From Dust We Are: Our Earthly Origins and Eternal Hope

Recently, I had the privilege of interviewing a dying man named Jim, a former pastor facing his second battle with stage four cancer. As we spoke, the fragility of his body, the ending of his earthly ambitions, and the nearing of death became tangible. "I cry easily these days," he confessed, "especially thinking about my life being cut shorter than I planned." Yet Jim’s focus was not on himself but on leaving well: journaling for his family, creating final memories, and ensuring his wife’s future. His perspective, particularly on the body, aging, and its limitations, resonated deeply with me. "Sometimes my theology is challenged," he admitted. "I realize how big God is, and that we are nothing but dust." Jim, like each of us, was coming to grips with the dustiness of human existence. My friend Jim had died this past week. We lament, but heaven gained a brother.

Dust: General and Special Revelation

Scripture speaks plainly: we are dust, and to dust we shall return (Gen. 3:19). Yet this truth, far from being bleak, reveals profound theological realities about the human body, creation, and hope.

General revelation — creation’s silent testimony — points us to the Creator. John Calvin opened his Institutes by saying that to know ourselves is to be driven toward contemplating God. Our dustiness is part of this general revelation: we are fragile, dependent creatures, made to seek the One who formed us.

Ancient Near Eastern (ANE) texts share themes with Scripture, often portraying humanity formed from clay, flesh, or divine tears. In Egyptian and Mesopotamian myths, humans are fashioned from the ground to serve the gods. Yet key differences set Scripture apart. In Genesis, humanity is not mass-produced for servitude, but personally created by God from the dust and crowned with dignity, made in His image.

The ANE clay motif often implied artistry, while dust suggested death. Biblical theology combines both motifs — humanity as clay fashioned by a divine potter, destined to return to dust because of sin. Even ancient Jewish writings, such as the Rule of the Community, reflect on humanity as "shaped from dust" and yearning for its origin. The Quran similarly echoes humanity's dusty beginnings.

Unlike ANE religions, however, the biblical vision affirms humanity’s worth. We are not mere accidents of divine whimsy, but bearers of God's image, lovingly formed from the dust.

Special Revelation: Genesis 2:7 stands as the locus classicus for theological anthropology. God did not create humanity ex nihilo (out of nothing), but from the dust of the earth. Calvin noted that this method “combined the parts of the universe,” binding humanity intimately to the earth. Our bodies testify that we are part of creation, dependent upon it for sustenance, shelter, and life itself.

Yet dust also points us upward. Adam’s creation was personal: God bent down to form him like a potter shaping clay. Our dustiness reminds us of our creatureliness, and God's relational nearness — He is not a distant architect, but a hands-on Father.

Moreover, being called "dust" is not an insult, but a theological statement. Adam’s name itself, adamah, means "earth." Throughout Scripture, referring to oneself as dust conveys humility, dependence, and mortality.

Cursed Dust: After the Fall, the dust motif becomes tinged with judgment. Mortality is now inevitable: "Dust you are, and to dust you will return" (Gen. 3:19). Death is not natural but a revelation of God's wrath against sin — a disruption of the shalom we were created for. Yet, even in the curse, God shows care: dust is entrusted back to the ground, awaiting His restorative hand.

Resurrection: Dust Recreated

Despite dust’s association with mortality, Scripture brims with the hope of resurrection. The "divine potter" motif reappears — not only in creation but also in renewal. During His ministry, Christ healed a blind man using clay, a symbolic act recalling creation and pointing towards new creation.

Early theologians like Tertullian saw the cycles of nature — seeds dying and sprouting, seasons changing — as parables of resurrection. As the seed planted in the earth germinates into life, so too will our bodies, though reduced to dust, be raised in glory.

Bavinck noted that our bodies, like seeds, seem dead in winter but are quickened in spring. In death, Christians are hidden, protected, awaiting the resurrection when Christ returns to defeat the last enemy — death itself.

Even the stories of Jonah and Noah serve as prototypes of resurrection. Jonah’s three days in the belly of the fish and Noah’s refuge in the ark are images of burial and eventual deliverance. Our graves, too, are but temporary resting places. As Tertullian reflected, “We have closets, graves, in which we rest a little while until His anger passes.”

Our hope is not in an escape from the body, but in the reunion of body and soul, renewed in the second Adam, Jesus Christ. Our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, destined not for decay but for eternal glory.

Conclusion: Dust Redeemed

Being made from dust is not a mark of insignificance but a sign of divine craftsmanship. God is the great artist, the potter who shaped humanity and who will, in the end, re-form our dust into resurrected, glorified bodies.

Sin brought death, but death is not the end. Through Christ — the resurrection and the life, the firstborn from the dead — our dusty frames will be raised incorruptible. Our destiny is not endless decay but eternal renewal.

Even now, as our bodies weaken and plans fall away, we can cling to this hope: the dust God formed, He will faithfully restore.

A gift for Jim — and for all of us walking toward the resurrection.

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Works consulted

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