From Beginning to Forever: A Study of the Grand Narrative of ScriptureSample

In its first few pages, the Bible provides us with answers to our questions of identity, community, and purpose. Through the words of Moses, God was showing Israel and us that our best lives are lived in community with Him and His people, under His rule and blessing.1 By showing us who He is, we are able to understand who we are called to be and what we are called to do in His world.

Before we can fully understand who we are, we have to first understand who God is, specifically what He has revealed about Himself in Scripture.

Read Genesis 1:1.

God’s first description of Himself shows He alone is God. No other being, animal, or part of nature rivals His authority; He alone is sovereign.

Not only did God create by His word, His word was created out of nothing! Only God has the power to do this, and therefore, in the first sentence of the Bible, He established Himself as the One who has full control and authority over all of creation. Since He created the world, He alone gets to determine how His creation lives.

Now that we have learned what the creation narrative tells us about God, let’s see what it tells us about our divine identity and purpose.

Read Genesis 1:26-28.

We were designed to reflect the good and true attributes of God to the world. By interacting with us or seeing how we interact with others, people should be able to know what God is like.

In addition to our divine design as image bearers, the creation narrative also shows us our divine purpose.

As King, God has given us the responsibility to steward His creation, helping it to flourish. We have been given the royal role of vice-regents (a person who acts in place of a ruler, governor, or sovereign), representing God’s reign over creation and exercising dominion on His behalf.

The answers to our questions about identity, purpose, and belonging are found within the opening pages of Scripture. We serve a sovereign God, who alone holds all authority as King. He has made us in His image and given us the responsibility to cultivate the world He created; our best life is found in community with God. But as we will see tomorrow, when we try to find the answers to these questions outside of God, things quickly take a turn for the worst.

1. Graeme Goldsworthy, The Goldsworthy Trilogy (Milton Keynes, England: Paternoster, 2000), 54; Vaughan Roberts, God’s Big Picture (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002), 22.