The Tectonic School Philosophy - Part 7

A series of posts outlining the background and purpose behind Tectonic School

This series of posts come out of the draft document that, combined with a sizable number of devotionals, will eventually comprise a book to help launch Tectonic School programs.

It outlines particular problems that are present in our society, our local churches, and in the lives of individuals and families. The solution offered is a plan to integrate a severely disenfranchised and undervalued group - young men - into meaningful involvement in local communities through training and employment in trade jobs and the life of the local church. This will be accomplished through cooperation in mutually beneficial relationships with local businesses, local churches, and local families. 

This is the fourth post in a series. The first post is available here: 

The Plan of Redemption Includes a Return to Our First Duties

The corruption of sin described in the next chapter of Genesis does nothing to change the basic purpose for which humankind was created. It increased the difficulty, and this was done for the benefit of humanity. Rather than going through the entirety of the Biblical narrative, I will simply highlight some points to show the general direction through which God worked to nurture and grow humanity through Biblical history. 

The first savior of humankind was Noah, the builder of the Ark. God could have protected humanity through supernatural means alone, but instead He commissioned righteous Noah to complete a building project. God provided the direction and the dimensions, but as far as we know, He relied on the ingenuity and creativeness of Noah to complete this task. God made the man, the man built the ark, and the ark preserved the components of creation needed to foster the growth of humanity through the next phase of history. 

Abraham became the father of many nations, most of them established their borders and began to build and plant in the land given to them. But Isaac, and his son Jacob, though they did not build permanent homes in the land God had given them; they lived as herders, stewarding the land and protecting it for future generations. Even in this impermanent state, they still worked the earth, building many wells that exist even to this day.   

Joseph, the son of Jacob, was brought into the land of Egypt against his will. But God used the gifts and wisdom he had given Joseph to build the kingdom of Egypt into an economic powerhouse. He wisely stored vast amounts of food, and used this to protect not only the Egyptians from starvation, but all known nations in the world. Through wise administration, Joseph safely regulated the food supply for people that likely never experienced famine before, and had no safeguarding habits of long-term food storage. God made the man, the man built the kingdom, and the kingdom preserved mankind for the next phase of human history. 

When the kingdom of Egypt became corrupt, God removed His people from that land. Moses delivered the Israelites from the Egyptians, and in the wilderness, God gave them a special purpose. He revealed His law to them, and gave them a task to complete. This was the creation of the Tabernacle; a tent of worship, and all the articles to be used in the practice of the priesthood. All the items were designed to reflect a return to the original patterns of creation and rest that were part of God’s original plan for mankind. 

God appointed certain men that He had selected, because He had created them with the skills and insight to complete these tasks. The plans were revealed to Moses, but Bezalel and Oholiab were the men selected by God to craft these items. Through their wisdom, they taught and appointed other men to complete some of the tasks, but the most crucial items were crafted by their own hands, such as the Ark of the Covenant. The result of this effort was the construction of not only a temple, but a nation of people, skilled to work for God.

Eventually, the Israelites returned to their promised homeland. God used them as an instrument to remove the inhabitants. This land of milk and honey was given to them ready to move in. They settled in homes that they did not build, with vineyards they did not plant - like a return to the Garden of Eden. In this way, even those who are not “chosen” by God are still used as instruments to build the homes of His children.

But they were not brought in to simply enjoy the fruits of another's labors. God restored to them the circumstances under which He first gave the command, “Be fruitful and increase in number, fill the earth and subdue it.” With a glimpse of God’s glory restored in the land, they were to take it from glory, to glory - continuing His original plan. 

David captured and built up the capital city, Jerusalem, and his son Solomon built a temple that was renowned throughout the known world. This temple was a glimpse into both the past and the future - a physical monument to the creative enterprise of God, and His purpose for mankind. It was a gilded reflection of the glory of Eden, and a foreshadowing of the everlasting city to come. Every square inch was designed to lead people to contemplate and reflect on the Glory of God through creation.

It was not during their trials and labors that the Israelites went astray, but during their time of success and indulgence. Following their greatest height of economic prosperity, the kingdom was split in two.  As the vineyards and fields planted by their fathers and grandfathers began to produce less, the coming generations did not turn towards the Lord for guidance, but instead began offering sacrifices to foreign gods. 

They committed the sin of idolatry, making central the things that ought to be peripheral, asking false gods to restore what had been taken from them, instead of thanking the True God for the circumstances that He deemed best for their growth. In the depth of their depravity, they even sacrificed their own children - destroying that which God values above every other creation, they extinguished the light of life from the fruit of their own wombs - image bearers of God.

This squandering of their inheritance led to the people of Israel being exiled to other lands. First, the northern kingdom was exiled by the empire of Assyria. The people of that foreign land mixed and mingled within the land of Israel, while the Israelites were shipped all over mesopotamia. 

Then, the southern kingdom of Judah was conquered by the empire of Babylon. Through their failure to keep the commandments God had given them, the Israelites lost control of their own destiny. But while they were living in a foreign land, God sent a message through the prophet Jeremiah: 

“Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.”¹

Even in exile, God directed His people to the same purpose that He had created humanity for at the beginning. To build, to plant, to marry and increase. Not to isolate, but to live in peace with those around them, even as strangers in a strange land. 

The result of this was that God’s chosen people began to live in such a way that they could connect with Him wherever they were, regardless of their access to a temple or altar. They finally embraced the truth that had been revealed to them, beginning a tradition of scrupulous adherence to the commands of the law, and the keeping of the texts themselves. They built synagogues where the words of God could be heard and the people could gather to pray.

Eventually, the Babylonians were replaced by the Persians, who restored the Israelites homeland. Still, many Israelites chose to live in the cities and nations they had been born in or grew accustomed to. Communities of the faithful existed all over the known world. Every sabbath, in every city, Jews would gather together and read the account of the creation of the heavens and the earth, and of mankind.

The political changes that came over the next couple hundred years brought big changes to the known world. Alexander the Great conquered swiftly, bringing the concept of hellenization everywhere he went. People in every corner of the known world learned the lingua franca of Koine Greek, even as they tried to remember and maintain their own customs and practices. 

The sophistication of ancient Greece eventually succumbed to the power and unity of Rome, and with the Roman conquest, new innovations came as well. A network of roads that still remains as the foundation of modern infrastructure around the mediterranean and throughout europe. But perhaps the most novel occurrence was the dawning of the Pax Romana. For the first time, nearly all of the known world was united in a state of relative peace, and the presence of the Roman legions ensured that travel was safe around the empire. 

This was the world in which Christianity was born. For many Jewish believers around the empire, Jesus was recognized as their promised messiah, who would bring about an everlasting kingdom, as prophesied in the book of Daniel:  

“The God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed, nor will it be left to another people. It will crush all those kingdoms and bring them to an end, but it will itself endure forever. This is the meaning of the vision of the rock cut out of a mountain, but not by human hands—a rock that broke the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver and the gold to pieces.”²

Jesus was recognized as the savior not only to the Jews that believed in him, but to people of all nations. The message of the gospel was expressed uniquely in every nation and people group, as the people recognized not only that Jesus coming was prophesied in the Hebrew scriptures, but in many of their own mythologies as well. 

The next post in this series is available here:

1.  Jeremiah 29:5-7

2.  Daniel 2:44-45