In the Mind of a Fish

God made man. He gave the man orders to take dominion over the earth. But he did not make the man the king or the judge over the earth.

Then, God found that man was alone and needed someone to help him. So, he made woman to be his wife. He, again, did not tell the man to be in charge over the woman.

But, they sinned. When they were put out of the garden, they were told how they were going to live. The curse was that man would rule over woman.

When they were sent out of the garden, God said, “The man has become like one of us, knowing good from evil.” The temptation that Satan set before the woman was that her eyes would be opened and she would be like God because she would know the difference between good and evil.

So, after man determined his own fate and found that he could be the judge of good and evil. This was “being like God.” Both God and Satan said that when man knows the difference between good and evil, he is like God.

Because man knows the difference between good and evil, he makes his own decisions on what he should or should not do. Those decisions are based on his knowledge of the difference between good and evil. In this way, he needs not inquire of God. He is perfectly capable of deciding for himself what is right and what is wrong, what is left and what is right, what is good and what is evil. But he gained this autonomy at the cost of his life and his relationship with God.

God used to walk in the garden with man. Man used to walk with God in the garden. But, now that he has gained the ability to be the master of his own life, he has become hostile to God.

Sometime later, God found a man who walked with him. That man was living in faith. His name was Enoch. After walking with God for 300 years, God took Enoch. He did not die because he pleased God. Genesis says that he walked with God. Hebrews says that he pleased God. Walking with God is pleasing God and Enoch was the only person after Adam who was reported to have walked with God since man became knowledgeable of the difference between good and evil.

Up to this time, there is no record of any human king.

After the flood, God chose Abraham to live in the wilderness we now call Israel. During the life of Abraham, there were kings and kingdoms all around them. He even walked through some of the kingdoms when going about his business and he related to them. Abraham fought with one king and honored another. But, there was no king over Abraham, of whom God chose and set apart for himself.

The tribes of the clan of Abraham lived with elders in their clan and eventually, through a series of unfortunate events, were put into slavery by a king. This was the Pharaoh of Egypt.

After several hundred years in Egypt, and after they became slaves to Egypt, while they were helpless and miserable, Moses arrived on the scene. When he had realized his identity, he decided one time to judge an Egyptian for being too harsh on one of the Israelites. The next day, he decided he could be a judge between two Israelites and found that he didn’t really have that authority.

When Moses had run off for forty years, God came to them and rescued them from the hand of the king. Moses became subject to the king of creation. And once he did that, he found that the king would make the judgments and determine the punishments. Moses wasn’t the rescuer of Israel. He wasn’t the judge of Israel. He was the voice of God to the people, but it was God acting out his own word as the king. Moses was not to respond to the people out of his own initiative. His orders were clear and when violated, they were addressed by God. Moses was not the king.

For four hundred years after Israel took their land that God promised them, they had no king. Instead, when trouble arose in the land, God would call forth a person termed “judge” who would, in some way, solve at least some of the problem by providing judgment from God. These problems were mostly in relation to outside influences. The Israelites had elders who guided their individual clans. But they had no king. When there was some problem that arose, God would solve the problem, either by supernatural means or by the hands of the judges.

After that 400 year period, the people cried out for a king. God gave them what they wanted even though God reported to Samuel that it was God who was being rejected as the king in this request. God compared this request for an earthly king as a rejection of himself. He compared it to all the other times that the people forsook him and served other Gods. This was not what God wanted. He wanted a people who would recognize him as the king and serve him alone.

It appears that since Samuel appointed his sons as judges over Israel and they did not follow Samuel’s ways, the elders did not want to subject themselves to those men. Instead, of asking that someone else be appointed, they asked that a king be put in place. Asking for a king to rule over them was just one more way that the people rejected God as their king.

The first king stank to high heaven.

The second king was David. This was a man after God’s own heart. The prophecies of the coming messiah refer to this person as the king who would sit on David’s throne. David was extremely unusual when it comes to the kings of Israel. From there on, they only got worse. They divided Israel into two kingdoms. They made rules based on jealousy and fear. They turned to other kingdoms for help instead of God. With few exceptions, God was very much displeased with the kings of Israel. So, he took away the kings.

When Israel and Judah went into captivity to foreign governments, the kings were deposed. There was never really another king in Israel after that. After a while, God brought the people back to Israel and kings and governors were assigned by the ruling governments. Even in the time of Jesus, there was a king over Israel. But this king was really only a subject of the Roman Caesar and not a king in his own right.

Then Jesus came. We have two genealogies recorded for Jesus in the NT. One of the genealogies links him to Adam. Adam’s king was God. The link to Adam assured us of Jesus’ humanity.

The other genealogy links him to King David. That link assures us that he is the promised messiah who is to sit on the throne of David in the coming kingdom.
Jesus’ message of good news was that the kingdom of God was near them. He even declared it to be in those who followed him. Jesus’ good news was not freedom from the kingdoms of the world. His good news was that the king that we rejected all those times is coming to establish his kingdom among us once more. He hasn’t given up on us. He hasn’t decided to just destroy us as his enemies. Instead, he has provided a means for us to submit ourselves to him as we should have always done.

Peter’s conclusion to his speech on the day of Pentecost was:
Brothers, I can tell you confidently that the patriarch David died and was buried, and his tomb is here to this day. But he was a prophet and knew that God had promised him on oath that he would place one of his descendants on his throne. Seeing what was ahead, he spoke of the resurrection of the Christ,[f] that he was not abandoned to the grave, nor did his body see decay. God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of the fact. Exalted to the right hand of God, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear. For David did not ascend to heaven, and yet he said,

" 'The Lord said to my Lord:
"Sit at my right hand
until I make your enemies
a footstool for your feet." '[g]
"Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ."

From that day, the church began to grow to be more than that 120 people who were in the upper room to thousands. These thousands of people who were added to their numbers were subjecting themselves to the king and messiah. This was Jesus that they submitted to.

The number of followers of Jesus as king continued to grow in Jerusalem until persecution and famine drove them from that place to others places. Wherever they went, they spread the news of the king of Israel who had died and rose from the grave as predicted by the prophet and king, David.