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the objective side of glory.
Acknowledged Glory
acknowledged glory can also be called the subjective side of glory.
the glory cycle pertains to humanity as a whole, within epochs of history, but is relevant to each of us personally.
good news! The gospel has launched fame’s recovery.
When God begins to restore human glory through the gospel, a cycle of glory recovery ensues for all creation—and this simultaneously restores God’s own glory.
Stage 1: God’s Glory
God’s intrinsic glory can never be diminished or be found lacking.
Love in English has strong emotional, psychological, individualistic, and sexual overtones that are not intended in the Hebrew.
Hesed is about displayed care: actions that show loyalty, faithfulness to promises, and practical concern for the well-being of others.
God’s acknowledged glory.
If God’s fullest glory is to be achieved, humans must be summoned to acknowledge God’s worth.
All creation is urged to acknowledge God’s glory.
when God’s glory is not acknowledged, God experiences an overall glory deficit. God’s intrinsic glory can never decrease, but his acknowledged glory has eroded.
Stage 2: Humans Given Glory to Rule
God created humans in his image in order to rule for him.
derivative glory
Proper image-bearing increases glory for humans, creation, and God.
Question: What is the chief end of man? Answer: God created humans in his image to rule creation on his behalf, so that creation could experience God’s glory derivatively through local human rule. The end result is glory for creation, humans, and above all God.
Since God is its source and final end, the recovery of human glory accelerates the restoration of God’s glory.
Humans must reflect God’s intrinsic glory in an undiminished fashion if God’s acknowledged glory is to reach its fullness.
God’s intrinsic glory can never be diminished, but a full attainment of God’s acknowledged glory depends on a maximal recovery of human glory.
Stage 3: Failure in Carrying Glory
what if we were to think of salvation in a less self-centered way? What if we were to put God’s problem at the center of salvation rather than ours? And secondarily creation’s problem?
God’s salvation problem is this: how can I reestablish my glory (honor) amid humans for their sake, for creation’s sake, and for my own sake?
When we see that our it-is-all-about-human-guilt-and-forgiveness way of conceptualizing the bad news is self-centered, we are in a better position to discern the gospel’s most urgent why. Above all, we must recognize this: the bad news is not merely that we deserve death and punishment. It’s far worse.
God isn’t just trying to erase our guilt. He is trying to undo harm and restore honor.
the deepest problem is not human guilt per se. Rather human sin causes a glory deficit that jeopardizes all creation.
The problem is loss of glory through a foolish exchange.
When we worship dehumanizing empty idols—and we’ve all done this—there is a glory exchange.
Paul’s summary is blunt: “All have sinned and are lacking the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23, AT). First, let’s notice what Paul does not say, even though he tends to be misread on this point. Paul does not say, “All have sinned and fall short of God’s perfect standard for holiness,” nor does he say, “All have sinned and fall short of God’s just requirements of the law.” Humans do need rescue because they fall short of God’s perfect moral standard and his just requirements, but that isn’t Paul’s precise point here. Paul keeps a God’s-eye view of the salvation problem, seeing how sin is disrupting
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As human glory has declined, God’s glory or reputation has diminished too.
what is the bad news? Our failure to make God’s glory present through our image-carrying leads to lost glory for God, humans, and creation. What is the gospel? Paul describes it as “the gospel of the glory of the Christ, who is the image of God” (2 Cor. 4:4, AT). The gospel is that by fully bearing God’s glorious image, King Jesus has initialized glory’s recovery.
When humans cease to worship the living God and instead worship bankrupt idols—money, power, sex, tolerance, and diversity—there is a disruption in glory.
glory deficit
stage 4 in the glory cycle: how the gospel initiates glory’s recovery.
The gospel is that God is in the process of restoring glory through Jesus the rescuing King, who:
Because creation needs humans to rule per God’s design, the gospel starts with the gift of a human who is born to reign flawlessly.
The incarnation is foundational to the gospel because the problem that God is trying to correct is a lack of his glory amid creation—a deficit that exists because humans are not carrying God’s glory to it in their image-bearing.
When the Son takes on human flesh, flawlessly bearing God’s image, then bankrupt humanity suddenly has an opportunity to view God’s unimpeded glory. Now a human, Jesus, is doing precisely what God designed all humans to do.
King Jesus is the paradigm for humanity. In fact, Jesus’s favorite title for himself, the Son of Man, means the person that best represents the category “human.”
The enfleshment of the Son is the good news that begins glory’s recovery.
The future ideal king—“the one to come”—is the human prototype on the basis of which God crafted Adam. Adam appeared first in time, but Adam was crafted in anticipation of the model human—the king!—who would arrive in the future.
even if Adam and Eve had not sinned, the incarnation would have happened anyway. Prior to the fall, the triune God—Father, Son, and Spirit—already intended to send the Son to take on human flesh to rule creation as the ideal King.
The fall tragically tainted the developmental process. But even had the fall never happened, the incarnation would have occurred regardless—the gift of the ultimate King—in order to bring creation to the maturity that God intends for it. Because they are prior to the fall within Scripture’s overarching story, incarnation and kingship are more foundational to the gospel—more basic to it—than the cross and resurrection.
when we follow Scripture’s lead by starting the gospel with the incarnation, we see why the gospel’s framework is royal. The incarnation teaches us that the cross is also for the recovery of glory, since it expresses and leads to perfect human rule. Salvation is not just rescue from negative consequences, but is rescue for restoration to full health.
the incarnation and the coming of the Christ-King may be more foundational to the gospel than the cross, but that is not to say the cross is less important or less essential to it. God forbid! Jesus’s accomplished work on the cross for us is a bedrock gospel purpose.
models of the atonement
(1) Substitution
The Ransom Theory
