lesson 33a

We're on lesson 33. Anybody know a famous football player that had a number 33? Come on. I don't know. Random. Dammit, Smith. I came out on seven. No. Dammit, Smith. Smith? Dammit, Smith. 21 or 22. Oh, maybe he's 22. Oh, he's 21 or 22. A couple of numbers.

Tony Dorsett. Oh, Tony Dorsett. I think, wasn't Terrell a home run? Terrell was one, too, I think. T.O. was 81. I don't know, Broncos. Well, Terrell Davis was 30. Terrell Davis. That's awesome. Ooh, boy. Well, at least we got a blank circle on the board. Every good class starts with a blank circle. A little bit of football trivia. So lesson 33, we're going to read Romans chapter 8, verses 19 through 21.

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 willingly, but because of him who subjected it in hope. that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. Why in the world does Paul go into this right now?

What did the previous verse say? Verse 18. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. I get that. That's a verse of hope, isn't it? that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.

But all of a sudden, he goes into kind of a poetic form about creation. So question number one, what was the creation designed for? Let's do this. So far, we've got a pretty pretty good map on the board in terms of the spiritual condition of humanity. But all of a sudden, Paul kind of switches gears a little bit and starts not talking about humanity directly, but he starts talking about creation. You mentioned creation was designed to glorify God. be fruitful and multiply all sorts of things, authority over.

Right, okay. So we could say it was an environment for man, right? Was it suitable? Yes. So you're telling me that when, on the end of the sixth day, Everything that man needed for an environment to glorify God was in fact in place. It wasn't lacking. It wasn't any concrete. But it was there. It was there. For God's glory, it was created. And as a suitable environment for man to live in, God took six days to create the estate that would perfectly suit the man He created, with every provision in place. Do you have pizza? When all the ingredients were there. It was on the agenda. So I have a question for you. If man had not fallen, do you think he would have figured out how to make pizza? Yes. You wouldn't eat pizza? You'd be on the mango diet? I do love me some mangoes. Dried mangoes?

I like how Newell put his thoughts around creation. He says, it's the natural ally of our souls. What rises from it is the music of humanity, but with a note of hope, and it's rising triumphantly above all the pain and conflict. So we're looking forward to what happens there. But in the first part, it's the natural ally of our souls. What rises from it is the music of humanity. So it's almost like all the instruments of an orchestra, but man puts it all together.

So I think the creation was designed to glorify God and to be a suitable environment for man. I'll spell it wrong. Completely suitable. Question number two. Because we quickly see that this environment changes. When the curse was put upon it, what happened to the design? It was subjugated to futility. What does futility mean? Exhausted. Exhausted?

Let's look at Genesis 3.17. I'll read it for you.

Then to Adam he said, because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree about which I commanded you, saying, you shall not eat from it, cursed is the ground because of you. In toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall grow for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you will eat bread till you return to the ground, because from it you were taken. For you are dust, and to dust you shall return. So what happened to the ground?

We were driving here today and saw a new house that had been built on the corner. And this backyard, the gray of this backyard was so steep, it was in the corner. It was just, all I had was rocks back there. You couldn't mow it, so they just filled it in with rocks.

And I said, you know, there's gotta be weeds that grow on there. Somebody's gonna have to get back there and scree slip all the way down. Try to get these thorns and thistles out of it. You can put rocks everywhere, but you can't block those thistles. Roundabout.

You still gotta put it on there, right? All the days of your life. Curse is the ground because of you, and toil you will eat of it. So, when the curse was put on it, what happened to the design? You're right. Futility. Let's read verse 19 again. It's really 19 here, or sorry, 20 really.

For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility. Did it raise its hand and say, yep, I'm up for that? So what part of creation was subjected to futility? Was it just the ground?

All of it. Everything. I'm going to use some big words. Animate. Right? Mat. Animate. Does that look right? The park station, it moves. And, inanimate. The park, it doesn't move. The rocks. All the stuff. It says that it's longing, anxiously longing. What does that sound like? Yeah. You know, when God created earth and all that he did in six days, he created it to not only his glory, but it also was to benefit man. The creation worked towards enhancing Adam and what God had given him to do.

When he sinned, it stopped doing that, and as a matter of fact, now it was against him. Nothing would work just to help him. It all went against him. It's interesting that man's purpose in caring for the creation required the creation. He could not have purpose without it, according to God, right? Well, and he couldn't, that was one of the godly characters that he got. He got dominion over, which would, God being God, that's what he has, but under God and subject to God, he has dominion over the creation. Yep.

And then when he sinned, that, what happened to creation? Like we said, futility, but now he would fight against it. So rather than it working with him, as it was designed to do, and working for him, now it works against us. It works against fallen man. Do you understand what I'm saying? The thorns and the thistles, the challenges that man faces in creation are a direct result of what? That curse, right?

The book of Ecclesiastes, and Mike pointed this out, I'm just reading some of the notes here. The book of Ecclesiastes dwells long with a mournful tone upon this vanity, this unattainment of things, putting forth the tender leaves of hope only to have the sudden frost of disease and death and earthly hopes. Our days on the earth are a shadow and there is no abiding, as David said in his great prayer in 1 Chronicles.

Did you get hailing yesterday? No, but I had plenty of it. We stood there in the window and watched all of these plants get decimated. You know, it's a really interesting thing to talk about the environment working against you. We've had roofers in our neighborhood for hella, almost a year. Because of man's sin, man's environment would not fit him any longer. Therefore, the results of the design were now flawed. Man must leave his first estate and live in one that suited his sinfulness. It's interesting. Everything changed.

Have you guys seen planet Earth? So sometimes when I'm studying and preparing, I'll put on, it's called instrumental study playlists. And it's just instruments and it's very calming and it just kind of blocks the noise of three kids running around upstairs. So I was sitting here thinking about creation, and this music was having me recall watching planet Earth and sea creatures under the, just the calming music that's usually accompanied by these huge, epic visions of creation, and 360-foot degree views of these coral reefs, and I don't know, all the different things, and I was thinking, And then they bring on this, what is he, like a British or Australian accent? Oh, the wonderful creation, however he does it, I don't know. Somebody give me an Australian accent. I was a Texas Australian. I have a joke about my British accent. It goes from, I need words to trigger, but it goes from British to Australian to pirate.

And by the end of it, I'm just like, argh, it's a beautiful creature. Have you ever seen Planetary? Do you know what I'm talking about? It's a documentary of just creation, really. And there's a British guy that always hosts it. And the thing is, is it's always, what's the perspective? Always. Evolution.

If you could give a documentary about creation based on these verses, for the anxious longing of creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. What is creation doing out there? Is it singing to beautiful instruments? It's moaning and groaning. It's beautiful, but it's not suitable in the same way anymore. And Paul says, it's anxiously longing.

What is anxious? Do you ever get anxious about anything? Oh, I just got to get out of this situation. You ever talking to somebody you really don't want to be in a conversation with? Aidan, you're shaking your head. Tell us. Tell us more about that. Yeah, sometimes you just get in a conversation and you're just like, man, I wish I could get out of this. What more can I do to not make this awkward anymore?

You get anxious. You start getting jittery and your feet start moving around. That's how the creation is behaving right now. It's anxiously longing. And what is it longing for? So man's environment has been cursed, has been changed. The attitude, if you were to give it one, is an anxiousness and a longing. And it's looking for something. So just as we need creation, what does creation need? Us. It needs us. This is a symbiotic relationship here, right? It's a relationship. Question three.

What are the elements of creation? Does it include heavenly beings? Creature is the non-rational creation, viewed collectively, animate and inanimate, equivalent to all nature. So we don't see this word being used to define spiritual beings in that way. The expression creation seems to refer to this earth even although the words in verse 22 are the whole creation.

In Colossians 1.23, somebody grab that, Colossians 1.23, Paul speaks of the gospel having been preached in all creation under heaven. Do we preach the gospel to spiritual beings? God announces the result of man's sin, curses the ground for thy sake, thorns and thistles shall it bring forth unto thee. The creation, the old version here reads creature, which is not accurate or clear, the reference is especially to the present world and to the order of life upon it. The whole creation must refer to the earth, for the cherubim, the seraphim, and the holy angels were not subjected to vanity. So they were not subjected to the futility that the natural earth is, right?

They have a different purpose. What is the job of the angelic realm in melon pollen? Occasionally they're messengers. Okay. They're set apart to do what? Glorify God. They are. They're set apart to deliver God's message. They're literally at His service. They're set apart. Do we know a word in Scripture that refers to being set apart? Sanctified? They're set apart, right?

To do God's bidding, ultimately. And that can refer to being a messenger, carrying out certain actions on this earth, We know that they make themselves known to man in certain cases, visibly, but they're not subjected to the futility that the natural earth is. It's interesting.

Colossians 1-23, somebody grab that one? If ye continue in the faith, grounded and settled, be not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven. Where have I, Paul, made a ministry? Under heaven. And I think that's what Paul is talking about here. That the anxious longing of creation waiting eagerly is under heaven. It's the natural earth and all that is inhabited by it.

Do you think that if we ever get off this planet and go to another planet that death will be there? Will Mars be crying out? I don't know, what do you guys think? What do you think, Aidan? If we could pack up with Jeff Bezos' plan to get off this earth and find life out there through SpaceX or whatever other program, get on Mars, would we die still? Would there be death there? Is there death there? If we're there, there is. Whoa, here we are. The question is, is there anything alive on Mars? I don't believe so. I don't think so either. I'd say there is, though. That's because they got to. Oh, sure. Yeah. Does this Earth believe in survival of the fittest? Yes. does the earth, if the rocks were to cry out and say, I just want to survive, I want to be the fittest rock I could be, and I just want to survive, that's my natural inclination. Or if the endangered spotted owl was to tell you what he was thinking, would he say, I just want to survive? What would he say? You just say, who, and eventually die. I think he might say, who are you?

And if you're a son of God, then I'm anxiously awaiting something in regards to you. Paul's telling us what the creation is saying. Now, it's poetic in terms of its form, but it's a reality in the sense that creation is going through the seasons not to survive. I mean, if you put it in biblical terms, what is it doing?

It's in that conversation that we're talking about where we don't want to be. We say, I don't want to be here anymore. This is not the way I was designed to be. This is what makes me anxious. I'm longing for you to be glorified. Because what happens to creation? Huh? You get released. It's released from the futility, right?

So here we got, we talked about the sin nature and that that leads at the point of physical death or rapture. But what we haven't talked about is the result of that. That's where we're headed, right? Are we anxiously longing for that as well? Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes we forget about that. But yeah, we're anxiously waiting to be complete, made in the image of the Lord Jesus himself, glorified, to be present with him. But down here, in creation, we're anxiously And what does verse 19 tell us that creation is longing for?

This thing. So when I draw circles, there's a lot of circles on here. When I draw them, usually they have a purpose. What does this circle represent? If this one is slaves to sin, this one is bond slaves of righteousness, is creation in slavery? slavery to futility. It is. I'm going to wait for some verses that we get to here a little bit before I fill that in. But yes, we'll see that. I'll just say it right now. So what does it say in verse 21? And I'll read 21st.

For the creation was subjected to futility not willingly, but because of him who subjected it in hope, that the creation itself will also be set free from its slavery to corruption, into freedom, into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. So we've got slave to corruption here, right?

Whose fault is that? Whose fault is it? Whose fault is that? No, it's God's fault. Right. He's the one that subjected it. just in the same way that sin was the result of man's disobedience, that sin had an effect on creation as well, right? It became a slave to the corruption of man, right? So, when you think about the ripple effect of that one decision, just in the book of Romans, I mean, You know, it's staggering to see the effects of that one decision on you and on the entire creation of the world. Slaves to corruption. Man, I'm cranking through these questions, Sporty. I've got a new pace. Don't worry, I won't follow it next time. Question number four.

Why was the creation subjected to vanity or idle or resultless or futility, aimlessness? Why? Because man was given dominion over it, so when he fell... His dominion fell. What do you guys think? Isn't that where authority is established? I've been thinking about that, yeah. Because of specific differences or biases, that's revealing ultimately authority, isn't it? I'm not sure I follow completely. I'll have to think about that. So was man given authority?

What was he told to do in the garden prior to the fall? Be good. Tend the garden. Tend the garden. What else was he told to do? Don't eat the fruit. He said do it. What about the animals? Name them. He got to name them. He got to name them. How long was that going to take? A couple days. A couple days? How long would he be exploring God's creation and giving names to it? Phylums and... All of it. I don't know what those would have been. At the time, I'm sure a zebra wasn't a zebra, and a giraffe wasn't a giraffe, but... Get lazy. It's easy. Especially the species. The species. So Adam must have understood Latin.

I believe he had more brain power than we do now. Oh, I shouldn't have eaten that fruit. I sure wouldn't. I mean, he had, it was corrupted in him. Yeah. He had a big brain. You know, one thing is, one thing I was thinking is, like, we try to go to our daughter's house occasionally. And when there are enough semis not laying on their side on I-80, we can get there in the springtime. Then we get to her house, there's dead big llamas and daddies and baby deer in her yard and stuff. I mean, they are suffering. They are suffering. Yeah.

Well, I think what's interesting, How do we feel about environmentalism as believers today? Let's throw that out there, it's not a big deal. Darwin? No, environmentalism. What do we think about Malaysia sending back all our trash? Kissing a tree. You moved on from a hub, huh? I call it that superstar. What do we feel about, how do we think about environmentalism? It's a side note, but it's applicable here.

You were given, originally, as man, the federal head, our federal head was given the job of caring for this earth. I was thinking about that last week as we're doing Genesis on Wednesday nights. And when God created the garden, he put Adam in the garden, and that's what he was to tend to. I think the rest of the earth was created and built to enhance him.

His responsibility was the garden, direct responsibility, because, I mean, the planet's pretty big. How did he know what was going on over here? In Denver? Yeah. So I think the way it was created by God to enhance the man, and it's a perfect environment for him, it functioned pretty much on its own.

But he put him in the garden and gave him a task to take care of it. And that was his main responsibility, was right in there. I don't know how big it was or what it was, but all the creatures were there. Everything was there. outside the garden. What was going on? Well, it was functioning the way God designed it to enhance the man and to enhance the environment.

Does anybody have an idea of what would have happened had he tended that garden? You think he would have got to travel a little bit? Think he would want to travel? Think he would want to travel? He'd fly around. He'd fly around. original and the environmentalist since I deal with extensively.

I think the biggest thing is worshipping the creation. It tends to be some of the focus. The creature worshipping the creation. Now, trying to take care of everything and being that way, but I think a lot of the focus becomes Mother Earth and that the focus is off of how it is, I think.

How long ago did that trait begin in man? Let's go back to Romans 1. Yeah, exactly. At the very beginning, there's that exchange. What does Romans 1, 18 say? Someone read that for us. Exchanged the truth for the lie. And started doing what with it? Exactly. That's what sin does.

It produces in us a desire to worship creation rather than the creator, ourselves, the environment, or a making of our own type of God that is somehow related to creation. They take God out of the creator realm, they place him in the creature realm, and he has creature attributes. Like Thor. Or Zeus.

Those guys had big problems, didn't they? And they had to fight. They had to fight to maintain power. And what do they need to maintain power? You can watch Star Wars, you can watch Transformers, you can watch, I don't know what any of the other new ones are, but you watch the same thing and it's created type beings fighting for some kind force, or power, or cube.

Once they have that in their possession, for as long as they can keep it, they rule the world. Or the heavens, or the galaxy, or whatever you want to do. But the making of divinity in a man's mind is to take creation and amplify it a degree above man. If I can just get to that next level.

Does that make sense? It's always the war between good and evil. Oh, yeah. It always is. The black, the white, the, you know, the... Well, I don't know. What's the... Hayden, what's the good and the bad in Star Wars? I forget what those two... The good, bad and ugly. But there's the dark side and then there's the light side.

I'm not a Star Wars fan at all. But... Nonetheless, the paganism has the same attributes continuously, and it's contained in evolution. What is worshipped in evolution? Better to ask Yoda about it. Ask not. It's the earth. Ultimately, it is the earth, right? Survival of the fittest. What's the driving force behind evolution? If you take it all the way back, what is it that sustains the concept of evolution?

Man. For that. Satan. They don't have a Satan. No God. Okay, no God. Lust. No one will be an authority over me. I think it's the problem that God has a way, he defines exactly how salvation works. People say, I don't want a God, I'm in charge. I think that's a lot of the problem. I think so.

Is there purpose in evolution? We're talking, this is related because we're talking about creation. I'm gonna circle back and we're gonna, we gotta get back to what Paul says about the actual view that we should have of creation. But it's interesting because almost every single one of our challenges, especially in the Western world, are inundated with evolutionary thinking.

So they have taken something in this verse and radically changed it to the point that now, rather than it looking and anxiously waiting for our glorification, they're looking to glorify it, right? They're now worshiping it. Every decision that we need to make is to sustain it. But what's at the back of it? And this is where it gets very interesting to think about the ideology of evolution. What's in the back? I think I heard somebody say it right there.

Chance? Yes. Chance. What's different about that for us? We have facts. That goes back to what I said. There's no God in it. They take it out. If it's chance, it's random. Chance is a God. That's all it can be. I think, is to take God out of it. How do you get God out of creation? You make it random, you make it chance, you make it everything else, but the purpose is to remove God. Does it work?

Well, for some people they believe it, but then you read Romans 1 and everybody knows there's a God. So, they try to So, it's interesting, Romans 1, it talks about, I use the jack-in-the-box illustration, some of you guys that have been here with me long enough. God's revealed himself, his eternal power, his divine attributes, it says in Romans 1, to all mankind. It pops up like the jack-in-the-box, it says, hey, you are a creature, and you know, through the creation, that I am divine, I have attributes, and you know my power.

Now, he doesn't know the gospel, but he knows that about his creator. But the first thing he does, the first thing we did, so long as we were still in sin, is we shove that reality back in the box. And it pops up. We shove it back in. And we're like, stop popping up. And then we just sit on it. You know, and we're like, this is not happening anymore. I'm tired of this.

And then it goes on in Romans 1 to say that they trade that truth for the lie and they start worshiping the creation. And then that extends itself into what we might call any form and shape of paganism. But regardless if it's Hinduism or evolutionary thinking, the tenets are the same. They're worshiping the creation rather than the creator himself.

But to kind of touch on the chance concept, there is no purpose for an evolutionist. If you were operating under that belief system, you were an accident. You're purely an accident. So, medicate. Do whatever you need to do. I mean, you're just surviving, right?

Contrast that to a sovereign God who created a dominion for man to live. We see the effects of our sin and we own it to the degree that we believe God about it. And yeah, we still have responsibility to care for this creation. But we don't care for it in the sense that it is our God. We don't place it above Him, right? And we don't place the creation itself above the truths that we know in scripture about ourselves and about our fellow humanity, right? Would that be the origin of man? What do you mean? That Darby book. Oh. Yeah. That's where it all started. It didn't actually start there. It was just formalized in a different terminology. It was understood there. Yeah.

When the curse was put on the earth, that purpose was interfered with in that a perishing and decaying creation cannot perfectly glorify Him. Can we perfectly glorify God? In Christ. In Christ. Perfectly and completely, I should say, we completely glorify God at the moment we're conformed to the full image of Him. But it's interesting to see how this stuff connects, right? I mean, This whole thing, it can't glorify God anymore. It was designed to, we said that.

But now it can't. So what does it want? To be left alone. No. It wants to be set free. It wants to be set free. Because it's in slavery to the corruption that we brought about. Right? So don't you find it interesting that it even has that attitude to be set free? I mean, from an evolutionary standpoint, there would never be that desire. It's completely opposite. It wants to survive. Yeah. No. God in his wisdom gives a believer information regarding the fallen earth as to where it's headed, where evolution has no heading. other than just time, time, time. Right.

Have you guys ever thought about these verses? No. Not really. I mean, we think about creation and Romans 1, we definitely touch on it, but I just think these verses are almost unknown to most believers in terms of what's going on around them, you know?

There's a lot going on, but when it comes to those mountains and your Sunday morning hikes and you getting to the top of Longs Peak and sitting there and saying, wow, this is my church. What is your church doing? Mr. Environmentalist. I just say that in a cheeky way, but I know plenty of people that post things on the internet about, this is how I worship. This is how I do religion. I get to the top of Rocky Peak. Spirituality. Huh? Spirituality. Yeah, this is my spirituality. It's this, and it's gorgeous, it's beautiful. Is it? And can you see God's hand of design in it? You absolutely can.

Romans 1 tells us that's very much a reality. But it's suffering, too. It's suffering. And it's longing to be released from that suffering, that futility. all the creation will be set free and they will see us as we are in Christ. That's amazing to me. That's amazing. You know, that all creation is waiting to see us glorified. So yeah, it will be. It will be new in kind, right? It's a new heavens, new earth, and it's going to be different. And we don't know the full details of it, but we do long for that glorification personally. And it's interesting that both animate and inanimate, the whole creation is longing for that same thing for us.

See, that fits because God is in His creation. He's in it. He says it back in Romans 1, you know that I'm God because I'm in my creation. I don't think he's in it. The divinity. I think you can see his divine hand, but I don't think he is in creation. Because that just leads to Hinduism. But you could definitely see his divine character in it, 100%. The other part about that is that when man rejects God as God, what he knows from the creation and himself, God lets him go. He turns you over to yourself. Your mind is darkened, and pretty soon, Yeah.

Cool. That was fun. Let's pray. See you next week. Father, how we thank you for your divine hand and just the revealing of just how much care you've given to man in creating this earth, this planet. Lord, we're thankful for the opportunity. We do have to live in it, although it is important for us as believers to recognize, as Paul said, that there's an anxious longing, and it's all centered around you being glorified and glorifying us in you. It all comes down to what you're doing in the life of your people, your family. Every single purpose that drives our existence and surrounds us on this planet is literally a family decision to bring about your family into the very image of your son. And it's just amazing to understand that and to better realize what you're up to in this big world that we live in.

So we thank you that you're gracious and you're personal and you care about us as a father. does for his children. And so we just pray that we might continue to recognize this and understand this and take this to heart and ultimately just to believe it. And we just thank you for this morning. And it's in your name that we pray. Amen.