The Process of Creation is Thick with Meaning
Introduction
In this series of essays on "The Christian Mind: Foundations in Genesis" we are attempting to distill what the early chapters in Genesis teach us about the very constitution of the world and of man in order to arrive at the basic bearing points of the mental compass. It turns out that Genesis is replete with material which provides the basic outlines of existence--which shape everything else--certainly all mankind. Or, to change the analogy, in these chapters we are confronted with the foundation stones and the basic building blocks of human history.
It is important to get a good grasp of these fundamentals, since our overarching goal is to delineate the Christian Mind--as opposed to the Unbelieving Mind. A basic principle is that the Believing Mind and the Unbelieving mind are fundamentally opposed, or antithetical, to each other. The early chapters of Genesis explain why this is the case--as we will see in later essays. What we are asserting is that the Christian sees, knows, and thinks of reality in a qualitatively different manner to the Unbeliever--who cannot think as the Christian thinks. For the Unbeliever to think as the Christian would be equivalent to a perpetually blind person describing their reality of the experience of sight. The Christian, who once thought as the Unbeliever, has now been made to see the truth and by God's grace can think of things as they really are.
But this is no idle mental exercise. One of the consequences of being given "eyes to see, and ears to hear" is that the Believer comes to think according to the truth, according to the way things really are. Consequently, as the Believer reconstructs his understanding of the world according to God's revelation of it, he comes to think God's thoughts after Him, which leads to the Believer inheriting and developing enormous cultural influence and power.
Jerusalem is interested in power. Not the way the Unbeliever is besotted with power (as he ever seeks to throw off the bonds of God and replace them with bonds of Man-as-god) but power according to the Kingdom of God. Power to subdue the creation, power to influence, power to serve, power to disciple the nations under the glorious rule of the resurrected King of all kings--whose yoke is easy, and whose burden is light, Who is gentle and humble of heart, and Who gives rest to weary souls. (Matthew 11: 28,29) The more Jerusalem conforms itself to the way the world really is, to the way God has created it, the more powerful and influential it becomes.
A simple anecdote may help illustrate the the point. Spurgeon, the great nineteenth century herald of God, was called to serve God amidst the seemingly relentless rise of speculative rationalistic criticism of the Bible. He was asked one day why he did not spend more time and energy in his public teaching defending the Bible. "What!" answered Spurgeon. "Should one spend time defending a roaring, ravening lion. Just open the gate, and let it loose."
Spurgeon had a well developed and honed Christian mind. He had learnt to think God's thoughts after Him. He had worked out how the world really worked. This anecdote shows that he had learned of the creative power of the Word of God. He had learned it from the Bible. He believed it, and practised it. As a consequence he became enormously influential and powerful in his day and generation.
So far in these essays we have learned that God is a person, such that all of life is, therefore, personal. Just as he created all things, every atom matters to Him. He thinks about, works with, predestines and governs the course of every atom in creation. Consequently, for the Believer, everything he does reflects a comprehensive personal relationship with God. Just as every fabric and fibre of creation belongs to Him and serves Him, so, for the Believer, every experience he has of the world is never personal-impersonal; it is always either personal-personal-Personal, or personal-impersonal-Personal. The Believer lives coram Deo--before the face of God--communing person to Person with God about everything that he experiences in this world. Everything is ultimately expressive of and in service to the Living God. Naturally, for the Believer, this changes everything, and utterly shapes the way he thinks of himself and the world.
The Unbelieving Mind acknowledges nothing of this. That is why the Believer is said to live, while the Unbeliever is declared to be dead in his trespasses and sins.
Secondly, we have seen that God created the world ex-nihilo: out of nothing. This means that all which exists apart from God is completely, utterly and totally dependant upon Him. I cannot think or frame or do anything without drawing upon Him and relying totally upon Him. If God were to withdraw His Spirit the world would immediately revert into a black hole of nothingness. This means that the Unbeliever, even while lifting up his fist to shake it in God's face, is utterly dependant upon Him even to frame and express his rebellion. This makes Unbelief the most contemptuously mindblowingly stupid and shameful orientation possible. Not that the Believer therefore treats the Unbeliever with contempt per se, for the Believer knows only too well that he was once like that and that the eyes have been opened by God's grace alone. Therefore, the Believer tends to regard the Unbeliever with compassion, and pleads with God that He might be merciful and open the eyes of the blind--to the ultimate glory of the Saviour.
Thirdly, Genesis reveals to us that God created all things out of nothing by the mere utterance of Words. God's Word is sovereignly powerful. Its mere enunciation calls what it speaks of into existence. Similarly the course of human civilization is conditioned and ruled over by His Word. His servants become powerful and influential as they both master language in general, and His Word, in particular. Mastery of the Word does not mean mastery over God; rather, the reverse. It means the Believer is mastered by the Word; his or her speech becomes as one speaking God's Words after Him, so as to exercise great influence and dominion in the Creation, which is also ruled by the same Word. Ironically, the Word becomes a key to wielding power--but not through gaining mastery over God and His Word--but through becoming a true and humbled servant of God's Word, so that His law and command governs our lives, male and female, rich and poor, bond and free.
God took six days to complete the Creation. You may ask, Why? For surely God could have called all the Creation into existence instantaneously. Of course. But the answer lies in that the very process of Creation is for our sake, that we might learn about God, our world, and ourselves. (Note here that we are asserting six literal twenty-four hour days. Anything else is contrary to the clear meaning of the biblical text itself. Anything else leads to theological monstrosities, as we shall endeavour to show in a forthcoming essay. But the debate between "literal creationism" and "long time theistic evolutionism" is nevertheless a highly instructive case study of the antithesis which exists between Jerusalem and Athens. Its takes us to the heart of how the Believing mind works and is framed, and how, by contrast, the Unbelieving mind works and is framed--and never the twain shall meet. Thus, we can learn much of rich illustrative value from the debate.)
We learn that in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, but that the earth was "formless and void" (Genesis 1:2). The basic material of creation had now come into existence--yet it pleased God to work with this material, gradually, systematically, and developmentally over a period of six days. Why? So that we might learn that this is how the Creation is made to be interacted with, as it were. Key themes of life are revealed here:
1. The theme of creational development (lower to higher forms of existence, immaturity to maturity, the move from potential to actual, and growth).
2. Process--which requires building gradually and incrementally--is the way not only that the world came into being, but it is the way it was made to work ever thereafter. He or she who is to have cultural power must relish the disciplines involved in building gradually and incrementally. The Believing Mind never despises the day of small beginnings! The things that last are those that begin insignificantly and are developed and shaped gradually over time. The Believing Mind is rarely in a hurry--the process is as important as the outcome--in fact, we may say the process is the outcome. This reality is everywhere present throughout creation, but probably the most striking illustration is that the Lord has decreed that it should take twenty to thirty years to develop a baby into a mature adult. In modern parlance, that's a long time. It should not surprise us that genuine responsible maturity only comes to those parents and children who submit to the process, to its length, and work hard every day at training and development.
Given that from the very beginning the Creation came into existence through gradual and incremental process, it should not surprise us that the most powerful cultures are those which think and live their lives in terms, not of decades, but generations. Nor should it surprise us that the Believing culture will ultimately triumph upon the earth, for the Spirit of Him Who sits at the right hand of God has been poured out upon the earth. He has taught us to think, not only generationally, but in terms of thousands of generations. (In this regard, it is not without great significance that the Decalogue, which contains some key statements of self-revelation by the Lord to His people, includes this: "for I the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, and on the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing lovingkindness to thousands (of generations) to those who love Me and keep My commandments." [Deuteronomy 5:9,10]. The phrase "of generations" with reference to thousands is not contained in the text, but the parallelism with "third and fourth generations" implies it. Deuteronomy 7:9 further confirms that the Lord's lovingkindness extends down a thousand generations and that, therefore, this is how we must read the Fourth Commandment. Assuming a generation consists of thirty years, the Lord instructs us to anticipate God's lovingkindness to extend through a thousand generations prior to His final advent--that is, thirty thousand years. We must reject all "end is nigh" millenarianism, with all the spiritual impotence that it brings in its wake.)
If cultural influence and power comes to those who think and act long term, a sign of extreme cultural weakness is evident when a people are focused upon the immediate, the instantaneous, the here and now. It is no accident that as the West has moved into a post-Christian era, its influence has waned. As it has systematically undermined everything that requires a lifetime of work and commitment (marriage and family amongst the most salient) and as it has focused upon instantaneous gratification; so its influence is crumbling before cultures and movements that have a much longer perspective, such as Islam. The West is powerless to resist Islam, for Islam thinks of world domination and of generations to achieve it.
Not that Islam will triumph in any permanent sense, for in the long run it too will be crushed and destroyed for the idolatry that it is--as the King of all kings stretches forth His imperious hand to redeem out of Islam a mighty people for Himself which no man can number.
3. The theme of systematic development amidst extreme creativity. System, pattern, structure and order--amidst the most extensive demonstration of creative Power that has ever been. Spontaneous creation generating, producing structure, pattern and order. We often think of these two things (creativity and order) as opposing poles, unable to co-exist. Yet the opposite is the truth, and it has always been the case since the very creation itself. True creativity takes place, and is enhanced, within a framework of structure, harmony and order. True creativity leads to structure and order. True order and structure thoroughly embraces creativity, and is always looking for the paradigm shift, because above all structures stands the creative Word of the Creator God.
The Structures of the World Expose the Folly of Unbelief
Firstly, we note the wonderful harmonious balance of the six days—which speaks volumes about how
the “world works”, as it were.
1. Light 2. Sea and Heaven 3. Earth (with its plants)
4. Luminaries 5. Fish and Fowl 6. Land creatures and Man
The existence of a deliberate pattern in the account has been cited by sceptics as evidence of literary artifice--which, in turn, is offered as a reason for the Genesis creation account not being a literal historical record. But this is simply gratuitous question begging. Rather, the harmonious pattern exists in the text because God created in a harmonious pattern--which, in part, is to teach us that creation is structured according to harmonious patterns--and that He, Himself, is a God for Whom order, structure, balance and harmony are intrinsic to His being.
Clearly, such harmonies and patterns are everywhere present throughout the world. The Athenian mind cannot provide a credible account for the existence of these patterns--more of which are being discovered all the time. It knows they exist. It inevitably frames its discourse in dependance upon them. It constantly uses them and refers to them. It sets its clocks and navigational instruments by them.
However, at the same time, and in the same breath, when discussing the origin of the world, the only ultimate "reality" in the cosmogony of Unbelief is always raw, brute contingency. (This, as we have argued previously, is the inevitable position of the Unbelieving Mind. Rejecting the very possibility of the Almighty, all governing, self-sufficient God, the Athenian has to grasp the nettle of reality being ultimately ungoverned and uncontrolled--that is, at root, random.) So, the Unbelieving Mind, while not only accepting the absolute necessity of structure and order throughout the creation, but also acknowledging that they are so fundamental that nothing meaningful can be accomplished without employing and trading on the structured order, at the same time (and almost in the same breath) the Unbelieving Mind insists that structure exists on a sea of ultimate pure randomness--it arose from ultimate randomness, it's essence is random, and all reality will collapse again into randomness. Structure and order are therefore a mere illusion--temporary at best, like misted breath on a winter's morn.
The Athenian mind confirms its errant foolishness and militant ignorance by simply shrugging its collective shoulders at the issue, choosing to ignore it. It prefers not to reckon with the inescapable inference that in every Unbelieving cosmogony man himself necessarily has to be ultimately random and meaningless--and not just mankind in collective abstraction, but every single individual on the earth. Preferring not to face that uncomfortable conclusion, the Unbeliever prefers simply to shut his eyes. When you are faced with unresolved problems in your world view the best you can hope for is studiously to ignore the problem. Hopefully, it might go away! And even if it doesn't, at least we can pretend that it has. So passes the monumental stupidity and ignorance of the Unbelieving Mind.
As Karl Popper once trenchantly observed, if the theory of Evolution were true, it could never be described. If it can be described, by definition it cannot be true. What did he mean? Well, even to posit the theory requires drawing upon laws of logic and reason, grammar and syntax, cause and effect, assumptions of uniformity through time and space; it assumes commonality of the human mind, such that language and reasonable discourse is understandable across minds, cultures, and time. Moreover, the theory posits certain governing laws, such as "survival of the fittest" to account for its operation. But the theory of Evolution, if it is to be taken seriously, makes the existence of such things impossible and meaningless.
On the other hand, clearly the theory can be described and argued for rationally--albeit untruthfully. Clearly, laws of logic and reason do exist, for logic and reason exist. The existence of such realities--of such structure, patterns, and order--prove beyond all reasonable doubt that the theory of Evolution is a fiction: therefore, its widespread popularity and universal promulgation can only be for ulterior reasons. We will discuss what those ulterior motives may be in a future essay.
The Entire World, As Created, was Very Good
We notice that six times (at the end of each day’s work) the Lord declares that what had been done was good. In classical Hebrew, repetition means emphasis. The Bible is making it emphatically clear that the world, as created, was completely and thoroughly good. Moreover, when creation had finished on the sixth day, the Lord declared that it was very good (Genesis 1:31). The Hebrew word for good, “tov” means “excellent, pleasant, fantastic, the very best.” This insistence upon the excellence of the creation tells us that the world in which we live is a wonderful and blessed place. It requires that the Believing Mind always holds the created world in deepest respect.
The Lord is also making a statement about the intrinsic goodness of matter and the created world. Here again we come to a watershed of distinction between the Christian and the Unbelieving Mind. The Unbelieving Mind, we remember, fabricates its gods as finite and limited, constrained and co-relative to an eternal "stuff". Man and the gods are therefore on the same "chain of being." The gods are merely "bigger" or greater extensions of man. But insofar as the gods of the Unbelieving Mind are immaterial (Pure Reason, Absolute Love--as examples of impersonal deities--or Zeus, Allah--as examples of personal deities) the Athenian Mind will ever tend to posit the consequent inferiority of matter, and the superiority of the non-material, for matter is clearly limited and, therefore, weak. For example, in seeking a distinction between animals and humans, the unbeliever will always tend to alight upon non-material attributes of man to establish his , such as reason, speech etc to indicate the superiority of man over the animals. (This mindset works in reverse as well. It is instructive that in the campaigns against whaling, the pagans of our day will attribute human emotions and rationality and personality to whales as a reason these animals ought not to be killed.)
The Bible teaches something very different. God created the material world out of nothing. He created the immaterial world (for example, the dimensions of time and space) out of nothing. Both the material and the immaterial world are good--excellent, wonderful. The material world is not, therefore, intrinsically evil, lacking, or wicked.
Plato, in his dialogues, expresses the contrary view--a view which has always been part of the Athenian Mind--and which, regrettably, has insinuated itself into and dogged the Church to this day. It is the classic "Chain of Being" view, where Man, to achieve salvation, must shuffle off the mortal coil and move up the chain of being to divinisation. To the Athenian Mind, the physical world will tend to be couched as one of two extremes: either the material world is all that there is (in which case we should "eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die") or beyond the material world there is a higher spiritual or immaterial world (in which case we should do out utmost to escape the world and get to the higher realms.) For the Greek, the body should either be subject to relentless debauched behaviour, or one should deny it with ascetic abstemiousness. Both extremes and all points in between proceed on the view that the physical world and matter are unimportant and inferior.
For Plato, clearly the latter view was to be emphasized. This is illustrated in the Phaedo Dialogue, where Socrates is contemplating his own death. We pick up the dialogue as follows--as Socrates asks his friends whether there is such a thing as death.
"To be sure," replied Simmias.
"Is it not a separation of soul and body? And to be dead is the completion of this; when the soul exists in herself, and is released from the body and the body is released from the soul, what is this but death?"
"Just so," he replied.
"There is another question, which will probably throw light on our present inquiry if you and I can agree about it: Ought the philosopher to care about the pleasures--if they are to be called pleasures--of eating and drinking?"
"Certainly not," answered Simmias.
"And what about the pleasures of [carnal] love--should he care for them?"
"By no means."
"And he will think much of the other ways of indulging the body--for example, the acquisition of costly raiment, or sandals, or other adornments of the body? Instead of caring about them, does he not rather despise anything more than nature needs? What do you say?"
"I should say that the philosopher would despise them."
"Would you not say that he is entirely concerned with the soul and not with the body? He would like, as far as he can, to get away from the body and turn to the soul."
"Quite true."
"In matters of this sort philosophers, above all other men, may be observed in every sort of way to dissever the soul from the communion of the body."
"Very true." . . . .
"Then when does the soul attain truth?--for in attempting to consider anything in company with the body, she is obviously deceived."
"True."
"Then must not true existence be revealed to her in thought, if at all?"
"Yes."
"And thought is best when the mind is gathered into herself and none of these things trouble her--neither sounds nor sights nor pain nor any pleasure--when she takes leave of the body, and has as little as possible to do with it, when she has no bodily sense or desire, but is aspiring after true being?"
"Certainly."
"And in this the philosopher dishonors the body; his soul runs away from his body and desires to be alone and by herself?"
"That is true."
"Well, but there is one other thing, Simmias: is there or is there not an absolute justice?"
"Assuredly there is."
"And an absolute beauty and absolute good?"
"Of course."
"But did you ever behold any of them with your eyes?"
"Certainly not."
"Or did you ever reach them with any other bodily sense?--and I speak not of these alone, but of absolute greatness, and health, and strength, and of the essence or true nature of everything. Has the reality of them ever been perceived by you through the bodily organs? or rather, is not the nearest approach to the knowledge of their several natures made by him who so orders his intellectual vision as to have the most exact conception of the essence of each thing which he considers?"
"Certainly."
"And he attains to the purest knowledge of them who goes to each with the mind alone, not introducing or intruding into the act of thought sight or any other sense together with reason, but with the very light of the mind in her own clearness searches into the very truth of each; he who has got rid of, as far as he can, of eyes and ears and, so to speak, of the whole body, these being in his opinion distracting elements which when they infect the soul hinder her from acquiring truth and knowledge--who, if not he, is likely to attain to the knowledge of true being?" (Plato, Five Great Dialogues, translated by B. Jowett, [Roslyn, NY: Walter J. Black, 1942]. Phaedo: pp. 93--95. Emphasis, mine.)
Clearly, according to Plato a higher stage of being is achieved when the soul is severed from the body, and can contemplate the purest abstract knowledge without the distortions and distractions of the senses, and of the physical realm. Clearly, man will only learn and know truly after he dies and the soul is liberated from the body, the material realm. Unfortunately, there are many professing Christians who would add their "amen" to these ideas. But such concepts are not biblical--they reflect the Athenian mind of unbelief, not the world-view revealed in the Scriptures.
The Material World is Holy, Just and Good
Contrast this Athenian world-view with Genesis. The Creation revelation comprehensively rejects the idea that the material world of flesh, senses, and bodily appetites is a sub-standard deviation, from which we must be liberated if we are to find the truth, or be saved. The world of body, parts and passions, the material world as created by God, before sin entered the world, was utterly and totally good. As the Catechism has it: "the work of creation is God's making all things of nothing, by the Word of His power, in the space of six days--and all very good."
Yet all too often the Christian slips back into Unbelieving thought frames. He divides his existence up between the "spiritual" and the "worldly", the sacred and the secular, the soul and the body. The worldly, the secular, and the body are seen as intrinsically inferior and as warring against the spiritual and the truth and what is considered godly. Such dichotomies are drawn from the wells of Athens, not Jerusalem. The first two chapters of Genesis completely shut the door on any such notions having biblical traction. Consequently, biblical terms such as "spiritual" or "worldly" need to be carefully delineated in the light of Genesis 1 & 2, not eviscerated of the biblical context, then subsequently filled with Athenian paganism.
In the Christian world view, salvation and redemption are not an escape from nature, but a restoration of nature as it was intended to be and become (the dynamic of development being intrinsic to the creation.) Grace restores nature; it does not obliterate it. Can you imagine a stronger contrast between Jerusalem and Athens. Socrates argues that salvation is escaping from the material world and the senses; the Bible reveals that salvation instead restores the material world and the senses, making them more potent and glorious.
How do we know this to be the case? There are many biblical evidences, but the strongest and most compelling are the incarnation and resurrection of our Lord. Our Lord is the second Adam, the Head of the new human race. He is the first-born of His people--and as the first-born He is the resurrected One, in human nature, in human flesh, in the material realm. Hence, in post-resurrection appearances, He insisted that His disciples understand the He was bodily raised. He ate with them. He insisted that they touch Him to grasp just how material and corporeal He is.
Consequently, we will all be raised bodily, which in turn will lead to the redemption and restoration of the entire created world to the unfolded state it would have achieved, had Adam never fallen. "For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will also be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body." (Romans 8:19--23). We are not going to be set free from creation: it is ironically the exact reverse. Creation itself is going to be set free from from us--that is, the futility of our sins; as the new mankind comes forth following the resurrected Son of Man, the firstborn from the dead, so the entire creation is born again into the glory it had before the fall of Adam and mankind into sin.
But this idea was utterly foreign to the Greek mind. It undermined the entirety of their Unbelieving world view. Just how foreign can be discerned when Paul preached on Mars Hill. Paul was listened to carefully as he proclaimed to them the One true Living God. He challenged them with the forthcoming judgement: "He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness." The Judge will be a Man--but not just any man--the Man, the Son of Man, Who has been appointed by God as judge of the whole earth. The proof of this investiture as Judge over all men is that God has raised Him from the dead. (Acts 17:31).
But it was precisely at the point at which they heard of the resurrection of the dead that the crowd began to sneer and ridicule the apostle. To the Unbelieving Mind, the body was so earthy, so evil, so finite, so limited, so brutish, and so slavish that instead of Jesus resurrection from the dead being a proof of divine investiture as Judge of all, it was a compelling proof that He was utterly incapable of being in any way a judge of men. To the Greek, if there was to be a judge at all it would have to be one who had escaped mortal life and had come to understand the essence and true nature (that is, the non-material nature) of everything--or, at least most things.
To this day, the Resurrection of our Lord is a stumbling block to the Athenian Mind. It is offensive. The sheer corporeality of our Lord offends the Unbeliever. It disqualifies Him from serious consideration. "It makes Him like us," they opine. "Therefore, He cannot be our Judge." The exact reverse is the case. It is precisely because He is exactly like us that He is qualified to be our Judge. He is appointed as the only qualified Judge of all mankind--the alone qualified One who will judge all sin committed whether in body or heart. For He became like as we are--born after the likeness of sinful flesh--yet without sin--the public declaration of which was His resurrection from the dead.
Examples of Platonism Falsely Insinuated into Jerusalem
When a person ceases to be an Unbeliever and repents, turns, and believes in the Lord he is made a new creature. All things in Christ have become new. The old has passed away. (IICor 5:17). However, parts of the old man remain, and need to be gradually removed through a process of Christian growth and sanctification.
Consequently the patterns of thought that properly belong to Athens are likely to be carried over into the Christian faith, unless there is a deliberate attempt to weed them out. Many Christians continue to "read" the world wearing the spectacles of Unbelief. This is why developing a Christian Mind is so important. It is part of putting off the old man and putting on the new. In developing a Christian mind we are self-consciously exposing ourselves to the correction of the Bible, subjecting our patterns of thought, our ideas, our paradigms and our pre-conceptions to the Word of God. As we do this, we are making every thought captive to Christ (IICor.10:5).
Very early on in the history of the Church of the New Covenant, under the pervasive influence of the Athenian mind in the ancient world, Greek concepts about gods and about man were insinuated into the Church, and the Bible was read through the spectacles of Unbelief. The idea was to mix the best from the pagan world with the "higher light" of Christianity. It was suggested that the Greek mind, represented by Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, plus some lesser lights, represented the apotheosis of enlightened thought, that was "not far from the Kingdom of God." Therefore, all that was needed was to add a bit of Christian truth on top of the Greek foundation, like icing on a cake, and all would be well. Thus, the Gospel and Jerusalem itself came to be understood as propounding enlightened paganism, plus.
But we have argued that just as oil and water do not mix, so there can be no agreement between Jerusalem and Athens. There are no foundations in Athens upon which Jerusalem can build. From the very beginning Jerusalem believes in and confesses the infinite and eternal God Who made all things of nothing, such that all that exists apart from Him, is under His sovereign sway and rule. There is no potentiality or actuality outside of His sovereign conditioning command. But Athens denies that such a God can exist. From the very emergence, from the very beginning of Athens upon the earth, the gods were conditioned and constrained by being and actuality and potentiality that lay beyond them--by "things" they did not control. The gods of unbelief are suspiciously like us--the creature--albeit in a "suped-up" version.
For the mind of Unbelief, salvation becomes a matter of becoming more like the gods--which involves a metaphysical change within man and his world--to become less material and more spiritual. We saw this in Socrates. For him, true enlightenment and salvation came when he died, shuffled off the mortal frame of sensory distraction, and contemplated being itself. Once he want through this metaphysical transformation he achieved a higher state of being, having been freed from the limitations of the material world.
These pagan notions were allowed to fester in the body of the Church. Salvation and spirituality increasingly came to be seen as a matter of escaping the mundane and the ordinary and their attendant distractions. Thus, the emergence of monasteries (an escape from worldly affairs to live a life of "pure" service to God); of vows of celibacy (removal from the worldly cares of family and the implicit sinfulness of sexual relations); of vows of poverty (escaping from the cares and responsibilities of possessions to enable pure service to God); and of false miracles, revelations, relics, sacraments (to ensure that one was really being confronted with God).
To this day, words such as "spirit" and "spiritual" retain a strong Greek pagan gloss in the way they are used and are understood amongst many Christians. "Spiritual" is what is opposed to worldly things--and worldly in this context means material possessions, cultural activities, careers, education, the material world. In other words, spirituality means undergoing a metaphysical change to where my being is modified. The impact of the material and the physical attenuates and I am more and more cast up into the immaterial, invisible realms. Many Christians read the Bible with this set of pagan spectacles.
However, in the Bible "spirit" and "spiritual" means that which is filled with, and controlled by, the Spirit of the Living God. A spiritual body is not an immaterial body--but a body, flesh and bone, completely under the control of the Spirit of God, to do His will. The opposite of spiritual is to be involved in works of evil (characterised as works of the flesh--or sinful human nature--see Galatians 5:16--24). We have seen in the beginning that God created all things of nothing by the Word of His power and all very good. In this frame, to be spiritual is to be in accord with the creating work of the Spirit of God--as revealed in Genesis. Thus, to be spiritual is to be intensely material and physical, amongst other things. (That is why, incidentally, when the Lord provided skilled craftsmen to build the tabernacle, the Bible characterises them as men filled with the Spirit. Exodus 35:30ff. Their being controlled by the Spirit meant that they were intensely skilled in craftsmanship--which, last time I checked, was a very material and physical activity.)
The way, the very processes, by which God made the world reveal to us the original spirituality and holiness of the creation, both of its material and immaterial aspects. As the Spirit of God falls upon us, we will lay aside the false spirituality of paganism, and will become again a people that are world and creation affirming, as we seek to bring every human thought and action captivity to Christ.
Powered by ScribeFire.
No comments:
Post a Comment