Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. (Genesis 2:19-20a ESVUK)
If we get God right and understand Him from the start, we’ll understand how being relational has always been at the heart of how He created us. Made in His image, we reflect the reality of the Father who sends the Son and His Spirit as they operate in creation and its culmination. Being anything other than relational was never going to happen. Never.
That’s fascinating for this part of the story of God’s creation of male and female. The context around this part highlights how God says it’s not good for man to be alone, and so He’ll make a helper suitable for Him. I might explore that in another issue of this journal of the journey. I deliberately highlight this part of the narrative, however, to highlight something fascinating about responding to the call and how that’s a relational thing even before the presence of the helpmate.
Man, created by God, responds to the call of God. Not only does He respond to that call, but He fulfils it in collaboration and partnership with God. It’s fascinating to read how God brings to man the animals and man gets to name them. Man exercising his responsibility over all given to his care functions as he receives what is brought to him by his Father. I honestly chuckle and get a little giddy at the thought of the Creator bringing the creatures to the presence of the man and seeing how he names them. The Father leaves it to the son to see how he’ll carry out his responsibility, and it’s all good with Him, even as the process of creation in its totality was all good with Him. It’s all good because the creation made in His image to have dominion has all he needs to carry out his responsibility, so it’s a pleasure to observe this taking place in a manner that affirms that responsibility.
This dynamic is seen again when the Son performs His earthly ministry, and all the way through, He makes it abundantly clear that all He’s doing is what He sees His Father doing and all He’s saying is what He hears His Father saying. And at the same time, He’s clear that He’s carrying out the responsibility given to Him by His Father, who entrusts the stewardship of the matter to Him, knowing He will complete all that He needs to complete to bring glory to Him.
These stories are given to us to establish the idea of what it is to be responsible to the call given to us by our Creator. We don’t have to make things up as we go. We can follow the path set for us. We don’t have to stress over being original or innovative as if that’s a measure of what life is about, because that can emerge naturally as we cooperate with the one who knows us better than we know ourselves. The relational element of life is not just about hearing and doing on our own. It is about hearing and recognising that the One who calls us is the One who is with us, for us and in us to accomplish and fulfil that responsibility. We were never created to do it on our own. We were always meant to do this in relationship with Him, as He takes great pleasure in calling us and then being present with us to affirm that which is in line with His call.
This is why prayer as an activity is so fundamental to life in Christ. Prayer is the means by which we communicate with God and keep the conversation going in engaging with the call. We make ourselves open to Him, sharing the frustrations of the challenge and our confusion and sense of inadequacy on matters. We even let Him in on the failings we have and acknowledge how we went too fast or too slow, or totally did something opposed to the call. We bring this all to Him and have the blessed assurance that as He was present in the garden with man in naming the animals, as well as present in the garden with His Son as He agonised, so He’s present with us to affirm, console, correct, guide, and support us in fulfilling those responsibilities.
The responsibilities are serious, and they’re not trivial or irrelevant. They are achieved, however, in relationships as we were created as relational beings. The first relationship that helps us is the vertical relationship as we look to the Father who called us and is with us. That should be the constant that underpins everything else. It’s also the foundation that sets us up well for the second part of the relational support given to fulfil our responsibilities …
For His Name’s Sake
C. L. J. Dryden
Shalom
Life With CD 