In This Is Love (part 3)

Nevertheless, despite his failure, it remains the case that Adam, according to Scripture, which is written with a conceptual framework dominated by Jewish tradition and custom, is thought of as the son of God. The Scriptures posit multiple sons of God. Indeed, to remain consistent with terminology employed by the author, Scripture contains multiple revelations of the sons of God. This is quite important to consider as we make our return trip to the place of our embarkation upon the theological, Christological, and missiological voyage of this study, which was the tenth verse of the fourth chapter of this first letter of John. Even the author’s own choice of words and structure spur us on to a remembrance of the multiple revelations of God’s sons, as we see the regular usage of “revealed” throughout the third chapter, and on into the fourth chapter.

The repeated use of “revealed” in the third chapter seem to hang on and gain their meaning from the most direct and purposeful statement in connection with the word, which was that the Son of God was revealed to destroy the works of the devil. Here, we make note of the fact that this author is not alone in his appeal to the revelation of the Son of God (or sons of God) as an obvious part of the divine plan of the Creator. In his letter to the Romans, the Apostle Paul engages in similar rhetoric, writing that “the creation eagerly waits for the revelation of the sons of God… in hope that the creation itself will also be set free from the bondage of decay into the glorious freedom of God’s children” (8:19,20b-21). Can we not surmise what Paul is implying by use of such language? Can we not equate the setting free of creation, in connection with the revelation of the sons of God, with the destruction of the works of the devil? Doing so does not at all seem like an unrealistic or implausible application of the premise.

So now we have two New Testament witnesses to the idea of the revelation of the sons of God, which should certainly lead us to explore this idea. The application of the title of son, in relation to God, is not limited to Adam and Jesus. Adam is merely the first. He is the first to be given a task related to destroying the works of the devil, with this task connected to his righteousness, or his being righteous, and that in the context of faithfulness to a covenant. The second son, or at least the second explicit reference to a son whose revelation is in connection with a charge to do battle with the works of the devil, with this son-ship presented in a manner consistent with that of Adam (righteousness---covenant faithfulness marked out by obedience to specific commands), is the nation of Israel.

It is necessary to qualify this statement for a number of reasons. The first reason is that Adam, in Genesis, is never referred to as the son of God. We only see this for the first time in the Gospel of Luke, while at the same time realizing that it reflects a long-held opinion. The first Scriptural reference to sons of God occurs in the sixth chapter of Genesis, where we read that “the sons of God saw that the daughters of humankind were beautiful. Thus they took wives for themselves from any they chose” (6:2). God’s reaction to this is indicative that such activity was not pleasing to God, as the text there quickly progresses to the pointing out of the wickedness of humankind (6:5). Clearly, these sons were not sons purposefully revealed to destroy the devil’s works, and there is no reference to any type of covenant of obedience.

Continuing our qualification of the insistence that Israel is the second in the line of definitively regarded sons of God, we must also take note of Abraham. Clearly, Abraham is given a covenant, and that covenant carries with it terms that will allow for the demonstration of his obedience. In his case it was circumcision. Also, righteousness is a term regularly associated with Abraham, and as we think through the divine promises to Abraham, it is rather clear that God reveals Himself to Abraham, and in turn reveals Abraham to the world, for the purpose of destroying the works of the devil. This may be especially seen in light of the fact that Abraham will come to be identified as the father of the faithful, with all of those that eventually gain status of being a part of God’s covenant people, both before, during, and after the time of Christ, referred to as children of Abraham.

Abraham may not have thought of himself as having the role of destroyer of the devil’s works, and this may be true of Adam as well, but we are concerned with the worldview of the author, and with what that means for us as that worldview shaped his communication to the church of Christ. Abraham makes his Scriptural appearance after the height of man’s rebellious activity, which was the tower of Babel, as mankind gathered together in one place to make a name for themselves, thereby rejecting God’s implied command to inhabit the whole of the created world. This rejection of responsibility could most certainly be identified as the work of the devil, and is equivalent to what Adam had done. Abraham’s call represented the beginning of God’s corrective measures, and we always serve ourselves quite well by remembering that the church (God’s covenant people) does not begin with Jesus and His disciples, but with Abraham.