The Cross serving Creation
1. Because God did not want to be God without us,
out of his holy grace God chose to create humankind to share life with
him as beloved children and as brothers and sisters one to another. (See
Philippians 2:6 in the NRSV for God's astonishing view of his Godhood.)
2. Because he willed to create embodied beings he
created a home suited to our nature in which we would live in peace and
joy with him, ever growing into his holy likeness in righteousness.
3. The home was/is not an end in itself but
is the place in which the human family lives unto God and with one
another in growing holy intimacy.
4. That "Grand Enterprise" would come to its
fullness in the person of the immortal and glorified Jesus and all who
are embraced in him and in his work.
5. The Grand Enterprise took into account that the
human family would rebel and would be in need of "saving" and God
purposed to save, as part of what was essential to fulfilling the (conceptually) prior creation purpose which remained intact despite the rebellion.
6. The "saving" work of God serves his creation purpose and does not
conceptually precede it. That is, God's first thought was not, "I would
like to save someone" and so he created someone to save. No, God
purposed to share his life of joy-filled holiness with companions he
would create and, since he took into account that they would sin, he
said, "I will 'save' them in order to remain faithful to my creative
purpose."
7. The creation purpose expressed itself in embodied
beings (humans) who would live with God in this creation home. With the
Fall the humans dragged the creation home down with them and God, in
keeping with his creation purpose, planned the "salvation" of the
creation as he brings his Grand Enterprise to its completion. (See
Romans 8:20-22.)
8. But the completion of his creation purpose is not
the mere restoration of things as they were in Genesis 1—2 because the
aim was never simply to create beings who could be happy in an earthly
paradise. The aim was to share his joy and life in righteousness so that
while the place (home) in which that would take place was an
essential element, the nature and quality of life lived in that place
(home) was the paramount issue.
9. God's eternal aim was life lived in a ceaseless
growing toward his likeness as it would be expressed fully in the man
Jesus. So that when God called and calls people to holiness he is not
simply laying down a command, he is expressing a condition without which
the life he has purposed to bless us with isn't possible. "Be like me!"
is not just a command—it is a call to life to the full.
10. The cross experience of Jesus is
the self-revelation of the God who created and purposed us for life and
who would pay the ultimate price to bring about the ultimate
relationship. God's eternal aim was not a status but a relationship, ever growing in holy intimacy and righteousness and therefore joy and peace
[All talk about God ordaining and predestinating human sin is the outgrowth of a theology that, thank God, is fatally flawed.]