SABBATH AFTERNOON
Read for This Week’s Study: Gen 1:27; 1:26; Mark 12:13-17; Gen. 2:19-25; Acts 17:26; Rom. 5:12-19.
Memory Text: “Know ye that the Lord he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves.” Psalm 100:3.
Key Thought: God created humanity in His own image; sin defiled that image. God’s plan is to restore that image in us.
Amen! It is His plan to restore His own image in us today, not at the end of time. All who go to heaven will have been re-created in His image. It is the mystery of godliness in humanity.
1 Thessalonians
3:12 And the Lord make you to increase and abound in love one toward another, and toward all men, even as we do toward you:
3:13 To the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints.
Colossians
1:19 For it pleased [the Father] that in him should all fulness dwell;
1:20 And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, [I say], whether [they be] things in earth, or things in heaven.
1:21 And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in [your] mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled
1:22 In the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight.
Luke
1:67 And his father Zacharias was filled with the Holy Ghost, and prophesied, saying,
1:68 Blessed [be] the Lord God of Israel; for he hath visited and redeemed his people,
1:69 And hath raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David;
1:70 As he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been since the world began:
1:71 That we should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us;
1:72 To perform the mercy [promised] to our fathers, and to remember his holy covenant;
1:73 The oath which he sware to our father Abraham,
1:74 That he would grant unto us, that we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear,
1:75 In holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of our life.
1:76 And thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of the Highest: for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways;
A nineteenth-century thinker, Arthur Schopenhauer, while deep in thought about the essence of human identity, accidently bumped into someone on the street. The person whom he hit angrily demanded, “Who do you think you are?”
“Who am I?” Schopenhauer responded. “I wish I knew.”
Who am I? Who are we as a race? What are we doing here? How did we get here, and why?
These are ancient questions that humans still debate today. Scripture, however, answers them all. That’s because there is an inseparable link between the question of our identity and the doctrine of creation. The answer to all those questions is found there; no other biblical doctrine is as central to our understanding of humanity as is creation, because it focuses on our origin, not merely our beginning. “Beginning” simply may refer to the fact of coming to be; “origin” attaches the idea of purpose to that fact of coming to be.
Therefore, radically opposed to evolution, which argues that there is no purpose for our existence (we are here by chance alone), is the Bible teaching on the creation of humanity. Rarely have there been two teachings that present starker or more irreconcilable alternatives to not only our existence but to our identity as human beings.
Amen! And Satan is busy to pervert this very truth. So much so that there are those even in our church that have twisted Genesis to do away with the simple truth that God created the and all that is on it in six literal days. Imagine someone saying it is impossible!! They do not trust in the Bible, therefore, they will have a hard, it not impossible time, knowing and trusting God.
SUNDAY October 14
Creation and Human Origins
“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them” (Gen. 1:27). What does this text tell us about our origins that is so radically different, even openly contradictory, from other views of human beginnings, such as evolution?
It is impossible to miss the point that, as a conscious act of God, humanity’s creation had a purpose behind it. Scripture has no room for any idea of chance. We were made with a distinct purpose, and we were given a distinct nature and essence right from the start.
Made “in the image of God” is about as concrete and distinct an essence, a purpose, as could be imagined. This point is important because some thinkers have argued that humans have to create their own meaning, their own purpose, because we come without any meaning or purpose inherent in us. If, for instance, evolution were true, one could make the point that-because evolution teaches that we didn’t come with any purposes (how could we, being accidents, and all?)- we have to make up our own. In contrast, according to the Bible, we were prepackaged, made in the image of God and created to bring glory to Him.
Origins deal with history. Read
Jude 14
1:14 And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints,
Romans 5:12-21
5:12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:
5:13 (For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law.
5:14 Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come.
5:15 But not as the offence, so also [is] the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, [which is] by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many.
5:16 And not as [it was] by one that sinned, [so is] the gift: for the judgment [was] by one to condemnation, but the free gift [is] of many offences unto justification.
5:17 For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.)
5:18 Therefore as by the offence of one [judgment came] upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one [the free gift came] upon all men unto justification of life.
5:19 For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.
5:20 Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound:
5:21 That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.
1 Corinthians 15:20-22.
15:20 But now is Christ risen from the dead, [and] become the firstfruits of them that slept.
15:21 For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.
15:22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
How do these texts help us to understand the historicity of Adam in Genesis 1, 2?
Genesis
1:26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
1:27 So God created man in his [own] image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
1:28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
1:29 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which [is] upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which [is] the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.
1:30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein [there is] life, [I have given] every green herb for meat: and it was so.
1:31 And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, [it was] very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.
Chapter 2
2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.
2:2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.
2:3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.
2:4 These [are] the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens,
2:5 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and [there was] not a man to till the ground.
2:6 But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground.
2:7 And the LORD God formed man [of] the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.
2:8 And the LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed.
2:9 And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
2:10 And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads.
2:11 The name of the first [is] Pison: that [is] it which compasseth the whole land of Havilah, where [there is] gold;
2:12 And the gold of that land [is] good: there [is] bdellium and the onyx stone.
2:13 And the name of the second river [is] Gihon: the same [is] it that compasseth the whole land of Ethiopia.
2:14 And the name of the third river [is] Hiddekel: that [is] it which goeth toward the east of Assyria. And the fourth river [is] Euphrates.
2:15 And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.
2:16 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:
2:17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
2:18 And the LORD God said, [It is] not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.
2:19 And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought [them] unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that [was] the name thereof.
2:20 And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.
2:21 And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;
2:22 And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.
2:23 And Adam said, This [is] now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
2:24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
2:25 And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.
Why is it important to understand Adam as a historical person?
If we did not, then we would be saying the Bible is not an accurate historical record of the past. Then we would not have the Bible as the rule for our lives. Then we surely would be greatly deceived.
It’s amazing how many Bible scholars dismiss the historicity of Adam: he’s a myth, they say, a symbol for humanity but not a real person. One can hold those beliefs only through greatly distorting the texts themselves, both in the Old and New Testaments.
Dwell on the fact that you were made in the image of God. What should that tell you about your own inherent self-worth, regardless of your faults, weaknesses, and shortcomings?
It is a rather astounding thought, that man was made in the image of God! More than that, that you personally have some relationship to God because of this! How it must hurt God to see us when we sin. Especially when we take the name of Christian. He knows His people called by His name and has promised us revival and reformation:
Ezekiel
36:22 Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord GOD; I do not [this] for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for mine holy name's sake, which ye have profaned among the heathen, whither ye went.
36:23 And I will sanctify my great name, which was profaned among the heathen, which ye have profaned in the midst of them; and the heathen shall know that I [am] the LORD, saith the Lord GOD, when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes.
36:24 For I will take you from among the heathen, and gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land.
36:25 Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you.
36:26 A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.
36:27 And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.
God loves us and has proved it by sending His Son to suffer and die in our place. May we behold this grace daily that we might be reconciled to our God.