I’ve been veeery slowly reading Paul Billheimer’s Destined For The Throne. I can’t buy into everything he says quite yet, but he is bringing out some compelling points that have augmented my own thinking on some foundational issues.

I’ve understood for a long time that God knew, before He “rolled up His sleeves” and began history, that Creation would fall and that the sacrifice of His own Son, Jesus Christ, would be necessary to save it from eternal destruction. This is what the Word means when it tells us that the Lamb was slain before the foundation of the world. – Rev 13.8

If that reality is new to you, take a moment to dwell on it. Seeing the end before the beginning (Is 46.10), and the terrible Price salvation was going to exact, it would have been so much easier for God to say, “Nope, nice idea, this Creation business, but it’s just way too expensive. Who needs the aggravation? For a bunch of ingrates?” He could have declined, and no one would have been around to feel bad about the decision. No harm done.

But He went ahead with The Project. And we must ask why.

God’s “super-redemptive” love

I’ve come at this every way I know how, and have concluded that there is only one possible reason for God’s going ahead with Creation. God is passionately in love with us. Now, I don’t mean that He’s desperately, forelornly lovesick and swooning over us. He emphatically is not out of control. He is not a fool for love. He is not Dion’s “Teenager in Love”. He still is awesome and majestic, sovereign in knowledge and power, and unshakably enthroned over Creation.

But behind it all He has a deep love for us that simply will not be satisfied until we are fully reconciled to Him, and indeed, until we are in organic ontological union with Him. And that love was willing to pay any Price, even the death of Jesus, to realize that goal.

God, from the very beginning, had both Creation and Redemption in mind. And by Redemption I mean not only that He would restore Adam’s race after it had fallen, but that He also would institute an entire new race, not of mere men, but one spawned from the Last Adam, the God-man Jesus Christ. We, as the Bride of Christ, will one day be in a “one flesh” marital relationship with Him!

Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. – 1Jn 3.2

As a certain pastor I used to know would say, “Selah” on that for a while.

A well-kept secret

Now here’s where Billheimer adds interesting insight. Paul the apostle tells us that the “super-redemptive” nature of Christ’s salvation was kept as a mystery, not only to man, but to angels as well:

We speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory; the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood; for if they had understood it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.- 1Cor 2.7-8

And his fellow apostle, Peter, confirms:

As to this salvation, the prophets who prophesied of the grace that would come to you made careful searches and inquiries,
seeking to know what person or time the Spirit of Christ within them was indicating as He predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories to follow.
It was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves, but you, in these things which now have been announced to you through those who preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven—things into which angels long to look. 1Pe 10-12

So we see that while the prophets strained to see the glories of God’s plan of redemption, the real meat of the matter was kept not only from them, but from the angels as well! And one of the reasons for this was to lure the devil himself into playing a key role in the very redemption of man!

Consider then, God, the Master Strategist. You know how great chessmen can play 50 games at the same time, against top contenders, and win them all? Or how about Bret Maverick in a high-stakes game, hiding a royal flush behind a poker face of stone? God’s got them all beat – with both eyes closed and hands tied behind His back – and immeasurably so.

God’s enemies outwitted

So, satan sees that Jesus has become a man. This must have had him extremely nervous. What on earth could God be up to? God’s not telling, and the angels don’t know. So satan’s employs his tactic of old by trying to make Jesus fall. He tries to trick Him, he tries to bribe Him, He tries to bargain with Him, with Jesus half-starved and weak out in the desert. Nothing works.

Then Jesus goes around the countryside, preaching the Gospel, setting men free from sin, disease, self, and the law, and casting demons out left and right. He’s doing major damage to satan’s perverse kingdom. The pressure is on. This simply cannot be allowed to continue.

Finally satan sees a chance and jumps on it. If he can’t make Jesus fall, he’ll at least get rid of Him. He puts it in Judas to betray Christ, he agitates the crowd against Jesus, and he succeeds in putting Jesus to death.

Whew! At least that’s over with! No more people being set free, no more forced expulsions. Jesus’ attempt to set man straight on earth had been defeated!

So thought satan. But he did not understand that God was the master gamesman who had hid His central strategy. It wasn’t the temporal game He was concerned about, it was the eternal one. And satan hadn’t a clue that behind God’s poker face lay an unbeatable royal flush. Clueless and cornered, he had played right into God’s hand, and by putting Christ to death had become the very instrument that brought about our salvation.

God victorious

When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Him. -Col 2:15.

There’s a great scene at the end of Gibson’s Passion of the Christ. The devil, who had been seen throughout as a cold, calculating woman, delighting in the sufferings of Christ with a heart of pure evil, wails in unquenchable anguish as she realizes her defeat and impending destruction have been secured, even as the veil of the Temple is rent and the Presence of God is forever loosed to dwell within man.

The devil indeed found out what the game really was about, but too late to do a thing about it. The Master Strategist had beaten him, elegantly, devastatingly, and permanently, at his own game.

God had a plan from the beginning, and counted the Cost. As the parable tells us, He hid His treasure in a field for a season to protect it, and then in the fullness of time He paid the Price and bought the entire  field, securing not only our redemption from the grip of satan, but our super-redemption into organic unity with God Himself. We’re not merely going back to Eden – we’re Destined for the Throne.

What can you say to a God like this, but All Praise unto You, Lord! You are worthy, and I am Yours! Hallelujah!