The story of salvation does not start on a warm summer day in the ‘90s, when, at the age of 6 or 8, I was on a car trip and the thought occurred to me that if we crashed and I died, I would go to hell. It does not begin on a spring morning in the A.D. 30s, when a man who was God rose from the dead, nor a few days before that when he was killed. It does not commence between 5 B.C. and A.D. 1, when the God-man was birthed by a virgin. It did not start several thousand years before that when God gave a formal system of sacrifices to a prince-turned-shepherd named Moses, nor before that when He saved the few righteous men on earth by water, nor even before that when the first man sacrificed an animal as atonement for his sin. It does not even start when that man fell from perfection into depravity. The story of salvation begins before the world was created, before time was started; there is no specific day, days not then having been formed. God made a covenant within Himself, between the members of His Trinity.
The Father declared, "O my Son, let us make an Earth, and a Universe to go with it, and it shall be very good. Let us make Man in our own image, after our own likeness, and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the Earth, and over every creeping thing that shall creep upon the Earth. Let us give him the Earth, as a place wherein he may take pleasure in our worship and our service and our glory, even as we take pleasure in it."
The Son assented, "O wise and good Father, this plan delighteth me as much as Thee."
The Father continued, "But, my Son, he and his children will rebel against us, and hate us. They shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasure more than lovers of us. For this reason they must suffer death, and for this reason also we shall create a Hell, wherein they shall suffer our just wrath forever when they die—"
The Son interjected, "O righteous Father, we shall be glorified in our wrath on their rebellion."
"Yet shall we make a way for them to be saved, and for this reason we shall also create a Heaven where the souls of the righteous may go at death, and there shall we reign over the realm of men. And we shall show them what is Sacrifice; for their sin, they must die, yet we shall accept in the stead of their own lives the lives of dumb animals, blood for blood."
"Yet, O holy Father, this is not just. Thou knowest—no animal could atone for their guilt."
"Presently, my Son. They shall yet become so vile that we must destroy the earth to remove their evil influence. We will spare, however, a few, the only righteous ones that shall be left. These shall repopulate the earth, and shall teach righteousness to their children. Even these, however, shall partake of the same corruption as their father, and they too shall be vile and deserving of death.
For this reason, we shall choose a nation, small, whose father was a wanderer and whose sons are slaves. We shall redeem them from their wretchedness, and shall detail to them the laws of our holiness. We shall show them in exactitude how to worship us aright, how to atone guilt that we may be approached. Yet we shall also teach them that our holiness may not be approached by sinfulness, and that the blood of bulls and goats, given for their atonement, cannot atone perfectly, and therefore we shall give them a priesthood to approach us in their stead. We shall give them signs and symbols and shadows—"
"But of what? And how to perfect the sacrifice?"
"Even these, however, shall partake the root of corruption. They shall in the end pervert our laws, defile our priesthood, elevate the shadows above the substance."
"But shadows of what?"
"Shadows of Thee, O my beloved Son. Thee I send to the earth, after all these have failed to turn the hearts of men toward us. Thou shalt go not in the glory Thou sharest with me now, but as a man, in the likeness of their sinful flesh—sharing their flesh, truly, but not their sin; to this end Thou shalt be born of a virgin. Thou shalt be tempted as they are, in every point, yet without sin, living a perfect and holy life. They will hate Thee, mock Thee, scorn Thee. Thine own people, the holy nation, shall deliver Thee up to death, naked on a cross, to be shamed and humiliated, and yet this shall be as nothing. I shall upon that cross pour upon Thee our full wrath for the sins of men, damn Thee in the Hell that they have earned, give Thee the wages of their sin. It is no light thing, but neither is their guilt. Thou shalt die, I said, but Thou shalt have earned no death of Thyself, and shalt therefore undie three days after, and be given a deathless body. For this I love Thee—that Thou layest down Thy life, to take it again, no man taking it from Thee, but Thou laying it down of Thine own power, and taking it up again of the same.
Thou shalt commit our truth to select persons—select for nothing in them, but at our good pleasure—and then come and take up the glory Thou hast now, and more besides. These shall preach our word to others, whom also we shall save, changing their stony hearts into hearts of flesh. Our Spirit shall breathe upon them who hated us, whose wish was to have nothing to do with us, who would deliver Thee up to death a million times if they could, and shall re-make their hearts, and shall give them faith to rest in Thy sacrifice as the ransom for their guilt. Though the greatest number we shall save after Thy sacrifice, yet shall these be from all generations of the earth, from the first that we shall have taught sacrifice, to the faithful ones—for the just shall live by faith—saved by water, to the wanderer that fathered the chosen nation, to individuals within that nation, to those not of that nation: a few that shall be saved with the holy nation, and a greater number still after Thine ultimate sacrifice, for then all nations shall be ours.
Upon these last, however—all we give faith after Thine appearing—shall we pour our Spirit, and we through Him shall dwell in their hearts. He will guide them into our truth; He will write our words in their hearts. He will teach them our laws, and to keep them, and they shall not be burdensome, but shall be an easy yoke and a light burden.
When the number of our chosen ones is completed, then shalt Thou return to the corrupt Earth as conquering judge, and shalt judge all men. The righteous, the faithful Thou shalt resurrect and bring into eternal life, and the sinful shalt Thou bring forth and condemn to everlasting death. Then shall we re-make the heavens and the earth, destroying the old with fire, and giving this new Earth to our redeemed people, theirs forever, in which to worship us and serve us and glorify us, now forever. They will live with no possibility of corruption, for all corruption shalt Thou drive from that place, but without shall be dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie."
The Son responded, His heart overflowing, "Truly, O gracious Father, I love Thee and Thy will, and shall do this thing, even as Thou hast said it."
And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light.
—Zachary Pletan
No comments:
Post a Comment