Genesis 3 "You are dust"
"for you are dust, and to dust you shall return."
You will not be "like God." He alone is king. He alone is mighty and inhabits eternity. You, pitiful creature with delusions of grandeur, are a dirtball. You will go back to dirt. The only right recipient of glory in the universe is God.
Perhaps no other thought infuriates modern man like this, to be told that there is one intrinsically and inherently WORTHY of pre-eminence and prominence and that He is arranging history and the universe both to ensure that and to crush all pretenders and challengers. It seems petulant, callow, and self-absorbed of God to be concerned with his own glory. It is NEVER a good thing in men. We universally mock it and sneer at it and view it as a character defect. It is a sign of insecurity.
What if, though, there could be a being to whom this characteristic PROPERLY belonged? What if He had an obsession with His own glory not out of fearful, insecure, and pathetic drives like ours, but by a genuine concern for all that is good and just.... because He himself is the good and just? What if his obsession (I know of no other word to use) with his own honor and first place in everything issued from a being who had no "fear" of being usurped as we have, because He possesses all power? What if this self absorption comes from a being who is selfLESS? This is the claim of the bible.
This would mean, among many things, that our thoughts of God are way way too small. It would mean that we have re-imagined him to be like us, and, as those verses on the back of AQUALUNG (if you are old enough to remember that album.... or indeed old enough to remember albums at all) are TRUE when it said man made God. We created him to be like us, familiar, comfortable, controllable...., or at least someone with whom we may negotiate. We would NEVER EVER come up with the idea of the biblical God for the simple reason that the bible is continually telling us our thoughts are too low. We are dust (NOT God) and to dust we will return. We don't "acknowledge God as God, or give thanks" because of Genesis 3. We retreat from Him and fear Him, and yet fear is so unpleasant that we make up a new one. That "god" we can feel comfortable in mocking.
The great occupation of eternity will be to happily declare "I am dust. I came from dust and went back to dust, yet I cannot sing enough nor praise enough the one who made me to share his image" This will require, though, that we take our proper place as creatures. Further, it will require that we take our proper place as REBELS in need of forgiveness. The seed of that promise is here. The astounding thing that will stand the created universe on its ear is that the seed of the woman came and crushed the head of the serpent, and dirtballs inhabit glory inexpressible. So I believe.
You will not be "like God." He alone is king. He alone is mighty and inhabits eternity. You, pitiful creature with delusions of grandeur, are a dirtball. You will go back to dirt. The only right recipient of glory in the universe is God.
Perhaps no other thought infuriates modern man like this, to be told that there is one intrinsically and inherently WORTHY of pre-eminence and prominence and that He is arranging history and the universe both to ensure that and to crush all pretenders and challengers. It seems petulant, callow, and self-absorbed of God to be concerned with his own glory. It is NEVER a good thing in men. We universally mock it and sneer at it and view it as a character defect. It is a sign of insecurity.
What if, though, there could be a being to whom this characteristic PROPERLY belonged? What if He had an obsession with His own glory not out of fearful, insecure, and pathetic drives like ours, but by a genuine concern for all that is good and just.... because He himself is the good and just? What if his obsession (I know of no other word to use) with his own honor and first place in everything issued from a being who had no "fear" of being usurped as we have, because He possesses all power? What if this self absorption comes from a being who is selfLESS? This is the claim of the bible.
This would mean, among many things, that our thoughts of God are way way too small. It would mean that we have re-imagined him to be like us, and, as those verses on the back of AQUALUNG (if you are old enough to remember that album.... or indeed old enough to remember albums at all) are TRUE when it said man made God. We created him to be like us, familiar, comfortable, controllable...., or at least someone with whom we may negotiate. We would NEVER EVER come up with the idea of the biblical God for the simple reason that the bible is continually telling us our thoughts are too low. We are dust (NOT God) and to dust we will return. We don't "acknowledge God as God, or give thanks" because of Genesis 3. We retreat from Him and fear Him, and yet fear is so unpleasant that we make up a new one. That "god" we can feel comfortable in mocking.
The great occupation of eternity will be to happily declare "I am dust. I came from dust and went back to dust, yet I cannot sing enough nor praise enough the one who made me to share his image" This will require, though, that we take our proper place as creatures. Further, it will require that we take our proper place as REBELS in need of forgiveness. The seed of that promise is here. The astounding thing that will stand the created universe on its ear is that the seed of the woman came and crushed the head of the serpent, and dirtballs inhabit glory inexpressible. So I believe.
