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Chapter 5
THE eternal creative power of god,
the
compassionate tour of duty of His only begotten son
and liberty
in love, where glory dwells
THE CREATOR: GOD, THE FIRST AND THE LAST, IS EMINENTLY CREATIVE,
AND CREATES
PEACE IN THE HEARTS OF HIS PEOPLE
THE FIRST
Creation is after all, the great exhibit of mind, thought,
understanding, artistry, mathematics, engineering, systems of thought, models of
ideas; and in its midst is love, which leaps into reality as comprehension
dawns, and realisation comes. Much more and worse than love can come, but love
moves readily where creation has its abode, creation after the style of God.
In Jeremiah 4, in the woes to come, we are
presented with an image of un-creation, the successive movement OUT of aspects
of what when the world was created, was movement IN.
Michael Denton*1 in his Evolution: A Theory in Crisis,
notes of the staggering level of miniaturisation involved in life's underlying
codes (1985, p. 338): "It is astonishing to think that this remarkable piece of
machinery, which possesses the ultimate capacity to construct every living thing
that ever existed on Earth, from a giant redwood to the human brain, can
construct all its own components in a matter of minutes and weigh less than
10-16 grams. It is of the order of several thousand million million times
smaller than the smallest piece of functional machinery ever constructed by
man." This is this amazingly complex, brilliantly manageable protein-synthetic
apparatus, DNA and RNA.
In similar vein, on p. 290, he notes: "It is now well established
that the pattern of diversity at a molecular level conforms to a highly ordered
hierarchic system. Each class at a molecular level is unique, isolated and
unlinked by intermediates. Thus molecules, like fossils, have failed to provide
the elusive intermediates so long sought by evolutionary biology ... At a
molecular level, no organism is "ancestral" or "primitive" or "advanced compared
with its relatives." Indeed, on p.288, he notes this: "when new types of
organisms are occasionally discovered they never turn out to be ancestral to
known groups but stand only as sister groups in keeping with the thesis that
nature's basic order is circumferential rather than sequential."
In other words, things move out from the centre, where creation
occurs, to their various assignments; and so do we who are Christ's, new creations,
sent with precise spiritual orders, commission, accepted freely (I Corinthians
3:17, Acts 16:7ff.), at the personal level, where hearts can know and love
respond. Reborn in the image of Him who created us, now in Christ, we are able
to be moulded to more and more felicity in this image (II Corinthians 3:18), in
terms of Christ Himself.
Creation itself of
the structure and contents of the cosmos and its outer environment,
is nothing to do with things adjusting upwards. Creation has its
ways for the world and its outer environment, and a strong mind, an organising
brilliance, a flexibility within kind, these are outstanding characteristics, as
when a musician has like pieces, not growing out of each other, but related by
modes of creation, inter-relationships within each, and different purpose,
either with closer or further objectives for the 'family', be it symphonies,
concertos or quartets.
You can try to imitate the creative efforts of someone with
vaster understanding than yourself, but in vain. It takes much in conception,
depth, vigour, vitality, imagination and self-control to create. Each work of
art, like some others as it may be, like the molecular level in life, has its
own signature, stamp, for each kind. There is nothing in between. We do not
merge, we make; instant thought, like particular children, are not mergers, but
distinctive, each one separate, even when made on the same mould. Thus creation
can make billions of faces, on one mould; billions of brains, on one mould,
masses of intelligence, which inhabit the creations, and spirits, which
activate them, and creations come forth, whether they be books, children, stars
of beauty.
Desecration ruins it, in thought, in mind, in body, in the world,
in the cosmos. Sin spoils, judgment rebukes; but holy joy in God's salvation
polishes it.
It as mini-creators that you and I live, because THE Creator in
the beginning, made heaven and earth. In the Hebrew there is in the first few
words of Genesis, a use of successive first letters to isolate and emphasis this
statement. Then in Genesis 2, God refers to the generations of the heaven and
the earth, all that made them to be, and all that would come forth from them:
their family tree, and the coat of arms, is that of God. Then
Genesis 5, for example, gives the generations of Adam, a living and
personal product of God; and there we have reference back to his being created,
he and Eve, and to what proceeded from them: all is CREATION, including
that vast and tumultuous but precise and gloriously engineered exhibit which
each one of us carries about in himself, herself, and THESE generations from
life, human life, are then in Genesis seen moving to families, cities, nations..
In Revelation 1:8, God is called the Alpha and Omega, the
Almighty, and in 22:13, the First and the Last, the
Beginning and the End,
and in 2:9, the Lamb gains the same name, the First and the Last, which of
course is one of God's own names as in Isaiah 44:6; and "besides Me," He says,
"there is no God." He is the beginning and the end of all creation. It is He
who did not "create it in vain," who indeed formed it
"to be inhabited", and in
Genesis 1 you see He moulded what He had made with this idea, this purpose. Nor
has He spoken in secret to man, His creation (Isaiah 44:19), nor has He
wandered from the point, saying to the desecrated creation, man (Romans 5):
"Look to Me, and be saved, all you ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is
no other." Every tongue will in the END acknowledge Him, every knee bow. This in
Isaiah is to God alone, and hence they so bow to Jesus Christ (Philippians 2).
The Saviour, Jesus Christ, workman and Word of God, has created
ALL THINGS, so not only is any thing at all that is made, HIS creation (not
products of things made, but the things themselves), while equally, nothing
that is not God is NOT His creation (John 1:3). He encompasses all things and to
Him is their will to be directed, in Him their hearts found, f or Him their
labours done and from Him the direction gained. Where they err, it is like a
rupture; and mankind HAS erred (Romans 5, 6:23). Man is not insignificant, but
without HIM, He is worse than insignificant: but he is judged, and becomes far
worse than insignificant, even an outlandish alien, unreconciled and with many,
unreconcilable, readily turning into tyrants who seek to increase their domain,
tiny or vast, even to rule the truth; but it cannot be ruled and their lives
like their logic, fail and cannot rise under its stamp. Repentance is no mere
option!.
They talk of mystery, but this ignorant puzzlement outside God is
then readily transformed into misery; for man MUST act, seek the stars, relish
opportunity, seek challenge, try to overcome, because he is made to act, and
when divorced from His reference and Redeemer, he still acts, but either on
purpose or by default, does so devastatingly in the end, as at Babel. Alas, he
is continually making follies for his power, his arrogant pride and his
accomplishments. You see it in Psalm 107, they arise, they fall, they seek,
they cry, they are heard, they flourish, they fail in weakness, forgetting. Oh
that men WOULD praise the Lord for His goodness to man, for without this, it is
to choke the channel in which it flows, like a water channel conveying moisture
to the fields, but choked with weeds.
THE MIDST
So creative is God, that He RE-creates what
having fallen, is made to stand by His salvation. Thus in Colossians 3:10, we
find that the Christian is one created, restored and being renewed after the
image of God who made him. This is restoration; and for the one who has
lived outside Jesus Christ, the Son of God, cut off from Him as a branch from
the vine, ALL THINGS BECOME NEW. It is a new creation (II Cor. 5:17ff.), an
irresistibly beautiful act, more than mere re-assemblage; for in the redemption
He purchases, there is a regeneration, as if your car could be, not
panel-beaten, but reduced to basics, these separated, and then these reformed,
and built again into the car. Now the 'new creation' is spiritual, mental,
moral; but then, in the resurrection it will be with a specialised and eternal
personal passport, each one sustained in his or her place, in that body, of
which Paul speaks, eternal in the heavens (II Corinthians 5,Philippians 3:20).
Not merely, however, will it be
resurrected, this will be done with the same irresistible power by which God
made the earth (Philippians 3:21), alone, as He declares in Isaiah 44:24,
Isaiah 45:18: that God who speaks, for there is no other. Creation and
resurrection are done by Himself, that glorious inventive, creative, undimmed
and undimmable Creator. Though the creation is swept by the winds of sin, and
the typhoons of judgment at many times, as in the Flood, and so wears out as
Isaiah 51:6 tells us, this, thousands of years before Lord Kelvin popularised
and showed the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which formulates the manner of it
in one dimension, yet the opposite comes in its time. The resurrection is
wrought by a power beyond sin, post-redemptive, so that as Paul declares in
Philippians 3:20-21,
"For our citizenship is in heaven from which we also
eagerly wait for the Saviour,
the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body
that it may be conformed to His glorious body,
according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to
Himself."
God's irresistible power mocks the tinny pretensions and tirades
of dictators, domestic, professional or national. He does not dictate: as
Creator however He DOES instruct, and as our students, with 12 years of school
and 3 or more of University are used to being instructed, hopefully, about the
nature of things, let us all learn. Is it so hard to learn then from God, who is
gentle and lowly in heart, as seen in His coming as Christ Jesus (Matthew
11:28-30), not to judge, but that the world might be saved. Judgment has wrath;
salvation has grace divine.
The power that cannot be resisted, however,
both to create and to save, is so because God has foreknown each one of us
before the creation (Ephesians 1:4), knows who are His, who receive Him, and
makes sure of them so that not one is lost. This is THE MIDST, after the
beginning, before the end: that time of application of the Gospel. In this, how
gloriously free you are, because you have only to repent and call on His name
for the forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:37-38), and you will be saved. Indeed,
confess Jesus Christ as Lord (not some other entity) and believe in your heart
that God has raised Him from the dead and you will be saved (Romans 10:9). He
the Creator, has been creative in freely supplying the means of RE-CREATION, in
a Gospel where HE who did all the work of creating us, has already done that
for saving (Romans 3:23-27, Ephesians 2, Titus 3).
WALK then in the Spirit, REJOICE in the new creation which is
yours, if you are in Christ, be thankful and worship Him, not even dented by the
impacts which Satan and Co. try to make: for resist him, and he will flee from
you (I Peter 5).
Wisdom and knowledge will be the stability of your times, says Isaiah 33:6, the
fear of the Lord is His treasure. This is true both of HIS treasuring that clean
fear of God in us, which nourishes our hearts and helps them to shine, and OUR
treasuring it in His presence, as a thing like the waters of the sea, both clean
and cleansing: such is the beauty of holiness, as we walk, in the midst.
THE LAST
Then comes the end (Matthew 24:14). When ?
when the Gospel has been preached in all the world, as a witness to all nations.
Currently, we face thermo-nuclear devastations, mounting earthquake
instabilities, increasing oceanic disturbances, harsher sun rays with less ozone
coverage, endless wars, not least concerning God's long stated intention to
bring back a fallen Israel to its land, before He brings a multitude of them
back to the Lord whom that nation once had crucified (with assistance from
Rome!), near missing asteroids, endless infatuated terrorists, in love with
death (as foretold in Revelation 6 as a passion), false gospels, shameless
instruction in the myth of organic evolution, based on nothing that can be seen
or made to happen.
Meanwhile increasingly, the atheists boast of their knowledgeable
ignorance, reactors who can rise above it all by pure miracle and tell it like
it is, which of course it isn't, nor on their model can they know; but
Christians do not limit themselves so, and not only can, but do know God (John
17:1-3), the real wonder for life on this earth; for He is personal, intimate,
courageous, strong, wise, inimitable, insuppressible, as pure as a torrent of
ice water from the mountains, kind to call, swift to hear, incapable of
manipulation, ready to hear the cry from the heart, when it is addressed and
packaged in Christ's own name and merits (Psalm 71).
It DOES end, this Age of Gospel grace and trial (I Peter 4, II
Peter 3, Acts 1), like other trials and tests. Always remember that. God who
created the universe and man within it, and the Gospel for man, and man's
creativity, alike, does not try for ever, for as He declares (Isaiah 57:15-16),
the spirit (of man) would fail before Him. Therefore endure, be courageous,
valiant, strong, fearless, valuing each day as an opportunity for the service of
God, the testimony of Christ, that many might find rest in Him, release and
commission, before the end. He creates
"the fruit of
the lips: Peace, peace to him who is far off and to him who is near"-
Isaiah 57:19.
When He DOES come, it will be an end indeed to this earth's
arrogance (Isaiah 2:27, 24), as with the servant, so with the master; but it
will be the beginning of rest from trials for His servants. Therefore rejoice in
infirmities, for these are opportunities for the Lord to show His power, and
wonders to behold, when He acts (Isaiah 64:5). When He has shown the earth the
better way (Revelation 20, Isaiah 11, Psalm 72), then it will go, no more space
or time for it (Matthew 24:35. Yet a new heavens and a new earth will be CREATED
(Revelation 20, Isaiah 65:17, II Peter 3), in which righteousness dwells.
I look forward to this, in the end, a new earth and heavens
CREATED. How staggeringly creative is the Lord! It will all be made new, until
the final eternity surpasses all that has been, and new bodies, themselves a new
creation in a world, will endure past all worlds, in the wit and wisdom,
knowledge and power of God. When the architect makes gifts of houses, whether
bodies or spirits or worlds, it is always better to know Him personally, since
He may give many worlds, when this passes, but when this world is past, relying on
it leaves nothing.
Nothing, that is, except judgment for severance from God, when salvation is
denied; and left no less, is everlasting life for His people, who have trusted
in Him only and altogether (Jeremiah 17, Psalm 71), so that the
end
of the matter is eternity, end aborted, with judgment tossed away like clouds in
the morning sky, at mid-day. There is rest (Revelation 7:14-17) wrought by
the works of Christ, in creation to make us there to rest, and in redemption to
make the delight of life to be at rest that we might function freely in Him,
whom, as Peter says to the redeemed children of God (I Peter 1),
"having not
seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with
joy inexpressible and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith - the
salvation of your souls."
The freedom of faith (II Corinthians
3:17) becomes the very atmosphere of the endless truth which warms the heart and
blesses the soul.
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Here
is the humanly impossible made plausible by the creative power of God,
who created redemption in the flesh by sending Christ to redeem,
glory in the heart which is redeemed, by accounting for the unaccountable,
with a love which knows no accounting (Ephesians 3)
for its grandeur and greatness,
but meets the demands of truth, with its precision as sharp as nails.
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He
calms of wrath due heedless unholiness,
and brings man to appreciation of the liberty
where heart finds both its foundation and its function,
in the estimable wonder of being an actual,
adopted child of God.
For us who are His, in our Father's house are many dwellings,
but the greatest part of it, is He who provides them
on His estate of sanctified energy, present glory,
endless liberty that love informs, where truth is relished and worship blesses.
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NOTES
*1
See News
57, and Ch. 3 of Alpha and Omega,
including *3 and
*5A.
*2
See
*1 in Chapter 3 above, and SMR Ch. 2.