Christ the King

How Jesus picks up and accomplishes what Adam failed to do.

Here is what David wrote to be prayed and sung in the worship of God’s people. Here are his thoughts, put to verse and music, on the wonderful things we are told in Genesis 1:26-27.

Psalm 8:3-8 ESV

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?

Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings

and crowned him with glory and honor.

You have given 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 seas.

In the New Testament, the writer to the Hebrews looks back on this and sees within it something profoundly eschatological (future looking). In Hebrews chapter 2, beginning in verse 5, we find this:

Hebrews 2:5-6a ESV - For it was not to angels that God subjected the world to come, of which we are speaking. It has been testified somewhere,

Two things: first, I just love that he says “It has been testified somewhere…” Now, I know they didn’t have chapter and verse divisions in the Bible yet, but were the Psalms not numbered? I mean…I just get a kick out of that. Anyway…

Second, and more important, look at what he says here. He is using Psalm 8 as a proof text that the world to come was made subject to Adam in his creation. This is the first hint that we have of an eschatological future for creation and for humanity. In original creation, when Adam and Eve were given dominion, that included not just original creation but also the world to come. Ponder that.

Now our writer to the Hebrews begins quoting from Psalm 8:

Hebrews 2:6-8a ESV - It has been testified somewhere,

“What is man, that you are mindful of him,

or the son of man, that you care for him?

You 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.”

Having ended his quotation, now our writer, under inspiration of the Holy Spirit, will comment:

Hebrews 2:8b ESV - 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.

For the world to come to be “the world to come” it must be a world in which the creation mandate, the dominion mandate, has been fully implemented. That hasn’t happened under Adam. That much is obvious. But it will happen, that’s what the writer to the Hebrews is getting at. How will it happen? It will happen under the reign of the second Adam, Jesus Christ, the King of kings who will successfully implement all that the first Adam failed to do.

Hebrews 2:9 ESV - But we see him who 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.

“Crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death.” That’s our Jesus who successfully fulfills and completes all that the first Adam failed to do. And although when he came his people refused to receive him, and many throughout history and many today refuse to receive him…

…to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God,—John 1:12 ESV

I hope that’s you. I trust that it’s you. A glorious future awaits those who are in Christ, for our king has come and reigns victorious and is even now bringing all things into subjection to him. Have a great weekend!