The Great Sea Dragons
Notes
Transcript
Handout
Humans invent dragons to represent the CHAOS in our world that we cannot CONTROL.
Examples:
Canaanite Mythology: Yam (the sea); Tunnan (sea dragon); Lotan (giant serpent); defeated by Baal
Babylonian Mythology: Tiamat (the deep sea/salt water) defeated by Marduk
If you keep bogies and goblins away from children they would make them up for themselves. One small child in the dark can invent more hells than Swedenborg. One small child can imagine monsters too big and black to get into any picture, and give them names too unearthly and cacophonous to have occurred in the cries of any lunatic.... The fear does not come from fairy tales; the fear comes from the universe of the soul.
The timidity of the child… is entirely reasonable; they are alarmed at this world, because this world is a very alarming place. ... Fairy tales, then, are not responsible for producing in children fear, or any of the shapes of fear; fairy tales do not give the child the idea of the evil or the ugly; that is in the child already, because it is in the world already. G. K. Chesterton
Where do dragons come from?
Where do dragons come from?
God included dragons as part of his GOOD CREATION . Gen. 1:20-23, Psalm 104:24-26, Isaiah 27:1
Then God said, “Let the water swarm with living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the sky.” So God created the large sea-creatures and every living creature that moves and swarms in the water, according to their kinds. He also created every winged creature according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. God blessed them: “Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the waters of the seas, and let the birds multiply on the earth.” Evening came and then morning: the fifth day.
How countless are your works, Lord!
In wisdom you have made them all;
the earth is full of your creatures.
Here is the sea, vast and wide,
teeming with creatures beyond number—
living things both large and small.
There the ships move about,
and Leviathan, which you formed to play there.
Dragons are not agents of EVIL or GOOD -- they are wild, CHAOTIC forces.
God created dragons because this is HIS WORLD and he WANTED them in it. Psalm 104:26, Job 41:11
There the ships move about,
and Leviathan, which you formed to play there.
Who confronted me, that I should repay him?
Everything under heaven belongs to me.
God does not DIRECT the dragons' actions--he RESTRAINS their wildness. Gen. 1:9-10, Psalm 104:5-9, Job 7:12
Am I the sea or a sea monster,
that you keep me under guard?
Then God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. God called the dry land “earth,” and the gathering of the water he called “seas.” And God saw that it was good.
He established the earth on its foundations;
it will never be shaken.
You covered it with the deep
as if it were a garment;
the water stood above the mountains.
At your rebuke the water fled;
at the sound of your thunder they hurried away—
mountains rose and valleys sank—
to the place you established for them.
You set a boundary they cannot cross;
they will never cover the earth again.
Living with Dragons
Living with Dragons
God's world was always meant to be BEYOND our CONTROL --and it always will be.
The chaos in our lives isn’t only from SIN — it also comes from DRAGONS. Job 40-41
“Fairy tales do not give the child his first idea of bogey. What fairy tales give the child is his first clear idea of the possible defeat of bogey. The baby has known the dragon intimately ever since he had an imagination. What the fairy tale provides for him is a St. George to kill the dragon.” G. K. Chesterton
We cannot SLAY dragons, but we can SERVE the one who does. Gen. 1:28, Isaiah 27:1, Mark 4:39,
God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, and every creature that crawls on the earth.”
On that day the Lord with his relentless, large, strong sword will bring judgment on Leviathan, the fleeing serpent—Leviathan, the twisting serpent. He will slay the monster that is in the sea.
He got up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Silence! Be still!” The wind ceased, and there was a great calm.