these skills and given instruction in their proper use.

We have an intellectual debt to those whose ideas and research we study. To be the inheritor of an intellectual legacy is as great a responsibility as any other, and frittering this away leads to impoverishment of the mind, neglect of our calling in life, and disobedience to God who has instructed us to learn and think.

But the vision of life and of our relationship to God which underlies that intellectual legacy cannot be accepted without further ado. We must be critically appreciative of it, and not simply adopt it uncritically.

Our primary task as students, then, is the task of learning, so as to be able to work with our intellectual legacy in an insightful, critical and creative spirit which is governed above all by our commitment to Christ and his redemptive work in renewing the entire creation.

The next Theme looks at the way in which a Christian worldview makes a difference in our studies.

1. What does the scenario of this parable teach us about the responsibility for an inheritance?

   
   

2. What is our responsibility for our intellectual heritage? If it is not our responsibility to maintain, continue and enhance that heritage through careful study and research, whose responsibility is it?