At the core of the gospel is not only the restoration of God’s rule & reign but also the redemption of humanity. It is this two-fold understanding of the gospel pulls the entire biblical narrative together. Without the fall of humanity there would be no loss of God’s rule and reign over creation, and without God’s rule and reign there would be no means of redeeming humanity.
Yet, some have suggested that the Apostle Paul’s focus on redemption is a different gospel from that of Jesus’ kingdom of God narrative in the gospels, but such a view looks at the pauline passages regarding redemption in isolation.
In contrast, a more holistic view of redemption in the Bible begins with creation in Genesis 1. In the creation account of Genesis 1.11-25 each kind reproduces seed after its own kind, until we get to man (v. 26) made in the image of God. While never stated implicitly, the implication is that we are of his kind, and thus man is set over the garden to rule and reign over God’s creation (v. 28). Likewise, the fall is not simply one of sin and death but a change of humanity’s status. Adam and Eve are no longer are masters but those who are being mastered. So the fall of man was not just about a loss of relationship with God, but in change in status. This is further illustrated by the new striving between man and woman, that she would desire to rule over him but he would dominate her (Genesis 3.16).
The fall is not unidimensional. Despite reductionist efforts to limit the fall to a need for forgiveness, the idea of restoration in the Bible includes the redemption of man’s relationship with God, but also with other human beings (male and female, slave and free) in Galatians 3.28 and with the earth and the beasts in it (Romans 8.19-24), which will be explored more in the next article.
The central point for this post is that our redemption includes our ruling and reigning with God (2 Timothy 2.12; Revelation 2.26-27, 5.10, 21) and one cannot be separated from the other. The scarlet thread of redemption that runs from Genesis through Revelation is also the thread of the kingdom.
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