God of the Dirt

From the Hebrew language of ancient Genesis, we learn that Adam was created and formed by God. “From the dust of the ground” the Lord of heaven and earth created our first parent, much like a potter creates and fashions something uniquely gorgeous out of a lump of common clay. In regard to human nature, the Bible captures and expresses this vivid imagery more than once. Even the patriarch Abraham would later understand that we, as human beings created in God’s own image, must trace our ultimate origins to the dirt of the ground (Genesis 18:27).

I’m so glad that God stooped down.

Later, when the Lord would bury Moses, the Pentateuch offers only a few hints at what our Sovereign Creator performed in the dirt (Deuteronomy 34:5-6). In a burial spot known only to God there in the land of Moab, the physical body of Israel’s national champion was returned to the ground by the Lord Himself. Perhaps that hero status granted Moses by the people was the reason why God kept the burial location secret. Knowing the restlessness of our hearts and our penchant for idolatry, perhaps God was protecting us from ourselves.

I’m so glad that God stooped down.

And, in a more familiar story, our Lord rescued a desperate woman who had been caught red-handed in the act of adultery (John 8:1-11). I don’t know what Jesus wrote there in the dirt, but it was more than enough to secure the rescue of this lady from her angry accusers. My guess is that Jesus exposed the shameful hypocrisy of those who wanted to enact “justice” by hurling their rocks at one who was no worse than they. Can’t you just hear those stones, one by one, falling to the ground? Each stone must have stirred up the dust as it hit the dirt, a reminder of the filth of self-righteous judgmentalism which characterizes this fallen planet, where every human system remains shackled by the bondage of depravity.

I’m so glad that God stooped down.

Two thousand years ago, on a hill called Calvary, a bloody Roman cross would land with a cruel thud in the dirt of the ground! But make no mistake about it, neither the Romans nor the Jews were the ultimate arbiters of the events of that day. On the sin-striped back of Jesus, our redemption was accomplished then and there “according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God” (Isaiah 53:10; Acts 2:23). It was God who purposed and planted the Cross. For us, according to His infinite wisdom and grace, God met perfect justice with perfect love.

I’m so glad that God stooped down.

Friends, I am of the dust of the earth, and to dust I will soon return. But, because the holy God of the universe condescended to become man, and has stooped down to meet me in Jesus Christ, the dirt in which my body will be laid will not be the end of my story … but only the beginning.

I’m so glad that God stooped down.

Pastor Charles