The Great Commission & The Creation Mandate
by Leong Tien Fock, Ph.D
The Great Commission as presented in Matthew 28:18-20 is usually read in isolation, not even in the context of this very Gospel itself. When we do not read a text in its immediate and larger contexts we will likely misunderstand it. Among evangelicals, Matthew 28:18-20 is often confused with world evangelisation, when evangelism is not even mentioned (only implied) in this version of the Great Commission (for the other versions see Mark 16:15; John 20:21; Acts 1:8).
The Kingdom of God and The Creation Mandate
Since the Kingdom of God was promised in the Old Testament, we need to understand what the kingdom or reign of God means in that context to fully appreciate the meaning of the Great Commission (note: the Kingdom refers to the eschatological Kingdom, while kingdom refers to kingship or reign in general).
In order not to miss anything, we need to go all the way back to the very first commission given to the human race: the Creation Mandate (Gen 1:28). It was before the Fall and in the Garden of Eden that God blessed Adam and Eve, saying, "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth." Thus the mandate to fill and subdue the earth and rule over the creatures was given when Adam and Eve were in direct fellowship with God and before there was a need for world redemption. This mandate must first be understood in this context before we can relate it to the Great Commission.
When the earth was first created it was "formless and void" and God had to do some major renovation on the earth and the solar system before life on earth was possible. Then he created plant and animal life and finally human life (Genesis 1). God further developed (a small portion of) the earth by planting the Garden of Eden and placed the first human couple there to "cultivate it and keep it" (Gen 2:15).
It is in this context that the Creation Mandate to be fruitful and multiply and fill and subdue the earth (outside the Garden of Eden) was given. What did it mean to Adam and Eve?
John Walton (2001:186) in his Genesis commentary explains:
If people were going to fill the earth, we must conclude that they were not intended to stay in the garden in a static situation. Yet moving out of the garden would appear a hardship since land outside the garden was not as hospitable as that inside the garden (otherwise the garden would not be distinguishable). Perhaps, then, we should surmise that people were gradually supposed to extend the garden as they went about subduing and ruling. Extending the garden would extend the food supply as well as extend the sacred space (since that is what the garden represented).
The Garden was a "sacred space" because it was within this space that God dwelled with Adam and Eve. And within this space God's will was to be done perfectly ("on earth as it is in heaven"). And when they sinned by not submitting to His will they were driven out. In other words, the Garden was where the kingship of God was fully realised, and to expand the Garden by filling and subduing the earth was to expand the kingdom of God. It was thus the pre-Fall version of the command to seek first God's kingdom and righteousness (Matt 6:33). The Creation Mandate came with the assurance of the availability of food in the Garden (Gen 1:29) just as the command in Matthew 6:33 came with an assurance of the provision of food (and other basic needs) through a promise. The implication in both cases is that the need to "make a living" is no excuse for not fulfilling the mandate or the command to extend God's kingdom.
But how would the multiplying of human beings and the filling and subduing of the earth actually work out in history?
Albert Wolters has answered it well:
When God rested from His work of creation (and renovation) on the seventh day, this is not the end of the development of creation, however. Although God has withdrawn from the work of creation, he has put an image of himself on the earth with a mandate to continue. The earth had been completely unformed and empty; in the six-day process of development God had formed it and filled it - but not completely. People must now carry on the work of development; by being fruitful they must fill it even more; by subduing it they must form it even more. Mankind, as God's representatives on earth, carry on where God left off. But this is now to be a human development of the earth. The human race will fill the earth with its own kind, and it will form the earth for its own kind. From now on the development of the created earth will be societal and cultural in nature. In a single word, the task ahead is civilization (1985:36).
Thus the Creation Mandate is to develop a civilisation that would spread to the whole earth. But what kind of civilisation would this be? The first human civilisation was that of the ungodly Cain and his descendants. They did build a city and develop agriculture, industry and the arts (Gen 4:17-22). But they did not call upon the name of the LORD (cf. Gen 4:26). And Lamech not only practised polygamy; he boasted about killing a boy for hitting him and, unlike Cain, had no fear of the consequence (4:23- 24). It was a godless civilisation that eventually led to the Flood, which destroyed the world except Noah and his family.
The Creation Mandate was given before Adam and Eve sinned by disobeying God. And they were in direct fellowship with Him. So the civilisation was intended to be distinctly (but not completely) different from that developed by Cain and his descendants. The difference would not be in the building of the city and the development of agriculture, industry and the arts. All this is part of the mandate to "fill and subdue" the earth. The distinct difference would be that the civilisation is developed in obedience to, and in fellowship with, the Creator. Hence, the civilisation is to be an expression of the kingdom of God. In other words, the kingdom of God is to be expressed through a civilisation. What then is this civilisation supposed to be like?
The Kingdom of God and The Nation of Israel
The book of Exodus gives us a clue. The nation of Israel was called to build a civilisation based on obedience to God and in fellowship with Him. Like the Garden of Eden, the Promised Land was a sacred space in which God dwelled with His people through the tabernacle and later the temple. And like Adam and Eve, to remain in this sacred space the nation must obey God. They are to build a civilisation based on the Ten Commandments. When the nation failed to do so but instead followed the ways of her neighbours, and after much chastisement through various calamities and numerous warnings through the prophets, the nation was exiled.
The Ten Commandments constituted what we call the Constitution of the nation. The specific laws in the Old Testament were mostly culture-bound elaborations and applications of these commandments. The various institutions - the state (and the monarchy), the judiciary, the economy, the family, education and the priesthood - are all governed by the relevant laws. This means all the institutions, including the government, answer directly to God by submitting to the Ten Commandments. By studying how the respective laws (in light of their historical and social contexts) were supposed to shape these institutions, we can get some idea what the civilisation God intended would be like. For instance, the law that required farmers, when harvesting, to leave something behind in their fields for "the alien, the orphan and the widow" to glean (Deut 24:19-21) means, in generic terms, that the economy must somehow cater to the needs of the marginalised. But this is not in the form of free hand-outs - even the widows had to work with their own hands.
The priesthood was needed because this was not the Garden of Eden. Priests were needed to serve in the tabernacle and administer the sacrificial system. The tabernacle and the sacrificial system were needed because human beings are now fallen and cannot keep the Ten Commandments perfectly. The tabernacle provided the setting needed for God to dwell with fallen human beings and the sacrificial system provided the (temporary) means for the Israelites to receive forgiveness of sins (note: all sins are forgiven on the basis of Christ's death; the sacrificial animals anticipated this ultimate Sacrifice and merely served as "credit cards").
When Israel failed in her calling in developing a civilisation that manifests the kingdom of God it was not because she failed to keep the Ten Commandments perfectly. She failed to repent and seek forgiveness when she violated the commandments. She was stubborn in following the ways of her neighbours.
Israel was to be motivated and thus empowered to keep God's commandments (and confess, repent and seek forgiveness whenever she fails) by fearing Him for who He is (Deut 10:12-14) and by loving Him for what He has done for her (Deut 10:22- 11:1). Due to the fallen human nature, only some Israelites, but not the nation as a whole, were able to do this. The Babylonian Exile showed that a new and additional source of empowerment was needed.
On the eve of the Exile in 586 BC, God promised through Jeremiah and Ezekiel that He would do something new. Ezekiel gives the most details on this new work of God: He will not only cleanse the nation of her sins but will also give her a "new heart" and a "new spirit" as well as "put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances" (Ezek 36:25-27). All this is to enable God's people to keep God's commandments to fulfil their calling.
The commandments can be summarised to two: to love God with one's heart, soul and might (Deut 6:5); and to love one's neighbour as oneself (Lev 19:18). Alternatively, they can be summed up as: "to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God" (Mic 6:8). It is significant that "to do justice, to love kindness" parallels "love your neighbour as [though your neighbour were] yourself." For injustice is least obvious at the giving end and most obvious at the receiving end. If we are to do justice we must put ourselves in the shoes of those on the receiving end.
The Creation Mandate and The Mission of the Church
Obviously this is the same salvation that the Church is called to bear witness to, whether as "light" (through loving one another and others) or "salt" (through influencing others). In fact, citing Isaiah 49:6, Paul said "The Lord has commanded us, 'I have placed you as a light for the Gentiles, that you should bring salvation to the end of the earth'" (Acts 13:47), indicating that Christ's mission to bring "justice-salvation" to the earth has now been given to the Church. Therefore to fulfill the Great Commission is to fulfill the Creation Mandate to develop a civilisation in which human relations and human institutions are shaped by justice and kindness and are thus submissive to God's reign. We need to take a look at the Great Commission in this light.
This Commission is thus obviously much more than evangelising the world or even "saving souls" and is really about "saving" the world by helping to bring it into the order God intended. Saving souls and teaching them to observe all that Christ has commanded is only the means to this end. Saved souls have "eternal life" (the emphasis of John's Gospel) because they have entered the eternal Kingdom of God. Just as the eternal Kingdom is "already" and "not yet" their eternal life is also "already" and "not yet." The "already" aspect is a foretaste of the "not yet" eschatological salvation in the new heavens and new earth. Thus Christians cannot really talk about eternal life without thinking of the eternal Kingdom.
If Christ has all authority in heaven and on earth, He already has authority over every nation, institution and person. Those in every nation who willingly respond to the Gospel of the Kingdom are to bear witness to it in and through every area of their life, so that they will make a difference in and to the institutions of which they are a part, whether the family, church, economy, or even the state. In this way they seek to bring their nation into submission to the reign of Christ. Of course this reign will never be universal or perfect until Christ returns. In other words, Christ came to bring "justice-salvation" to the nations; He has left us, but has sent us the Holy Spirit, to continue from where He left off; and He will return to consummate what He and we have been called to do.
This is an extract. The full article will appear in Forum VI to be published by the NECF Malaysia Research Commission. |
