Jun 2 2019 The Great Narrative of the Bible - The Chaotic Sea

We are starting a new series for the summer – and if you have any questions – feel free to shout them out! If you don’t have questions, I’m doing something wrong!

We are going to be going through the Bible to see the Great Narrative of the Bible – the story of God and His work in Creation that runs from Genesis 1 to Revelation 22. This grand story – metanarrative – points to Jesus Christ and His work of redemption that was accomplished on the cross – and how these stories move in that direction to point us to Christ.

Just to be upfront – I am relying on a number of scholars for this – these are not things I have come up with on my own – and there will be some analysis of Hebrew words – and I do not know a lot of Hebrew – so this is stolen – which is okay if you say it up front!

Genesis 1: In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

This is the WHO – the Bible is a WHO book, not a HOW.

There are a lot of things that tell us HOW – like going to YouTube to see how to change my weedwhacker string – I could never do it – I had to throw it away every time I ran out of string – but I went to YouTube – and in five minutes, I could see how to change the string.

This word for God is the generic word for God – not just the Jewish God, but all the people of Canaan would have known this God – El – Elohim – they would know him to be the Chairman of the Board of the gods – the Most High God – El Shaddai – the Supreme God.

What happens in chapter 2 – throughout chapter 1, they use this word – but in Chapter 2, they used a different word – YAHWEH – Israel’s God is Yahweh – that is His name – The Most High God – is Israel’s God.

Genesis 1: ² The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.

When we read this – our minds should go WHAT? Why is that there? What in the world is going on with this? Formless and void – those are religious words – they are in Bibles – so we don’t know what it means – Genesis 1:2 – the word literally – would be wild and wasted. Worthless. Unproductive and uninhabitable.

Let there be light! And there was light! And let there be this and that and it just happens. And we should be asking – why is everything a mess in verse 2 – there are many theories – but we won’t discuss that – because there are more important words.

TOHUVAHOVU! Isn’t that a neat word! You could name your kids that!

We are getting a hint, right off the bat – that something is not right. Something goes crazily wrong.

Tim Mackey calls this theme – the chaotic waters of the Bible – there is a Bible Project video on it – this concept of what is going on in verse 2 runs throughout the Bible – and then we see it the last time in Revelation 21 – it is critical to the great story of the Bible – playing a significant role in this grand narrative.

The Spirit of God was moving over the waters. This might be repeat for some of you who go to adult Sunday school –

The word spirit – Ruach – can mean several things – Spirit – Wind – Breath

Just depending on the context.

The spirit is always connected with the waters throughout the Bible – popping up in the most important places in the Bible. I’m not going to go through Genesis 1 and 2 – but this next slide –

Separating/Preparing – the first 3 days – He makes the earth habitable and productive - separating

Day 1 Light/Dark

Day 2 Water/Water – Pushing down the waters to the sea and up to the clouds

Day 3 Water/Land – Separates water from land – lifting the land up and pushing the waters down -

Filling/Inhabiting

Day 4 Sun/Moon/Stars – Connected to day 1 – light and dark

Day 5 Fish/Birds – connected to day 2 – Fish in the waters below, birds in the sky above

Day 6 Humans/Animals – separating land –

When he separates the waters is the only day he does not say, “It was good” – in the Old Testament – these chaotic waters are evil – evil creatures come out of the sea – and the waters are also a place of judgment – but throughout the Bible there are ways where this is reversed and it becomes a place of salvation.

⁶ Then God said, "Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters." ⁷ God made the expanse, and separated the waters which were below the expanse from the waters which were above the expanse; and it was so. ⁸ God called the expanse heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day.

There is a second place where the waters are ‘evil’

Genesis 6: ⁵ Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. ⁶ The LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. ⁷ The LORD said, "I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, from man to animals to creeping things and to birds of the sky; for I am sorry that I have made them." ⁸ But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD.

⁵ Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. ⁶ The LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. ⁷ The LORD said, "I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, from man to animals to creeping things and to birds of the sky; for I am sorry that I have made them." ⁸ But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD.

¹¹ Now the earth was corrupt (ruined) in the sight of God, and the earth was filled with violence. ¹² God looked on the earth, and behold, it was corrupt (ruined); for all flesh had corrupted (ruined) their way upon the earth. ¹³ Then God said to Noah, "The end of all flesh has come before Me; for the earth is filled with violence because of them; and behold, I am about to destroy them with the earth.

This is an undoing of the Creation story – what God did that was so good, humanity has undone. When Adam and Eve rebelled in the Garden – that began a process of the destruction of Creation – and Paul says in Romans 8 – that it continued from that day to his – all creation is groaning and longing for salvation – human violence and evil is destroying God’s creation – it is ruining the world.

From the point that Adam and Eve ate of the tree – the world will grow thorns and thistles – and the land will not be as productive as it was – and we get to the flood and the created earth is falling apart – about to cave in on itself. So God is going to send this flood.

17 "Behold, I, even I am bringing the flood of water upon the earth, to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life, from under heaven; everything that is on the earth shall perish.

After entering the ark:

Genesis 7: ¹¹ In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the same day all the fountains of the great deep burst open, and the floodgates of the sky were opened.

This is the reversal – pushing the waters down – now they come back up – and on day 2 he pushed the waters of the sky up – and after Noah entered the ark – he opened it up and it all came down – so there is this reversal of creation – so after the flood – what God did – He sent a WIND (RUACH) across the earth – a reversal of creation – and a new creation. The story is told in a brand-new way – and a dove shows up – and the wind – and the dove – and the water. We’ll look at that next week. That doesn’t mean we are done now!

A third story – and it will get practical in a second. The Birth of Moses – another chaotic water story:

Exodus 2: Now a man from the house of Levi went and married a daughter of Levi. ² The woman conceived and bore a son; and when she saw that he was beautiful, she hid him for three months. ³ But when she could hide him no longer, she got him a wicker basket and covered it over with tar and pitch. Then she put the child into it and set it among the reeds by the bank of the Nile.

But this is not a basket – literally BOX – another translation – ARK – the exact same word. We have this water story and God is connecting Moses with Noah – this all ties together – as Noah was saved in an ark through the waters – so was Moses.

The fourth story – We’ve all seen it in the movie! First use of ‘technicolor!’

Exodus 14: ²¹ Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; and the LORD swept the sea back by a strong east wind (RUACH) all night and turned the sea into dry land, so the waters were divided. (SEPARATING THE WATERS!) ²² The sons of Israel went through the midst of the sea on the dry land, and the waters were like a wall to them on their right hand and on their left. ²³ Then the Egyptians took up the pursuit, and all Pharaoh's horses, his chariots and his horsemen went in after them into the midst of the sea.

Separating the waters just like day 2 – the Israelites are saved by the chaotic waters -

²⁶ Then the LORD said to Moses, "Stretch out your hand over the sea so that the waters may come back over the Egyptians, over their chariots and their horsemen." ²⁷ So Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and the sea returned to its normal state at daybreak, while the Egyptians were fleeing right into it; then the LORD overthrew the Egyptians in the midst of the sea. ²⁸ The waters returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen, even Pharaoh's entire army that had gone into the sea after them; not even one of them remained.

Exact same language when he told Noah that he would destroy all on the earth.

Next story – They were wandering in the wilderness for 40 years – and it was time to cross the Jordan -…

Joshua 3: ¹⁴ So when the people set out from their tents to cross the Jordan with the priests carrying the ark of the covenant before the people, ¹⁵ and when those who carried the ark came into the Jordan, and the feet of the priests carrying the ark were dipped in the edge of the water (for the Jordan overflows all its banks all the days of harvest), ¹⁶ the waters which were flowing down from above stood and rose up in one heap, a great distance away at Adam, the city that is beside Zarethan; and those which were flowing down toward the sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea, were completely cut off. So the people crossed opposite Jericho.

Now, same story – a salvation story – the Jordan river will come up again in some very important parts -and there is a difference – the Priests are carrying the Ark – the presence of God – and as their feet hit the water – the waters parted and were on dry ground.

But what the story is telling us – the rest of Israel walked through on dry ground – because the priests led the way.

There is a priest coming – who will walk through the waters of sin for us – and the rest of us – all we do is walk through free and clear – because of what the High Priest does for us on the cross.

There are multiple stories about these waters

When you get to the prophets – the story changes slightly:

Daniel 7: Daniel said, "I was looking in my vision by night, and behold, the four winds of heaven were stirring up the great sea. ³ "And four great beasts were coming up from the sea, different from one another. ⁴ "The first was like a lion and had the wings of an eagle.

Beasts coming out of the chaotic waters – and then we see:

17 'These great beasts, which are four in number, are four kings who will arise from the earth.

What the Chaotic waters have represented all along – the kingdoms that are wicked and in rebellion against God -

Revelation 13: And the dragon stood on the sand of the seashore. Then I saw a beast coming up out of the sea, having ten horns and seven heads, and on his horns were ten diadems, and on his heads were blasphemous names.

This is speaking of the Roman empire – Babylon –

“Apocalyptic literature—the sort you find in the strange pages of Daniel and the book of Revelation—is a genre of Scripture that tries to get us to see (or see through) the empires that constitute our environment, in order to see them for what they really are. Unfortunately, we associate apocalyptic literature with ‘end-times’ literature, as if its goal were a matter of prediction. But this is a misunderstanding of the biblical genre. The point of apocalyptic literature is not prediction but unmasking—unveiling the realities around us for what they really are. While the Roman Empire pretends to be a gift to civilization and the zenith of human accomplishment, John’s apocalyptic perspective from a heavenly angle shows the reality: Rome is a monster.”

How do I see us in that book? Our culture?

Smith says this

When Paul talks about the spiritual forces of wickedness – both spiritual and human – even in the simplest, most benign – Dark forces are working in those!

We live in a coffee culture war! Starbucks or Dunkin? Studies show which side you are on – may determine who you vote for! This seems silly, but it is a simple one.

Amazon – does more than fill orders – do you know what it does, it fills souls! SO many people have their souls filled on Amazon – buying thing.

Opioid addiction – where does it come from? The medical profession – Pharmaceuticals – this institution that is curing diseases, and yet, in so many ways – things like this ruin lives.

We need to look at our world differently – our institutions – differently – try to see what ways these things have influenced us!