The Greatest Event in History

There is not much most people wouldn't do for those they love. Abraham presents an example of this in Genesis 14. You will recall that the cattle of Abram and the cattle of his nephew Lot, whom Abram had brought with him from Haran, were too numerous for them to dwell in the same place. They had to part and Lot took the fertile Jordan valley (and "pitched his tent toward Sodom") and Abram remained in the hill country.

There happened to be at that time two rival groups, one group of four kings, and a group of five kings. Chedorlaomer of the four kings seems to be the top dog of all nine of these kings. The five kings had been subservient to Chedorlaomer for twelve years, but in the thirteenth year they apparently quit paying tribute money to him, so that in the fourteenth year Chedorlaomer and his allies attacked the five kings and routed and plundered them and their lands. The connection between Abram and these nine kings is that the king of Sodom was one of the five kings who was defeated and his land plundered, and (mostly) Lot was taken captive.

An escapee apprised Abram of the situation. While the Bible mentions a couple of allies of Abram, it appears that in the ensuing battle, Abram acted without allies. Here is the Bible account. "Now when Abram heard that his [nephew] was taken captive, he armed his three hundred and eighteen trained servants who were born in his own house, and went in pursuit as far as Dan. He divided his forces against them by night, and he and his servants attacked them and pursued them as far as Hobah, which is north of Damascus. So he brought back all the goods, as well as the women and the people. And the king of Sodom went out to meet him at the Valley of Shaveh (that is, the King's Valley), after his return from the defeat of Chedorlaomer and the kings who were with him." Genesis 14:14-17.

There are several things to be learned from this paragraph. Abram had 318 servants. That's a lot of servants. Their “training” was most likely to put a stop to marauding bands who might cause trouble. Abram displayed not a moment's hesitation in acting to recover Lot. Damascus is about 210 miles from the area near Hebron in which Abram lived and Abram pursued his target even farther north. He was successful, with the Lord's help, and brought back everything that Chedorlaomer and his allies had carried off, including Lot.

In summary, when someone whom Abram loved was in danger, Abram immediately put every resource available to use to recover his endangered loved one. The text indicates no hesitation regarding the possible outcome against the armies of four kings (who had just defeated five kings.) He led his band over 200 miles on foot to achieve his goal, and then had to return that same distance bringing back all items which had been plundered and restoring them to their place. In all, this trip may have been nearly 500 miles on foot, but was certainly at least 400 miles.

This trait of taking remarkable measures to protect/save (especially) those who are loved is the theme of thousands of books and movies. Abram’s adventure is noteworthy, but it is not unique.

God seems to have acted in an opposite manner in relation to His beloved Son. God gave up His Son for the sake of the world. To accomplish God's purpose, Jesus needed to leave Heaven and go to an inhospitable world which crucified Him on a cross. This was God's plan. As the song says, "He (Jesus or God, either one) could have called 10,000 angels but [Jesus] died alone for you and me." And God let him die alone. In fact this event, in its entirety, was God's plan before the foundations of the world were formed, Ephesians 1:1-10.

We cannot comprehend the magnitude of the fact that God, the creator of the universe, King of kings, Lord of lords, and supreme in omnipotence would condescend to His fallen creation at all, let alone to the extent of offering His only begotten Son as a sacrifice for our sins. This is without doubt the greatest event in history. What kind of magnificently awesome being would lower himself to free an unworthy sinful creature like us humans? The answer to that question is the story of the Bible.

But it turns out that God was not acting out of character with Abram's rescue of Lot. Rather, God's behavior toward man is analogous to Abram's behavior toward Lot. Lot, Abram's nephew, had been taken captive by evil forces and Abram went to extraordinary lengths to rescue him. Mankind, God's creation, had, and has, fallen to the temptation of Satan and thus became ensnared by sin. God used extraordinary measures to redeem His creation from the grasp of Satan.

Sin is evil, and a just God must mete out punishment in the case of evil. There is no justice in the existence of evil in the absence of punishment. On the other hand, a loving and omnipotent God could not stand by and allow his creation to live eternally in hell, separated from Him.

But this required an individual who would suffer the punishment for the guilty. An individual who had no guilt of their own could absorb the punishment rightly deserved by those who were the guilty. That individual was Christ, the Son of God, and the plan to absolve mankind of guilt was in the mind of God before creation. It is so amazing that God knew that creating mankind would place His perfect Son in the crosshairs of punishment, requiring Him to die, and He still created mankind anyway.

So Jesus had to die, be buried, and be raised from the dead to pay the ransom and set the pattern. Those who die to sin and bury their old ways, their “old man,” the Bible calls it, in baptism, can enjoy the resurrected new life that leads to heaven. We have to take part in the first two before we can take part in the third.

We have to consider things we can't really understand. We are confronted by a God whom we cannot comprehend. We must acknowledge things of which we cannot conceive. We are that weak and unworthy. One of those things is the love and mercy of an almighty God. (Consider the scope of "almighty.") The main one of those things is that same almighty God offering up His only Son to (willingly) take the form of a human for the purpose of dying on a cross to rescue His creation from sin.

The words of this song offer a perspective for reflection on this greatest event in history.

*I Could Still Go Free

Lock me up in a prison

And throw away the key.

Take away the vision

From these eyes that now can see.

Deprive me of the food I eat

And even bind my hands and feet.

For as long as I have Jesus

Then I can still go free.

That I could still go free-

What kind of man would reach down His hand

And do this for me?

Unworthy to live and not fit to kill,

Yet a man on a cross put me in His will

And said that I could still go free.

I never could quite understand

Why a king would want to leave His throne.

To don the robe of an earthly man

And feel the pain of flesh and bone.

Then to later trod that lonely path

That leads to Calvary.

But those blood red stains broke all my chains

So that I could still go free.

That I could still go free-

What kind of man would reach down His hand

And do this for me?

Unworthy to live and not fit to kill,

Yet a man on a cross put me in His will

And said that I could still go free.

*as sung by the Redeemed Quartet

https://youtu.be/EsgiHVPYHv4?si=IOd4zPqucIBR_liE