So... I had a WOW moment at church this Saturday. We have been studying the book of Genesis for a bit. I mean, we started in Chapter one in September, and we are just now getting to Chapter 3. It is AMAZING how much is in there if you take it verse by verse and see what the inspired word of God is saying! We are going to be spending the next 6 weeks, yes 6 weeks, covering Chapter 3. In doing a short summary of what he wants to cover, Lloyd brought to my attention something that I never quite realized. It was WOW.
The GREATER STORY: CREATION, FALL, REDEMPTION, RECREATION.
He started with CREATION: Genesis 1 and 2; God revealing His POWER (chapter 1), and His PROVISION (chapter 2). At ths point everything was GOOD. "Then the LORD God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it. " Gen. 2:15 The words "cultivate and keep it", translated, are always in corolation with priesthood throughtout the bible. In other words, cultivate and keep it, is simply WORSHIP. That is all we were to do. BUT Adam and Eve rebelled. FALL: Genesis 3 it changes, and instead of everything being GOOD, now something is WRONG with everything. In our world today, and in every day of our lives, something is WRONG, sin is here. The importance in this, is that this isn't the end of the story, and of course this wasn't a mistake. God has weaved our sin into His Greater Story. REDEMPTION: Genesis 4 through Revelation 20. With faith in CHRIST there is a conversion from a fallen humanity to chosing to TRUST God to PROVIDE. God, redeeming us to complete His work by RECREATION: everything is BETTER than GOOD. Revelation 21 through Eternity, is declaring our Eternal delight in heaven. God's redeemed creation is BETTER than His sinless creation in the garden. Isn't that amazing?
The part that really made me think, was SIN. I have heard the story since I was a child... Adam and Eve eat the apple from the bad tree, and suddenly their eyes are opened. They have sinned because they did something they weren't supposed to do, and all of their offspring, me and you, are born into sin. I have been missing so much over the years by leaving the story at that. First of all, who said it was an apple? And God created all of the trees and said they were "good". The tree of knowledge of good and evil was never a bad tree, but simply a prohibition. In a sinless garden, there was still something that was off limits to Adam and Eve. Interesting, isn't it? I wonder if there will be prohibitions in a sinless heaven? But what really got me is the sin itself. I always thought of the sin as the "eating". But ya know, Eve had to have sinned in her heart to make the decision to eat. She had to decide that God is NOT GOOD or TRUSTWORTHY in order to choose to eat of this prohibition. So it was a WOW to me, that sin is not simply doing something we're not supposed to do, but SIN is the decision that God is not TRUSTWORTHY. That's what He asks of us in the bible, over and over and over, trust in ME, believe in ME! SIN is the opposite of this. Also, God is GOOD. In our world, something is WRONG with everything. Wrong things happen to everyone! Don't look at the world to determine if God is GOOD, go to the cross! He is GOOD, and has sent His own Son to die on the cross and redeem us. We have the choice; making our own provision, or being broken to realize that we can do nothing without Christ. With Faith in Him, we are redeemed and TRUST God to PROVIDE. One leads to Eternal delight in Heaven, and the other to damnation. Trusting in God is the foundation of our Faith! That makes me look at Salvation differently too! Everytime we sin, we are basically deciding to trust ourselves instead of God. If Salvation is Trusting Him, than it is obvious that we will never be able to save ourselves because daily we choose ourselves over Him. This is where His GRACE, at least for me, IS A HUGE WOW! If we truly choose Him, than we are covered by His GRACE, redeemed and forgiven. Glory be to such a POWERFUL, PROVIDER, GRACEFUL, REDEEMING, LOVING, AND TRUSTWORTHY GOD!
