Promises So Certain
I hope that you reach the end of your life and can say with Joshua, “I am about to go the way of all the earth, and you know in your hearts and souls, all of you, that not one word has failed of all the good things that the LORD your God promised concerning you. All have come to pass for you; not one of them has failed” (Josh 23:14).
Now Joshua was old and advanced in years, and the LORD said to him, “You are old and advanced in years, and there remains yet very much land to possess… Now therefore divide this land for an inheritance to the nine tribes and half the tribe of Manasseh”
Joshua 13:1, 7
Can you imagine promises so certain? The Israelites had wandered in the wilderness for 40 years because of their unbelief. God had promised them a land, and they refused to believe Him. Fast-forward and Joshua has brought them in and they have begun the conquest of Canaan. They had defeated king after king, but there was still work to be done. Joshua is too old to continue with the Israelites, so what is he to do? “…divide this land for an inheritance…”
Can you imagine promises so certain? Divide up the land. What land? The land you haven’t conquered yet, but the land that was promised.
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The Hollow Core of Human Flourishing
The preacher says, “All is vanity” (Ecclesiastes 1:2). All created things, and all human endeavours related to them, are insufficient for yielding any true contentment. “All is nothing,” it could be translated, or “empty of any virtue as to the effect of making us happy.” This includes created delights such as riches, honours, and worldly pleasures, particularly as they are abused, and “subjected to vanity” (Rom. 8:20), by people seeking their chief good from them. Also “vanity” are all the efforts we make by human power or skill to make ourselves happy, or contented, whether in the contemplation or the enjoyment of created things. These are vain because they are unable to afford any thing but disappointment, and disappointment in the highest degree, “vanity of vanities.”
Spiritual Beings Need Spiritual Fulfilment
There are earthly and tangible delights which are in themselves good, and in their right use lawful, and subservient to us for attaining true happiness. Yet even these prove altogether unprofitable, and unsatisfying to us, if we seek to enjoy them as our chief good. They are so disproportionate, so inadequate, to the human soul. The nature of the soul is spiritual, and the soul is capable of enjoying an infinite good – God reconciled to through Christ as our portion. This is why our souls can never be satisfied with these fading and transitory things. All temporary delights, mainly because they are fading, and unable to satisfy the immortal soul, are here pronounced to be vanity of vanities.
The “Just a Bit More” Fallacy
Solomon continues, “The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear with hearing” (Ecclesiastes 1:8). While people are pursuing earthly contentments as their chief good, they foolishly imagine that if they just had a bit more of them, they would then be satisfied. Yet, pursuing earthly things as our best portion always ends in dissatisfaction, not only in the pursuit but also when they are attained, as if by drinking you only become more thirsty. All the toil and wearisome labour that people have in pursuing these lying vanities, and all the dissatisfaction and even disgust they feel in consuming them, never in the slightest diverts them from spending themselves yet further in the pursuit! They still keep gazing at these unsatisfying sights, and still listen greedily to the voice of temptations and corruption, expecting to find happiness in these things. Even when their efforts are unspeakable weariness, yet still they labour in the same way.
The “Now We Know Better” Fallacy
In fact, people persist in this, so entranced with the apparent sweetness of earthly things, as if nothing like it had ever been tasted by anyone who ever lived before.
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The Great Commission in the Old Testament
Once we understand the Great Commission as a function of kingship, we are in a better place to assess this agenda throughout the rest of the Old Testament. God’s reign is universal, and from the beginning, His plan of salvation aimed at all the families of the earth, never overlooking the fact that He “shall inherit all the nations” (Psalm 82:8).
Properly conceived as grounded in God’s own kingship, the Great Commission begins before humanity’s fall away from communion with God. On the sixth day, man was commissioned by God to fill and subdue the earth, and to rule over the creatures (Genesis 1:28). Accordingly, one might justly define the Great Commission as “ruling and subduing” the earth and its creatures—an understanding we will need to unpack.
To be sure, the phrase “ruling and subduing” has deeply negative connotations in our modern world, filled as it is with memories of horrific tyranny and the abuse of power. Nevertheless, we should note that this commission was given before the descent into sin and misery, precisely within the context of man in union with God—that is, given to man as bearer of the image of God (v. 26), created both to fellowship with God and to mediate the blessed reign of God over all the earth.
The theology here is twofold. First, Adam is to gather up all creation into the seventh-day praise and adoration of God—that is what it means to “rule and subdue.” He is charged to set apart (“sanctify”) creation increasingly until the whole earth is holy, filled with the abiding glory of God.
Second, there is no blessing to be enjoyed, be it ever so marginal, that does not derive from the reign of God—that is the joy of what it means to “be subdued,” especially so after the expulsion from life with God. For this reason, we gladly teach our children that Christ executes the office of a king “in subduing us to himself” (WSC Q&A 26).
The Great Commission bestowed upon Adam entailed that his kingship would be in the service of his priestly office, namely, that he would “rule and subdue” for the sake of gathering all creation to the Creator’s footstool in worship. The Sabbath consummation was the heart and goal of the sixth day’s commission.
Once we understand the Great Commission as a function of kingship, we are in a better place to assess this agenda throughout the rest of the Old Testament. God’s reign is universal, and from the beginning, His plan of salvation aimed at all the families of the earth, never overlooking the fact that He “shall inherit all the nations” (Psalm 82:8).
Here, the role of Genesis 1–11 as a prologue to Israel’s narrative cannot be overemphasized, for Israel’s own identity and sacred calling springs from this universal context and is ever determined by it. After the nations are scattered into exile from the tower of Babel, God calls Abram in Genesis 12, promising that through him “all the families of the earth will be blessed” (Genesis 12:3). This promise is later reiterated to Abraham: “In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice” (Genesis 22:18; see 18:18). It is then vouchsafed to Isaac (Genesis 26:4), and then onward to Jacob as the father of the twelve tribes of Israel (Genesis 28:14).
Coupled with this promise is the undercurrent of kingship. Abram had been promised that “kings will come from you” (Genesis 17:6), and a genealogy is followed that will blossom forth into the line of David. Eventually, through Israel, a king would arise to gather the nations back into the presence of God.
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Researching the Rationales of PCAGA49’s Proposed BCO Amendments
We submit this resource with two important caveats. First, many of these proposals from the Presbyteries were amended — and a few almost entirely rewritten — in the Overtures Committee. While the “whereas” statements in the initial forms may help presbyters to remember the original reasons for the amendments, they do not speak to the final form of the amendments, which is the only form that counts at this juncture. Second, these overtures obviously do not provide the strongest arguments against any of the proposals.
The list of Book of Church Order (BCO) amendments handed down to the Presbyteries from the 49th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) is daunting. For a basic refresher on the amendments before us, including a breakdown of the votes that they received in Overtures and from the General Assembly, see TE Scott Edburg’s excellent article, Proposed Constitutional Amendments before the PCA in 2022.
The length of the list of amendments this year, however, may pose unique challenges to keep all of the goals, purposes, and reasoning for these amendments in mind. Most in the PCA probably understand the rationales behind the more public and controversial proposals, such as Items 1, 4, 5, and 7, even though some may disagree with those rationales. On the other hand, fewer will remember the technical reasoning behind some of the more procedurally focused proposed amendments, such as Items 2, 3, 6, 8, 9–12.
Often, the reasons for these amendments are listed in the Whereas clauses or the rationales written in the original overtures. That reasoning, however, gets stripped out after adoption by the General Assembly, and the Presbyteries receive only the amendment language itself. To help recall some of the original arguments in support of these amendments, here is a list of links to the original overtures as submitted by their respective Presbyteries.
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