Alpha failure completed on the cross; Omega hope launched with the resurrection

Alpha – the beginning. God created humanity and told humanity to make more people and to rule over God's earth. God – man – creation (love God, love people, rule wisely)

Alpha failure – the serpent, a member of creation who should be under man's dominion, tricked humanity with promises about the power of the fruit of creation (specifically the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil). Adam should have taken authority but he foolishly left his role of responsibility and in doing so abdicated his rule under God to the rebellious creation. Enter: sin and death under the rule of the Adversary.

Life after the Alpha failure has meant that rebellious creation now blocks God and man. Powers and principalities in rebellion to God function as if they were in charge. God has condemned this with a curse upon man and creation. Subsequently the natural creation is in chaos, full of violence, aggression and frustration. How do we experience this? We justify animal like behavior arguing that it is natural. Death defines the fallen world.

How does God deal with the Alpha failure? God the Son takes the failure onto himself by reliving the challenge of Adam to trust and obey God the Father by the power of God the Spirit. Jesus lives the life Adam should have lived and does it in a much more demanding environment. Jesus then takes on the consequences of the Alpha failure by submitting to the death of a rebel. The cross is the consequence of the Alpha failure.

What message comes from the cross? "τετέλεσται/Tetelestai!" – it is finished. The price of the Alpha failure has been paid for. And then there was silence, until a new hope arose: the Omega – the ending. Jesus' was raised to life as the first of the last. He is the Hope of how it will end. God will be visibly and undeniably in charge as King, people will once again worship and obey Him as kings and priests in the King's service and the world will flourish under wise rule. What was started will be accomplished.

But what about now? We still see a world gone wild in aggression and death. What is different is that our hearts can be turned upside right. We can by faith see beyond the oppression of rebellious creation. We have been declared righteous heirs in the Kingdom in spite of the pretense of the powers and principalities. We, in Christ, are to live up to what we have already attained: sonship. We are the children of glory, the princes and princesses of the King and we are to act like it. How does true royalty act? With dignified strength and grace standing up for justice and for mercy in humble service to the King of Kings, the First and the Last, the Alpha and the Omega.