Shalom

Shalom

For my pending ordination I have written my confession of faith. It is not in final form but is probably near enough to post here. This is not a personal testimony of conversion but a statement of belief. I welcome questions and comments.

The true story of our existence begins with the holy, eternal, uncreated, triune God graciously creating the universe as a home for mankind to live with Him. We know this story because God has revealed it to us.

To understand our story we must first understand who God is and how we know about Him. We know something of God through observing creation, which overwhelmingly points to a creator with love, purpose, order, and beauty. We also know something of Him through reason, and an internal sense of good and evil.  He is known more completely to us through the life of His son Jesus and subsequently through Scripture.

Scripture is God’s revelation written through men for humanity to know Jesus. Scripture is true, without error and is self authenticating. It is complete as was given to the church in the first century and to the Jews before Jesus. It consists of several types of literature and was written over many centuries by over forty authors. Despite its diversity, it reveals a unified story about the truth of God’s existence and ours. Scripture is not to be added to or subtracted from and is collectively interpreted by the faithful across time and space by the aid of the Holy Spirit. This Spirit led interpretation upholds the veracity of Scripture despite efforts to debunk it based on historical and linguistic skepticism.

Through Scripture we are given sufficient but not total knowledge of God. He exists as three distinct persons with one essence. The three persons are God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The three exist in perfect relationship with each other combining an equality of being with a hierarchy of roles.

God the Father directs all things. He is spirit, and He is holy, just, perfect, loving, merciful, faithful and true. He is not described by these attributes, rather these attributes are perfected in Him. He perfectly orchestrates all of human history with the coexistence of good and evil, toward the extermination of evil and restoration of absolute goodness. This orchestration is known as providence. Providence is the reality that God has authored our entire story. He is never a passive reactor to human events, but is always an active director without culpability for evil.

Jesus the Son enacts the Father’s will. He intersected intimately with humanity though His incarnation. He is all God and all man.  After His resurrection He ascended into Heaven where He sits at the right hand of the Father advocating for sinners. He will remain there until He returns to earth to defeat evil and reign with His people.

The Holy Spirit has been involved in all of human history but was uniquely dispersed to the church at Pentecost. He illuminates the Son. He convicts humans of sin and initiates their salvation. He gives comfort and various gifts for the building up of the church in power and unity. The greatest gifts of the Holy Spirit are the power to believe and the power to forgive. When we put our faith in God the Holy Spirit comes to live in us.

This is what we know of God. Now here is the story of us.

Jesus fulfilled the Father’s will by creating the universe under His direction with the aid of the Holy Spirit. The universe is the home for humans to live with God.  Humanity, created uniquely in` the image of God, was charged with establishing God’s Kingdom by creating more image bearers and exercising dominion over creation by creatively developing it with care to its well being. Abundant families through monogamous marriage and the development of culture were the activities that humanity was to engage in to establish the creator’s Kingdom. Humanity was to have an abundant and peaceful coexistence with God. This state of peaceful flourishing under God established liberty can be described by the Hebrew word, shalom.  Shalom is God’s vision for humanity living together with Him. We were made to exist with Him in His glory and presence. Shalom is the highest and best vision for mankind.

This perfect state did not last. Shalom was destroyed as the evil usurper Satan, who fell from Heaven with a legion of angels, entered a serpent. As a serpent, Satan convinced Eve and Adam of the lie that God had cheated them because He did not want humans to be like Himself. Once they believed the lie their hearts became intent on self centered power in place of God centered authority. Consequently they ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil which they were warned not to eat of because they would surely die. Adam and Eve immediately found that Satan had lied, and God told the truth. Death for all humanity and creation was the consequence of their rebellion. Humans in their sin could no longer be in relationship with a holy God. Death and separation was the consequence of Adam and Eve’s sin and is the consequence for every human since. We are separated from God, each other, ourselves, and creation. All relationships are broken, stunted and frustrating. A profound loneliness haunts all mankind because it desires relationship with its creator that its sin prohibits. This death causes an ever escalating rending apart of things meant to be whole. Marriages, families, friendships, communities, and every human attempt to make lasting whole relationships eventually gives way to the selfishness of the human heart. All our attempts to restore shalom are futile. Evil is the way of fallen man. Our ability to restore our relationship with God by our own effort is impossible. Presence with Him was lost, and His glory could no longer be seen by us.

All was not lost. What was impossible for us to restore was possible for the creator God who became our redeeming God. Simultaneous to affirming the consequences of Adam and Eve’s sin and establishing curses on the ground and the serpent, God foretold of a struggle of good against the evil unleashed in the Garden. The offspring of the serpent and the offspring of the woman would battle through time. The serpent would do damage but the ultimate son of the woman would deal the crushing blow and defeat Satan and death. This promise of redemption and restoration was fulfilled in the virgin birth of Jesus, His perfect life, His atoning death, and His victorious resurrection.  Victory over death is available to all who come to Jesus in faith, acknowledging their deserved death because of sin and His exclusive role as Savior. Those who accept Christ as Savior have their sin put on Jesus and His righteousness put on them. Those who reject Christ remain in death and will suffer eternal separation from God in Hell. All humanity is justly accountable for accepting or rejecting Jesus. Yet, this truth lies in tension with the reality that the redeemed were chosen by God.

Tensions are an integral part of our story. Jesus’ restorative resurrection exists within a tension of being completed at Calvary but not finalized until His second coming. We exist between these two movements of the finalization of redemption. In this space we have the unique privilege of bringing the life saving truth of Jesus Christ to others. We do this by gathering ourselves into redemptive communities which comingle daily with the world at large.  These redemptive communities are the church which Jesus calls His bride. The church is simultaneously a uniting of all Christians everywhere and the localized manifestation of places of regular gathering for collective worship of God and equipping for mission. Our mission as the church is to make disciples, teach all Jesus taught and baptize in His name. As we live this out we worship, pray, witness through word and deed, and restore communities through the continued development of godly culture. As the church we subjugate personal ambition for corporate mission and live together in a way that manifests Jesus Christ to the world. We live in a way that establishes tastes of shalom and foreshadows final restoration. The church is meant to image the presence of Christ and a glimpse of His glory. The story of redemption through faith in Jesus Christ is maintained symbolically by the church through practicing the ordinances of believer’s baptism and communion.

Restoration will be completed with Jesus’ second coming when He defeats Satan and his city of Babylon and establishes a new heaven and new earth centered in the redeemed city of the New Jerusalem.  At this time shalom will be restored, and all people who acknowledged Jesus as their Lord and Savior will live with Him forever in His presence and glory experiencing never ending flourishing.