Community, Cross and New Creation

Community, cross and new creation—these are three motifs that come to us from the pen of Richard Hayes. You can see these symbols in some of the passages relating to the work of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. I understand there’s more to the passages; however, consider what we see in Matthew’s words,

20But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins."

22All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23"The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"—which means, "God with us" (Mt. 1:20-23.)

Here you see community in that the father, son, and Holy Spirit and are working together. You see, symbolically, the cross in the sense of the Son denying self in His willingness to become human. (Philippians 2 talks much about this.) You, literally, see new creation in the birth of Jesus—God becoming a man—with the Holy Spirit facilitating this progress.

Since before time, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit have related to each other; they are part of a community. In Genesis one and two, the Godhead looked at Adam and saw that it was not good for man to be alone. God created human beings to live in relationships, just as God lived in a relationship

as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. So, to reflect the image of God, it was necessary to create at least one other being there and so God created woman.

It is because he made a woman, this man and woman should begin reflecting what it was to be made in the image of God. And, of course, they go on to have children, and they show how to relate and live in community as a family. (Unfortunately, as you can see in Genesis 3-4, the first family also offers examples of how NOT to live in relationship and in community, in a family.)

Fast forward to the New Testament. It is interesting to me, when you get into the New Testament, you see Pharisees and teachers of the law, coming up to Jesus. Notice how they typically approach him. Did they come up to him and say, “Say, Jesus, we want to ask you some questions about marriage and how we can make marriage better or what marriage should be like?”

No, typically, when they go to Jesus, what do they want to talk about? Divorce. They want to focus on what should be, in humanity, the exception, not the rule. And, so, they want to talk about the negative and not the positive. You see this in Mark 10.

Back then, you had different thoughts from different Rabbis about what was an acceptable divorce and what was not an acceptable divorce. These teachers of the Law come to Jesus and, to test him, basically ask, “Okay, who’s saying it right? Who’s giving the right answer? Who’s teaching it the right way?”

In verses five and six, Jesus says, 5"It was because your hearts were hard that Moses wrote you this law," Jesus replied. 6"But at the beginning of creation God 'made them male and female.'

Did you notice in verse 6 what Jesus did? He took them back to the garden. He went back to creation. And, what is he taking them back to? Is he taking them back to divorce? No, he is taking them back to marriage, and what marriage should be.

Then, in verse 9, Jesus says, “9Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate." You see what Jesus does? He makes another move. He takes them to what? Discipleship. The Cross. He connects marriage to being a follower of Him.

He paints this picture – if you are really serious about marriage – then, you need to understand there is a connection between marriage and following me. So, he very much plugs marriage into himself.

But that is not all. He is calling marriage a new creation, a work done by God. It is a community, like the Father, Son and Holy Spirit form a community.

And Jesus, again, puts marriage in the realm of relationship. This time he is talking about a relationship with himself – the Son. That is why, we need to understand, when we look at marriage–the manner in which one behaves in his marriage is an external symptom of his relationship with Jesus. Now, that’s very important and very critical to understand.

In marriage, you are a new creation, formed by God, living under the cross, for the purpose of building a godly community.

Five Things I Think I Think (with a nod to Peter King for this idea)

1. Time Magazine did a cover story on the iPad last week. It was a good read. I suppose this will be the salvation of the magazines and newspapers that are still left. In the future, probably a year or two, I suppose the PC companies will be coming out with their own versions of iPads. Of course, they tried this ten years ago and they did not catch on. But there is something about Steven Jobs that allows him to see into the future and begin a trend.

2. I saw where my buddies Tim Archer and Steve Ridgell are doing book-signings all over the country. I think we, here at Shiloh, are going to use their book LETTERS OF THE LAMB as a resource next spring when we study Revelation in our Bible classes. I really enjoyed reading the book and think it is going to be helpful for those of our church, who choose to make it a conversation partner. What I did was read a chapter a day and just spend some time thinking about the images from Revelation, practical teachings from LETTERS, and allow them to point my mind toward God. I highly recommend this book. (No, they are not paying me for an endorsement! However, feel free to write the authors and encourage them to do so.)

3. I read THE TIME TRAVELER’S GUIDE TO MEDIEVAL ENGLAND, by Ian Mortimer, over the weekend. It discusses life in England in the fourteenth century. I can sum it up in one word---“ouch.” What a painful life it was back then!

4. I survived the first sermon in my series on sexuality yesterday morning. Actually, I am gratified at the response.

5. Dare I hope for a good season from the Rangers?

Have a great week!