22 Dec Making sense of life

Genesis 1:26-28

²⁶ Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” ²⁷ So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. ²⁸ And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

I love stories. Every life is a story and every story have its main character. Every child thinks that the world revolves around them. I used to think that everything revolves around me. Dad is a genie in the lamp who gives me what I want; Mom is a fairy godmother who comforts me; My sister is Thanos that I must defeat; Vegetables are my kryptonite. My worldview is pretty much, “I am the centre of my universe!” I remember when my niece, Ellecia, was still a baby, she received the attention of everyone around her. It doesn’t matter what time it was, whenever she was hungry and cried, food would be provided for her. Whenever she was bored, someone would entertain her. She could be up at 3 AM in the morning and someone would be there for her. It could be her mom, her dad, her aunty, her ama or her akong but it was certainly not me. I just slept through the night. Ellecia, like every baby in the world, was born selfish. She demanded every attention she could get and never asked permission and never felt sorry for messing up other’s schedule. To her knowledge, she was the centre of the universe and everything revolved around her.

All of us were born with the same propensity. Eventually, we get told and trained that life is not about us. Our parents began to discipline us; our teacher scolded us; our friend fought with us; our boss used us; our lover left us. We experienced enough in life to understand that life is not about us. But it doesn’t mean we like the idea. In fact, most if not all our frustration in life happens because we do not like the idea that life does not revolve around us. Even though intellectually we understand that we are not the centre of the universe, internally we still fight to regain control of those things that give us meaning in life. So, what do we do? We thrive, we fight, we thrive, we fight, despite knowing fully that we will never be in control. But it doesn’t stop us from trying. And eventually, it creates frustration in us that leads us to either slavery or hopelessness.

Tonight, my goal is to set you free from those frustrations. I want to show you that you are not the main character of your story and you are not the centre of the universe. You need to understand that there is a greater story that has been playing from the very beginning. And only when you live by this story that your life begins to make sense. The Bible is full of stories of different man and woman that we can call “heroes.” But they are not the hero of the Bible. Joseph is an amazing Prime Minister but that’s it. David is a great king but that’s it. Their stories are simply a glimpse of a greater story that the Bible points toward. Our stories are simply a tiny part of a greater story that has been written from eternity by the greatest writer. For the sake of clarity, let’s call this story the grand narrative. Here is my conviction. To the degree that we understand the grand narrative, to that degree we can make sense of our lives. And in the grand narrative, we are not the main characters; God is the main character and the purpose of the grand narrative. This is very important for us to understand. Our stories are only small parts of the bigger story that is centred on God. And the main character of our stories is not us but Jesus. If we do not understand this, we will be frustrated and mad at God for not giving us the life that we wanted. But when we understand that we are not the point but God is, it frees us to live our lives for God’s glory.

Tonight, I want to give you an overview of the grand narrative of the Bible. The Bible can be divided into four chapters: Creation; Fall; Redemption; Restoration.

Creation

I’ll start at the beginning of all beginning. Genesis 1:1 – In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. I love it. The very first statement in the very first book of the Bible says, “In the beginning, God.” Don’t miss this. When was the beginning? The beginning here speaks of a time before everything that we can see with our eyes existed. The beginning was a time where the universe has yet to be. No light, no form, no molecule, no star, there was absolutely nothing. There was nothing but there was someone. When there was nothing at all, God is. God was there in the beginning when there was nothing. God is the beginning. To say that God is the beginning means that he is uncreated and there is nothing or no one before him. He is the origin and he is not bound to anything but himself. God begins the beginning. There is nothing second about his attributes. He was, is and always will be first.

Genesis 1:3 – And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. I love the way the old preachers used to say it. So, God looks at nothingness and he speaks into nothingness. And as soon as God speaks, “let there be…” before he even finishes his sentence, light appears and invades darkness. And God continued to speak the universe into existence.  So there was a rhythm that was established in Genesis 1 and it went like this, “God created day and night and it was good; God created the land and the seas and it was good; God created plants and animals and it was good; God created the sun and the moon and all the stars in the galaxies and it was good.” All of creation was good and creation was at perfect peace. The Hebrew word for it is “shalom.” I remember my first time listening to the orchestra at the Opera house. The conductor is playing one of Mozart’s piece. If you’ve been to an orchestra, you know how it goes. It begins with total silence. Then the conductor takes out his long chopstick. And with one swing of his chopstick, you hear a sound invades the silence. You hear the sound of the violin. Then at the next swing, you hear the sound of the cello. Another swing, the double bass. Then the flute, piano, and percussion come in and play their parts. All these sounds work together in harmony at the command on the conductor to create one amazing piece and I fell asleep in perfect peace. That’s shalom.

On the sixth day of creation, God decided to do something even more spectacular. Genesis 1:26-27 – ²⁶ Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” ²⁷ So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. This is extremely profound. Listen. God is self-sufficient. He is fine on his own and he does not need you or me to make himself feel better. God is never lonely. The fact that God refers to himself as “us” shows that God is in a perfect Trinitarian relationship with the Son and the Holy Spirit. They are in a relationship that love, serve and glorify each other perfectly and unconditionally. With another word, God is infinitely happy without you or me. But then, God created human and that is where our story began. Mark this. God did not create you and me out of necessity. I’ve heard some preacher said that God was lonely and that is why he created us. A thousand no! I’ve also heard that God created us to worship him as he cannot worship himself. A million no! God is perfect by himself and he does not have any unmet needs.

So the question is, why did God create anything? One thing we know for sure is that this God has no need for creation. God is content and happy for eternity. Therefore, for God to create, it cannot be out of need. Today, we create because we have a need. I cook because I have a need to feed my empty stomach. I create a sermon because I have a need to preach the sermon at this church. But the same cannot be said about a perfect God. A perfect God has no need. He is in a perfect relationship with the other members of the Trinity and therefore he is not lonely. So why did a perfect God create? There can only be one answer: overflow of joy. This is massive. You and I are not the products of chaos. You and I are the products of the overflow of God’s joy. My friend, creation began out of God’s overflow of joy. And you and I are the product of that joy. And not only that, the author of Genesis tells us that we are created in the image of God.

This is what theologians called Imago Dei. God makes human the head chief of all creation. We are to rule and have dominion as a representative of God. There are so many applications that can be drawn from Imago Dei. Let me just give you four of them. Number one, we can stop looking for affirmation from others. God takes notice of you. He thinks of you and he cares for you. If the God of the universe thinks of you, who cares about what others think? We are created in God’s image. We are not valuable because we have many followers on Instagram. You can 4000 followers or you can have four. Your dad, your mom, your sister and your brother. You are not more valuable because you have over 100 likes on your Instagram post. Your value does not depend on your hairstyle. You can have long hair, short hair, spike hair, lack of hair, or no hair. You can wear a suit, a ripped jeans, or a tank top. You can be tall, not so tall, not so short, or a dwarf. You can go to UTS, UNSW, Sydney Uni, Macquarie, LCB or others. You can be a preacher, a cleaner, a chef, a student or unemployed. None of it determines your value. Your value is built in the unchanging fact that you are created in God’s image and you are who God says you are.

Second, we can honour others. Let’s say there is a lesbian in our church. She is very open about her stand on LGBT and she comes to our church regularly. What would we do? First of all, regardless of what the law of our country says, homosexuality is a sin. It goes against the truth that God created male and female and that marriage is reserved between male and female. This is the unnegotiable truth of creation. Therefore, we will condemn the act of homosexuality. But, and this is a very important but, we also need to realise that this lesbian woman is also created in the image of God. Just because she rebelled against God’s design does not make her an exception to God’s image. Therefore, we will not shame, curse or demonize this woman. But rather, we have the responsibility to speak truth and grace into her life. We will invite her to our house, converse with her, love her, and speak the truth into her life. She might disagree strongly with our stand on homosexuality, but she can’t accuse us of not honouring her and loving her as a person. If we believe in Imago Dei, we would say that homosexuality is wrong, but we would not make the homosexuals think that they are the scums of the earth. So, we condemn homosexuality, but we offer grace to the homosexuals. Everyone is created in the image of God and every single individual is valuable. As much as our value is not defined by anything we do, others’ value is not defined externally. They are the reflection of God’s glory as much as we are. Therefore, we should respect and honour each other, looking at everything through God’s lens. We don’t value them based on their past, appearance, pain, hurt, and family. We treat everyone with respect and kindness and we never write people off. Everyone is precious in the eyes of God.

Third, we are not products of evolution. We are not. It does not matter what your science textbook says. There will be no planet of the apes. Human is the only one who is created in the image of God and given dominion over creation. Not apes. We are not animals and we are far more valuable than animals. Back in the days, I used to have a husky named Max. We loved Max. He was a gorgeous dog. Just looking at him guarding the house, I felt safe. So back then our family consisted of my dad, my mom, my 11 years old sister, 9 years old me, ka Iluh, and Max. Let me ask you a question. Let’s say for example that my family experience a financial difficulty and we need to save money, who goes? Let me tell you what my dad would not do. My dad would not think to himself, “Hmm, who cost me the most in the long run? Is it my wife? No, she hardly ever spends money. She is very Chinese. Is it my son? No, his happiness is simple. All he needs to be happy in life is KFC and fried rice. He is cost-efficient. Oh, I know who should go. It’s my daughter. She is the one who costs the most.” My dad would not do that. Even though, truth be told, my sister is a very high-cost woman. She has an expensive taste. But this is not a mathematical question. No one would suggest, “Get rid of your daughter. She is too costly.” It’s not even a question of convenient. If the measure is convenient, I’ll be the first to go. No one causes more headache to my parents than I do. But I hope we do know what the right answer is. Who goes? Max. No question or debate. Keeping Max will make life a lot easier for my parents. I’m sure Max is more obedient than me. But the measure is not cost or ease. We know instinctively that humankind has a special dignity above the rest of creation. We are not the same as animals. We are not the product of evolution. We are created in the image of God. We are given dominion over creation.

Fourth, we are created to display God. To be an image-bearer is to function like a statue. Why did you put up a statue or an image of someone? You put up an image of someone so that when people look at that image, they are reminded of that particular someone. So if we build a statue of Ps. Semuel in honour of the 23 years he has pastored this church, the purpose of that statue is for you to remember him every time you look at that statue. He might be in Indonesia and away from us but we remember him every time we look at his statue. This is the purpose of an image. “Will we build a statue of Ps. Sem?” I don’t think we need to. All you have to do to remember Ps. Semuel is to look at me. People say that if you want to know what Ps. Semuel looks like, all you have to do is to look at me and imagine me with a moustache. That is why I don’t have moustache. Why did God create man in his image? To represent God. God created little images of him so that we communicate who God is to one another and to the rest of creation. So, when people look at you, they not only see you but they are reminded of who God is. Today, we live in a culture that is obsessed about being original. They say things like, “Find yourself; be yourself because everyone else is taken.” Listen. You are not made to be original. You are made to reflect the original. Your goal in life is not to be yourself. Your goal in life is to represent God. That is who we are. The way we rule and have dominion over creation should reflect the glory of God. This is the purpose of Imago Dei.

God not only created humanity in his image, but God also give a mandate to human. Genesis 1:28 – ²⁸ And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” Human is blessed by God to exercise authority over the earth. God is the God of order. At this time, God is finished with creation. He has created everything and it was good. However, creation was still raw. Human is given the mandate to cultivate creation. It was good but it was not perfect. It’s like this. When I see all the ladies in this church right now, you are perfect. You are dressed nicely, and you have the right amount of foundation, lipstick and makeup in your face. You are perfect. But when you woke up this morning, you are not perfect; you are good. Do you see the difference? We are given the mandate to take the raw materials of creation and draw out its potential for the flourishing of everyone. With another word, we are created to work. Work is not a curse. Work is God’s idea for human from the very beginning. We are to subdue the earth and exercise dominion by working. In fact, God himself works. All kinds of work have dignity because God himself works with dust and we work because we are created in the image of God. There is no difference in dignity between secular work and works of ministry. Being a preacher of the gospel does not make one better than being a gardener. Both are part of God’s work.

Everything that God created was good. At the end of Genesis 2, God looked at his creation and said, “Sun, stars and galaxies are good. Land and ocean are good. The earth is good. The plants and animals are good. Food is good. Sex is good. Man and woman are good.” Everything worked in perfect harmony. There was shalom. Every part of creation screamed out to their Creator, “It is good.” The glory of creation reflects the glory of their Creator. All creation plays their parts in playing one beautiful symphony that had one main theme, “FOR THE GLORY OF GOD.” This is the first chapter of the grand narrative of the Bible.

Fall

Genesis 3:1-5 – Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” ² And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, ³ but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’” ⁴ But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. ⁵ For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

The very next word after God’s wonderful plan for humans is the words of deception. God is so gracious and loving but how easy it is for us to forget the grace of our God. The lie of the enemy is that God is holding something good from us. We forgot how good and loving and great God is. The serpent came up to the woman and say, “Did God actually say?” This is the enemy’s number one trick. In fact, this is his only trick. What the serpent tried to do was to make the woman questioned God’s character. The serpent was saying, “Are you sure that God has your best interest in mind? Are you sure that God loves you? If he loves you, why does he withhold the fruit from you? There must be something good that God does not want you to have. Can you trust this God?” The lie of the enemy is extremely illogical. Do you know how many prohibitions God gave to Adam and Eve? One. That’s it. Adam and Eve were free to do anything they wanted except for one. God gave them a million yes and one no. But the serpent ignored the million yes and focused on the one no. And the enemy is still using the same trick today.

Imagine if right now in front of you, you have two debit cards under your name. Each debit card has its own account that you can freely use. One of the accounts has $1 million and the other has $1. You can choose only one of them. Which one would you choose? If you are in your right mind, the number of zero in the account determine your choice. Even if the choice is between 6 zeros and 5 zeros, you would still go for six zeros. But the choice is truly between $1 million and $1. Does anyone need time to fast and pray before making the decision? No. You would choose a million in a heartbeat. To choose $1 over $1 million is illogical and insane. But that’s what Adam and Eve did. They chose the 1 thing that God said no over 1 million yes. You might be tempted to walk to them and slap them in the face and bring some sense back into them for their illogical decision. But that’s what you and I choose every time we choose to sin. Every time we sin, we question God’s goodness. We sin because we believe the lie of the serpent. We sin because we believe that very thing will satisfy our desire. Every time we sin, we believe the lies of the devil that God is withholding something good from us. That God does not want us to be happy. God is stingy. Therefore, it is up to us to pursue our own good. Sin is us trying to sit on God’s throne. Every time we sin, we choose $1 over $1 million. That $1 might buy us a soft-serve cone in this hot weather but $1 million can buy us an ocean of soft-serve. When we sin, we do not trust that God loves us. Sin is what happens when we lost a vision of the goodness of God. We are blind to who he is.

So, Adam and Eve ate the fruit of knowledge of good and evil. Their eyes were opened and they realized they were naked and at that moment, shame and guilt entered the creation. They sew fig leaves to cover their nakedness from each other. And then comes of the most heartbreaking verse in the whole Bible. Genesis 3:8 – And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. God came to the garden and rather than drawing near to God, Adam and Eve hid from God. Sin entered the creation and it changed the history of humanity forever.

There are four devastating consequences of sin. One, sin destroys relationship with God. Rather than running to God, we are running from God. God wants a relationship with us, but we hide from God. And sin makes us stupid. Think about it. God is the one who spoke every tree into existence and Adam and Eve tried to hide behind the trees. They thought that trees can hide them from God. It’s like playing hide and seek with a little kid. You walk into the living room and you see their feet under the curtain. And you say, “Where are you? I know you are here.” And you hear a voice saying, “No I am not.” That’s what we do with God. It is stupid but it is true. Ever since Adam and Eve sinned, everyone was born hiding from God. No one wants a relationship with God even though God wants a relationship with us.

Two, sin destroys relationship with self. Our eyes were opened and we realized we were naked. Shame entered and we tried to cover ourselves with fig leaves. That is why there is an innate longing inside all of us to prove ourselves. We are trying to cover ourselves with fig leaves to hide our sense of shame. But it does not matter how hard we try, it is never enough. Our life is like a treadmill. It functions like a circular pattern where you work so hard and yet you get nowhere. This is what happen we run on a treadmill at the gym. We get into our gym clothes, gym shoes, we get sweaty and smelly, we run hard, our heartbeats get faster, but at the end of the day, we are still in the same place. This is the way life works. Let me give you an example. Right now, I am taking a summer class. I have an assessment due soon. And I also have to preach today. So, this is how my week looks like. I wake up in the morning, go to the office and check office email, do all the office works that need to be done, and then I work on my assessment. When I am tired of doing my assessment, I work on my sermon prep. That’s pretty much my week. It took me about 20 hours to prepare 1 50 minutes English sermon. Add another 5 hours for Indo sermon. So right now, you are tasting my 20 hours of toil in sermon preparation. In about 20 minutes, I’ll be done with this sermon. Awesome. But guess how my week will look like next week? Pretty much the same. There will always be more assessment to do. There will always be the next sermon to prepare. It is a never-ending cycle. And let me tell you what happened. Some of you will like my sermon and thank me for it. Some of you hate my sermon already. It’s okay. I forgive you. But by next week, most of you won’t remember what I preach today. So here comes another cycle of me preaching to you for another 50 minutes. You remember it for a day or three if I am lucky. Then by the next Sunday, the cycle is repeated. There is always a sermon to prepare. There is always a laundry to do. There is always a meal to cook. There is always a bill to pay. There is nothing new under the sun. iPhone XI is not new. They had iPhone X last year and they will have iPhone XII next year. Yes, they can trick us momentary to feel like it is something new. But it only takes us three days to realize that our new iPhone XI is not so new anymore. And when iPhone XII is out, no one will remember the awesomeness of iPhone XI anymore. Right? Life is like a treadmill. It is fig leaves that cannot satisfy. We always look forward to the next big thing in life and yet no matter what we do, it is never enough.

Three, sin destroys relationship with others. Rather than affirming one another, sin caused us to blame one another. When God held Adam accountable for eating the fruit, what did Adam do? He blamed his wife. When God asked Eve, she blamed the serpent. Rather than give to one another, we demand from one another. Let’s take a quick survey. How many of you have been deeply hurt because of another person? Raise your left hand. How many of you have deeply hurt another person? Raise your right hand. If both of your hands are not raised, we are judging you right now. Relationship with one another is extremely difficult. In fact, relationship has its way to reveal what was broken in you that you never thought was there before.

Four, sin destroys relationship with nature. We know this. All we have to do is read the news and we will soon find out that the world we lived in is broken. We find news of natural disaster all the time. Earthquakes, tornados, volcanos, hurricanes, tsunamis, floods, diseases, bush fire. And not only natural disasters, but death also reminds us that there is something wrong with the world. Every time we go to a funeral, we are reminded that this is not the way it supposed to be. And one of the consequences of sin on nature is that all creation is right now groaning in the pain of childbirth. These are the consequences of sin. The serpent lied to Adam and Eve that they would not die when they ate the fruit. And yes, Adam and Eve did not die straight away when they disobeyed God, but it led to the death of relationships with God, self, others and nature. And the devil is still lying to us today that our sin will not have eternal consequences. But praise God that this is not the end of the story.

Redemption

Although the world is in chaos and everything is broken, God did not for one second lose control. Despite our rebellion toward God’s gracious love, God proceeds with his pre-determined plan from eternity. He does not leave us on our own. Look at what God does. First, God seeks sinners. This is beautiful. This is what separates Christianity from other religion. This is the story of the whole Bible. It is not us who seeks God but God who seeks us. It was Adam and Eve who disobeyed God and it was God who sought them. We are the one who sinned against God and yet it is God who took the initiative to restore our relationship with him.

He not only seeks us but second, God dies for sinners. Listen to what God said to the serpent. Genesis 3:15 – I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel. This is the first promise of the gospel. God promised that a day will come where the woman’s offspring will crush the serpent’s head. And the word offspring is singular, a single person. But that is not all to it. God also said that the serpent will bite his heel. With another word, there will be a battle. The poison of the serpent will hit this offspring and he will die. But that is not the end of the story because the offspring will also destroy the serpent’s head. My friend, this is the central message of the Bible. Genesis tells stories of how God preserves the offspring of this woman. Exodus shows a picture of what the offspring will do. Leviticus describes the standard that the offspring has to meet. Numbers recounts the provision that offspring will give. Deuteronomy outlines the laws that the offspring must fulfil. Joshua is the shadow of the deliverance that the offspring will perform. Do I need to go on? Sally Lloyd Jones says it best. “Every story whispers his name.” The central message of the Bible is the coming and the work of an offspring redeemer who destroy sin in its head. And the name of that promised offspring is Jesus. Jesus fought sin on our behalf. He was bruised for our transgression. Sin killed Jesus. In the fall, we take God’s place on the throne. In the redemption, God takes our place on the cross. And the good news of the gospel is that sin may think that it killed Jesus, but three days later, Jesus is risen from the death and crush sin in its head. Jesus triumphed over sin once and for all at the cross.

And as if that is not awesome enough, God did another thing. Third, God covers sinners. Genesis 3:21 – And the Lord God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them. God saw Adam and Eve tried to cover their shame with fig leaves and it was not working. So, God killed an innocent animal, blood was shed, and God made a garment out of the animal’s skin to cover Adam and Eve. This is another foreshadow of Jesus. God will sacrifice his innocent son, his blood will be shed, and God will clothe sinners with his son’s righteousness. So today if you put your faith in Jesus, you are not only forgiven of your sins, you are clothed with Jesus’ righteousness. You no longer have to cover yourself with fig leaves. You are covered by the blood of Jesus. This is what it means to be Christians. To be Christian does not mean trying hard to live a good life but trusting in Christ’s work alone for your life.

Restoration

It leads us to the fourth chapter of the narrative of the Bible. In Genesis 1 and 2, we have the story of God’s good creation. In Genesis 3, we have the story of fall and redemption. And from this point forward, the story of the Bible is about the fulfilment of God’s promises of redemption and the promise of restoration. Here is a spoiler alert. I am going to tell you how our story and the story of the Bible ends. There is coming a day when there will be no sin and suffering, no pain and sickness, no death and sorrow. Where all who trust in Jesus will be fully restored and we will have a perfect relationship with God, self, others and nature. God himself will wipe away the tears from our eyes. And the best of all, God will be with us and we will be with God. The world that is to come will not only be like the world before the fall. It will be even better than before the fall. But that day has not come yet. We are on our way there. Today, we still experience many disappointments and frustrations that are caused by sin. But one day, sin will be no more. And until that day come, we have a mandate from God. We are given the responsibility to be God’s representative on earth. We are to reflect God’s image wherever we are. We are called to bring God’s kingdom on earth. How do we do it? Listen to Jesus’ words.

Matthew 28:18-20 – ¹⁸ And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹ Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Church, the end of history has been written. Christ wins. This is the reason we are alive. To let the world know the good news of the gospel. Our stories are a small part of God’s big story that points to Christ. There is an invitation from the author of our story for us to stop living small and start living big. Stop living as if we are the main characters of our story and start living God’s story where Jesus is the main character of the story. Will we go and live our lives for his story? Because history is his story.

Discussions:

1. Can you see how you try to be the main character of your life? Give some examples.
2. What does it mean for God to be self-sufficient? What does it say about us and creation?
3. Look at the four applications of Imago Dei. Which one strikes you the most and why?
4. What is the only trick of the enemy? Can you give some examples from daily life on how the enemy is still trying to lie to us using the same trick?
5. Out of the four consequences of sin, which one do you think affects you the most?
6. Read Genesis 3:15. This verse is famously known as the first promise of the gospel. Explain why.
7. How does understanding God’s big story helps us to make sense of our lives? What is our role in this big story?