The Salvation of Creation

And from the midst of it came the likeness of four living creatures. And this was their appearance: they had a human likeness … -- Ezekiel 1:5

Creation moves toward the human form because it is man who is made in the image and likeness of God.  Ezekiel is one of those books that can be read at more than one level and misread, I suspect, quite easily.  Initially, when I was about Ezekiel’s age as he began his ministry, I read the prophet’s words on a very personal level that served to change rather dramatically the trajectory of my life.  Coming back to him now – past the top of the arc, one might say, I am looking less for a direction and more at where I am liable to land.  I am looking for what is real and what is really going on. 

It’s not that hard to get caught up in playing the game of existence and forget what is at stake in our lives.  Ezekiel isn’t describing just a vision of some creature that brought him a message.  The vision is a part of the message.  Man is not the measure of all things, but he is the pinnacle of natural evolution, of material existence, and he is evolving toward Him who is the measure of all things:  … until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood,  to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes  (Ephesians 4:13-14).

Creation is not pointless or meaningless.  Nothing that exists is without purpose, and the destiny of all is tied up in man:  For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.  For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.  For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now (Romans 8:19-22).  The “now” of which Paul writes is the unveiling of Christ Jesus and the power of the Cross. 

The law of nature has been life at the expense of death and blood, brutality, the law of tooth and claw, predator and prey.  Each species fights for its own life and cares not for the life of any upon which it might feed.   Only man has any sense that there could be another way, and many of us can deal death to the lower creatures without much regret.  We recognize the necessity of it and do our best to make the end swift and painless.  

But it will not always be so.  Someday the lion will eat straw beside the ox and sleep beside the lamb.  As we will see as we go on in Ezekiel’s vision, we are reconciled to God in Christ, and creation will be reconciled up and down the spectrum in us.