In our previous building block post, we looked at the mental framework that was established with the Christ as he laid the foundation for his kingship. That moment in time acted like a pivoting point for the arc of the story of mankind from beginning to end. In this post we will take a step back and look at the grander narrative. We will track through the perfected creation in the beginning to the perfected restoration in the end and how those two elements overlay with the pivoting arc of mankind and creation in the middle through the actions of the Christ.

In saying that, the content of this post will be at a higher reference level and will not dive deep into the significance of each corresponding point. Rather, we will be looking at the events throughout history as recorded in Genesis and we’ll be laying those across predicted events laid out by the books of the Prophets and the book of Revelations by John.

Let’s start the building of our timeline at the beginning, Genesis. The account of creation in Genesis is the poetic introduction to the 11 accounts/generations that make up the book of Genesis. Keep in mind that this book was being created during the time in which Israel was becoming their own nation. This means that the places that are referenced, and the people’s names that are used, have more to do with familiarity to the intended audience than the accuracy of original titles. In the poetic introduction of Genesis, we see the creation of the world through the means of bringing matter into existence. We see this done in multiple ways through both the elements of the outer universe and the elements found within our own world. We also see the establishment of life which is a systematized cycle that utilizes those elements. Finally, we see the creation of man who was also imbued with the spiritual likeness of God. In this perfect creation, the elements of physical matter had been created in their perfected states; including the hierarchical and system-centric structures that we have discovered through our observational sciences throughout time. The self-sustaining systems of light, matter, and life would have been established in such a way that they were deemed “Good” by God.

After the poetic summary of creation, we get the first generation/account starting in Gen 2:4. It is at this point that we start to see a separate focus on “created life” and that of the “spirit of man”. You also see the origin and purpose of man established within this framework (a continuation of the larger purpose of man established in Gen 1:27-30). It is within this first account that we see the choice that mankind made that separated itself from God. Because of that, we have our first set of deviations from a perfected state of creation.

In Gen 3:1, you see the start of the narrative that people call “The Fall” (the fall from perfection, the fall from God and the institution of sin). Within this narrative, you see God intervening after man has made the choice to establish themselves as the decision maker of “Good and Evil”. Starting at Gen 3:14, you see God stating some changes that will exist within creation going forward. This set of changes that were put in place altered the physics of our world. It also showed the ramifications of no longer being in alignment with God. The moment mankind chose to utilize its own determination of good and evil, it was separated from the perfect state of spiritual connection to God and his truth, including a perfect creation.

Once humanity knew evil, God removed eternal life. Otherwise, it would have been an eternity of knowing and experiencing evil and an eternity of not being able to do anything about it.

We also have in this first account the introduction of man striking out against man, brother against brother, thus establishing the new self-centric framework that “man is unto himself only”. This means that they are separated from both God and each other in the heart of everything that they do. Because of the self-centric nature of man, the destruction of mankind itself was growing at a quick rate. This institution of man came to a crescendo of man always having evil intent (Gen 6:9). This summary leads us into the start of the second account (starting in Gen 6:9) when it is said that all of creation was going to be destroyed, save a few.

With the event of the world being flooded, we see an alteration in physics yet again. This time, we see the diminishing of the population and a further reduction in the duration of a single life in order that man may be spared from the wickedness of man. With such a long lifespan, the acts of a wicked man can easily outweigh the efforts of the righteous before God. The actions of wicked men at that time escalated to a point that only one man and his family were deemed righteous enough to continue the existence of mankind.

After the events of the flood, God made a promise to not alter the physics of the earth in a negative way just because of man (Gen 8:21). We also see for the first time that animals will now fear man (Gen 9:2). This means that prior to this point, the living creations, both animal and man, we’re able to interact together. But, from this point going forward, we now have a distinct separation of the rest of the living creation and that of man. We also have a statement from God stating that man will be held accountable for the killing of man. And that he was to multiply and fill the earth (Gen 9:7), a reiteration of Gen 1:28.

The next major account to occur is the story of the tower of Babel (Gen 11). In this recorded account, there is another shift in how mankind interacts with itself. If the flood was a reworking of physics around creation and life, then the tower of Babel is really pointing out the intent (mind) of mankind and how it is against God. During the tower of Babel, we see rapid separation from God and a desire to establish the dominance of mankind. If you remember, one of the purposes of man was to cover the face of the earth but the main intent of Nimrod, and the people of Babel, was to collect themselves together and make a designator unto themselves. To persuade them in a new direction, and to slow down the rapid direction mankind was taking, God caused the development of a multi-lingual structure that caused people to separate into different groupings and move away from each other. This was less of an alteration of physics in a negative way (something God said he would not do again), and more of an alteration of the mind (soul) of man and how it interacts within its created body and with others.

This account of Babel is one of the last major alterations to creation to prevent mankind from destroying itself so quickly. From this point forward, we start to see the establishment of what God was putting in place to create a path back to himself and perfection. This path was established in the next account/generation in Genesis with the covenant established in Abraham. This selection of a single man and his descendants creates the recorded narrative for the rest of the Old Testament. Everything that we read beyond this point is being done through the generational history of the Hebrew people. The narrative scope thins down to just the Hebrews (eventually Israelites), but we see the content that is recorded explode. This new people group became the established framework that was an instrumental path towards God’s restoration movement. The covenant that God established with Israel would lay the framework for what it would look like to turn towards God, and it developed a social-judicial system that would govern them as a people for the next 1000 plus years.

Everything occurring within creation up to this point has been a downward drop from the perfect. It was a very rapid fall and slowed with God’s alteration to physics and the world developing into nations of people, particularly with the nation selected by God to represent himself. This downward path on a graph would look like the front part of the letter “u”. It was at this point that we see the Christ come and establish his Kingdom. This creates a divergence in the path of man. Some will continue to rise back towards God and what will be his restoration while others will maintain their self-directed path and will eventually look like the tail of the lower case “u” that is traveling further from God and are slated for destruction. We have already established what this pivot point looks like in our prior building blocks and how your alignment with the Christ will put you on the path that eventually leads to perfection. For the rest of this post, we will look at what the future state looks like and how it will reverse all the things that had been altered through the downward fall.

As we continue to strive to understand what it means to climb back up the far side of the “u”, we are no longer evaluating the things of the past but are stringing together the revelations of God to his Jewish prophets and the understanding of the first apostles (who had further details revealed to them from Jesus the Christ). In saying that, I will do my best to string the future narrative together from what is revealed to us but there is no definitive on the timing and no agreeance on sequence of events. With that caveat, let’s continue up our arc.

The biggest staples to look at after the crucifixion, resurrection, and installation of the Christ are the following: the destruction of the Jewish temple (Mat 24:1-2) and a securing of a group of Jews that have had their hearts hardened and eyes blinded with a stupor until the end (Rom 11:1-10), and the spreading of the gospel to all of mankind (Mat 24:14). These things have already happened or are in the process of happening and show the change from a single representative people to a global kingdom under the authority of the Christ. This is the reversal of the last point we talked about with the selected people group that God used to represent Himself.

Prior to that, we talked about the changing of language at the tower of Babel. We first see an allusion to the restoration of a single language in the book of Acts after the Spirit is sent to the Disciples. At this event, the Disciples started to speak of the mighty deeds of God. Every man, though from a different area, were able to hear and understand the Disciples in their own native language (Acts2:4-11). We currently live in a world that has 7000+ languages in it but see those languages disappearing at a rate of about nine per year with a growing rate of depletion. If we are to understand the Jewish Prophet Zephaniah correctly, then after God has poured out His wrath on all of the world (called The Great Tribulation, which we will get to in a bit), then he will give the people purified lips so they may call on the name of the Lord, shoulder to shoulder (Zep 3:8-9).

The next thing we will look at as we step backwards is this weird relationship we have with animals. After the separation that occurred at the time of Noah, we saw a further restriction placed on what animals the Jewish people could interact with within their social-judicial system. At the time of Acts, and the spread of the gospel by the Disciples (turned Apostles), we see the restriction removed. We have also seen throughout time that animals have become less scared of humans. This may be due to the increasing presence of humans in wild areas, the feeding of wild animals by humans, and the breeding of animals for tameness. But this is not true for all animals, especially the apex predator. Although this is the current state, we see the Jewish Prophet Isaiah tell us that during the reign of the Righteous One of Jesse (of the line of David, of which Jesus is the Righteous One; Christ) we will see the wolf dwell with the lamb and the leopard lie with the young goat. The calf and the young lion eating together with a young boy leading them. The cow and bear will both graze together, and the lion will eat straw like an ox. You will even see young children play with cobras and vipers with no fear of danger. All of this is occurring in what people call the Millennium Period of the Kingdom of Christ.

After the staples in the timeline that we talked about earlier with the fall of the Jewish structure and spread of the Gospel, we see the future staple events of the “Great Tribulation” period and “Millennium” period that we referenced above. The Great Tribulation will act as an accelerant to end our current age prior to the time of the Kingdom of Christ (Millennium). This accelerant will be drastic like the flood but instead of slowing down the decay of man, it will accelerate the two paths (the right side of the “u”). Those who have aligned themselves with the Christ will eventually rule with him in His Millennial rule (whether that is a corporeal reinstatement within creation or surviving through the tribulation). The other path (the tail of the “u”) is that of man pushing even farther from God and physically being wiped out in preparation for the rule of the Christ. This flood like experience will greatly show the divide between those who only focus on themselves like Cain did and those who have taken on the command of “loving others” that the Christ set forth.

Up until this point, and through the Millennial reign, sin/separation is still part of this creation; though greatly diminished in its effects (Isa 65:20). At the end of the rule of the Christ, there will be events driven by those who held on to their desire to be against God and only for themselves. In these events, there will be one last destruction and that is it. Creation as we know it will no longer be. It will have been removed to make way for a new creation. Prior to this new creation, we read that there will be a final judgment for all of the dead who were part of this creation. In this “Judgment”, there is one of two resultants that will occur. Either you will pass through judgment with your name being presented with Christ and belonging to him or you will be judge in accordance with your own actions. Those who were not found to be with the Christ are cast into lake of fire deemed “The Second Death”. For those that were walked through judgement with the Christ as their Patron King will be ushered into the new creation.

It is in this new creation that we see the last few elements of sin removed. There will no longer be a separation from God as his throne will dwell within the new creation. The “Tree of Life” will be reinstated; symbolizing that physical death is no longer a concern. The spirt of man is still his to have but those who are there have learned the lesson of choosing God rather than their own understanding of “Good and Evil”. The new creation will be a full restoration of what was originally intended for mankind.

• Building Block 1: We Overcomplicate Sin
• Building Block 2: Repentance, It’s Not About Feeling Bad
• Building Block 3: The Realignment of Faith
• Building Block 4: How Then Shall We Live
• Building Block 5: In The End, We Begin