Latest / Reformed Thinking / “Yet Not Crushed”: Antanagoge and the Bible’s Rhetoric of Honest Grief and Defiant Hope in English Translation

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“Yet Not Crushed”: Antanagoge and the Bible’s Rhetoric of Honest Grief and Defiant Hope in English Translation · Reformed Thinking

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  Welcome back to another session of Reformed Thinking.
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  I'm your host, and I'm really glad you could join us.
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  We're here to to open up the books, clear away some of the
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  dust, and get right into the substance of what we believe
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  and, well, why it matters for your life right now.
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  It's good to be here. We have a topic today that is, I
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  think, one of the most significant concepts for keeping
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  a steady head and, you know, a hopeful heart in a world that
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  often feels like it's spinning off its axis.
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  I completely agree. And it's one of those things
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  where, you know, when people hear about rhetoric or literary
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  devices, their eyes can glaze over a little bit.
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  High school English class flashbacks.
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  Right. Dissecting poetry just to pass a
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  test. But today we're looking at a
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  rhetorical device that is, I would say, actually a lifeline.
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  It's a concept called Antanagoj. Antanagoj, It is a bit of a
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  mouthful, isn't it? It is.
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  It's pronounced Antanagoj. Yeah.
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  But before anyone tunes out thinking we're just playing word
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  games, let's let's define this. It comes from the Greek anti
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  meaning against and anagene which means to lead up.
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  That's right. And in the classical world, in
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  rhetoric, it's defined as a compensating balance.
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  It's a figure of speech where you admit a negative charge, you
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  admit a difficult reality, but then you immediately put forward
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  a positive truth that outweighs it or reframes it entirely.
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  A compensating balance. I like that description.
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  It sounds almost like the scales of justice, but, you know,
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  applied to theology. That's a great way to see now a
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  politician might use this to dodge a scandal, you know, Yes,
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  I lost the election, but look at all the free time I have now.
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  Right, a very trivial use. Very.
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  But what we find in Scripture, and this is especially clear
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  when you view it through the lens of the Westminster
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  Confession, is that the prophets and the apostles use this very
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  device to assert the absolute supremacy of God's sovereign
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  decree. So we're calling this the
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  grammar of Sovereign Grace. I think that's the perfect way
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  to put it. It is the grammatical structure
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  of hope. It's how the Bible admits that
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  sin and pain and death are real. They're very real.
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  We're not Stoics, and we are certainly not Christian
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  Scientists pretending pain is just an illusion.
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  No. It admits the reality of the
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  negative, but it immediately asserts that those things are,
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  well, they're subservient to a higher over ruling reality.
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  It functions as the great reversal it.
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  Does it is the structural proof that while the fall is heavy,
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  the decree of God is in the end heavier?
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  I think that's a crucial distinction you just made there.
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  We're not talking about some kind of mysticism where you
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  just, you know, close your eyes and pretend the bad stuff isn't
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  really there. No, and that's a dangerous error
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  to fall into. Antanagog requires you to look
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  the negative squarely in the eye.
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  You have to name the darkness before you can pivot to the
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  light. If you skip over the negative
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  part, the positive doesn't have any weight to it.
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  It feels cheap. OK, so here's our road map for
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  this session. We're going to look at 3 big
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  examples of this. We're going to look at the
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  history of Providence with Joseph and Genesis, then the
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  logic of justification in Paul's letter to the Romans, and after
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  that the actual experience of suffering in Second Corinthians.
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  Then we want to give you a kind of toolkit, a way for you to
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  spot this pattern when you're reading your own English Bible.
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  It really does change how you read the text once you see it.
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  OK, let's jump right into the deep end then.
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  Section 1, the grammar of Providence.
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  We're going to Genesis chapter 50.
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  The end of the book, The very end.
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  The very end. Can you set the scene for us?
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  So the narrative arc of the patriarchs is closing.
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  Jacob the father has just died and this creates a crisis, a
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  real crisis for Joseph's brothers.
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  You have to remember, these are the men who threw Joseph into a
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  pit and then sold him into slavery years and years ago.
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  They've been living under his protection in Egypt, but they
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  assume in their guilt that Joseph has only been playing
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  nice for their father's sake. Right now that dad's gone, the
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  gloves come off. That's what they're thinking.
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  That is their fear. They are absolutely terrified of
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  retribution. Their guilty conscience is
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  seizing them. And they think, OK, the old man
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  is dead now the Prime Minister of Egypt is going to finally pay
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  us back for what we did. And it's in this moment, in
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  response to their fear that Joseph says what might be one of
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  the most significant Theo logical statements in the entire
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  Old Testament, Genesis 50, verse 20 in the King James, it reads,
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  but As for you, you thought evil against me, but God meant it
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  unto good. There it is.
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  To bring to pass as it is this day, to save much people alive.
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  There is the antenna godge, the great reversal right there in
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  plain sight. Let's break this down a bit,
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  because our sources point out something really fascinating
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  about the Hebrew verb being used here.
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  The verb is chashab. Yes, Chashab.
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  And it's a very a very tactile word.
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  It means to plate or to devise, to calculate or to plan.
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  It's the language of intentional design.
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  You're weaving pieces together to form a pattern.
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  And what's so clever is that the text uses this one verb for two
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  very different actors. That's the genius of the syntax.
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  You have two subjects, 2 agents acting on this one verb.
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  First you have the brothers Chashab, Tim, you devise.
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  And what was the object of their calculation?
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  Evil. So Joseph isn't letting them off
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  the hook at all. Not in the slightest.
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  He doesn't say, oh, you guys just made a mistake or it was
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  all a misunderstanding. No, he says.
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  You calculated evil. It was moral malice.
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  It was sin, plain and simple. But then comes the pivot, the
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  but God. The divine counterbalance
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  Cheshaba he devised and this he is referring to God and the
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  object of God's calculation was Toba.
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  So just to be clear, we are talking about the exact same
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  event here, the one event of them selling Joseph into
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  slavery. The very same historical event,
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  but it's being viewed through 2 distinct layers of causality.
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  And this is what in theology we call the doctrine of
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  concurrence. OK, let's unpack that word
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  concurrence. This is where people can get a
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  little tripped up. Well, the Westminster Confession
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  of Faith in chapter 5 handles this so well.
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  It explains that God the Great Creator upholds and governs all
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  things. But, and this is the key, he
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  does so in a way that includes the freedom and the
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  responsibility of secondary causes.
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  So in this story, the brothers are the secondary cause.
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  Correct. They acted freely.
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  No one forced them to throw their brother in that pit.
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  They acted according to their own sinful nature.
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  They are responsible. They are guilty.
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  That's the negative side of the antenna gauge.
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  It has to be stated. But God is the primary cause.
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  Yes, God, acting sovereignly from eternity, decreed that this
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  very act, their evil act, would be the instrument he would use
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  to save the covenant family from a devastating famine.
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  It just destroys a couple of really bad ideas.
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  Doesn't. It Oh, it really does.
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  First, it destroys fatalism. Fatalism would say the brothers
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  were just robots, that they had no real choice.
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  But the text says you meant evil.
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  They had intent. They are culpable.
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  OK, but it also completely refutes open theism.
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  And open theism, that's the idea that God is just sort of
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  reacting to things as they happen.
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  He's making clean it up as he goes.
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  Right, the idea that God saw Joseph get sold into slavery and
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  thought, Oh no, I need a plan BI Guess I'll try to make him
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  vizier of Egypt now. No, the antenna godge here
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  asserts that God's intent was antecedent.
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  It came before their action, before they conspired in the
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  field. God had already decreed the
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  outcome in the palace. That is just it's mind bending.
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  The evil that they did was the very instrument God used to
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  secure the good. That is the beautiful irony of
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  Providence, and Joseph sees it. He realizes that if his brothers
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  had not been so wicked, the entire family would have starved
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  to death. God used their malice to bring
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  about their salvation. And you can't talk about Joseph
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  without talking about Jesus. It is the clearest type, the
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  clearest shadow. In the book of Genesis, Joseph
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  is the beloved Son, directed by his brothers.
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  Stripped of his special robe, sold for pieces of silver, he
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  descends into the pit. It is raised to the right hand
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  of power to save the world. The parallel is just stunning.
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  So the cross is the ultimate version of Genesis 50.20 Oh.
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  Without a doubt, Acts chapter 2 verse 23 makes the very same
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  rhetorical move Peter is preaching, and he says Jesus was
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  delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of
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  God. That's the primary 'cause.
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  That's God's plan. Yes, and then he says Jesus was
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  taken by wicked hands and crucified.
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  That's the secondary cause. So the.
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  Cross was the single greatest evil ever committed by mankind.
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  The murder of the innocent Son of God.
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  Yes, and at the same time it was the greatest good ever performed
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  by God. The atonement for the sins of
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  the elect, That is the grammar of sovereign grace.
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  The negative is real, horribly real, but the positive overrules
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  it completely. That is way and it leads us
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  perfectly into our next section. We're moving from the history of
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  Providence to to the logic of justification, Section 2, the
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  Antanagog of justification, and we're looking at Romans 6.23.
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  For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal
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  life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
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  This is a verse we've all heard 1000 times, but when you look at
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  it as a kind of rhetorical balance scale, it really stands
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  out. It does.
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  It's the the colophon, the concluding signature of Paul's
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  whole argument about law and gospel, that he's been building
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  for chapters. Let's start with the negative
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  side again. The rages of sin is death.
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  OK, There's a specific Greek word Paul uses for wages here,
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  isn't there? Obscenia.
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  Yes, in the 1st century this was a technical term.
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  It referred to the rations or the stipend that was paid to a
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  Roman soldier. So it's basically a paycheck.
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  It's a quid pro quo, right? A job is done and payment is
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  legally required. Paul is setting up a terrifying
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  premise here. He's saying that SIN is an
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  employer. You punch the clock.
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  For sin, you punch the clock. Every act of rebellion against
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  God, every moment of living for yourself is work.
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  And God, as a perfectly just judge, owes you a paycheck.
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  He is obligated by his own justice to pay you what you've
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  earned and the. Paycheck is death.
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  Spiritual and eternal separation from Him.
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  That is what we have earned. That is the negative reality.
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  We are sitting in the divine courtroom and the Ledger says we
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  are owed wrath. But then then we get the pivot,
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  the word but deke in the Greek. The great reversal.
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  But the gift of God is eternal life.
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  Now look at the asymmetry here. If Paul were keeping things
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  perfectly balanced, what should he have said?
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  He should have said something like the wages of righteousness
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  is eternal life. Precisely.
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  If it were a fair trade on both sides, he would say you earn
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  death for sin, but if you work hard and are righteous, you earn
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  life. But he breaks that pattern
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  completely. Shatters the symmetry because he
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  has to preserve the theology. He switches from absunia, which
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  is wages, to charisma. Which comes from the word charis
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  meaning grace. Exactly.
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  It's a benefaction. It's a donation given not based
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  on the worthiness of the person receiving it, but purely on the
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  generosity of the one giving it. Upsunia is what we are owed.
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  Charisma is what we are given freely.
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  This just. Completely nukes the idea of
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  moralism then. Completely.
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  It directly confronts what we would call condign merit in, for
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  instance, Roman Catholic theology, the idea that our good
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  works can somehow make us worthy of salvation.
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  Paul says no, you cannot earn a gift.
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  If you earn it, it's a wage. If it's a gift, it has to be
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  free. So the positive side of this
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  antanagog is not just try harder and be a better person.
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  No, not at all. The positive side is located in
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  Christ Jesus. That's the critical
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  prepositional phrase at the end of the verse.
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  The gift isn't a thing, it's a person.
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  It's all about imputation. Imputation.
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  Let's define that. It means crediting something to
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  someone's account. The death that we earned was
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  paid by Christ on the cross. The perfect life that he earned
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  is credited to our account when we believe.
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  I love how our source material puts this.
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  It says this one verse destroys pride because we realized the
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  only thing we ever earned was death.
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  That's right, it humbles you completely.
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  But then it also cures despair, because life is not a wage we
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  have to desperately work for. That is the pastoral application
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  right there. If you are sitting there
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  listening, thinking I haven't done enough to be saved.
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  This text says stop trying to earn the wage.
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  You can't balance the scales yourself.
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  You have to look to the counterbalance that Christ has
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  already achieved for you. That's incredibly fraying.
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  OK, so we've dealt with history and Providence, and we've dealt
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  with legal standing and justification.
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  Now let's get into the messy part, the actual experience of
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  living this out. Section 3, the scale of glory.
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  We're in 2nd Corinthians 4.1 scene.
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  This is. Where we move from the the
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  courtroom to the hospital room for the prison cell.
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  Paul is writing this while he is suffering immensely.
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  The verse reads for our light affliction, which is but for a
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  moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of
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  glory. You can just see it.
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  Paul is building a literal scale in his mind.
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  He is weighing the now against the not yet.
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  So let's look at the negative side of his scale.
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  The word is ellipsis affliction. Flipsis, and it literally means
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  pressure. Like a grain press or like
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  grapes being crushed to make wine.
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  It's an intense word. That doesn't sound very light.
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  It doesn't feel light, no, and Paul knows that.
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  He is not being dismissive of pain.
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  I mean this is a man who has been stoned, shipwrecked, beaten
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  with rods, but he uses 2 adjectives to qualify this
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  intense pressure. A lafron meaning light and
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  perotica meaning momentary. So why would he call all that
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  light? Is he just delusional from the
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  pain? No, he's recalibrating the
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  scale. It is only light when you
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  compare it to the other side. The positive side?
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  The DOXA, the glory. Now what's fascinating is that
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  the Hebrew concept behind glory, the word kabod, literally means
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  heavy or weighty. So you have this direct contrast
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  light affliction versus the weight of glory.
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  And momentary suffering versus an eternal weight.
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  It's a complete mismatch. Our source material mentions
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  this Greek phrase here. Cath hypoboleene is
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  hyperboleene. Yes, hyperbole unto hyperbole.
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  It is a superlative that almost breaks the language.
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  Paul is struggling to find words adequate quit to describe how
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  heavy, how substantial the glory is.
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  The visual here is just incredible.
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  Imagine a giant balance scale. On one side.
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  You put cancer, You put the loss of a child.
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  You put betrayal, you put martyrdom.
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  That side is heavy. It feels crushing.
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  It does. It feels overwhelming.
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  But then on the other side, God drops the glory of Christ.
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  And the scale doesn't just tip, it slams down.
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  It slams down with such force that the suffering side flies up
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  into the stratosphere. It becomes, by comparison,
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  mathematically insignificant. That is the logic of Christian
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  hope. And there's one more critical
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  word in this verse we can't miss Qatargasatai.
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  Worketh for us, or sometimes translated, produces this.
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  Is so vital. The affliction is not just
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  something we have to tolerate until we get to heaven.
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  The affliction is the factory. It is actively, actively
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  producing our capacity for glory.
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  That's a very reformed view of sanctification, isn't it?
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  It is, we believe, that God ordains trials, not to destroy
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  us, but to fit us. For heaven we are being carved.
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  The trials are the sculptors tools.
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  So suffering isn't just a waiting room, it's more like a
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  gymnasium. Or a construction site.
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  It is doing something in US. It is preparing us to be able to
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  bear the weight of glory. If we were not carved out by the
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  suffering here, we would not have the capacity to hold the
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  joy that is coming. That changes how you look at a
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  bad day or a bad year or bad decade.
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  It has to, otherwise suffering is just meaningless cruelty.
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  But with the Antanagog it becomes purposeful.
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  It has a goal. OK, let's apply this to ministry
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  on life in the church. Paul does this again in Second
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  Corinthians chapter 6. This is our fourth section, The
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  Paradox of Ministry. Yeah, and the context here is
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  key. Paul is fighting for his
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  Apostolic reputation. He's up against these so-called
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  super apostles. The the celebrity pastors of the
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  1st century. Precisely.
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  They had the look, they had the eloquence, they had the letters
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  of recommendation. They look successful and they
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  look at Paul, who was poor, beaten up, unimpressive in his
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  speech, and they said this guy cannot possibly be God's man.
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  So Paul fires back with this list of paradoxes, the first one
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  as deceivers and yet true. That's it.
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  The world calls the gospel a lie.
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  If you preach the exclusivity of Christ today, you'll be called a
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  bigot, intolerant, a deceiver. Paul admits the label.
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  He says OK, that's what they call us.
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  That's the negative part. The.
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  Positive yet true. We possess the only saving truth
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  in the universe. We don't need the validation of
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  the world because we have the validation of God.
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  Then he says as unknown and yet well known.
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  The Greek is Agnumanoy and Epigen Scamanoy.
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  We are ignored by the cultural elites.
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  The major news outlets are not writing glowing profiles on
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  faithful pastors and small rural churches.
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  They are unknown. But well known by whom?
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  By God, by the Good Shepherd. And that is the only audience
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  that matters in the end. If you are famous on earth but
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  unknown to God, you are in serious trouble.
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  If you are unknown to the world but well known by God, you are
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  eternally secure. Here is the one that really hits
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  our modern culture I think, as poor yet making many rich.
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  This one just confronts the prosperity gospel head on.
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  Paul was materially destitute. The word is Choi.
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  That means utterly poor. He did not have a private jet.
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  He did not have a mansion. So how is he making people rich?
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  He was dispensing the true wealth, the gold of the gospel,
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  justification, adoption, eternal life.
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  He was handing out keys to the Kingdom of Heaven while he
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  himself was wearing rags. The choice there is pretty
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  stark. Do you want to pursue material
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  gold, or do you want to dispense the gold of the gospel?
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  You often cannot do both. And the final one in this list
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  having nothing and yet possessing all things.
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  The Greek word for possessing is catechontes.
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  It means holding down fast. It implies full and secure
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  ownership. How can you have nothing and yet
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  own everything? It's because of our union with
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  Christ. If you are united to Christ by
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  faith, you are a Co heir with him.
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  First Corinthians 3 says all things are yours and you are
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  Christ's, and Christ is God's. The believer owns the entire
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  cosmos in reversion. We just haven't taken full
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  possession of the estate yet. This whole list is really a
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  diagnostic for the Church today. We often want the positive side
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  of the paradox without the negative side.
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  We want to be seen as true without ever being called
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  deceivers. We want to be rich spiritually
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  and materially. That is the great idol of the
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  modern Western church. We want the crown without the
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  cross. Paul says no.
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  The Apostolic life, and really by extension the Christian life,
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  is living in the tension of the antanagog.
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  You bear the negative in the physical realm, while you cling
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  to the positive in the invisible realm.
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  We've seen the examples, now I want to equip our listeners.
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  How did they do this for themselves when they open their
• 18:47
  Bibles tomorrow morning? How can they learn to spot this
• 18:49
  pattern? This is Section 5.
• 18:51
  How to spot antanagotch? It's a method of reading
• 18:55
  hermeneutic, you could say. And First off, we need some
• 18:57
  boundaries. This is not just, you know,
• 18:59
  looking on the bright side. No, it's not just a simple
• 19:01
  contrast either. Antanagotch is a specific
• 19:04
  rhetorical move where a negative is admitted fully and seriously
• 19:07
  admitted, but it is then interpreted by a governing
• 19:10
  overriding positive. OK, so step one in our detection
• 19:13
  method, locate the negative. Is there a real weight, a real
• 19:17
  sin, a real sorrow being mentioned?
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  Look for phrases like I am weary with my groaning or the wages of
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  sin is death. It has to be a real problem, not
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  a trivial one step. Two, locate the positive.
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  Is there a counter assertion that's based on God's character
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  or his covenant promises? Not just oh things will get
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  better, but God is faithful or your steadfast love endures
• 19:38
  forever. OK.
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  And Step 3 identify the markers. These are your pivot words
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  you're looking for but yet nevertheless.
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  Or the construction though yet. Though he slay me, yet will I
• 19:50
  trust in him? That's the classic example from
• 19:53
  Job, absolutely. OK, Step 4.
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  Check the interpretation. Does the positive actually
• 19:59
  correct the conclusion you would normally draw from the negative?
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  This is a subtle but really crucial point.
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  If I say I am afflicted, the national conclusion is so I am
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  going to collapse. If the text says afflicted but
• 20:10
  not crushed, the positive statement directly denies that
• 20:13
  expected collapse. It corrects the logic of
• 20:15
  despair. And finally, check the context
• 20:18
  and the structure. Sometimes this happens over a
• 20:20
  whole chapter or whole Psalm. Right.
• 20:22
  The macro structure Psalm 13 is a great example.
• 20:24
  It starts with how long, O Lord, will you forget me forever.
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  That is a deep dark negative good on for several verses, but
• 20:33
  the last verse says, but I have trusted in your steadfast love.
• 20:37
  That's single, but pivots the entire poem from lament to
• 20:41
  praise. So you have to read the whole
• 20:43
  thing to catch the arc of the argument.
• 20:45
  Exactly. You can't just cherry pick the
• 20:47
  happy verses. You have to follow the flow of
• 20:50
  the argument from the problem to the resolution.
• 20:52
  Now, with any powerful tool like this, there is a danger of
• 20:56
  misusing it. Which brings us to Section 6,
• 20:59
  misreadings and warnings. Yes, and we can do real damage
• 21:02
  to people's faith if we get this.
• 21:03
  Wrong. This reading, number one you
• 21:04
  hear a lot is grief silencing. This is the cheer up theology.
• 21:08
  It's using the but God part to shut down the lament way too
• 21:12
  early. Like telling someone at a
• 21:13
  funeral but they're in a better place now 5 minutes after their
• 21:16
  loved one died. That is pastoral malpractice.
• 21:19
  Biblical realism means the negative clause.
• 21:22
  The sorrow must be allowed to land.
• 21:23
  It has to be validated. Jesus wept at Lazarus's tomb
• 21:27
  before he raised him. The pivot is meant to be a
• 21:30
  shepherd, not a scold. It doesn't say stop crying.
• 21:32
  It says do not sorrow as those who have no hope.
• 21:36
  There is a world of difference there.
• 21:37
  Misreading #2 prosperity optimism.
• 21:41
  This is thinking that the positive side of the verse means
• 21:43
  your earthly circumstances are guaranteed to improve right now.
• 21:46
  So I am broke, but God is going to send me a check in the mail
• 21:50
  tomorrow. That is not biblical Antanagog.
• 21:53
  Look at Habakkuk chapter 3. Though the fig tree should not
• 21:57
  blossom nor fruit be on the vines, that is a description of
• 22:00
  total economic collapse and starvation.
• 22:02
  And the pivot. Yet I will rejoice in the Lord,
• 22:05
  it does not say. Yet I know God will make the
• 22:07
  figs grow tomorrow. The pivot is to the person of
• 22:10
  God Himself, not to a change in the dire situation.
• 22:12
  That is a huge distinction. It's the difference between true
• 22:15
  faith and, well, idolatry. If your joy depends on the
• 22:20
  things, your God is the fig tree.
• 22:21
  If your joy depends on the Lord, you have true faith.
• 22:24
  OK misreading #3 self mastery or stoicism?
• 22:29
  This is the error of think. This is all about mindset
• 22:32
  management, you know, positive thinking.
• 22:33
  I just need to reframe this difficult situation.
• 22:36
  The whole I am the captain of my soul idea.
• 22:39
  No, the confidence of the biblical antanagog is always
• 22:42
  extra nose. It is outside of us.
• 22:44
  It is confidence in God's objective promise, not in our
• 22:47
  subjective resilience. We're not pivoting to our own
• 22:51
  strength. We're pivoting to God's strength
• 22:53
  revealed in Christ. And lastly, the danger of
• 22:56
  selective quotation. Quoting the victory without
• 22:59
  mentioning the tribulation. You hear it all the time.
• 23:01
  We are more than conquerors. Well, the verse right before
• 23:05
  that lists sword, famine, nakedness, and peril.
• 23:09
  If you quote the victory without the struggle, you create a thin,
• 23:12
  fragile faith that shatters the moment any real pain hits.
• 23:15
  So we need the whole verse. We need the though and the yet.
• 23:18
  We need the whole balance, whole picture.
• 23:19
  Let's bring this all home. Section 7.
• 23:22
  Practical theology for the Church.
• 23:24
  How do we actually live this out?
• 23:26
  1st in our prayer life we should pray using this grammar.
• 23:29
  Can you give me an example of that?
• 23:31
  Look at Psalm 42. The psalmist actually talks to
• 23:34
  himself. He says, Why are you cast down
• 23:37
  on my soul? He names the depression.
• 23:38
  He gives it a voice. Then he preaches the truth to
• 23:41
  his own soul. Hope in God.
• 23:44
  When we pray, we should be honest.
• 23:46
  Name the complaint, tell God exactly what is wrong, and then
• 23:50
  preach the truth of the gospel to ourselves right there in the
• 23:53
  presence of God. That's very good.
• 23:54
  Name the complaint, then preach the truth.
• 23:57
  What about for preaching and counseling?
• 23:59
  As pastors and counselors, we should not be afraid to name sin
• 24:03
  and judgment. That is the negative.
• 24:05
  It's the bad news that makes the good news sound so wonderful.
• 24:08
  If you never talk about the wages of sin, then the gift of
• 24:11
  God just sounds like a nice little trinket.
• 24:13
  Sounds like a Knick knack instead of a lifeline.
• 24:15
  Precisely. We need to avoid cheap
• 24:17
  sentimentality. We need to offer the sturdy,
• 24:19
  ragged hope of the covenant. The message is your cancer is
• 24:23
  real, but T the resurrection is realer.
• 24:26
  That is the message people need to hear.
• 24:28
  And finally, the escalological focus, the end times focus.
• 24:31
  Yes, the yet so often points to the future.
• 24:36
  We live in the tension of the already, not yet.
• 24:40
  The great reversal has been secured by Christ at the cross,
• 24:43
  but we are still awaiting its full consummation.
• 24:46
  This keeps us patient in suffering.
• 24:48
  We know how the story ends, even if this particular chapter is
• 24:52
  dark. It gives us the Longview.
• 24:53
  The eternal view, yes. We have covered a lot of ground
• 24:56
  today. We've gone from Genesis to
• 24:58
  Revelation, from the depths of Joseph's pit to the heights of
• 25:02
  eternal glory. And it all seems to center on
• 25:04
  one thing. Or rather, one person.
• 25:06
  Yes, Jesus Christ is the Incarnate Antanagog.
• 25:09
  He is the living embodiment of this principle.
• 25:12
  Unpack that for us as we close out.
• 25:14
  Well, just think about the great exchange on the cross.
• 25:16
  Jesus took the ultimate negative.
• 25:18
  He took the curse of the law. He took the wrath of God.
• 25:20
  He took the separation from the Father.
• 25:22
  My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
• 25:24
  He took the full wages of sin. And why did He do it?
• 25:27
  So that we could receive the ultimate positive, the
• 25:30
  righteousness of God, the adoption as sons, the gift of
• 25:34
  God, which is eternal life. He took all the bad so we could
• 25:37
  get all the good. He took the full weight of
• 25:39
  judgement so that we could receive the eternal weight of
• 25:41
  glory. That is the gospel.
• 25:43
  That is the only hope anyone has.
• 25:46
  So here's a final thought for you to to chew on as we finish
• 25:50
  For the unbeliever, for the person who is outside of Christ,
• 25:53
  there is no but God. That is the terrifying reality.
• 25:55
  The sentence just ends. The wages of sin is death,
• 25:59
  period, full stop. But for the believer.
• 26:02
  For the believer, the But God is the structural guarantee of all
• 26:06
  our hope, no matter how the sentence of our life starts.
• 26:09
  I am dying, I am failing, I am lost.
• 26:12
  God puts a comma, adds his gracious butt, and he finishes
• 26:15
  the sentence with grace. That is where we stand.
• 26:18
  Thank you for diving deep with us today.
• 26:20
  Read your Bibles, look for the yet, and remember the great
• 26:22
  reversal. Amen.
• 26:23
  We'll see you next time on Reformed thinking.