Mankind In The World | Voddie Baucham

thank you if you have your Bibles with you open them to Genesis 1. I I think I'm supposed to get you out of here by nine don't don't think don't think that's going to happen but uh as you open the Genesis chapter one tell you a story again we've been in in Lusaka for the last seven years and went to help start the African Christian University and and a story that just sort of brought home to me what that was all about and what it was going to be about occurred not long after we had been there we've been there I guess about a year and and we we got a dog and we we got a Boerboel now for those who don't know uh bourbals were were one of two Southern African breeds that were bred to hunt lions and the verbals that the Dutch Southern African farmers were called boers the Boerboel is The Boar's dog and uh so the warbles would protect the farm and protect cattle against Lions they're big dogs they're they're they're they're South African Mastiffs and and they're and and they are they're they're just really big Fierce dogs who ain't scared of nothing they'll defend you against man or beast and your kids can ride them and they won't mess with the kids as long as your kid's not a lion just wonderful dogs and so our our boerble that we had then as he was a puppy and and um his name is Atticus Finch so I was I was training Atticus and we'd gotten to a point in this training where we needed sort of increase distractions so we lived across the street from this this restaurant that had a big field out in front of it and it was a roundabout and cars riding by all the time so I would take him over there on a really long lead and just worked through some of his commands in a place where he could be distracted you know and learn to listen and so I'm go over there I've gone over there several days and a guy comes out Zambian guy he comes out and he just wants to ask me about this dog that he's seen me with and he just he says well what kind of dog is that like it's a it's a it's a boerble I mean there you know it's breed that's common in this region of the world right breed was developed in this region of the world they're all over the place you know this is adorable he goes hey I know Suburban but like what but but like what kind that's like it's just just a just adorable and after a while I realized what he was asking me he wanted to know where I found a dog that spoke English because zambians are not about training dogs you get a dog you you lock it up during the day you let him out at night inside your wall fence so the burglars are scared zombies for the most are very fearful of dogs because dogs are not trained they're not part of the family so he was watching me every day talking to this dog and this dog doing what I told the dog to do and he was like man I gotta get me one of those and if you could have seen the look on his face when I told him you could do this with any dog and so I just started explaining to him the Dominion mandate the cultural mandate where God creates man and gives him dominion over the birds of the air and the Beast of the field and and how this was part of what it looks like to take Dominion and so we got to talking about you know me while I was there I mean it's obvious that you know I wasn't from around those parts and you could tell from my accent that I was an American and he thought that maybe I had you know come there for this because I talked to him about you know how you know where I live I mean they got dogs that do everything man they got dogs who are you know in the military and they got dogs who worked with the police and they got dogs who did you know I mean just all kind of stuff so he thought maybe I'd come to Zambia to help train dogs to do this stuff and I said no no I came here to teach theology and that in a nutshell was for me part of the difficulty of helping people there understand what we were doing at African Christian University but it wasn't just there that it was difficult it was also difficult when I would come here to help people understand what we were doing at African Christian University because you know for the for the first I guess couple of years that we were there I would come back here just like I do now come back three or four times a year and uh do a preaching tour and and people would say oh yeah that's right you went to Zambia so you could help you could start a seminary I said no it's not a seminary I said oh so you can start a Bible no to start a university and they would just sort of look at me like the Zambian guy did what I told him you could train a dog if I told people that we went over there to start a seminary they would have been like yeah I get that if I told him we went over there started Bible College yeah I get that tell them went over there to start a classical Christian liberal arts university where people are studying Agriculture and business and education and Fine Arts and we're working toward you know the hard Sciences like biology and chemistry and we want engineers and lawyers and doctors and their eyes just rolled the back of their head why would you go do that because of the Dominion mandate God did not create man so that every man could be a preacher let me say it again God did not create man so that every man could be a preacher he created man and he gave us a mandate I love preaching amen I want to do it till I die in fact ideally for me I I died doing it just preach die I want you to ask yourself a question why do you think it is that there is such growing discontentment with men and women in the church but the discontentment with women there's just this growing number of women who for example want to be preachers women who love theology they want to be preachers and they don't understand why they can't be preachers and they feel like God's doing them a disservice because they can't be preachers young men who feel like the church really doesn't have anything to offer them and not always but in many instances this comes down to us failing to comprehend or failing to appreciate the cultural mandate that we have in Genesis chapter one failing to comprehend and failing to appreciate the fact that God created us to exercise Dominion to subdue the Earth and that's what I want us to look at here tonight this cultural mandate of ours that all of us are called to be part of that all of us were created to be part of Genesis chapter one beginning in verse 26. then God said let's make man in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea over the birds of the heavens over the livestock over all the Earth over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth so God created man in his own image in the image of God he created a male and female he created them and God blessed them and God said to them be fruitful and multiply fill the Earth and subdue it have dominion over the fish of the sea over the birds of the heavens over every living thing that moves on the earth and God said behold I've given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the Earth and every tree with seed in its fruit you shall have them for food and to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth everything that has the breath of life I have given every green plant for food and it was so and God saw everything that he had made and behold it was very good and there was evening and there was morning the sixth day now pay close attention what happens next thus the heavens and the Earth were finished and all the host of them and I want you to pay attention to a a word that's going to be repeated here and on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done and rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done so God blessed the seventh day and made it holy because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation three times three times before we move on let me just draw this principle out for you work is not a product of the Fall work is not a product of the Fall the arduous nature of our work is a product of the Fall our laziness in the face of the work that we have to do is a product of the Fall if you can't say Amen you ought to say ouch the the fact that that this world that God created and in which God has placed us doesn't cooperate with us but actually works against us in our work that's a product of the fall but work itself is not a product of the Fall it's holy and set apart because God is the first worker we work because we are made in the image of The God Who works and here's a news flash we're going to work in the new heavens and new earth and it's going to be good verse 4. these are the generations of the heavens and the Earth when they were created in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens when no Bush of the field was yet in the land and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up for the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the land and there was no man to work the ground and amidst was going up from the land and was watering the whole face of the ground then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the Breath of Life and the Man became a living creature again we just heard about this from the perspective of the new creation the re-creation the Regeneration and the Lord God planted a garden in Eden in the east and there he put the man whom he had formed and out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is Pleasant to the site and good for food the tree of life was in the midst of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and Evil this is a portion of scripture that has taken on Amazing new depth of meaning for me over the last seven years because what I did not understand was how much of the culture in which I had lived the culture in which I was born the culture in which I had prospered I did not understand how much of this culture had been impacted by not just the proclamation of the Gospel but actually a Biblical worldview and specifically as it relates to work and what has come to be understood as the Protestant work ethic I didn't get that I I didn't understand how much worldview impacted the way cultures view work and the way cultures exercise and execute their work I didn't get that I didn't understand that I've begun to understand that didn't understand the significance and the importance of investing in that I tell you when it came home to me a couple of years ago when I headed back after a winter tour and after doing this conference and a number of other conferences and and I got home and was in acute heart failure y'all remember that and when that happened I was glad grateful to God that he got me back to this place where people have been able to invest in the kind of medical advances that saved my work that saved my life here that weren't available to me there yes we want preachers there yes we want the gospel to go forth there but we also want good doctors and that's our calling in the cultural mandate hear me those of you who have not been called to preach you are not less than you are not less Christian you are not less important you are not less significant in the grand scheme of things because God did not put us here so that we could just sit in church so that we could just read our Bibles and then do nothing with what we learned but he intended that the world would be impacted and that the world would be shaped and that the world would be formed and that the world would be transformed as we carried out this mandate there's three categories of trees that we see here that I want to point out for you the one is the most obvious one the category of the trees that are good for food we get that we understand that there are trees there so that we can eat amen hallelujah praise the Lord earlier on if you go back to earlier in the passage look for example at verse 31. and sorry go back further than that go back to verse 29. God said behold I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the Earth and every tree with its seed and its fruit you shall have them for food simple statement you shall have them for food in other words there are things God says that I have planted here in the Earth on the earth that are here for you to be able to feed and sustain yourself but not just to feed and sustain yourself go with me to the end of the Bible That's the beginning of the Bible go with me to the end of the Bible and go with me to revelation 22. then the angel showed me the river of water of life bright as Crystal flowing from the Throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city also on either side of the river the Tree of Life with its 12 kinds of fruit yielding its fruit each month the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the Nations so creation begins there in a garden and it begins there with these trees and creation ends with another tree but this tree is not just to sustain but it's for the healing of the Nations interestingly enough these trees that God put in the garden were there as well with healing properties to sustain us and part of this Dominion mandate is for us to take those things that God has given us and cultivate them so that we can be sustained by them it's part of why we're here but that's the most obvious one what about the ones that are not as obvious look at the text again in verse 9. out of the ground the Lord God made spring up every tree that is Pleasant to the sight and good for food every tree that is Pleasant to the site and good for food that second type of tree we get that second type of tree I'm sure Adam God in fact can you imagine when Adam got that can you imagine when God first took Adam to a tree and said this is for food this is for you taste this imagine the fruit from a tree in an unfallen Garden I mean just you know come on now and then there's another one and you taste that fruit and another one and you taste that fruit and then in my mind's eye I can see Adam going to another tree and looking for fruit on that tree and not finding fruit on that tree and saying okay all of these trees over here I understand that that one gives me this fruit and that one gives me that fruit and but this one doesn't seem to have any fruit on it is it a useless tree no it's not useless then why is it here because it's beautiful and I didn't put you here just to eat I put you here to enjoy the beauty of the creation that I've made and also to emulate it in the work that you do look down with me if you will beginning of verse 10. a river flowed out of Eden again we see a river at the end of the book to water the garden and they're divided and became Four Rivers the name of the first is Pichon and it is the one that flowed around the whole land of havilah where there is gold and the gold of that land is good dellium and Onyx Stone are there God did not put gold there so that Adam could eat it he put it there so that Adam could make glorious and beautiful things because God is concerned about that in fact look with me if you will a couple of passages of scripture in Exodus look in Exodus 21 for example verse 1. then bring near to you Aaron your brother and his sons with him from among the people of Israel to serve me as priests Aaron and Aaron's son nadab and abahu eliezar and ithamar and you shall make holy garments for Aaron your brother for Glory and for beauty you shall speak to all the skillful whom I have filled with a spirit of skill that they make Aaron's garments to consecrate him for my priesthood God these individuals with skill God by his spirit filled them with skill so that Aaron could have garments that were skillfully made to set him apart in his service not just these garments go to Exodus 35. Exodus 35 verse 30. foreign then Moses said to the people of Israel see the Lord has called by name Bizzle the son of URI son of her of the tribe of Judah and he has filled him with the spirit of God with skill with intelligence with knowledge and with all craftsmanship to devise artistic designs to work in gold and silver and bronze in cutting stones for setting and in carving wood for work in every skilled craft and he has inspired him to teach both him and a holy AB the son of ahisamak of the tribe of Dan he has filled them with skill to do every sort of work done by an engraver or by a designer or by an embroider in blue and purple and Scarlet Yarns and fine-twined linen or by a weaver by any sort of workman or skilled designer and the holy ad and every Craftsman in whom the Lord has put skill and intelligence to know how to do any work in the construction of the sanctuary shall work in accordance with all the Lord has commanded the priesthood is important Aaron was an important man and God filled him with his spirit so that he could serve God's people as a priest but God also filled the Craftsman with his spirit so that they could make him glorious and beautiful garments to serve God in God's Temple was a place for God's presence to dwell and God would fill that place the Tabernacle with his very presence but that same God filled these workers and these Craftsmen with that same spirit so that they could with skill build beautiful and glorious things so that they could be inhabited by God we could go on and talk about musicians that God filled with his spirit so that they might serve the Lord in the temple and many others whom God filled with his spirit and and I believe in this tree or this category of trees that were there because they were beautiful God gives us a theological foundational principle that God created us not just so that we could eat and so that we could work to feed and sustain ourselves but also so that the work of our hands would emulate the work of our God in making things that are beautiful and glorious it's part of our mandate it's part of why we're here so we're here to work yes we're here to work in order to feed and sustain ourselves yes we're here to work in order to make things that are beautiful and glorious yes but there's another category of trees the tree of life was in the midst of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil our work sustains us our work brings beautiful and glorious things into the world but our work governed by the righteous law of God our creator that's what this category of tree reminds us of and it ends up being the most important category of trees because when Adam eats from the tree that the law of God specifically told him not to eat from sin enters the world and I want you to see what sin does look in chapter three and look at verse 17. and to Adam he said because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you you shall not eat of it cursed is the ground because of you in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life you you will still eat from that which I've provided but it will be a painful and arduous process you will still be sustained by that which I've put in creation but sometimes there will be drought and you won't be able to feed yourself as readily as you had been able to thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you and you shall eat the plants of the field by the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground for out of it you were taken for your dust and to dust you shall return not only difficulty but death and so here we are created in the image of God and given this amazing cultural mandate to go and make the rest of the world like the garden this amazing cultural mandate to go and enjoy all that God has created for us to go and sustain ourselves with all that God has made for us with this amazing mandate to go and make beautiful things like the God who created us and the world that he placed Us in to make beautiful things to make glorious things and then the fall happens and now is is there no hope no there is hope why because there's another tree and those first set of trees we see the opportunity for sin and sin enters the world because man misuses a tree disobeys God's instruction about a tree but then we see that at the end of the age at the end of the book that there is a restoration and there is that tree of life but how do we get from the fall and the curse and all of these things going wrong to the place where we enter into that Garden again and have that tree of life the answer is another tree the tree on which Our Savior dies the tree on which he receives in himself in his body the penalty that was due to our sins the tree on which he hangs and lays down his life so that he could give us life and it is only because of this middle tree that we have any hope of partaking in the last one but don't miss this Saints and here's what we miss usually our understanding goes something like this we had those first trees and Adam messed it up we're heading toward that last tree and the last Adam is going to Usher us in so now we celebrate that middle tree we proclaim the truth of the gospel and point people to that middle tree in hopes that they get to that last tree but you missed the step Adam's fall didn't negate the cultural mandate and us coming to faith in Christ doesn't just open up for us the hope of getting to the last tree being made new creatures in Christ ought also to transform the way we view the cultural mandate turn with me to one more Passage Matthew 28. Matthew 28. beginning at verse 16. now the 11 disciples went to Galilee to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them when they saw him they worshiped him but some doubted and Jesus came and said to them all authority in heaven and on Earth has been given to me go therefore and Make Disciples of all Nations baptizing them in the name of the father and the son and of the Holy Spirit and by all means don't stop at verse 19. teaching them to observe all that I've commanded you and behold and with you always to the end of the age I believe in my heart of hearts that our job is not just to teach people how to get to heaven but it's to teach them how to serve and obey the Lord Jesus Christ in every area Avenue and aspect of their lives to teach them the Glorious and beautiful truth that God has called and gifted them in a variety of ways and that the same God who used gifted and skilled people on whom he poured out his spirit so that they could make Aaron's garments so that they could build the Tabernacle so that they could play skillfully in the temple that same God continues to pour out his Spirit on his people so that they can do great and glorious things in his name and make their little part of the world look more like the garden I've changed the way that I respond to certain people for example when when women would talk to me about you know preaching and wanting to preach and all of this it's always the same they come and they you know talk about um you know the feeling like they have these gifts and they want to exercise these gifts and they don't think it's fair that they have these gifts and they don't get to exercise these gifts you know why would God give them these gifts and he didn't want them to exercise these gifts and you know and and and and I I do I do that all the time I hear this I hear this all the time and there's a couple of things I tell people number one nobody gets to exercise all their gifts amen nobody gets to exercise all their gifts I don't get to exercise on my gifts I don't nobody gets to exercise all their gifts that's a terrible argument here's the other problem the other problem is you've bought a lie that says the only way that you can be useful in the Kingdom is if you're a Bible teacher from the platform and that's just simply not the case God has given you place in his garden a place in his Vineyard and he says to you wherever that place is make it look more like the Garden today than it did yesterday if that place is raising your children in the discipline and instruction of the Lord do not despise the Lord's good gifts and the Lord's good calling but you flourish in that place and you make that home where you're raising those children look more like the Garden today than it did yesterday and you teach your children how to take their gifts and their abilities so that when God puts them in whatever corner of the garden he's called them to be in that they learn from you that their job is to make that little corner of the garden look more like the garden that God created today than it did yesterday wherever that place may be to the glory of God and to do it with excellence and with great skill can you imagine think about those passages that we read and just imagine what it would be like to walk up to an Engraving on the temple or the Tabernacle or to walk up to Aaron's garnet and to look at the Glorious and magnificent detail and say this was the work of someone filled with the spirit of the Living God oh that we would take our little corner of the garden that seriously all that people would look at us as Christians and say you know what I hate them I hate their Jesus I hate everything they stand for but one thing you can't take away from them the joy that they take in serving their God through pursuing truth beauty and goodness and their little corner of the garden and not just the joy but the great satisfaction so here's what's interesting about that man who wanted to know where he could find a dog who spoke English the conversation turned very quickly to this same Dominion mandate and after the conversation turned very quickly to this same Dominion mandate we got to talk about why I would leave here and go there and and Africans ask me that all the time they do like like why are you here well we came here to help you know start this University so you left America yes you left America were you were your were your parents does that mean no my parents weren't Zambia my family's been in America since the 1700s they came as slaves because you all sold us to the white man but that's that's a whole nother story for a whole nother day right and ultimately it opened the door to have a conversation about those trees at the beginning of creation and that tree at the end of creation and that tree in the middle on which Our Savior died because you cannot divorce the creation mandate from our Great Commission because when God created man in His image and in his likeness he gave us that mandate and When sin entered the world sin didn't just Mar our souls admired our whole world and in Romans 8 Paul tells us that all creation is groaning in anticipation because even the Earth will be redeemed because it matters to God so just like he turns us into new creations this Fallen world that we live in will be turned into a new creation because it matters to God so treat your corner of this creation like you believe it matters to God because it does let's pray oh our great God our good God and creator our great God creator and Redeemer our great God and Father and the father of our Lord Jesus Christ we bow before you today as the humble work of your hands acknowledging the fact that you created us in your image and you created us with purpose not just that our souls might be redeemed but that our very world might be redeemed and that has redeemed Sons and Daughters of God we would pursue righteousness and holiness but that we would also pursue truth and beauty and goodness Grant by your grace that we might hold firmly to these two mandates that we might be a people who are passionate about souls and that we might also be a people who are passionate about Redeeming the time and redeeming our corner of this Garden and that's you redeem us and our world Grant by your grace that we might look forward with anxious anticipation to that day when all things will be restored and made new and Grant this we pray in Christ's name and for his sake oh man

Channel: Founders Ministries

Views: 253,109

Keywords: Founders Ministries, Tom Ascol, Founders, Reformed Theology, 1689 Confession, Reformed, Founders Ministry, Founders Conference, Voddie Baucham, Voddie Baucham Sermon, 2023 Founders Conference, founders conference 2023, founders conference 2023 paul washer, founders conference sermons, biblical anthropology, biblical anthropology (the study of man), nfc24, founders, founders ministries conference 2023, voddie Baucham, creation mandate, voddie baucham sermons, cultural mandate

Id: JXdAMxK1oxE

Length: 53min 52sec (3232 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 13 2023