some thoughts

In my new position, I’m in Microsoft Project almost 10H a day. The backbone of any project is what’s called the Work Breakdown Structure (WBS), which is basically just an outline consisting of the top-level task and all the related, subordinate sub-tasks. So, for example, the top-level task might be “Build a Cabinet,” and the sub-tasks (or “child” tasks) might be “design cabinet”, “procure materials”, “treat wood”, etc.

• Build a Cabinet
  • —Design the Cabinet
  • —Procure materials
  • —Treat Wood
  • —etc…

Each of those tasks, children of the parent “Build a Cabinet” task, would also have child tasks such as (for procure materials, for example) “select a vendor”, “ask to borrow Jim’s pickup” or whatever. One rule of designing this structure is that no single task be without relationship to all the other tasks–that is, that no task may be “orphaned.” Each task must “come under” another.

Another rule is that when a parent task is outdented in the outline, making it subordinate to a higher-level parent task, its children follow. The subtasks (children) are not orphaned when the parent tasks move (that is, when their subordination shifts), they are not moved under a different parent, but they follow the parent task wherever it goes. That is, the subordination of tasks is hierarchical: when the parent task becomes subordinate to a higher (or lower) level task, the children’s subordination follows. Task-families are re-subordinated together. Every task is in relationship to all the other tasks; there are no individual, orphaned tasks–at least not in a perfect, well-structured schedule/project (/reality). Orphaning happens when a child (or worse, a parent with children) is outdented–moved from its position of relationship to all other tasks, and ultimately out of subordination to the highest level task. The technical term for this is insubordination.

Now imagine the top-level task of the project being “Creation.” Imagine also that the first child-task of the Creation-project is called ‘Adam.’ Picture, then, all his children (all the way to yourself) arranged in groups of children-task-families under him. Now picture the fall. When Adam fell, he shifted out of subordination to the Father–thus orphaning not only himself, but all his children after him–all his “posterity” see (WSC Q6)–and ruined God’s first project, “Creation.” The whole Creation project [file] became corrupt. So all of us, as children of Adam, are born in a state of insubordination to God, who “manages” the project of Creation. But rather than re-subordinate the old creation, under Adam, God decided to not just renovate, but upgrade and blow away the old Creation project. (He started a whole new, and incorruptible, project [file].) And he began with a new first-child, or a New Head: Christ Jesus, the Second Adam, the firstborn over the New Creation-project. When a person is “transferred out of the kingdom of darkness [the old, fallen creation], into the kingdom of the beloved Son,” it’s not just a re-ordering within the same project–it’s a transfer from one old, corrupt project file into a new, clean one. (In order to transfer, or copy-paste, a task in MS Project from one project file into another, an external “user” must intervene…Creator/creation distinction!) Saving Grace is that ultimate transfer of an insubordinate person-task (insubordinate due to his subordination to the insubordination of Adam–got it?) into a new position of subordination to Christ Jesus, who is himself perfectly subordinate to the Father. As children of the new creation, we are right with the Father due to our being in right relationship to him through Christ, our superior, covering “parent.” Right relationship with the Father is only possible through right relationship with Christ. (Not a perfect analagy, of course, but I think it works pretty well.)

Now, this ultimate New Creation has come already (in a sense) and yet it hasn’t yet come (in a sense). The final, new creation is what’s called the invisible church–the perfect, complete fulfillment of the New Creation, visible to the naked, physical eye. Then, we’ll see perfectly who is truly in that New Creation “outline,” who is truly subordinate to Christ and thus right with the Father. But until then, we deal with what’s called the “visible church,” with those whose true relationship with Christ we’re not yet sure of–but in faith, we hope it is right. Some of those “others” are our children. They belong in the covenant community, in the New Creation project, subordinate to their parents who are subordinate to Christ, by faith and in hope that they will one day be revealed as members of the now-invisible church. The alternative is to leave our own children as orphans–which is not only unacceptable emotionally, but potentially offensive to God (see Exodus 4:24-26). Christ did not leave us as orphans; neither should we leave our children as orphans.

Now for some urgency: that corrupted Creation project [file] has been slated for deletion. The only way for a person-task to survive that deletion, is for him to be un-subordinated from Adam in the Old Creation, and re-subordinated to Christ in the New Creation project (file). We’re copied (not cut) from the old, and pasted into the new - then, File…Save. We’re kind of in between projects, of the new but still in the old (Eph 1, Col 1). But once marked by the Holy Spirit (downpayment)–flagged as ‘for the New Creation.,’ by grace through faith, we’re ’sealed’ for the new. When the old project is deleted, our bodies will die with it–but those sealed by the Holy Spirit will appear with Christ when the new project window is brought into view–into the foreground on the screen of reality. (Or something like that–the analogy’s there somewhere…you get it, right?)

Now for a little down-to-earth evangelistic application. The people I work with–who understand the whole project outline/WBS concept, and use the language of parent/child, task families, subordination and orphaning–are not believers. Pray with me that I might be able to share–not necessarily the latter, more technical/difficult portions of the above, but at least the part about being orphans and being brought into the family of God by right relationship/subordination to Christ, who is the only one to ever remain in right relationship with the Father.

Father of the fatherless and protector of widows
is God in his holy habitation.
God settles the solitary in a home;
he leads out the prisoners to prosperity,
but the rebellious dwell in a parched land. - Psalm 68:5-6, ESV

…just a thought, inspired by something I read this morning concerning covenant relationship, in Deuteronomy 17:20, –particularly the phrase “he and his children.”