Chapter # 8 Paragraph # 3 Study # 3
April 16, 2017
Humble, Texas
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• I. All of God's Creation Has Been Subjected to The Vanity.
  • A. The emphasis is upon "The Vanity".
    • 1. The main concept involved is "emptiness".
    • 2. However, the "emptiness" is not exhaustive, but specific.
      • a. Liddell and Scott Greek-English Lexicon defines it in terms of "frustration".
      • b. Strong's says it is "inutility". The two concepts are linked by the reality that "the emptiness" is emphatically "an emptiness of capacity".
        • 1) "Frustration" arises when one is unable to achieve whatever goal he/she is pursuing.
        • 2) "Inutility" simply means that it cannot serve the goal as an effective methodology; it lacks the very essentials that make a methodology effective.
    • 3. But even this specific concept of inherent inability needs some qualifications because "The Vanity" is observably successful in, for example, creating the conditions of the frustration that is its essence.
      • a. This means that our grasp of "The Vanity" must include a temporary effectiveness in some of its objectives.
      • b. And this is the point of our text/context: the sufferings of this present time are the direct result of the effectiveness of "The Vanity", but those results are declared to be only temporary and, actually, ineffectual under the dominion of the wisdom of God Who uses all things to forward His goals.
  • B. The actual issue involved in "The Vanity" is identified in the next verse (8:21) as "the bondage of the corruption".
    • 1. Since "the bondage" is real, the effectiveness is real and not "empty".
    • 2. Since "the corruption" is "boss", the actual meaning is the "undoing" of the order which God has put in place.
      • a. The main illustration of meaning is in the physical realm where "corruption" is defined in terms of "from dust you came and to dust you shall return" [the intensified term is used in Acts 2:27 and 31 in very clear terms of being returned to dust].
      • b. But our text says that God has underwritten a total reversal of "corruption".
      • c. The point is that "The Vanity" is the assumption of "power" to undo God's accomplishments.
• II. This "Subjection" Was Put in Place by The One Who Did the Subjecting.
  • A. This "subjection" was not something the creation wanted; it was not voluntarily accepted.
  • B. God had a longer range plan that required the subjection of His creation to the experience of "The Vanity".
    • 1. His longer range plan was the Kingdom of Righteousness, Peace, and Joy.
    • 2. The firm establishment of this Kingdom required a more solid foundation than simply creating sensate beings of personality in a state of moral innocence.
      • a. In the creation of such beings in the heavenlies, Lucifer arose.
      • b. In the creation of such beings on the earth, Adam arose.
    • 3. This more solid foundation consists in part of a temporary experience by the creatures of the impact of loveless disbelief.
• III. This "Subjection" Was Installed Against a Backdrop of "Hope".
  • A. Not only the creatures who learn from their experiences have a future in the glory of God, the creation, itself, also, has such a future even though it has the limitation of being destroyed so that a new creation can take its place.
  • B. The "hope" is that the God of Creation will actually accomplish His "undoing" of the adversary's vanity as a statement of the actual "vanity" of that adversary's claims.
    • 1. The adversary's method is "bondage to corruption".
    • 2. God's "undoing" is "freedom" in the context of The Glory.