The Truth about Humanity

[0:00] We're going to turn to our reading for this morning, which you may have guessed is in Psalm number 8. And you will find Psalm 8 if you have one of our church visitors' Bibles on page 450.

[0:24] And we're going to read these words together. It begins to the choir master according to the getith, some sort of musical term, a psalm of David.

[0:40] O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. You have set your glory above the heavens. Out of the mouth of babes and infants you have established strength because of your foes to still, to silence the enemy and the avenger.

[1:01] When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him and the son of man that you care for him?

[1:17] Yet you have made him a little lower just than the heavenly beings. You have crowned him with glory and honor. You have given him dominion over the works of your hands.

[1:30] You have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, also the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas.

[1:42] O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. Amen.

[1:54] And may God bless to us this, his word. Well, would you turn with me to Psalm number eight that we read together?

[2:05] And our title today is The Truth About Humanity. Now, that, of course, is a very big subject.

[2:18] And the question that's posed in verse four of Psalm eight is a question that has been asked since the very dawn of time. What is man? The French artist Paul Gauguin had a famous painting which embodied these things with great pathos.

[2:36] In the corner, he wrote, where do we come from? What are we? And where are we going? It's a painting of great pathos. He painted it when he was grieving for the loss of his daughter, when he was in a great deal of debt and really in despair.

[2:54] In fact, he had intended to kill himself when he finished his painting. Actually, he attempted suicide but was unsuccessful. But he was asking that agonized question in the face of despair, what is human life really all about?

[3:11] Now, most people, I think, in our culture today who ask that question, they do so without any thought that God is a part of the answer. The prevailing scientific humanism of our secular world answers that question.

[3:27] What is man? Well, like Bertrand Russell, the atheist philosopher, did. He is just the outcome of an accidental collocation of atoms. Or like Richard Dawkins, who says man, and I'm quoting, is a robotic vehicle blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes.

[3:48] Now, that's the answer according to some of the new atheists in our culture today who are very vocal. But, of course, for others in our postmodern world today, there just aren't any answers.

[4:03] Although one postmodern writer has said that asking such questions and seeking answers is, he says, a necessary part of our humanity.

[4:14] That's interesting, isn't it? Richard Dawkins wants to say that we shouldn't ask questions like that at all. But the postmodern philosopher says, well, there are no answers even if you ask the questions.

[4:27] But he does recognize that there's something intrinsically human about wanting to and needing to ask those questions. When I was on holiday, I was reading a very brilliant book called Do No Harm.

[4:39] It's written by Henry Marsh, who's a retired neurosurgeon from London. I was interested in it because he removed a brain tumor from my brother-in-law some years ago, so I knew a little of him.

[4:51] But it was fascinating reading that book, and I do recommend it to you. Reading his description of seeing the living human brain through the lenses of the operating microscope as he is carefully operating on that organ.

[5:06] He's not a Christian man at all, but his book is wonderfully human and wonderfully honest in wondering aloud about all these great questions raised by the mystery of human consciousness and so on.

[5:21] Very close to the work of a neurosurgeon. What is man? How do we explain all the paradoxes of our human condition that we know to be true?

[5:36] Man's greatness is his capacity for good, for glory, for grandeur. All the culture, the reason, all the love, all the honor and nobility that is undoubtedly in our human world.

[5:50] And yet, along with his grandeur, his baseness, his capacity for evil, for hurt, for destruction, for selfishness, for sheer horror.

[6:04] How do we explain man's significance and his stature as the shaper, even the controller of nature, as the conqueror of earth and now even the conqueror of space? How do we explain that alongside his smallness and his finitude when compared to the vastness of the universe, the stars, the galaxies, the eons of time?

[6:32] It's a great paradox, isn't it? But this psalm, I believe, gives us the definitive answer. It tells us that to understand humanity, we must first understand deity.

[6:46] To grasp the truth about man, we must first grasp the truth about God, and in particular, the name of God. Do you see how verses 1 and verse 9 bracket this psalm?

[7:00] And the answer, the psalmist says, begins with a God who is called the Lord. Those capital letters there signify the personal name of Yahweh or Jehovah, the God of Israel.

[7:14] His name and his praise begin and end this psalm, and his name is the key to everything. To all the truth about man and about this world.

[7:27] And yet, you'll see that in between these two verses, all the rest of the psalm focuses on mankind. Because paradoxically, what we find is that somehow, somehow the chief revelation of God and who he is, is bound up with man and who he is.

[7:46] Man on earth is the chief revelation of the glory of God. Look at verse 2. God's glory, it says, is set above the heavens.

[7:57] And yet, on earth, even the weakest human display of the mere babbling of infants displays God's glory. To the extent that it shuts the mouth of gainsayers.

[8:09] Out of the mouths of babes and infants, you have established strength because of your foes. To still them, to silence the enemies. The most powerful revelation of God is to be seen in looking at humanity.

[8:24] Far more even than in the wonders of nature. And that's what the psalmist is saying in verse 2 and also in verses 3 to 8. You see, he can hardly believe it. He says, what is man that you're mindful of him compared to all the glory of the stars in heaven and the vastness of space?

[8:41] Man is so small, so puny. I was all there. I was looking at the stars one evening. It was so dark. We had a masterful, wonderful display.

[8:51] And when you look at the stars, what do you feel? You feel tiny, don't you? And yet, verse 5, look at what God has given man. He has put him at the center of the universe.

[9:07] He's crowned him. He's given him dominion over all these things. So how do we make sense of this? How can we get to the truth about humanity?

[9:21] Well, we won't understand humanity, who we are and what our purpose is, or the world and what it is and where it's all going. We won't understand that until we understand the God who is the Lord, the God named in this psalm.

[9:37] And that he alone is the creator of man. And that he alone is the redeemer who became man himself.

[9:48] So I want to think about those two things this morning. First of all, the psalmist makes clear that we can't understand man, either in the present or in the future, without the God who made man.

[9:59] The God of scripture, the Lord, Yahweh, Jehovah, who is the creator of heaven and earth. So look at verse 5. You have made him.

[10:11] Now that is the central affirmation of this psalm. But not just this psalm. It's the central affirmation of the whole Bible. And it is the central plank of all civilization as we know it.

[10:23] Of all justice. Of all human dignity. Of liberty. Of responsibility. Of law. It all rests upon the fact that God created mankind.

[10:34] Not, as modern secularists want us to believe, that man created God. As a figment of his imagination. Now let's not get into arguments about exact details.

[10:46] About how God undertook every detail of his created work. People have differing views on that. But I think the scripture does leave us open to differing interpretations. But one thing is absolutely incontrovertibly clear.

[11:00] That whatever the details, the Bible is in firm opposition to modern day scientism. Humanism and scientific humanism.

[11:12] The kind of religion followed by the likes of Richard Dawkins and others. God made man, says the Bible. Unless we take note of that.

[11:24] Then any attempts to answer the questions about humanity will collapse into a fog of total confusion. And I might say any society and civilization which fails to recognize this.

[11:35] Will likewise collapse into a world of inhumanity. And an inhumanity that will appall even the most hardened of people. Look at what Psalm 8 tells us about mankind being created by God.

[11:51] Look at verse 5. You have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings. Crowned with honor and glory. You have given him dominion over all the works of your hands.

[12:02] All things are under his feet. Sheep, oxen, beasts of field, birds of the heavens, fish of the sea. Whatever passes along the pass of the seas. That is just expressing what the Bible all through expresses.

[12:19] It's echoing there in the book of Genesis, isn't it? Let me read to you from Genesis chapter 1 verse 26. God said, Let us make man in our image after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the heavens, over the livestock, over all the earth.

[12:34] And over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image. The image of God he created him. Male and female he created them.

[12:44] And God blessed them. And God said to them, Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. And subdue it and have dominion over everything in this world.

[12:57] God has made man, according to our psalm, according to the whole Bible, to be not God, but nevertheless to be elevated to a place of unique glory and honor above all the rest of creation.

[13:12] That's very clear. Man is the chief revelation of God's glory on earth. He is made in God's image, says Genesis. And he is the chief manifestation of God's rule on earth.

[13:25] He is made in that sense as God's image to have dominion, to be God's viceroy, if you like, over the world. Now sometimes it has to be said that particularly those who are keen environmentalists point a finger at Christianity and blame this teaching of the Bible, of dominion of man over the world, for all the wrong in the world, for all the destruction of the world, for all the environmental disasters and so on.

[13:53] But that is simply quite mistaken. The word to have dominion means to have authority and to exercise responsibility. The picture here is of man being made an under ruler for the great king.

[14:09] And when a king commits his business to underlings, he doesn't give it to them to ruin it and cause havoc and chaos. He gives it into their hands in order to profit his business, to look after his interests.

[14:21] And human beings are given that great responsibility to God to bring the whole cosmos under his glorious and gracious rule. So the whole world, the whole universe, became like and reflected the garden of God, the garden of Eden.

[14:39] So the Bible tells us that man is a creature. He's not God. He's lower than divine. And yet it also tells us, as verse 6 makes clear, that he is not just an animal.

[14:53] He's not just to live like the other beasts. He's crowned with glory and honor above these things. And his purpose derives from his identity as that. Because man alone is delegated God's special authority over creation.

[15:08] And God has made this whole cosmos to be subject to mankind. Verse 7, all the domestic animals, the wild animals, verse 8, the whole creation. That is God's purpose for mankind.

[15:20] God says in Genesis 1, fill the earth. Exercise God's authority over the earth. Bring it under his dominion. Fill the earth with man's glory, because that will fill the earth with God's glory.

[15:35] Man, you see, is created as God's chief worshiper. He's chief servant. That's what worship means, to serve. And he worships God, serves God by glorifying him and enjoying him and shining his glory in the whole world.

[15:51] And that's the Bible's answer, very simply, as to what man is. We can't understand man, humankind, unless we understand the God who made us.

[16:03] And that is the God of the Bible alone. And he made us to display his glory and perfection and beauty and might in this world. Well, you might object and say to me, that's all very well, but that is not what we see, is it?

[16:19] That's not what you were saying in your prayer a few minutes ago. That is just an illusion. That's a fantasy. And the skeptic can say that with some justification, because the truth is we do not see cosmic harmony at the heart of the world.

[16:37] So where is this subjection of nature to man? Where is this perfection of glory? Surely the world that we live in is exactly the opposite of that.

[16:48] Surely what we see is nature against mankind. We've got hurricanes, we've got volcanoes, we've got tsunamis, we've got all of these things. Can't even have summer weather here in Glasgow in July and August.

[17:02] We've got the animal kingdom, it seems, against man. Not just all these shark attacks we've been reading about in recent days, crocodiles, snakes, all of these things, but bacteria, viruses, what are the hospitals full of?

[17:17] Trying to help us from organisms we can't even see, they're so small, but they floor us. There doesn't seem to be any harmony of nature. It doesn't seem to be all under man's feet, does it?

[17:28] It seems to be out of man's control completely. Nature's fighting against us. Isn't that the reality? And man, well, humanity is constantly at war with itself, everywhere.

[17:45] Strife, wars, economic chaos, and so on. Isn't that what our world news is showing us? All the time? So the skeptic says, of course, the Bible's all wrong.

[17:57] That can't be right. Psalm 8 can't be true. Genesis 1 is a lot of nonsense. So let's talk sense. Let's listen to the voice of the world today, because the world today is so clever.

[18:10] It has so much knowledge, it can surely give us much better answers. Surely, we can explain mankind without God. Our world says man is not specially created as a crown of creation in God's image.

[18:24] Our world says, no, man is just an animal like all the rest. He's just evolved from amoeba. And so verses 4 and 5 here in this psalm must be chucked in the dustbin.

[18:35] They're absolute nonsense. Professor Dawkins can give us a much more sensible explanation. Man is just like other organisms. He's just a tool of selfish DNA.

[18:46] Surely, that must be right, mustn't it? Looking at our world. But if that is right, then of course we have to be consistent, don't we? We must be properly scientific.

[18:59] We must apply that truth to the whole of our thinking. Because if man has no special dignity, if he's just dancing to DNA, if human life has no particular sanctity, if it's just the chance chain reaction in the river of DNA flowing through history, then that must mean, mustn't it, that the logical conclusion is that man's life is really just very cheap.

[19:26] It's no more valuable than that of a fish or a dog or a worm or a bacteria. That must be the logical conclusion, the inevitable conclusion of a secularist outlook on life.

[19:39] And so I guess if that's true, it shouldn't surprise us that we live in a society where abortion is rampant, for example. And when a woman comes many years later, ridden with guilt, as so often they are, which the media loves to suppress, we just say, no, no, no.

[20:00] It was just DNA. It wasn't a human life at all you got rid of. Don't worry. And that we live in a society where murder is rampant, even for very trivial reasons.

[20:12] But all we have to say to the victim or to the friends of a victim of murder is to say, no, no, no. He's not a murderer. He's just dancing to his DNA. There's no fault there.

[20:24] Or in a society that exploits the vulnerable. Did you hear about the vast numbers of children in America today being trafficked and exploited for sex just this week?

[20:36] Or the elderly who are exploited so often in care homes? Well, we say, well, of course. It's just a dog-eat-dog world. It's survival of the fittest. What would you expect?

[20:47] That's normal. That's good. Not a very great comfort, is it, for the suffering person, for the distraught person, for the woman who's been raped, perhaps, for the parent of a child who's been abused by somebody, or for the victims of brutal violence.

[21:07] It's, oh, cheer up. It's just all in the DNA. It's just the way things are. See, consistency demands, doesn't it, in the face of the most grievous suffering, in the face of the most manifest evil, that we should just shrug our shoulders and say, well, so what?

[21:28] If that view of humanity really is true. If it's all just chance. If it doesn't matter. We're just like a me-be. So why can't we live like that?

[21:39] If we're just animals. Why do we find ourselves constantly asking the why question, even when the professors say, oh, don't ask that question. And then, of course, secondly, the world today says, not only is man not specially created above all others, but, of course, man is not created at all.

[21:58] There is no God. There is no God who created man. There is no God above to worship. Man, man is his own God. There is no higher being than man.

[22:11] Man has no authority above himself that we should bow down to. Nor have we been given any responsibility from above. Responsibility to steward and rule over this earth.

[22:23] Of course, what that means, in fact, is that man is God. Doesn't it? So not only is life cheap, human dignity is no greater than that of an animal, but the existence of good and evil isn't real either because it's man who just makes the rules.

[22:44] And we can make up any rules we want. We can decide what's good and what isn't. And our rules are not to be governed by some transcendent authority that proclaims absolute morality, absolute good and evil, and tells us that we are accountable to a God who declares these things.

[23:04] The absolute power now is in the hands of human beings. And that's the only thing that separates us from other species is that we have found that power.

[23:14] You see, the Bible says man is created. And man is under God's authority. And that gives great dignity and value because of the God in whose image we are made. And it gives us great responsibilities to the world around us and the world beneath.

[23:30] The scientific humanism said, no, there's no authority above us, and therefore we have no real responsibility to the world below us. And that leaves us, doesn't it, in rather a state of total confusion because man is only a beast on the one hand, and yet man is God at the same time.

[23:51] And so we live in a world that we've created where a beast is God. And that rather does describe our world, don't you think? But it's not the utopian dream of secular humanists.

[24:06] It's not the wonderful world of scientific believism. We don't have to go very far back, do we, in human history to see that it is a history of powerful human bestiality, not ultimate progress.

[24:23] It's the secular myths like this that have so devastated our world since the 20th century. I have a book here somewhere by Professor John Gray, who's Professor of European Thought at the London School of Economics, I think it is.

[24:42] And he's not a Christian man at all, but he says this, the result of these secularist myths has been a form of tyranny new in history that commits vast crimes in pursuit of heaven on earth.

[24:59] And he notes and says that people harp on often about the crimes, the so-called crimes of religion. But he says, the mass murderers of the 20th century were not perpetuated by some latter-day version of the Spanish Inquisition.

[25:10] They were carried out by atheistic regimes in the service of enlightenment ideas of progress. Stalin and Mao and others were not believers in original sin. Even Hitler, who despised enlightenment values of freedom and equality, shared the enlightenment faith that a new world could be created by human will.

[25:31] Each of these tyrants imagined the human condition could be transformed through the use of science. History has demolished these ambitions.

[25:43] And that, I'm afraid, is the reality, isn't it? And we know it to be true. But it's the reality of what happens when you reject the biblical view of man as created by God above and as responsible in the earth below.

[25:58] The reality is, what you're left with is powerful human bestiality. Not the mindless utopian drivel that John Lennon sung about. Imagine there's no God in heaven, no earth, no hell below, and everyone will be living life in peace.

[26:15] Well, we've been imagining that for many, many decades now. Are we living life in peace? John Lennon was a fool. And that imagining is what has led to evil upon evil, to genocide upon genocide, to the rule in this world of beasts who are God.

[26:36] That explains the moral confusion that's everywhere in our world today, especially in our Western world, where humans and animals are completely confused together.

[26:50] And where God and a transcendent morality is rejected altogether. We have all sorts of absurdities. As I've said, we have abortion which is rampant and it's accepted with no questions at all.

[27:02] But talk about fox hunting and there's uproar. In the press and in the House of Commons. Talk about genetically modified wheat to feed the world and you'll have protesters everywhere.

[27:15] But genetically modified babies, oh, that's absolutely fine. We've just agreed to do that in our parliament. So trees are projected by enormous amounts of legislation.

[27:27] But people's lives are about to be very unprotected as we push for euthanasia. People for the ethical treatment of animals are so confused on this that they equate animal life above human life.

[27:49] Here's what the president of the peoples for the ethical treatment of animals said a year or two ago. Yes, six million Jews died in the Holocaust, but six million chickens die here in slaughterhouses.

[28:08] So we legalize sex between minors and we've made sex between men and boys age 16 allowable. And yet we are increasingly about to criminalize even the speech of anybody who dares to say that modern versions of same-sex marriage or whatever are wrong.

[28:29] What a confused world we're living in. And yes, it is quite right. We do not see this picture of Psalm 8, of Genesis 1, the whole world in harmony, the whole world subject to man's rule.

[28:42] The question is, why do we not see that? And the answer, I think, is rather obvious. God is our creator. He's made man as his image to mirror his dignity and glory in the world.

[28:55] He's made man to image his rule in the world. But where man has rejected that, when man has rebelled and cast off all knowledge of the truth and rejected that whole way of looking at life, of course you're going to get chaos in the world.

[29:15] John Gray again says, liberal humanism has taken the Christian belief in the separation of humans from the rest of the natural world and stripped this idea of the transcendental content that gave it meaning.

[29:29] And describing the results on the world of that kind of thinking, he says this, the history of human relations with other species is a record of almost unbroken rapacity. Wrecking the environment seems to be in the nature of the beast.

[29:42] The beast who has become God. dancing to the tune of his own DNA and wrecking the world, not restoring the world.

[29:55] See, that is the absurdity, that is the foolishness to which all of this leads. Asius says, well, where is God? Where is God when the latest tragedy happens?

[30:05] There's a shooting or there's a hijacking or a bombing or whatever it is. But the Bible says, where is man? You're responsible, you who say you are God and so powerful.

[30:18] But by your own admission, you're helpless, aren't you? You're just an animal dancing to the tune of your DNA like everyone else. You say, oh, how unjust when these things happen.

[30:29] How can there be a God? But where does your idea of justice come from? Where does your idea of good and evil, justice and injustice, if it's all just in the DNA? My justice is as good as yours, as his, as somebody else's.

[30:41] I think it's just to blow people up. No wonder we're living in a society that is increasingly marked by meaninglessness and despair.

[30:54] Suicide is the biggest cause of death for men in their 20s in our country. Isn't that astonishing and tragic? We're increasingly apathetic. People don't even vote in elections.

[31:08] We live in a world that's increasingly isolated. There are more and more lonely people, aren't there? John Lennon was right about that one. See, humankind in our Western world have lost our identity.

[31:20] We're asking, who are we? We've lost our purpose. We're asking, what is life for? Because we have left God out of the equation. That's the Bible's contention.

[31:33] But the Bible tells us that you can't understand man's story without the God who made man. John Gray says, liberal humanism is now established as the unthinking creed of thinking people.

[31:48] Yet it is itself a religion, a shoddy replica of the Christian faith, markedly more irrational than the original article and more harmful.

[31:59] which is the greater leap of faith, he says. To accept the biblical version that humanity has eaten from the tree of knowledge and must somehow live with the consequences or to believe that somehow science can deliver humanity from itself, which is the greater leap of faith.

[32:18] It's astonishing candor from a man who is not a Christian at all. Of course, he has no answer. He sees no answer for man.

[32:28] He sees that man will just destroy himself. It's very bleak, the conclusions of his book. But is that it? Is everything lost about the story of humanity?

[32:43] I think it would be very easy to despair and very understandable to despair were it not for the answer that the Bible does so wonderfully give us, friends?

[32:55] Because it teaches us that we can't understand the truth about humanity without understanding God the creator and neither can we grasp the truth about humanity without understanding God the redeemer.

[33:08] The God of the Bible is not just the God who made man, but he is the one who in the fullness of time became man in order to redeem man and to make this whole fallen world of ours new as it should be.

[33:25] The answer to all our searching, to all our questions lies in this God who has a name, the name that envelops this psalm in verses 1 and 9. The Lord, Yahweh, Jehovah, the God of the Bible, the God of covenant promise who revealed himself fully and ultimately and uniquely and wonderfully at last in this world in the human flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, in the flesh of the one who is the true man, the only true man this world has seen since Adam.

[34:01] He himself became man to remake humanity and the world so that it would be as it was made to be. And of course it's true, the Bible is honest, the Bible acknowledges that we don't yet see the perfect picture of the world as this psalm paints it.

[34:18] But it does speak prophetically this psalm. It tells us what the world was made for and it tells us what the world is being redeemed for. And the New Testament tells us that although we must wait still for that final consummation to see man restore to his full glory, to see the whole world restored to glory, yet it tells us that we have already seen a foretaste, a foretaste that gives us certainty that that will surely be because we see Jesus.

[34:52] And in him this world has seen a glorious picture of humanity in glory, a glorious picture of a human being as the crown of creation, as all Christ's people will be one day.

[35:07] In Hebrews chapter 2, the writer quotes this psalm and it's wonderful what he says. You might like to look up Hebrews chapter 2 just to see it.

[35:20] I think it's page 1001 in our church Bibles. But he quotes the psalm about man being crowned with glory and honor and about everything being in subjection under his feet.

[35:34] And in verse 8, he says, at present we do not yet see everything in subjection to him, that is to man. But we do see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus.

[35:47] We see him crowned with glory and honor because of suffering and death so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. See, this world has seen the true manifestation of humanity as it's finally destined to be.

[36:03] Once, a man who did walk this earth walked it truly as its Lord. He was a perfect embodiment of God's glory on earth.

[36:14] A perfect embodiment of God's gracious rule here on earth. If you have never done so, read the Gospels, read about Jesus of Nazareth, see how all creation truly was under his feet, under his dominion.

[36:27] Winds and waves obeyed his voice. Animals, even in a hostile desert, submitted to him. Sickness and disease and even decay and death were banished at his command.

[36:40] Bread and fish and wine were all created at his touch as the Lord of creation surveyed his whole dominion.

[36:54] And as Jesus rode into Jerusalem as a king on the donkey with the children singing Hosanna. Do you remember Jesus said himself, haven't you read Psalm 8, that out of the mouths of infants and babies you have prepared praise.

[37:10] He came to reveal true humanity to this world and he came to restore true humanity for a new world, a recreated world. And in his resurrection to bodily life, he declares that restoration is real and tangible and that it has begun for our lost and sad world.

[37:33] The resurrection declares the glory that we long for and that we were made for, the world of Psalm 8 and it tells us it's coming, it's coming soon when Jesus comes again to establish his majestic name over this whole earth.

[37:49] So you see, ultimately, the answer to this question, what is man, what's human life all about, ultimately, the answer to the truth about all humanity is found in just one place, one place alone and that is in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ where the God with a name, the Lord, the Creator God, the Redeemer of all things, where he made himself known uniquely and wonderfully forever on earth so that we could know him.

[38:20] Jesus Christ is the answer to every great question about human life. The question, where is God and what is God really like? Well, he's the answer.

[38:31] Look at Jesus Christ, listen to Jesus Christ, then you'll know in his words, in his deeds, in his face is everything that you need to see, to know, to hear what he is like and to know the one true God.

[38:47] And the question, what is man, what is life really about? Where is it going? What's it for? Why do I exist at all? The answer is, look at the Lord Jesus Christ. If you just look at ourselves and if we look at our world, if we see humanity only as it is now, marred by sin, by rebellion against God, all we see is man lost in egocentricity, lost in selfishness.

[39:12] People adrift in the world, no moorings above us and having therefore cast off all authority here below. cast off all the responsibilities that we're made for, the mess, the pain, everything is plain to see.

[39:25] That would bring us to despair if that's the only answer to what it is to be human. But look to the Lord Jesus Christ and we see true humanity and we see the true destiny that we were created for and redeemed for that everyone who is in Christ Jesus will be.

[39:45] He's the founder of our salvation, says Hebrews 2. He came to restore, to bring many sons to glory, to share that glory of true humanity. Look at Hebrews 2.10.

[39:58] He says that right after quoting this psalm, he says that Jesus, for whom and by whom all things exist, will not be ashamed to call us his brothers.

[40:08] that he, through his suffering and death, has destroyed the power of death and delivered us from the slavery and from the misery of our own fallen mortality.

[40:21] And that means that we shall at last be like him. We shall know true humanity forever. What's the truth about humanity? What is man?

[40:33] Not just a beast whose life is cheap and meaningless. Nor his own God who has power to transform life or make any difference ultimately in this world.

[40:48] No. According to the Bible, man is a glorious ruin. He's glorious, yes. He's created and crowned with glory and honor by his creator.

[40:59] But he is ruined because of his rebellion and sin against his maker. That's what the Bible teaches us about humanity. And that's exactly what we see all around us, isn't it?

[41:11] That explains the world. Man's glory and his ruin are side by side in front of us all the time. That's the story of humanity. That's the story of human history. The great and the terrible.

[41:25] But in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, you see, that glory that departed has returned and been restored with a superabundant glory and restored never ever to depart again.

[41:41] And that's why Christian people can rejoice and sing with the psalmist, O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. Aren't you glad if you're a Christian that you know the name, the name of Jesus, the name that explains this whole world, its beginning and its end?

[42:04] If you don't really know him, shouldn't you make that a matter of real priority? If you want to begin to find the kind of answers that any thinking human being knows, they need to ask.

[42:17] They must find answers to. Well, if that's you, I pray that you'll do that urgently and begin to find those answers this very day.

[42:31] Let's pray together. O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth.

[42:43] Now we thank you for the revelation of your glory and of man's glory in the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ, the word, to close earth's story when you open heaven's scroll.

[42:57] Christ in us, the hope of glory. Recreate us, body and soul, in your image. And so make us holy and make us whole for the glory of our God in both heaven and earth.

[43:18] Amen.