Denouement
“Denouement” is a fancy word for the final conclusion, when the climax comes to final resolution.
In a murder mystery, the climax is the moment the detective solves the mystery, or when he finally figures it out. The denouement is when the bad guy is caught. It’s the end of the story when the loose ends have all been neatly tied up and all that went before finally makes perfect sense.
In the Bible, the denouement is the Second Coming of Jesus. It’s when the wicked are judged and sent to destruction, the redeemed are saved and protected from destruction, and God joins heaven and earth to walk with man once again.
I know that some of you are the kind who buy a murder mystery and read the last chapter first. I can see it in your eyes. You sneak a peek into the ending so that the rest of the story makes sense — so you know how it all works out.
And so for you, we’re going to sneak a peek at the end —
(Rev 21:1-5 NET) Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and earth had ceased to exist, and the sea existed no more. 2 And I saw the holy city – the new Jerusalem– descending out of heaven from God, made ready like a bride adorned for her husband.[2] 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying: “Look! The residence of God is among human beings. He will live among them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them. 4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death will not exist any more – or mourning, or crying, or pain, for the former things have ceased to exist.” 5 And the one seated on the throne said: “Look! I am making all things new!” Then he said to me, “Write it down, because these words are reliable and true.”
(Rev 22:1-3 NET) Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life– water as clear as crystal – pouring out from the throne of God and of the Lamb, 2 flowing down the middle of the city’s main street. On each side of the river is the tree of life producing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month of the year. Its leaves are for the healing of the nations. 3 And there will no longer be any curse,[3] and the throne of God and the Lamb will be in the city. His servants will worship him,
Notice what happens. God brings heaven down to earth and walks with man — once again! The tree of life is returned to the earth. The curse is removed. And everything is made new once again.
It’s a happy ending. We just have to have the patience to wait for it, because there are many sad endings in between. But the sadness will be fixed. “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes”!
Flood
Sin entered the world through Eve and Adam. Both sinned. Immediately after their sin, we read that Cain kills Abel, demonstrating that sin destroys families, even leading to murder of our physical brothers.
Sin continued to prevail, so much so that in only a few generations, God nearly gave up on mankind altogether. Ultimately, he decides to destroy most of mankind, saving only Noah and his family.
But just as soon as the world is destroyed and Noah and his family begin the human race again, we find that Noah becomes drunken and sin re-enters the world.
The world cannot be redeemed by destroying the sinners, because the righteous sin, too. No one merits salvation. All are broken. All need a redeemer.
Abram
As a result, God begins his master plan to redeem the world from sin, to cure our brokenness. He calls Abram to follow God by traveling to Palestine.
Now, Palestine is one of the more barren, poor places on the planet. It has no oil and no minerals. It has precious little water. It can be farmed, but farming is hard work — much harder than in Egypt or Babylon, where the fields are deep with rich soil and well watered by rivers. The only river in Palestine is the Jordan River, which we Southerners would call the Jordan Creek.
There are mountains, hills, and wilderness — desert, to an American. The largest body of water is a half-mile below sea level, filled with salt, and surrounded by desert. Nothing grows there except towers of alkaline minerals.
And although it’s on the Mediterranean Sea, it has no harbors. The Phoenicians lived to the north, had harbors, and became great seafarers. The Jews in Palestine feared the sea, considering it the “abyss,” symbolic of chaos.
While Westerners would build condos on the Sea of Galilee, the Jews stay far away. The sea may be a place to fish, but it’s not a place to enjoy. It’s a place to be feared.
This is the Promised Land, the “land of milk and honey.”
Why is the land valuable? Well, because you can’t travel from Babylon to Egypt except by going through Palestine, and you can’t travel from Greece to Egypt except through Palestine. It’s a place that armies pass through as kings seek to defeat and conquer other nations. It’s a place of trade and barter, where foreigners travel to visit other lands in hopes of making a good deal.
Palestine, therefore, is place where trade takes place, where deals are made, and where armies camp as they prepare to conquer another place far more important.
For Abram, Palestine was a place to raise sheep and goats, to gain wealth as he dealt with the kings of local city-states, and a place to meet God face to face.
You see, Palestine is a place we’d call “God forsaken,” but to Abram and his descendants, Palestine became the place where God deals with man. God chose one of the least attractive, least wealthy, least defensible spots on earth to bless with his special presence.
Why? Because God is all about taking the most broken and most unworthy and redeeming them — beginning with Abram — a very flawed human being whose saving characteristic was a willingness to go where God told him to go.
Abram is not the climax because we haven’t seen victory made certain yet. We have a glimpse of God’s plan, but there are many conflicts and many resolutions required to get from Abram to Jesus.
But even this early in the story, the Author provides glimpses of what is to come: God’s initiative to reconcile man and God, faith, blessing the nations through Abraham … It’s all there in Genesis although not fully revealed until the last chapter of Revelation — as any good story should be told.
__________________________
[2] Just like God’s presenting Eve to Adam, freshly made from his rib, made of the same flesh, destined to be united perfectly.
[3] The curse of Genesis 3 is undone, and man no longer has to labor to eat, women will no longer suffer the pain and death that comes with childbirth, and there will no longer be strife between male and female. This curse will end —
(Gen 3:16b NET) “You will want to control your husband, but he will dominate you.”
Jesus came to end the curse, and the church is part of the redemption of marriages and male/female relationships. Thus, male domination is not a command but a curse that Jesus died to undo — but the curse will continue so long as sin prevails on earth — not as God’s wish but as a result of the brokenness that comes from sin.
If Palestine was barren. Then why did God call it a “place flowing with milk and honey”-a place of plenty?
John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews, and Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament (Accordance electronic ed. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2000), 79.
In those lands, milk came from goats, and goats were herded in the wilderness. Americans would say “desert.” The shepherds remained to the east, in the wilderness, away from the agricultural areas. Arable land is too precious to let sheep and goats in when the crops are in the field. This would not be at all “lush” to Western sensibilities.
“Honey” appears to be a reference to dates, which grew wild on palms in well-watered areas. Again, not exactly what we’d think of as “lush.”
Rather, this is a reference to what the land produces without being worked and so not a reference to its productivity for agriculture. And so, there is the sense that without even working the land there are dates and goat milk can be had — much better than manna and water in the desert. But the land must be worked to produce much more.
I’ve had the pleasure of speaking with Israelis, who speak of the difficulties of life in Israel. They are well aware of the absence of natural resources, the scarcity of water, the rockiness of the soil. They consider their greatest “natural resource” the creativity of their citizens, and so the government encourages research and development by its citizens (and they are very good at it).
The top soil in Goshen is 200 feet deep or more. It’s among the most fertile land on the planet. The coastal plains of Israel are fertile, but nowhere near as fertile as Goshen was. Most of the land is hilly and must be terraced to be farmed. It’s hard work.
On the other hand, if you wandered through the desert and came upon Palestine, you’d be astonished at the sudden, dramatic change in fertility and water. You go straight from desert to farmland with nothing in between.
The terraced farms of east Palestine that abut the desert are filled with fruit trees, vines, and other vegetation — eked out by centuries of terrace building, rock removal, planting, etc. It’s an astonishing site.
In short, Palestine is a land where hard work is rewarded, little comes easy, but where God provides enough each day for that day. It’s a land of “daily bread.”
Ray Vander Laan’s video lessons present some lessons based on these thoughts with excellent videos. Highly recommended.
Well, God did say that the land contained lush vegetation that they did not sow or plow. So it appears the slaves of the Canaanite kings did all the dirty work. God indeed called it “my rest” which is supposed to foreshadow Christ’s rest in the new heavens and new Earth.