Series: THE STORY GOD IS TELLING
Title: “From Whence to Where?”
Introduction:
A. It has been said that “everyone loves a good story.”
1. The enduring qualities of Aesop’s Fables and Grimms’ Fairy Tales are all the proof we need.
2. Who doesn’t remember Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel, Sleeping Beauty and Snow White?
3. And what of this famous fable?
Once when a Lion was asleep a little Mouse began running up and down upon him; this soon wakened the Lion, who placed his huge paw upon him, and opened his big jaws to swallow him.
"Pardon, O King," cried the little Mouse: "forgive me this time, I shall never forget it: who knows but what I may be able to do you a turn some of these days?" The Lion was so tickled at the idea of the mouse being able to help him, that he lifted up his paw and let him go.
Some time after the Lion was caught in a trap, and the hunters who desired to carry him alive to the King, tied him to a tree while they went in search of a wagon to carry him on. Just then the little Mouse happened to pass by, and seeing the sad plight the Lion was in, went up to him and soon gnawed away the ropes that bound the King of the Beasts. "Was I not right?" said the little Mouse.
B. It is their inherent truth that makes such stories endure.
1. This morning I want us to begin a story. How long it shall last I have no idea.
2. You see, this story is nothing less than the story God is telling us in this book. And in that sense it never ends.
3. But for the next several Sundays … and perhaps months … we’re going to look at the highlights of this story.
4. We’re going to begin with a survey …
Central Idea: “The Story God is Telling” has but three chapters. Each chapter answers one of the following questions: [1] Where did we come from? [2] Where are we going? and [3] How are we going to get there?
I. Where Did We Come From? The answer is found in Genesis 1-2.
A. We came from Eden.
1. Genesis 2:8—The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man He had formed.
2. Eden means “delight.” And what a delightful place it must have been. From Milton’s Paradise Lost I read
Inside, all around grew trees of noblest kind for sight, smell, or taste--trees laden with fairest fruit and blossoms of bright rainbow colors on which the glad Sun mixed his golden hue. Amid them all, the Tree of Life, the middle tree and highest that grew there, bloomed ambrosial fruit of living gold; and next to life, our death, the Tree of Knowledge, grew.
Southward through Eden flowed a large river upon which sat the garden Paradise. Its course was not deflected by the mountain, but engulfed and swallowed underneath. Through veins of porous earth, its water was drawn up with natural thirst to a fresh fountain spring at the highest part, and with many a bubbly brook and stream the whole garden was fed. The waters meandered and rippled over pearly rocks and sands of gold under hanging branches, to visit each plant and flower of Paradise, both where the morning Sun first warmed the open field and where unpierced shade enveloped the bowers even at noontide. Between rich delicious groves were interposed level grassy expanses, where flocks grazed the tender herb. Here sat a palmy hillock; there the lap of some watered valley, spreading her store of flowers in every hue. These grew not in fastidious, carefully planted beds, but poured forth in nature’s profuse bounty. On another side, shady grottoes of cool recess were cloaked with gently creeping vines luxuriant with purple grape and rose without thorn. Murmuring waters cascaded down the hills’ diverging slopes, or united their streams in a lake that held her crystal mirror to the leafy fringed bank. Birds added their choir to harmonize with leaves dancing in the breeze in celebration of the Assyrian garden’s eternal season of spring.
Among all the living creatures, walked two of far nobler shape, erect and tall, godlike in … majesty, the seeming worthy lords of all. In their looks the divine image of their glorious Maker shone, though differently in each.
3. Modern scholarship, of course, suggests Africa as the cradle of humanity. Since we know that continents drift … and Eden is pre-Noah … the earth must have looked different that it does today … so I have no problem with this conclusion.
4. Geography doesn’t deny the reality … We came from Eden.
B. We came from the earth.
1. Genesis 2:7—And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground.
2. The name Adam means from the red earth.
3. This probably means the first man was made from red clay … perhaps our Native Americans are genetically closer to Adam that we who are yellow, black or white.
4. Science does confirm our earthy origin. The elements that compose the human body are the same as those you find in common garden soil … oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, calcium, phosphorus, potassium, sulfur, salt [sodium], chlorine, magnesium … and more than a dozen trace elements.
5. There is no doubt about it … We came from the earth.
C. We came from God.
1. Genesis 1:26, 27 and 2:7—Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness; let them have dominion over … all the earth … So God created man in His own image, in the image of God he created him; … And [God] breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being.
2. This is where many evolutionary scientists struggle to breathe.
3. They refuse to even consider the ultimate question of origin … and reject every scientific challenge to their “God cannot exist” or “God chose to use evolution” mindset.
A teaching colleague of mine … a man I greatly respect as a person and a teacher … is blind when it comes to evolution and intelligent design. “Intelligent Design isn’t science,” he tells me … but he never tells me why. He has learned to think “evolution,” and refuses to even look at other explanations.
4. But is it evidence of intelligence when we refuse to examine questions that challenge their beliefs? … And that is as true for Christians as it is for atheists, evolutionists, and Intelligent Designers.
5. If Intelligent Design isn’t science then prove it with science, not scorn.
6. Ultimately something or someone must be eternal … either matter or spirit. That which is eternal is the first cause of everything else … and is by that very fact GOD.
7. The message of the Bible … The Story God is Telling … is that matter has a Maker. We have a Creator who loves his creation … you, me, the whole world.
Transition: We may be “dirt,” and we may have lost our paradise … but we still belong to this loving God who made us. Now for our second question …
II. Where Are We Going? The answer is found in Revelation 21-22.
A. We are going to a new world.
1. Revelation 21:1—Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. Also there was no more sea.
2. It is unquestionably true that in the story God is telling the world as we know it comes to a screeching halt. Even an unbelieving world expects this.
a. They remind us of the Mayan calendar that ends on December 21, 2012. On that date the winter solstice aligns with the equator of the Milky Way … possibly leading to a stellar tear that rips apart the whole fabric of the universe.
b. And there are the 108 potentially hazardous objects astronomers are tracking. In 2028 Asteroid 1997XF11 will come between 24,000 and 600,000 miles of Earth.
c. The next year the asteroid Apophis is predicted to slip through a keyhole—altering the asteroid’s trajectory enough to put it on a bee-line lane for banging into us in 2036. NASA gives it a 1 in 5 chance.
3. Now it isn’t my intent to scare you … In spite of the above, None of the asteroids or comets discovered so far is on a collision course with Earth. However, we can’t speak for those yet to be discovered.
4. But we can speak the story God is telling. Listen to Matthew 24:29. Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heaven will be shaken.
5. Now Matthew 24 may be purely apocalyptic poetry describing an evernt long past [i.e., the destruction of Jerusalem by the Roman general Titus in A.D. 70.]
6. But that can hardly be said of 2nd Peter 3:10-12. He is clearly talking about time’s end.
But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up. … the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat. Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.
7. Yes … we are going to a new world. Once there …
B. We are going to a new city.
1. Revelation 21:2—Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God …
2. Now there is no better description of this new city than the one found in the story God is telling.
a. It’s going to be massive … 12,000 furlongs cubed … 1400 miles long, 1400 miles wide, 1400 miles high.
b. It’s going to be strong … 12 foundations … and it’s going to be safe … with walls almost 200 feet thick.
c. It’s going to be beautiful … walls of jasper, the city itself made of pure gold. There will be all kinds of precious stones adorning the foundation … and each of the 12 gates will be a pearl.
d. It’s going to be pure … there shall by no means enter it anything that defiles … only those who are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.
3. Best of all … it’s going to be home … our home and God’s home. Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God.
4. We are going to a new city. And …
C. We are going to a new Eden.
1. There is a garden in the midst of this New Jerusalem.
2. Revelation 22:1, 2—And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the middle of its street, and on either side, was the tree of life, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
3. This is the other end of the road of which earth’s Eden was but the beginning.
4. All that was lost has been found and improved upon. No more curse … but the throne of God. No nights … no lamps … no sun … for the Lord God will give us light.
Transition: From this wonderful story God is telling we know where we are going … to a new heaven and earth … with the New Jerusalem as its capital … and the new Eden at its heart. Now for our third question …
III. How Are We Going to Get There? The answer is found in the nearly 1200 chapters that lie between Genesis and Revelation [1251 by my calculation].
A. Some try to get there by being righteous. It doesn’t work!
1. It didn’t work in the OT.
a. There we read of Noah. The Bible calls him a just man, perfect in his generation [Genesis 6:9]. Noah was the best his world had to offer, but he still needed grace in the eyes of the Lord [6:8].
b. Then there was Job. He was a blameless and upright man who feared God and shunned evil [Job 1:1]. Like Noah, he also offered sacrifices to the Lord … and in the last chapter of his epic struggle he says, “I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes [42:6].
2. It didn’t work in the NT, either.
a. The classic example here is the rich, young ruler of Matthew 19. In his own eyes he had kept the law without flaw. “All these things I have kept from my youth.”
b. But he still knew something was wrong … and when he learned what it was, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.
c. He loved his money more than his Maker … and it kept him out of Eden.
3. Why? Because we can never merit salvation through personal holiness.
a. Our Righteousness is like a filthy rag before a holy God.
b. One of the early church fathers has said it better than I. Even our tears of repentance must be washed in the blood of Jesus.”
4. Sin is the problem. This universal pandemic infects us upon exposure. We are born without it … but we are born into it … hence there is none righteous, no, not one … all have turned aside [Romans 3:10ff].
5. This sin has so blinded us that Solomon could write, “There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death” [Proverbs 14:12].
6. We can’t get to Heaven by being righteous … because we’re not!
B. Some try to get there by being religious. This doesn’t work, either!
1. Many have tried this approach.
a. In the OT we have David. Think about all the worship music he composed. Remember also his sins: adultery, murder … He was a kingly success, but he was also a fatherly failure.
b. In the NT Church we have Ananias and Sapphira who got together to conspire … they saw the honor given Barnabas when he gave his land to the Lord. They wanted the same praise … and some of the profit … so they came up with a plot to cheat the Lord and get ahead. They were exposed … and it cost them their lives!
2. On May 24, 1738 John Wesley wrote in his journal a detailed account of his spiritual pilgrimage.
As a young boy in the family of a clergyman he had been "carefully taught" that salvation could only be obtained by "keeping all the commandments of God." Over the years at school and university, he wrote, "’I now hoped to be saved, by, (1) Not being so bad as other people, (2) Having a kind of religion, and (3) Reading the Bible, going to church, and saying my prayers.’ I doubted not but I was a good Christian."
He was eventually ordained as a minister and lived very strictly. As he put it, "I omitted no sort of self-denial." But this brought him no peace with God. He went as a chaplain to the American Colonies and came under the influence of Moravian Christians. On his return to England he realized that what he was lacking was "faith in and through Christ." He wrote in his Journal that he resolved to renounce all dependence upon his "own works or righteousness" and instead turn to a "saving faith, a full reliance on the blood of Christ shed for me."
2. Wesley realized that religion is no better than righteousness. Neither work because both are works!
C. The only way to get there is by being redeemed. That’s a work of grace, God’s!
1. In this story God is telling both the Redeemer and the price of redemption are revealed.
2. Jesus is the only Redeemer! God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son … God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself [no longer holding our sins against us] … There is no salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved [John 3:16, 2nd Corinthians 5:19, Acts 4:12].
3. According to the law without shedding of blood there is no remission.
So Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many … He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself [Hebrews 9:22, 28, and 26].
Conclusion:
A. What a wonderful story God is telling …
1. Now we know where we came from … Eden, the earth, God.
2. Now we know where we’re going … to a new world, with a new city, and a new Eden. And …
3. Now we know how we’re going to get there … not by being righteous or even religious … we’re going to get there by being redeemed with the blood of the Lamb.
B. Last month [December 2005] C.S. Lewis classic The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe was brought to the big screen. In a climatic scene, the great lion, Aslan, offers himself to die for the traitorous Edmund. And so he is slain.
But to the surprise of Susan and Lucy, who have found his lifeless body, his life returns and he is raised from the dead.
What the movie fails to make clear the book does …
As Aslan explained it to Susan and Lucy; the Witch knew of the Deep Magic from the Dawn of Time. But she was not aware of the Deeper Magic from Before the Dawn of Time.
According to a decree from before the Witch’s time, “When a willing victim who had committed no treachery is killed in a traitor’s stead, the Table will crack and Death itself will start working backwards.”
C. That’s the sum and substance of The Story God is Telling.
Jesus went willingly to Calvary’s Cross … he who knew no sin became sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him [2nd Corinthians 5:21].
