| Subscribe to our email list |
Have any questions? We’d love to chat. Call us at (303) 495-3345, or email us at contact@denverpres.org
The Bible recounts for us the dramatic unfolding of God’s ongoing interaction with humanity. Knowing the plot and our role in the story enables us to make sense of life as we experience it, infuses every aspect of reality with meaning and significance, and informs the manner in which we respond to the circumstances and opportunities we encounter on a daily basis.
In the opening scene, God creates the world, and makes human beings in such a way that they resemble Him more closely than anything else He has made. The Creator assigns to these special creatures a unique role: to be the apprentices through whom He will continue His ongoing creative work in the world. They are given the responsibility of applying their strokes to the canvas, adding their notes to the symphony begun by the Master. God looks with approval upon the world He has made. Though just beginning, it is already a theater of creativity, beauty, wonder and harmony.
The story takes a sudden and tragic turn. The first humans reject their role as apprentices and declare themselves the masters. But they quickly learn that autonomy is overrated. As the unavoidable consequence of being cut off from the only source of life and wisdom, their initial experiences of intimacy, harmony, flourishing and life fade into alienation, chaos, frustration and death.
But out of love for humanity and for His world, God intervenes. To set all things right again, the Creator (and now Redeemer) declares that He will heal the fundamental disease of which all the afflictions of our world are but symptoms – the severed relationship between Himself and His apprentices.
The story spans millennia, climaxing in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth – God Himself in the flesh. Because human beings could never come near to God, God Himself came near to us, becoming one of us in order to heal the relationship that provides the only context in which humanity can truly flourish, and in which the entire world will be restored to its original state of harmony.
Because the ultimate cure has already been effected through the person and work of Jesus, God assures us of the ultimate fate of humanity and of the world. All that has gone wrong will be set right. The earth will be renewed. Humanity will be made whole. God will once again dwell upon the earth in our midst.
“Behold, the dwelling place of God is with humanity. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” (Revelation 21:3-4)
Being participants in this story enables us to experience and express our faith in every sphere of life. The main plot of the story is Creation. Knowing the purpose for which we were made infuses all of our relationships, creative endeavors, intellectual discoveries, recreational activities and enjoyment of the labors of others with a deep sense of meaning.
The subplot of Redemption enables participants to make sense of the universal human recognition that things are not the way they are supposed to be, either in our own lives or in the world around us. Knowing that God is setting everything right again fills us with hope that our unfulfilled longings for wholeness, intimacy, justice and beauty will ultimately be satisfied. It is in this hope that participants are motivated to optimistic and compassionate activism, seeking to bring about in the present partial glimpses of the complete restoration that Jesus will bring about in the future.
Since this is a very long story spanning cultures, continents and centuries, we recognize that we are by no means the first or only participants in it. As a congregation of the Presbyterian Church in America, we are part of an historic Christian body that traces its organizational origins back to the 16th century Protestant Reformation. As one household in the extended Christian village, we embrace as fellow citizens all churches that celebrate the statements of faith affirmed by Christians since the 2nd century, and which treasure the books of the Bible, composed over nearly two millennia, as the reliable and indispensable means by which God reveals Himself and nurtures His people in all ages.
We are children of grace
We are participants in a story
We are agents of reconciliation
