God Gave Man Dominion

Please turn your Bible to Genesis chapter one. Genesis chapter one. That can be found on page one.

We'll be reading verses 26 through 28. Please stand when you have that for the reading of God's word.

Then God said, let us make man in our image and after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth 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.

And God blessed them. And God said to them, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.

Amen. You may be seated. Dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for the wonderful gift of dominion.

We ask that you would open our eyes to understand your word, to understand what the whole council says to us.

Not merely these verses here, but what your whole word speaks to us. In Jesus' name, amen.

Well, we've been going through basic truths in Genesis, looking at how some of the most foundational realities of the way that we were created are things that are the most attacked by Satan.

So we do not wanna be ignorant of Satan's devices, but recognizing what things that God has made foundational in his creation, looking to those, seeing how

God has ordered his world and recognizing these are key things that the enemy seeks to destroy.

Now, the basic truth we have for today is that God gave man dominion. Dominion, also known as rulership, is closely tied to the notion of ownership, to property.

These are things that we think about all the time. These are things that we are fairly preoccupied with, sometimes in sinful ways, but even in not sinful ways, we are constantly preoccupied with our own possessions.

Oh, we work 40 hours a week, sometimes more, in order to acquire possessions.

We spend time thinking about our own possessions. We think about the possessions of others. When we watch the news, what are we concerned about?

We're concerned about rulers, dominions, all kinds of things.

So we're preoccupied with our own possessions. We're preoccupied with the possessions of others. And then

Scripture itself is preoccupied with the concept of property. You know, the last time

I even preached in the morning, it was on Luke 18, with a rich young ruler, and it was about covetousness and the whole problem of covetousness.

The Bible says that the love of money is the root of all evils. There is something really central in the theme of Scripture about property, about money, about dominion, about rulership, about ownership, and while we are preoccupied with these things in some sense, and the

Bible's even preoccupied with these things in another sense, we spend very little time about thinking about what dominion actually is, what property actually is.

And so I think it is important that we consider, we take a step back and we consider these things more holy. What actually is dominion?

What exactly is God commanding here? As we look at all this, we'll see that dominion is given by God in creation, it is lost in the fall, and it is restored in Christ.

It is given in creation, it is lost in the fall, or corrupted in the fall, rather, and then restored in Christ.

First of all, what is this dominion over? It says, be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.

Primary thing that's mentioned here is animals. Animals, animate things.

There's a sense in which when someone thinks of rulership, when you think of ruling, you think of ruling over animate things that you would control, and so the

Bible primarily speaks of animals. However, it also says to subdue the earth. Multiply and fill the earth and subdue it.

So it is not just animals, it also speaks of plants here, talking about God having given plants to man.

And then, inert creation, also the land itself. And we might even observe the advance of technology, and how man has been able to go into space.

Might say even the lower heavens have been given to man. Now there are a few things, two things in particular, that have not been given to man.

Psalm 115, 16 says, the heavens are the Lord's heavens, but the earth he has given to the children of man.

Right, the children of Adam is what he's talking about. Job 38, 17, have the gates of death been revealed to you, or have you seen the gates of deep darkness?

So there are things that are too high for us, they are God's dominion, the heavens, and there are things that are too low for us.

He controls hell itself. So outside of heaven and hell, the rest of this material creation is something that has been given to mankind.

It is something that has been given to man, and it is a great gift. It is something that really elevates man, and is something very profound that God has done.

So if you consider, what is dominion? Dominion is a kind of plenary authority, a plenary authority over creation.

Right, now it is not plenary in the sense of not being in any sense a stewardship, it is a stewardship. God has dominion over the whole earth.

Okay, he controls all things, and yet man under him as a steward is given a sort of plenary authority.

So it's not plenary, plenary meaning complete, right? It's not complete in that we don't give an account to God, but it is complete in that one who has dominion over something does not have to give account to any other kind of court, right?

It truly is something that is his. Now this is something that reflects the image of God, right?

We saw in this passage that this is very connected with the image of God. It says, let us make man in our image and after our likeness let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, et cetera.

God has dominion, he has made man in his image, he has given man dominion. You see, in scripture, it says in Psalm 95, three through five for the

Lord is a great God and a great king above all gods and his hand are the depths of the earth and the heights of the mountain are also his.

The sea is his for he made it. His hands formed the dry land. So God owns everything, but God making man in his image makes us like him also having a capacity for dominion, for possessing things, for owning things, for having property.

Now this is something that is not itself proper to the image of God, okay? Man having dominion is not something that is in the image itself because even if you had no other aspect of creation, no capacity for owning anything else, right, because nothing else exists, man would still be made in the image of God, but it is consequent the image of God.

Because God has made man as his representative, being like him in several specific ways, knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, and dominion over the creatures, we have consequent this image as a representative of God, the capacity for dominion, the capacity for owning things, the capacity for having authority over things.

And this is something that is very interesting if you think about it because this is something that God has not even given to the angels.

Now the angels have knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, right? These are the things that we often think about when we think about the image of God.

These are things that our catechism talks about, our confession talks about, knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, that the angels know things, they are righteous, you know, those who continue to serve the

Lord, have not fallen, they have holiness, they are called as holy angels frequently. And yet they have not been given any kind of capacity for dominion over the creatures.

And this is a special glory that has been given to man. Psalm 8, five says, yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor.

You gave him dominion over the works of your hands. You have put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the sea.

Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. This is a very privileged position that man has.

This is not something that is just natural for anything in creation.

There's no other thing in creation like man that has the capacity for dominion. And yet God has set him up over the earth.

This is something that not even the angels have. Not even the angels have this sort of dominion. You know, it is a very, if you think about what it is like to be raised from this state of what is inherently owed to man, which is nothing, and being given so much, being put over the world, and how honoring that is, how glorious that is.

One analogy I think of is Joseph. You remember Joseph being a slave, being in prison, and then what happens?

Pharaoh takes him, gives him the signet ring so he can be his representative, gives him clothes, puts him on his chariot, rides him around, and has everyone bow down to him, though he was just moments ago a slave and a prisoner.

Okay, this is what it is like for mankind, even Adam. You know, barring all notions of sin and everything,

Adam did not deserve this majesty that God has given him. God has placed him over creation.

Now, this dominion is something that we often think about collectively when we're reading

Scripture. I think that's how most people tend to think about it. They think about mankind having dominion over the earth.

But it is also something that ought to be considered individually. So for example, when we think about knowledge, righteousness, and holiness in the image of God, I have my own knowledge that is distinct from yours, right?

Knowledge is not just considered collectively in mankind. I have my own righteousness that is distinct from your righteousness.

I have my own holiness, distinct from your holiness. These are things that, while we might speak of them collectively for mankind, they are also things that man enjoys distinctly individually.

Same is true for dominion. Dominion is not just something that man has collectively, something that man enjoys distinctly.

Now, what that means is that personal property, owning things, is very real, right?

There are several proofs you could go to for that. Some are just in nature. You don't even have to look to Scripture, but just the way that God created man, although you do see it in Genesis 1, right?

He created man with a need to eat, right? He must, man must consume things.

He must exclusively possess things in order for him to survive. That, God has made man so that he requires some kind of exclusive possession.

And so, plants are mentioned there in that passage. And then, plants also mentioned for the animals, because the animals also need that very lowest level of dominion to be able to exclusively enjoy the benefits of a plant in order to survive.

But God, in setting man over the animals, and later in Genesis 9, giving him permission to eat the animals, we see that that need for consumption implies this kind of dominion in ownership.

Now, on top of that, we have other very direct passages. The Eighth Commandment. The Eighth Commandment says, thou shalt not steal.

Now, if that doesn't imply that property is a real thing, that someone can have dominion over a particular piece of God's material creation, what does it imply?

Well, it certainly implies that property is a real thing. It is something that can be stolen.

It is something that someone has that is then violated. It is authority that someone possesses that is violated when it is stolen.

And then, this is something that is a right, right? It is something that God has given man the capacity for this authority that no court other than his own court is one that could rightly take it away from him, apart from the means that God has established.

You see, many people think of dominion as something that only kings have.

Only kings have dominion. And anything that we have underneath is just something of our own, is a privilege that has been granted to us.

But this is not the case. When Ahab desired Naboth's vineyard, he could not just, because he was king, say,

I want your vineyard. I'm the king. I'm the one who has dominion. You only have dominion or ownership as a privilege under me.

I get to take your vineyard. No, he took it wrongly by making sure that he got killed, right, or Jezebel did this.

So, this is an example in Scripture that shows us that dominion is not just the thing of kings.

This is the thing of individuals. Even individuals have dominion. You have dominion over particular things.

You have particular things that you own, that you have dominion over. And this is,

I want to just dwell on how profound that is for a moment, the notion of dominion, because you as a

Christian might have thought about how your reality is a bit bigger than those who have a materialistic worldview.

When you think about things like morality, right, that there's rightness and wrongness, that's something that exists beyond just the material world, right, that there is right and wrong in the world, and that because we have a

God who finds things, some things offensive and some things pleasing, there's a rightness and wrongness to things. Beauty is a real thing.

Maybe you've considered that as a Christian, you know, that there are some things that are objectively beautiful. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but there is one beholder that is above all others.

Those things that he finds beautiful are truly indeed beautiful. Maybe you've thought about logic.

Logic is not a material thing, and yet it's very real. Nothing would work if logic were not real, but this is some immaterial thing that is very real because of our

God. Ownership is something very real, even though it is immaterial.

You have a particular relationship to things that is not embedded in the atoms of the thing itself.

Now, if you own a car, that is your car. It has a relationship to you that is beyond just its material properties.

It is not somebody else's car. It's not my car, right? It does not have that same relationship with me, and so there is more to God's reality than just material things.

You're probably used to thinking about this when it comes to morality, when it comes to beauty, when it comes to logic. Maybe you've thought through some of those things.

This is also true when it comes to the notion of dominion, when it comes to the notion of authority and property. This is a very wonderful way that God has made the world in order to reflect who he is as one who has dominion.

So a question at this point is, how does something become under the dominion of an individual?

Well, Genesis very clearly tells us it is through subduing. It says, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea, et cetera.

Subdue it. Okay, so when something is subdued, that is when dominion is had over it.

A lot of times when we talk about Christ, we will talk about him subduing our hearts.

That is him having dominion over us. We enter his dominion, his kingdom, his kingship, because he subdues us, right?

He changes us so that we are willing servants. He has, we are wild things that are rebellious and he has tamed us, okay?

That is what happens with the animals. The animals can be subdued, they can be captured, they can be used, and they can be owned.

Okay, this is how man is to have dominion over the beasts of the field, et cetera. And the same is true with other things.

Same is true, most quintessentially, with land, because it is the earth that is to be subdued.

This is typically referred to as homesteading. Now, you might have heard the term homesteading.

It's referred to what crunchy people who own chickens do, right? You know, the homestead.

But what homesteading traditionally refers to is cultivating the land, and by cultivating it, taking possession of it, okay?

And so this is something that happens where before, it does not exist under any particular ownership.

It is just under the common ownership of mankind, the common property of mankind. And then by cultivation, it becomes your own.

This is often called homesteading. Now, there's interesting questions about this, like how far out, how much of the land has to be cultivated in order for it to really be your own?

You know, when Columbus shows up in the Americas, he can't just say, oh, all these Americas are mine, right?

A significant portion of the land must be cultivated in order to truly call it your own. But we see this frequently in Scripture.

You know, one very good example is Genesis 13. Abraham is with Lot, and the land that they're at is too small for the both of them, so they decide they're going to split ways.

And at this time, the people have not spread across the face of Canaan so much that they cannot simply use this land because it is not owned by anyone, right?

And so they go, and the problem with Abraham is that because he's a nomad, because God has called him from place to place, he can't cultivate it and own it.

But God promises to him that one day his children will own it. He will have dominion through his children.

And you notice those are connected there in Genesis too, right, be fruitful, multiply, subdue the earth, have dominion.

He will be able to have dominion through his children which will multiply and will be able to cultivate the whole of the land, and they will possess it.

And these are phrases that are frequently brought together. He says, when you subdue the land, and he's partly talking about the enemies that must be conquered, when you subdue the land, you will possess it.

This is how this comes to be. Now, like I said, there are interesting questions about how much of the land needs to be cultivated for it to be your own.

It used to be that people considered their possession once they captured land, existed all the way into the heavens, right?

Now that airspaces are like things people use, we realize maybe that's not the best way of thinking about property.

Now that, what's the word I'm looking for?

Now that wireless spectrum, right, the wireless spectrum can be cultivated, this is something too that people have claimed ownership of.

I claim these sections of the spectrum, T -Mobile owns a certain section of the spectrum, et cetera. These are interesting things.

The fact that there will be difficult problems in determining dominion does not show that dominion is not a real concept.

Okay, yes, there are fuzzy cases, there are difficult things, but this does not mean dominion and private dominion, personal dominion is not a real concept, it is.

And it is something we see throughout Scripture. And it's something that Adam is given as a command.

Now a lot of people, when they see this, a lot of them think that Adam is being given all of creation as something he already owns.

He doesn't already own in this passage, he is given this as a command. It is said, he has the capacity for dominion over it, but he does not already have dominion over it.

Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens, over every living thing that moves on the earth, right?

He hasn't been fruitful or multiplied yet, that is to come. He hasn't subdued and had dominion yet, that is to come.

So these things are a command to Adam and likewise to us, in him they are a command.

We are to have dominion. Possessions are a good thing to build up.

Now many people read Scripture and they come to the opposite conclusion. There are many people who have taken vows of poverty, who have joined monastic orders because they believe that Scripture is telling them that they must renounce personal property.

But God presents, even in the way that he has created creation, personal property, dominion as a good thing, as something that is commanded.

Now, think about the different passages that talk about this. You know, especially in the Proverbs, there's all kinds of commands towards diligence, toward building up a storehouse of things, et cetera, right?

And we've talked about some of these Proverbs recently with some of these other basic truths.

All right, what is the glory of old men? It's their grandchildren. What is the, or the crown of old men is their grandchildren.

What is the glory of young men? It is their strength, right? These are things that are indicating what the purpose of man is, right?

Man is to be strong. As men and women grow older, they need to have children and grandchildren.

What does the Bible say that the glory of the wise is, or the crown of the wise in the Proverbs? The crown of the wise is his wealth.

It says the crown of the wise is his wealth. This is also something that is good. Ephesians 4 .28

says that the thief should no longer steal, but he should labor working, doing honest work with his hands in order that he might be able to share with those in need.

So it does not command poverty. It rather commands building things up in order that you can be as God with those things, one who has much and gives much.

You can be one who has much and gives much. It is something that is commanded.

Now, there's all kinds of things you could be hearing me saying that I'm not saying, and a lot of these apply very analogously to children, right, if I call children blessing, if I say being fruitful and multiplying is a command,

I'm not saying that every means of having a child is good. Right, if I go to, you know, if I go to the sperm bank, make a donation, you know, and have 200 kids, that was not an ethical way of me having lots of children.

All right, so there are unethical ways of taking dominion. Right, on top of that, it should not be my highest priority above all others where all else gets shoved aside, right?

So that would be an example where you use sinful means in order to pursue something or other priorities are taken out of line.

It does not mean that God cannot call some particular people in rare circumstances to some other kind of pursuit that would require severe poverty all their days.

Okay, just like Paul is called to not pursue marriage, to not have children because of his very rare and very particular circumstances, it can be the case that Jesus calls the rich young ruler to sell all his possessions and follow him.

Okay, that is something that happens on rare occasions. But in normal occasions,

God has made man for having children. On normal occasions, God has made man for taking dominion.

God has made man for building up wealth in order that he might be an image bearer reflecting God who has much and gives much.

This is a good thing. Now, this is all, all this dominion, all this good thing that God has given as a gift to man, it's a particular way that man images

God is corrupted in the fall. Okay, man, and it's particularly interesting how it is corrupted because Satan, taking this form of a serpent, seduces

Eve and seduces Adam. And so you have man being told to take dominion over the animals, and then what ends up taking dominion over him?

It's an animal, right? And so the whole thing has been completely reversed.

And this is what we see today, that that earth that we're supposed to take dominion over by cultivating it, now thorns grow up out of it, and it's much harder to take dominion over it.

So naturally, in even natural senses, dominion has been corrupted.

The animals that we are to, that we are to have dominion over often have dominion over us.

All kinds of stories about people who've been killed by, you know, chimpanzees, pit bulls, name the animal.

You know, there's the animal's fierce enough, there's someone who's been killed by it at some point or another. It's a terrifying thing.

This is a natural reversal of the way that God has created nature, right?

What I mean by natural is it's not moral. There's nothing, when someone gets eaten by a shark, that doesn't mean that he has some particular sin.

It just means that we live in a fallen world where nature has been, where nature has been itself corrupted under the weight of sin.

Right, and then your environment can kill you. You know, you can drown. Even other men will kill you.

And so your dominion just over yourself is reversed by others desiring dominion over you.

There are all kinds of ways that dominion is corrupted in the fall. Now, I say corrupted in particular.

It is not lost in the fall. In Reformed theology, and this seems very clear given what

Scripture says, in Reformed theology, the image of God is corrupted in the fall, and it is renewed and restored in Christ.

In Lutheran theology, it is completely lost. There is a, it's funny because the Trinity hymnal is a, it's a

Reformed hymnal, but there's one version of the Trinity hymnal that has a Lutheran song in it that talks about the image being lost.

And whenever I see that, I think, that's very interesting given that that's not, that's not the theology of the people putting together the hymnal when it talks about it being lost.

But the image of God is not lost. It is only corrupted. And so dominion is not something that is lost. It is only something that is corrupted.

And it is still a command to us. It is still something that has been given, it is reinforced in Genesis nine, where we are told, and God blessed

Noah and his sons and said to them, be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth. The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth and upon every bird of the heavens, upon everything that creeps on the ground and on the fish of the sea.

Into your hand they are delivered. Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I have given you the green plants,

I give you everything. All right, so man still has dominion over the animals. He still has dominion.

He still has ownership. Property is a real thing. The eighth commandment, still a real thing. Now, it is not just naturally corrupted so that it's more difficult to take dominion because of the way nature is arranged after the fall.

It also had been morally corrupted. It is more difficult for man to take dominion because of moral obstacles.

So if you consider the works of the flesh and how all of them affect your ability to take dominion, your own wicked foolishness, you know, remember the crown of the wise?

That is his wealth. The wealth is the crown of the wise. A fool does things that take away his wealth, that rob himself of wealth.

You think about laziness. Proverbs frequently commanding diligence. No, but we are lazy, and so that prevents us from increasing any kind of dominion.

We lack self -control, dominion over our own spirits so that we would arrange our own lives as we ought and be able to pursue those things that God would have us to pursue.

And then our own selfishness so that when we do take dominion, often it is not out of the true reflection of God, but one who is generous.

So there are all kinds of ways that right dominion is made more difficult by moral corruption within us.

Now, beyond just those works of the flesh versus fruit of the spirit categories, you can also think about how man in his foolishness, through the effects of sin on his mind, has embraced all kinds of philosophies that were contrary to the dominion that God has given.

You know, one of these is veganism. Now, when I say veganism, you're probably thinking of the diet. Okay, I'm not primarily talking about the diet.

There was one time during the early days of COVID, my workplace was trying to arrange some kind of entertainment for us as a group, but they weren't able to do the usual thing of taking us all out to a restaurant since everybody's locked in their homes.

And so they had us sit on a Zoom call with a vegan sheep farm that was taking care of abused sheep that had been rescued or something like that.

And some of the women in the group were really excited about this. They liked getting to see the sheep. And one of them said, you know,

I knit a lot. Do you use the wool and turn it into yarn so that people can knit with it? And they said, oh no, we don't believe in using any animal products.

We take all their wool after we shear it and we go throw it in the woods where it can just compost. So they believe, so not just talking about the diet, talking about the ideology of veganism, refuses to take dominion over the animals, considers it wrong to take dominion over the animals.

And in this particular circumstance, it's ironic because they're trying to rescue the animals by putting them in particular pens, et cetera, taking dominion over them while at the same time trying to convince themselves that that's not what they're doing.

Right, it's ironic. But then consider all the other ways that people have odd ideas around dominion.

Many of you know that one that's important to me is the notion of intellectual property, right?

There's the idea since the 18th century, this is a fairly new thing in human law, that people treat ideas as property, right?

Ideas that are possessed by all who hear them, right? If you come up with an idea for a better light bulb and somebody else now knows about that idea for the better light bulb, it is in their possession, right?

It is not something scarce. They cannot dispossess themselves of it. And this is now treated like some kind of exclusive property even though it is not exclusive property, it is not scarce.

It was not treated as exclusive property for most of human history. All the laws that address this explain from the outset, and by all the laws,

I'm mostly talking about the UK and the US, from the outset explain the pragmatic reason for having this law in order to encourage creative works.

They think that that's what it will do. They also say that it is not to perpetuity, right?

A patent is in the US for 20 years, right? Yet real property is to perpetuity.

You know, if I have land I can pass down to my children, they can pass down to their children, et cetera, right? If it's not something that you can really pass on forever, is it really property?

This is man trying to come up with his own ideas that run contrary to what

God is speaking of when he speaks of subduing and dominion and things that are exclusive, the things that are scarce and therefore must be exclusive.

Now, of course, this has happened with land quite a bit, and it's happened in ways you may not have considered.

Do you know who owns the moon or who owns Mars? There's a treaty made in 1967 that decided that homesteading wouldn't be impossible if anyone made it to the moon or to Mars, right?

That you are not allowed to cultivate it and claim possession of it. Dominion is not allowed there.

Everybody owns it collectively. Now, maybe you see that and you think, well, that seems like a reasonable thing for countries to get together and do, but what is it saying given what

God has said about man's command to take dominion, to cultivate things, to own things?

And they have said that dominion is not allowed here. That has been done with whole continents.

Antarctica, convention from, or sorry, a treaty from 1958, I believe it is, makes it so that no one can own any part of Antarctica, right?

These are not things that you are allowed to take dominion over, though dominion is a command.

This is the case in much of the United States, very large tracts of land, to the tune of 80 million acres, something like that, is owned in such a way where the government has said no homesteading is allowed here.

There were particular homesteading ordinances, but they have all expired. The one for Alaska ended in 1986.

So for my entire lifetime, since I was born that year, there has been no homesteading, no taking dominion of property that has been untouched and unowned by anybody.

And so here we have this command of God that is treated very lightly with these things. You might have pragmatic reasons that you think such treaties would be helpful, but what do they say about the command that God has given?

What do they say about man's understanding of his obligation to God in order to encourage the children of each generation to go and cultivate the land, subdue it, take dominion?

Now, of course, this mindset about land is not, this is not, in a lot of ways, these have been transgressed very recently.

In other ways, there are always forces at work to have people question these things before.

Robin Hood, very old character, right? Steals from the rich, gives to the poor. He's supposed to make you, and he's one where, he's a character that the earliest recording was from 1300,

I believe. This is a very old character, and a lot of people have written books, so there's not a canonical Robin Hood.

But typically what the books do that talk about Robin Hood, they're trying to get you to question the nature of property, right?

They're trying to get you to question, well, does that really belong to him? Should it not belong to someone else? And what was

Robin Hood's chief crime that made him an outlaw? Killed the king's deer, right?

He was on the king's land, killed the king's deer. And so the idea, typically the way it's framed in the writings about Robin Hood, is that should someone of much wealth really be able to own a few hundred acres of land?

Should that really be his? Should that not be the common property of all man? Where someone can go and kill a deer on it and it not be a big deal?

The Bible has answers for these things. In Nehemiah 2 .7

it says, I said to the king, if it pleases the king, this is Nehemiah speaking, if it pleases the king, let letters be given to the governors of the province beyond the river that they may let me pass through until I come to Judah.

And a letter to Asaph, the keeper of the king's forest, that he may give me timber to make beams for the gates of the forest of the temple, for the wall of the city, and for the house that I shall occupy.

And the king granted me what I asked, for the good hand of my God was upon me. So Nehemiah is recognizing that the king, someone of great wealth, can own a forest to himself, right?

But frequently that kind of thing is frowned upon as being something that is too, yeah, people don't like that idea of dominion, it feels too unfair.

Yet, why is it not the case that someone can with significant wealth own some hundred acres?

Not talking about tens of millions, talk about hundreds. Which I know for this area sounds like a ton because people live on less than an acre here, but if you've lived on, you know,

I at one point lived on 20 acres at one point, another point

I think I might have lived on, you know, my father lived on 50, I think, at one point with my grandparents.

But, you know, this, and they were not especially rich people or anything, right?

So when I say hundreds, you might think of that as very large given the area we live in, it's not necessarily that large.

One of the ideologies here is preservationism versus conservationism, if you've ever heard those terms before.

Conservationists want to steward nature in a way where it is conserved. Preservationists want to make sure it remains completely untouched by man.

They consider the ideal state of nature to be one that is uncultivated, right? Like nature is best when it is uncultivated by man, when man is not touching it.

It's very interesting when you go to a lot of the California state parks, you know, the docents will tell you not to touch anything.

And I get that a lot of these are very high traffic areas, and so if everybody's touching everything, it'll wear it away really fast.

But you can tell that there is a mindset that's tending towards preservationism, that it would be best if man only looked and never touched anything, right?

But that misunderstands what creation is here for. Creation is here for man. God has made man to have dominion over creation.

And of course, none of these are quite as direct and evil as the ideology of communism, okay?

Communism, which says that there is no such thing as dominion at all. All property is common property, right?

And then democratic socialism, which is the stepping stone to communism. You know, communist theory acknowledges democratic socialism as being the stepping stone, where in communism, you have a stateless society that has no property.

Democratic socialism, you have a state that has taken control of the means of production and is redistributing wealth as needed.

And this is what, many people embrace this as being a good thing.

When something goes contradictory to what the Bible says about ownership, about property, about Ahab not being able to just take

Naboth's vineyard, right, did you know that a majority of people from ages 18 to 29 affirm democratic socialism as a good thing?

A majority of those, 18 to 29, right? And this is something, this is a basic truth. This is a foundational thing.

Man is made for dominion. If you think that man, that he should not have complete dominion, that we as a collective should be redistributing his dominion, this is something that is very, very contrary.

And it happens all the time, right? There's all kinds of things. You're probably familiar with the idea of social healthcare, right, the idea that we as a society should be collectively supporting one another's healthcare, not out of our own generosity, but out of the force of the government, that that wealth be redistributed in order that people have healthcare.

Now, and we talk, people talk about this as a right, right? Property is a right, and that it cannot be taken away from you, right?

Ahab cannot take Naboth's vineyard away, not with God's permission. And there is, but this is a, but this is something that people talk about as a right, as though it is something that has to be given, okay?

So there are negative rights, things that cannot be taken away. Those are real rights. But then people come up with these positive rights, things that have to be given to them.

And what does that mean? That means that other people's property must be collected, you know, their money must be taken in order that it be redistributed to those who are particularly in need.

This is not generosity, this is not what scripture speaks of when it talks about caring about the poor, et cetera. This is something that is completely contrary to the notion of dominion given in Genesis one.

See this also with public schools, right? The idea being that, you know, those resources that are necessary to educate children, et cetera, it is best if that were not under the dominion of particular heads of household, but that those were collected and shared with the community at large in order that it be something collective and not something where there is any kind of individual dominion.

This happens with public libraries. Now it used to be that, like if you read older writings about public schools and public libraries, these are things that are made available to the public by a rich patron who is donating to making them happen.

It is something generous, right? Right now when people talk about public schools and public libraries, they're talking about something very different.

There is a public library that's going to be built just over right here where the

Lakewood Park is. That measure passed on the last ballot and it's a $290 million library that is going to affect everyone, you know, who lives in this area.

In this neighborhood, you know, just looking at the average home price, it means that the average homeowner in this neighborhood is going to be paying $400 a year for the next 25 years.

This is what's going to be required of them in order that this library exists communally. So this is the mindset is you can have some dominion, but occasionally it's good for the community to get together and decide forcefully without your permission to own these things communally.

And so does man really have dominion over those things where another can just come without any special permission from God, just take them away?

And this is not just, you might be hearing what I'm saying as being primarily about liberal policies.

This is not just about liberal policies. You often see conservatives promote these very things. Something I've seen lately a lot, people, conservatives will say, stop giving so much money to Ukraine.

Why? The answer is because there is so much flooding in North Carolina, right?

So the idea is not just the negative. It is positively our wealth as a nation should be collected and shared particularly with those in need, not out of an act of real generosity, but out of an act of force.

And so it is, this is, imagine if Naboth wanted to take the vineyard, or sorry, imagine if Ahab wanted to take

Naboth's vineyard to share the wine with others. Would that have then been okay? Okay, now you can take

Naboth's vineyard because you're not just using it for yourself. No, it would have still been wrong. It would have still been wrong.

And even churches will do this, right? A lot of times churches, when they are thinking about how to be generous to the poor, they will, when they see someone who has housing needs, what do they do?

Rather than really trying to meet those housing needs, they help them figure out and navigate Section 8 housing, which is basically another way that money is taken from the collective and used in a communal fashion in order to subsidize the housing for the needy.

And so even churches are often promoting, are promoting a communal ownership of things that deny and reject man's individual dominion.

And these things, these things ought not to be. It's very frequent, it's very accepted, it's very normal that these things ought not to be.

Now, you might also be thinking, this is too political to speak this way.

This is not, it's not too political to speak about these things. These are things that Scripture speaks directly to when it speaks of dominion, when it describes the authority of kings, when it describes the rights of individuals, when it describes the

Eighth Commandment. And we are to call all men to repentance, especially those who are guilty of great sins like these.

This ideology that would treat property as something that is to be owned communally and not to be had any kind of individual dominion over is a satanic mindset, is satanic on a few fronts.

Satanic in that you have the serpent himself who is trying to take away man's dominion in the garden, destroying, corrupting man's dominion.

And you have the continued effects of this and the absolute rejection of religion from those who embrace this philosophy in the furthest measure.

This is a quote written by Friedrich Engels, who is a co -author of the

Communist Manifesto. This is from a drafted document called A Communist Confession of Faith that he wrote.

Do communists reject existing religions? Answer, all religions which have existed hitherto were expressions of historical stages of development of individual peoples or groups of peoples.

But communism is that stage of historical development which makes all existing religions superfluous and supersedes them.

All right, so the idea is once we all share things in common we don't need religion anymore. Now you might say this is not what the individual who votes for any of these kinds of socialist policies is doing.

Well, the individual who votes for those socialist policies is thinking that there's some measure of prosperity that can be afforded to man by rejecting

God's created order, by rejecting the way that God has made the world. And this is anti -God.

Not only is it anti -God, but if he has made us in his image to have dominion, then the more you reject the image of God in man, the more you fail to understand yourself as well as understand

God. And that knowledge which God would have for man in order that we might honor him is corrupted.

And even those who have been saved by the grace of Jesus Christ often entertaining these ideas so that they would not understand who

God is or who they are as they ought. Now, once again, if you think of this as too political, there's a quote

I'd like to read for you. For many a year, by the grand old truth of the gospel, and let me phrase this with,

I don't think many people realize how much people do treat this as an alternate gospel. There are a lot of pulpits where what is proclaimed is just socialism.

Like, that is the good news, is that by sharing things communally, we can achieve real peace and prosperity.

I knew a guy in a former workplace who was also a preacher, and he sent me a sermon he had preached, and it was about the 11th hour workers, right?

And his takeaway from the 11th hour workers was that everyone should receive what's same no matter how much they worked, et cetera, right?

And this was the message. You may not realize it, but a lot of pulpits, this is the message that is proclaimed.

And so it is not wrong for us to speak very directly against these very real evils.

Here's the quote. For many a year, by the grand old truth of the gospel, sinners were converted, and saints were edified, and the world was made to know that there is a

God in Israel. But these are too antiquated for the present cultured race of superior beings.

They're going to regenerate the world by democratic socialism and set up a kingdom for Christ with the new birth, without the new birth, or the pardon of sin.

Truly, the Lord has not taken away the 7 ,000 that have not bailed the need to bail. The latter -day gospel is not the gospel by which we were saved.

To me, it seems a tangle of ever -changing dreams. It is, by the confession of its inventors, the outcome of the period, the monstrous birth of a boasted progress, the scum of the cauldron of conceit.

It has not been given by the infallible revelation of God. It does not pretend to have been. It is not divine.

It has no inspired scriptures at its back. It is, when it touches the cross, an enemy. When it speaks of him who died thereon, it is a deceitful friend.

Many are at sneers at the truth of substitution. It is irate at the mention of the precious blood. Many a pulpit where Christ was once lifted high and all the glory of his atoning death is now profaned by those who laugh at justification by faith.

In fact, men are now to be saved by faith, not by faith, but by doubt. Those who love the church of God feel heavy at heart because the teachers of the people cause them to err, even from a national point of view.

Men of foresight can see cause for grave concern. Okay, so the author of this quote recognizes that there is a interweaving of denial of the gospel in democratic socialism, that as you reject

God's order, as you consider something else the hope, there is inevitably a rejection of the gospel.

Now, I said the author, or I think I may have said the writer, this is not written, this was preached.

This was from Charles Spurgeon. When Frederick of Friedrich Engels was asked who he hated the most, his answer was

Spurgeon. Man has been given a crown.

He's been given the great gift of this crown of dominion, and man has plucked out all the little jewels, and all the metal has become so tarnished that it will not withstand the day of judgment.

But there's hope in Jesus Christ. Jesus is a great king, a king who has a great dominion, and he has brought men into his kingdom of grace.

Consider these words from Romans chapter six. Romans 6, nine says, we know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again.

Death no longer has dominion over him. And then later in verse 14, for sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law, but under grace.

Man's supposed to have dominion over creation. Creation has dominion over him. He dies, he's killed by the elements, right?

Why, because of our sin. What does Christ do? He makes it so that the creation no longer has dominion over us, because we will be raised again.

We truly have dominion over creation in the gospel. We are made a royal priesthood, right?

Royal meaning we are kings. There is a sense in which we have an authority and a reign that is not available to those who have not entered into the kingdom of grace.

It is available in as much as they enter into the kingdom of grace, but so long as they remain rebels of the kingdom of grace, they cannot have any true kind of kingship.

But those who have by faith entered may have that dominion. And consider how

Satan himself, the one who tempted man in order to corrupt his dominion, has himself been conquered by Jesus Christ.

Christ has conquered him. He has, according to Romans 20, bound him so that he no longer has the ability to deceive the nations.

God has given his people in this royal priesthood such a status that they may go and make a kind of dominion, increase his dominion across the earth through bringing men into it, since Satan is no longer bound.

Or excuse me, since Satan is bound, since Satan is bound. Revelation 20, and he sees the dragon, the ancient serpent, who is the devil in Satan, and bound him for 1 ,000 years.

He sees the ancient serpent, the ancient serpent, the serpent from the very beginning, the same one who ruins man dominion.

Christ has taken dominion over him. Now, a lot of people look at the kingdom of grace that Christ has established, and based on some of the things they see in Scripture, they think that this is where mankind gives up any kind of physical dominion in order to pursue this spiritual dominion.

This is not the case. But I'll give you the reason why they think this. Acts 2 .45

says, and they were selling their possessions and belongings, and distributing the proceeds to all as any had need.

So a lot of people see the activities of the church, talks about them having all things in common, and they read this as referring to a kind of communism.

And there are groups that have Christian communes. You can go on YouTube, you can find video diaries of people who live in Christian communes where they try to sell everything, or they try to own everything in common.

But just a few chapters later, when it talks about one such person who had sold his things to give them,

Ananias, Peter says, while it remained unsold, did it not remain your own?

And after it was sold, was it not at your disposal? So Peter is affirming that even in this kingdom of grace, mankind has continued ownership.

Not only does mankind have a continued ownership, but his mind is renewed in order that those works of the flesh don't have to, the flesh does not have to control him, right?

The fruit of the spirit, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self -control, right?

These are things by which we can increase that which we have in order that we might be generous to others, and we can do that in a measure that it is more difficult for us to prior to having our mind free from that kind of foolishness, that kind of laziness, that kind of lack of patience, that kind of, yeah, selfishness, et cetera.

Now, one thing that is also interesting is this has implications for our understanding of God himself.

Recall, if man is made in God's image, and that is why we have dominion, because God would have us to know about him through making us owners of creation just as he is owner of creation.

This has implications for how we know him, because if we reject him, if we reject his truth so long as we are rebels, then that dominion is not communicating to us the goodness of God as it ought.

It is, right, we are responsible for knowing it, we have no excuse, but we will continue to suppress it and reject it.

Consider these words of scripture in Isaiah chapter 28. It says, give ear and hear my voice, give attention and hear my speech.

Does he who plows, does he who plows, for sowing plow continually, does he continually open and harrow the ground?

When he has leveled its surface, does he not scatter dill, sow cumin, and put in wheat and rose, and barley in its proper place, and emmer at its border?

For he is rightly instructed, his God teaches him. Dill is not threshed with a threshing sledge, nor is a cartwheel rolled over cumin, but dill is beaten out with a stick, and cumin with a rod.

Does one crush grain for bread? No, he does not thresh it forever. When he drives his cartwheel over it with his horses, he does not crush it.

This also comes from the Lord of hosts. He is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in wisdom. So in other words, man cultivating the earth and farming it is not just doing things of his own.

These are gifts from God to him. This is wisdom given to him from God, and in the context of Isaiah 28, it is in order that he might know the character of God.

God is one who does things appropriately in seasons. Just because he is not bringing judgment against his enemies at this time does not mean he will not bring judgment against his enemies later.

These are truths which are supposed to be gathered from God, recognized by men as they see themselves made in the image of God, subduing the earth, taking dominion over it.

They are supposed to learn more about God himself. And man, so long as he suppresses the knowledge of God and his unrighteousness, will not learn these things.

But man who has been saved by Jesus Christ is able to learn these things. Now, in the kingdom of glory, now beyond just the kingdom of grace, the kingdom of grace fixing the moral problems with dominion, the kingdom of glory fixes the natural problems with dominion.

Okay, the kingdom of glory is when Jesus' kingdom becomes fully manifest when he returns on that final day. This is what we're still looking forward to.

On that day, after he has put every last enemy under his feet, in other words, he already has some kind of dominion, but it is not fully manifest because every last enemy needs to be put under his feet in a more complete sort of dominion.

Right, you should be relating these terms at this point, you know, dominion, kingship, ownership. These are very similar concepts.

All of these things, it is through this, he conquers all things.

The devil is thrown into the lake of fire, and that rain becomes fully manifest so that all this is reversed.

Revelation 21 .4 talks about there will be no more, there will be no more tears, there will be no more mourning, there will be no more death.

Why? Creation will no longer have any kind of, even in the natural sense, right? Any kind of dominion over man.

But man will perfectly have dominion over creation as he ought.

Now, not only is this restored to where Adam had it, it is also completed, right?

Adam was given the start of the task, he barely got anywhere with it. Jesus completes that task. He is the heir of all things.

Okay, God has appointed him the heir of all things. Through his work that he has done, God has granted him all things. They are all possessed by him.

He is the heir of them all. And then in him, we get to be possessors of all those things.

Romans 8, 16 through 17 says, spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him, in order that we may also be glorified with him.

We may be glorified with him to enjoy the fullness, the completeness of the possession that Adam did not work toward, that Adam did not make progress towards.

Now, not only is it completed in Jesus, but it is also elevated in Jesus.

Even a dominion beyond that which was in scope for Adam has been given.

And to show that, I want to do that from Hebrews, from Hebrews chapter two.

You know, in Psalm 8 that we looked at not too long ago, it talked about how man, it talked about how

God has been so kind to man to put him over all things. He's crowned him with glory and honor, et cetera.

He has made him a little lower than the angels. Hebrews, in applying this to Jesus, doesn't say he makes him a little lower than the angels.

He says it makes him a little while lower than the angels. He truly was humbled.

He was, you know, he's humiliated on the cross. He's a little while lower than the angels in that sense, in his humanity.

But yet, he has been raised up above all things. It says in Hebrews 2, 7, quoting

Psalm 8. You have made him for a little while lower than the angels. You have crowned him with glory and honor, putting everything in subjection under his feet.

Now, in putting everything in subjection to him, he left nothing outside his control. At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him, but we do see him for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely

Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God, he might taste death for everyone.

So because Jesus experienced the humility of the cross, God has raised him up and crowned him with glory and honor that will become fully manifest at some point, that will be fully seen.

And consider what it says in 1 Corinthians 6, 3. In 1

Corinthians 6, 3, it says that we will one day judge angels. Now, how is that possible if we were made lower than the angels?

What has happened is that Christ, being made a little while lower than the angels, has, by his excellent work, so earned from the hand of God glories and majesty that he has been raised up above the angels in order that he will judge them.

He will rule over them. Those evil ones, he will judge in that he will condemn them.

The good ones, he will judge in that he will rule and command them and give them his wisdom. And these are things that are shared with us.

We will judge angels. That status which Adam had was lower, that he was not on scope to go for something beyond that.

It has been accomplished through Jesus Christ. It says in Revelation 3 .21,

the one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne as I also conquered and sat down with my father on his throne.

So Jesus Christ, having accomplished a perfect dominion, now sits on a throne reigning and he bring those of his people, those who have trusted him in faith, those who are suffering with him in order that they may also be glorified with him, to sit on his throne with him in order that they might have that same dominion that is even higher than the dominion that Adam enjoyed, one that is not lower than the angels, but one that is elevated even higher above the angels.

And this is an excellent crown, an excellent crown that's so much better than the one that mankind has destroyed, mankind has corrupted.

Says, I am coming soon in Revelation 3 .11. I am coming soon, hold fast what you have so that no one may seize your crown.

First Peter 5 .14 calls it an unfading crown of glory. This is the dominion that we have to anticipate in Jesus Christ.

This is one that we can enjoy now and is one that will be fully manifest on that last day. In conclusion,

I'd like to read three verses. 1 Timothy 6 .16, to him be honor and eternal dominion, amen.

Revelation 1 .6, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever, amen. 1

Peter 5 .11, to him be the dominion forever and ever, amen.

Amen. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, you are a good and awesome

God. What is man that you are mindful of him? You have given us so much and we thank you for placing us in a good position with a great privilege over your creation.

We ask that you would help us to obey your commands rightly, that we would increase our estate in a way that we would be able to be generous to others, that we would truly reflect you as image bearers, that we would rule over the earth that you have given rightly.

We pray that we would do this for the glory of Jesus Christ and we ask that as his kingdom increases and as it becomes that final day, when it becomes fully manifest, we ask that you would hasten that day and that you would keep us looking forward to it.