The Big Story of the BibleCreation, Fall, Redemption, New Creation

One Story from the First Page to the Last

The Bible is sixty-six books written over many centuries, yet it tells one story. On the evening of his resurrection, Jesus walked with two disciples on the road to Emmaus, and "beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself" (Luke 24:27). The whole of Scripture, read the way he read it, is about him.

That story can be told in four movements.

1. Creation: God makes a good world and places man in it to live with him.
2. Fall: man turns from God, and sin and death enter the world.
3. Redemption: God keeps a promise, carried through a line of covenants, until his Son comes, dies, rises and pours out the Holy Spirit.
4. New creation: God makes all things new, and his people live with him for ever.

Every psalm, law, prophecy, gospel and letter sits somewhere inside those four movements. Knowing where a passage sits is often the first step to understanding it.

The story can be followed through the Bible's own cross-references, the places where one passage points back or forward to another. Followed link by link, they run from the garden of Genesis to the city of Revelation.

Creation: A Very Good World

The Bible opens with God alone. He speaks, and the heaven and the earth come into being, day by day, each one ordered and filled. On the sixth day he makes man in his own image, male and female, blesses them and gives them dominion over the earth. Then he looks at all he has made. For the shape of those days, see The 7 Days of Creation.

And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

Genesis 1:31
KJV

God planted a garden eastward in Eden and put the man there. A river went out of Eden to water it, and in the midst of the garden stood the tree of life (Genesis 2:9). Above all, the garden was the place where God was present with the people he had made. When Scripture later describes the LORD God "walking in the garden in the cool of the day" (Genesis 3:8), it shows that this nearness was the ordinary life of Eden. Everything else in the Bible's story is about that nearness: how it was lost, and how God restored it.

The Fall: Driven Out of the Garden

God gave one command. Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil the man was not to eat, for in the day he ate of it "thou shalt surely die" (Genesis 2:17). The serpent questioned God's word, the woman took the fruit and ate, and she gave to her husband, and he ate (Genesis 3:6). For the whole account, see The Fall of Man.

Everything changed at once. The man and his wife hid from the presence of the LORD God among the trees. The ground was cursed; the woman's sorrow was multiplied; and death, which God had warned of, entered the world: "dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return" (Genesis 3:19). Then God sent the man out of the garden and placed cherubims at the east of the garden, with a flaming sword "to keep the way of the tree of life" (Genesis 3:24). Paul draws the line from that day to every human life since: "by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin" (Romans 5:12).

The chapters that follow show how far the ruin spread. Cain killed Abel. By the days of Noah, God saw that every imagination of man's heart was "only evil continually" (Genesis 6:5). At Babel men built a city and a tower to make themselves a name, and the LORD scattered them across the face of the earth. Mankind was now outside the garden, away from God's presence, under death.

A Promise in the Garden

Before God sent Adam and Eve out of Eden, he spoke a sentence over the serpent. It is the first promise of a Saviour in Scripture, and every later promise grows out of it.

And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.

Genesis 3:15
KJV

The seed¹ of the woman would bruise the serpent's head, and the serpent would bruise his heel. Matthew Henry called this verse "the dawning of the gospel day. No sooner was the wound given than the remedy was provided and revealed." The New Testament names the serpent plainly: "that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan" (Revelation 12:9). Paul takes up the same picture in his promise that "the God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly" (Romans 16:20). John writes that the Son of God was manifested to destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8), and Paul in Galatians 4:4 that God sent forth his Son, made of a woman. For a full study of this verse, see The Curse and the Protoevangelium.

From here on, the question running through the Old Testament is: who is the seed? The word follows a single line through Genesis, from Seth to Noah to Abraham, and Scripture keeps narrowing the answer.

The Covenants: The Promise Carried Forward

God carried his promise forward by covenant²: a solemn bond in which he bound himself by his own word. Each covenant adds something to the promise of the seed, and each points beyond itself. For an overview, see The 5 Major Covenants of the Old Testament.

Noah: a world preserved

After the flood, God established his covenant with Noah and with every living creature, promising never again to destroy the earth by water. "I do set my bow in the cloud," he said, as its token (Genesis 9:13). The covenant with Noah keeps the world standing so that the promise has a world in which to be fulfilled.

Abraham: a blessing for every family

Out of the scattered nations of Babel, God called one man. He promised Abram a land, a great name and a great nation, and something wider still.

And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.

Genesis 12:3
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Abram believed the LORD, "and he counted it to him for righteousness" (Genesis 15:6). Paul reads Genesis 12:3 as the gospel itself: the Scripture "preached before the gospel unto Abraham" (Galatians 3:8). Paul then names the seed: "And to thy seed, which is Christ" (Galatians 3:16). The blessing promised to Abraham's family was always meant to reach the whole world through one descendant.

Moses: a redeemed people, and God among them

Abraham's descendants went down into Egypt and became slaves. God brought them out with a mighty hand, and on the night of the Passover he gave them a sign: "when I see the blood, I will pass over you" (Exodus 12:13). At Sinai he made them his own people, to be "a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation" (Exodus 19:6). He gave them his law, and he gave them a tabernacle, with a reason that echoes Eden: "that I may dwell among them" (Exodus 25:8). When it was finished, the glory of the LORD filled it (Exodus 40:34).

David: a King whose throne lasts for ever

When Israel had a king after God's heart, God promised David a son whose kingdom would never end.

And when thy days be fulfilled, and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, I will set up thy seed after thee, which shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build an house for my name, and I will stablish the throne of his kingdom for ever.

2 Samuel 7:12-13
KJV

Solomon built the temple, but the kingdom divided after him, and in time the kings of David's line were carried into exile. The promise stood. Peter, on the day of Pentecost, said David knew God had sworn that "he would raise up Christ to sit on his throne" (Acts 2:30), and the angel told Mary that God would give her son "the throne of his father David" (Luke 1:32). See The Davidic Covenant.

The new covenant: a new heart

Israel did not keep the covenant made at Sinai. God says of it through Jeremiah, "which my covenant they brake" (Jeremiah 31:32). The kingdom was carried away into Babylon, and the people of God found themselves in exile, as Adam had been. Yet in those same years God promised something greater than Sinai.

But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.

Jeremiah 31:33
KJV

This verse names the goal the whole story moves toward: "and will be their God, and they shall be my people." The law would be written on the heart, and sins would be remembered no more (Jeremiah 31:34). Its cross-references lead straight to the upper room, where Jesus took the cup and said, "This cup is the new testament in my blood, which is shed for you" (Luke 22:20). See The New Covenant.

The Seed Comes: Christ's Birth, Death and Resurrection

After centuries of promise, the seed of the woman was born.

But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.

Galatians 4:4-5
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"The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us" (John 1:14). Jesus is the son of Abraham through whom the nations are blessed, and the son of David who will reign for ever; Matthew opens his Gospel by naming him both. He began to preach that "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand" (Mark 1:15). He healed the sick, cast out devils and forgave sins, and every one of those works pushed back the ruin that came in at the fall.

Then the serpent bruised his heel. Isaiah had foretold that "he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities" (Isaiah 53:5), and at the cross it came to pass. Matthew Henry, on Genesis 3:15, wrote that "Christ's heel was bruised when his feet were pierced and nailed to the cross." But the cross was not the serpent's victory. Through death Christ came to "destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil" (Hebrews 2:14). On the cross he said, "It is finished" (John 19:30), and on the third day he rose.

For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures:

1 Corinthians 15:3-4
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Paul sets Christ beside Adam. "For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive" (1 Corinthians 15:22). Where one man's disobedience made many sinners, "by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous" (Romans 5:19). Irenaeus of Lyons (202) saw the same pattern in the two trees: at the cross the Lord "was making a recapitulation of that disobedience which had occurred in connection with a tree." The first man fell at a tree; the second Man won the victory on one. For the witnesses to the empty tomb, see The Resurrection of Jesus.

Pentecost and the Church: The Blessing Reaches the Nations

Forty days after he rose, Jesus ascended to the Father. Ten days later, on the day of Pentecost, the promise of the new covenant began to be kept in a new way: God gave his Spirit to dwell in his people.

This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses. Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear.

Acts 2:32-33
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Peter told the crowd that this was what Joel had foretold: "I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh" (Acts 2:17). The law was now being written on hearts, and about three thousand souls were added that day. Babel had scattered the nations by confounding their speech; at Pentecost men from many nations heard the gospel each in his own tongue. For that day, see The Day of Pentecost.

From Jerusalem the gospel went out to Judaea, Samaria and the uttermost part of the earth, and the blessing of Abraham went with it. "And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed" (Galatians 3:29). The people God had promised to Abraham are gathered from every family of the earth, Jew and Gentile together, and the title once given to Israel at Sinai now belongs to the church as well: "a royal priesthood, an holy nation" (1 Peter 2:9).

This is the part of the story the church lives in now. The new creation has already begun in everyone who belongs to Christ: "if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature" (2 Corinthians 5:17). Yet "the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now" (Romans 8:22). The serpent took his death blow at the cross, but the day when God bruises Satan under the feet of his saints, as Romans 16:20 promised, is still to come.

New Creation: The Garden Becomes a City

The Bible ends where it began, with a world made by God and his people living in his presence. John saw a new heaven and a new earth, and heard a voice from the throne.

And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, Write: for these words are true and faithful.

Revelation 21:3-5
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The word for tabernacle³ is the word Hebrews uses for the tabernacle Moses made in the wilderness (Hebrews 8:5). What the tabernacle and the temple pictured, and what Christ began when he dwelt among us, is now complete: God himself shall be with them, and be their God. The covenant words of Jeremiah 31:33 are spoken over the whole redeemed race. The word for new⁴ in "Behold, I make all things new" is the same word Paul uses for the new creature in 2 Corinthians 5:17. The cross-references of Revelation 21:1 lead back to Isaiah, where the LORD said, "behold, I create new heavens and a new earth" (Isaiah 65:17). Then John is shown a river and a tree.

And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. And there shall be no more curse: but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him:

Revelation 22:1-3
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The tree of life, last seen behind a flaming sword in Genesis 3:24, stands again in the street of the city. The cross-references from Genesis 2:9 run straight to this chapter, to Revelation 22:2 and Revelation 22:14, and to Christ's promise to the church at Ephesus to give "to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God" (Revelation 2:7). Matthew Henry read the scene this way: "here is another paradise restored by the second Adam. A paradise in a city, or a whole city in a paradise!" On the words "no more curse" he added, "no serpent there, as there was in the earthly paradise."

The end is more than Eden given back. Eden was a garden for two; the new Jerusalem is a city for the nations, its gates not shut at all by day. In Eden God walked with man in the cool of the day; in the city there is no temple, "for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it" (Revelation 21:22), and "they shall see his face" (Revelation 22:4). Adam could fall; the redeemed "shall reign for ever and ever" (Revelation 22:5). For a fuller study, see The New Heaven and New Earth, and for God's presence traced through every stage of this story, The Chronology of Presence.

Faithful Christians read some details of the end differently: the thousand years of Revelation 20, and whether the new earth is this earth renewed or an earth made afresh after the fire of 2 Peter 3:10. The reading followed here is that God renews the creation he made, because Paul says "the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption" (Romans 8:21). Every one of these readings confesses the same end to the story: Christ returns, the dead are raised and judged, Satan is destroyed, and God dwells with his people for ever.

All Things Gathered in Christ

Paul gives the whole story in one sentence. God's purpose, he writes, is that "in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ" (Ephesians 1:10). The verb, gather together in one⁵, means to sum up. Christ is the sum of the story: the seed promised in the garden, the blessing promised to Abraham, the Passover Lamb, the son of David, the Mediator of the new covenant, the Lord who pours out the Spirit and the Lamb on the throne of the city. Irenaeus said the same of Christ, that "it is He who has summed up in Himself all nations dispersed from Adam downwards, and all languages and generations of men, together with Adam himself."

A reader who knows this story can open the Bible anywhere and know where he stands. Genesis 1 and 2 describe the world as God made it. Genesis 3 explains why it is not that way now. From Genesis 3:15 to the Gospels, every page carries the promise forward. The Gospels show it kept, Acts and the letters show it spreading to the nations, and Revelation shows where it ends. The reader himself lives in the chapter between Pentecost and the return of Christ, with the Spirit as the earnest of the inheritance (Ephesians 1:14) and the tree of life still ahead.

The Bible closes with Christ's own promise and the church's answer to it.

He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.

Revelation 22:20
KJV