v. 25 – dominion,

Devotional:

Dominion is not a word that we are accustomed to referring to because it usually has a negative connotation when referring to someone’s rule and reign over others. It is also used aside when drawing lines of governance for nations. It technically means “the territory of a sovereign.”

To say that Christ has dominion is to say everything is His territory. This is fitting because all things do belong to Him and are under His sovereign control. This is nothing clearer than when God speaks through the prophet Isaiah saying, “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool” (Isaiah 66:1).

Jesus the Christ, who sits on the throne of grace at the right hand of the Father, uses the earth as a footstool. This is how the Bible communicates His total dominion. There is nothing that happens that does not first pass through the hands of Christ, and in that truth we find great confidence as His people. But in order to really get our head around the realities of His dominion, we have to go back to the beginning.

When God created Adam, He gave him dominion over all created things. “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’ So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth’” (Genesis 1:26- 28).

God gave Adam a great responsibility and created him with everything he needed in order to accomplish such a trusted task. This incredible gift of dominion was God’s gift to all of mankind.

Inside this gift is the mandate to flourish and bring flourishing forth. We were to cultivate an environment whereby all created things walk in accordance with their God-given purpose. And in doing so, creation reflects back to God His infinite worth – primarily through the means of our enjoyment of the things He placed under our rule or dominion.

But, as we well know, Adam screwed it up royally. Instead of flourishing with dominion, Adam chose to fall and surrender his dominion to God’s enemy, Satan, and by doing so bring death to creation.

Paul helps us understand the generational impact of Adam’s surrender of dominion in Romans 5:13-14. “Death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who had not sinned according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come.”

So instead of passing on a lineage of dominion whereby all things flourish, Adam passed on a lineage of death whereby all things wander around looking for their purpose that he gave away. This is known as federalism. Federalism simply has to do with the idea of representation. It is when one person or group of people acts on behalf of another or others. Our government in America is a federalism, which means we elect people to act on our behalf. God created Adam and appointed him to act on our behalf, but he did not do a good job, and because he dropped the ball in such a severe manner his sin was written on the hearts of all men for all time. Because he sinned, all have sinned. Some would argue the “law” as revealed to Moses created sin, but it certainly did not. Paul clearly articulates in Romans 5 that the law made clear what was already known, which is that all men are sinners.

The good news is But. God. “But God shows his love for us in this that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). See, God didn’t abandon humanity; instead He invaded it. Adam was not the only one appointed with federal headship, Christ has it as well. By faith, we come out from under the federal rule of Adam to live under the federal rule of Christ. In Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, he makes this clear. “For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:21-22).

Christ is our representative. He elected Himself to be so. And as He hang on the cross, He bore the punishment for Adam’s sin as well as mine and yours so we could wear His perfect robe of righteousness. He became death so we could have life. This cosmic move of mercy restores us into our rightful place of dominion so we can now enjoy God’s creation and exercise dominion over it, living out the very purpose for which God created us.

REFLECTION:

What areas of your life do you still struggle to give God dominion?