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 Sermon > Sunday Morning Service |
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Title |
The Message of the Cross(4) - God Created Men |
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Speaker |
Rev. Jaerock Lee |
Bible |
Gn 1:27~28, 2:7 |
Date |
2005-04-10 |
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[Scripture]
[Genesis 1: 27-28] [Genesis 2: 7]
"So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. [28] God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground."
"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."
[Introduction]
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,,
This is the fourth session of the message of the cross, and I will talk about God who created men. God has neither beginning nor end; He existed from before the eternity that nobody can fathom.
Then, at a certain point in time, God made a plan. It was plan to create the heaven an earth and human beings. To accomplish this plan, God prepared all the things one by one over a long period of time.
First, from the spiritual space where He had been dwelling, God divided the physical space where He would create all things and human beings.
Then, God divided God the Son and God the Holy Spirit from originally one God to become the Trinity. From this moment, God put a certain image, and it is the image that we men have now.
In the spiritual realm, He made the spiritual beings such as heavenly host and angels and cherubim. In the physical space, He made the earth on which the human beings would live.
After He finished all the preparations, God began to create the heavens and the earth in full scale. Genesis chapter 1 briefly tells us about the process of God's 6-day creation.
On the first day, He created light; on the second day, the expanse, and on the third day, He divided the land and sea and made plants, vegetation, and trees bearing fruit. On the fourth day, He made the sun, the moon, and the stars in the sky; and on the fifth day, living things in the sea and birds.
On the sixth day, He made livestock and animals that move along the ground. Lastly, He created the human being. His work of dividing the physical space from the spiritual realm, and creating the heavens and the earth and all things was after all for the creation of men.
Just as the parents decorate the baby's room and prepare everything for the baby even before he/she is born, God made the suitable environment for men and created them so that they could enjoy everything.
Why, then, did God create men? Why does He let so many people live on this earth until today? If you can answer this question, you will be able to get the answer to why you live and how you should live.
In order to know the true value of men, you first have to know God's purpose of creating human beings. You can live a truly meaningful and valuable life when you live up to the purpose of being born into this world.
I hope you will realize the purpose of God's creating men through this message.
I pray in the name of the Lord that you will be able to confess, "I have lived a truly valuable life," when you end your life on this earth.
[Body]
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, Genesis 2:7 says, "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." God created the heavens and the earth by His Word, but He Himself formed the man from the dust of the ground.
He molded not only the outer appearance but also internal organs, bones and muscles, and all the tissues perfectly.
After God made the man very sophisticatedly, He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. Since this time, the man became a living spirit.
But when they hear this, some people say they cannot believe it. They doubt how an image made from the dust of ground can have life and move around.
But even men, a mere creature, can make robots that are similar to men, as they accumulate knowledge. They make computers that are somewhat like human brain; they can even make artificial internal organs or skin.
When they assemble elaborate parts to make a machine and connect it to electricity, it moves as if it is alive.
Even men as creatures can do these things. Then, why would it be difficult for God the almighty to create men? It is just men have made their limit in their thoughts that they cannot believe in the power of God.
Even today, God shows us works of creation for us to think beyond our own limits of thoughts.
In our church's revival meetings or in overseas crusades, there are many people who experience the work of creation of God. For example, people whose legs were different in length due to infantile paralysis or traffic accidents experienced that the length of their legs became equal.
The shortened legs became longer by 2 cm, 4 cm, or 8 cm. For example, deaconess Heekyung Song's left leg was 4 cm shorter than the right one due to congenital cerebral palsy.
She had to limp when walking, and because her spine and the hipbone were twisted, it was hard for her to stand or walk for a long time.
Meanwhile, she received prayer in revival meeting in 1997, and at the moment, her shorter leg became longer so that she could stand up straight.
The spine that had been bent due to shorter leg was straightened, the twisted hipbone also became normal, and her height became taller by 3 cm.
For a shorter leg to be lengthened like this, not only the bones, but also the muscles, nerves, and the skin tissues must be renewed altogether. By the prayer, God performed a work of creation to make all these parts complete.
Also, in 2002, we had a united crusade attended by a total of 3 million people at Marina Beach, Chennai, India. A boy called Ganesh attended this meeting. He had a tumor in his hipbone and received a surgery to remove a part of the hipbone and hip-joint.
A metal plate was inserted to connect the remaining portion of the hip joint with the thigh bone.
In the X-ray picture, you can clearly see the metal plate and the bolts on the bone.
Even after he received this surgery, Ganesh still suffered from pain, and he could not walk without crutches.
But when he received the prayer at the crusade, all his pain was gone immediately, and he came to walk and run by himself without crutches. He can even play cricket.
Some time later, we heard that his bones, of which some part was removed, grew up again, so that he could now remove the metal plate and the bolts.
God the Creator can lengthen shorter legs, make one walk even without a bone at the necessary parts, and make a removed bone grow gain. Through these works of creation, we can surely believe that God created men.
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, God the Creator, after He made Adam and Eve, gave them the seed of life so that they could have offspring. He gave them sperm of man and egg of woman. In the sperm and egg are concentrated the life energy of the parents.
In such a small seed of life, parents' appearances, characters, intelligence, and habits are all contained so the children resemble the parents. God is the one who gave this seed of life to produce children and He is also the one who gives conception through the seed.
The baby is made by the combination of the sperm and egg of the parents, but the conception itself is controlled by God. Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, if the children resemble the parents and ancestors, whom did Adam, the ancestor of mankind, resemble?
Genesis 1:27 says, "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them."
Adam and Eve were made after the image of the holy God. The image here does not only refer to outer appearance. The more important for a man is his spirit, and his body is just a vessel to contain the spirit.
The more important meaning of saying that man is created in God's image is that his spirit came from God's spirit, and it is made after the image of God's spirit.
When Adam was first created, his spirit was filled only with goodness, light, and truth just like God who is holy and pure.
But since Adam ate from the tree of the knowledge, mankind came to be stained with sins and evil. Unlike when he was first created, he lost the image of the holy God.
Therefore, what we have to do as believers in God is to recover the lost image of the holy God. We should love God and live a changed life according to the word of God.
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, the mankind has long been trying to get the answer to the question, "Why do we live?" But we can find the clear answer for the purpose of our lives only when we acknowledge God the Creator.
We first have to realize why God created men and cultivates them on this earth. Now, I used expression 'cultivation', and this is from parables in the Bible.
There are many parables in the Bible, and among them are many about cultivating the land, farming, and harvesting fruits and wheat.
For example, in Matthew chapter 13, Jesus compared the heart of men with four kinds of land.
He explained the measure of bearing truth as fruit is different according to on what kinds of hearts the seed of God's word falls.
Also, He explained about the judgment through the parables of wheat and chaff in Matthew chapter 3, and the parable of weeds and wheat in Matthew chapter 13. Souls who are like the wheat will go to the barn of the kingdom of heaven but the souls who are like the weeds and chaff will fall into the fire of hell.
Through these Biblical parables, God lets us know that His creating men on this earth and leading the human history is like 'cultivation'. Just as farmers plow the land and cultivate, God also cultivates us like a farmer.
That is why we can say God's providence of creating us human beings and letting us live on this earth is the providence of 'human cultivation'. Then, why did God create Adam and has been cultivating men until today?
Conclusively speaking, the purpose of human cultivation is to gain true children. God wanted to gain children with whom He could share His love. God the Creator has the power of the Deity, the authority as the Judge, and strict justice as a divine being.
But at the same time, He also has humane nature such as love, compassion, and mercy.
He sometimes rejoices and becomes happy, or becomes sad or laments at other times.
Because He has humane nature, He wanted to have somebody with whom He could share His love rather than being alone. That is why He planned to create and cultivate men.
Of course, even though He did not make men, He had countless angels and heavenly hosts.
They are beings that only obey God unconditionally; they worshipped, praised, and gave glory to God.
They are not beings that choose to obey or not in different situations but only obey unconditionally. But God wanted true children who could obey with their freewill and love stemming from their heart unlike these angels.
Let me give you an example.
A person has a son, and he sometimes makes troubles and breaks the heart of his parents.
But when his parents scold him, he repents, asks for forgiveness, and comes to the parents in a lovely and winsome way. As he gets older, he comes to understand the heart of his parents.
His thanks and love for the grace of his parents become greater as much as he understands his parents. But let us say in his house is a high-tech robot.
This robot is made in human shape. It can even speak and obeys all the commands. It can do even hard works without any difficulty to benefit the people. It will never give any trouble or break the heart of the parents like the son mentioned just now.
Then, which one would you want more? Will you say you wouldn't need a son because you have the high-tech, well-obeying robot?
No matter how well a robot obeys and it resembles men, we cannot compare it with our own children with whom we can share our heart.
God wanted to gain this kind of true children with whom He could share His heart. Rather than heavenly host and angels who are made only to obey, He wanted true children who would obey willingly with love for God. That is why He made men.
If He gained true children who know His heart and obey Him from the depth of their heart, He would lead them to the eternal kingdom of heaven and let them enjoy only joy and happiness.
But when you farm, you will not gain only wheat. Although the farmer tries his best, there is not only wheat but also chaff at the time of harvest.
You cannot eat the chaff, and if you put the chaff with the wheat in the barn, even the wheat will become inedible. Therefore, you can just use the chaff only for fertilizer or you have to burn them.
In the same way, after God cultivates human beings, He will separate the wheat and the chaff at the end.
Matthew 3:12 says, "His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire." Here, the 'unquenchable fire' refers to the fire of hell.
When the end that is set by God comes, God will end the human cultivation and judge everybody who has lived on this earth. At this time, those who have not become the wheat but the chaff will fall into the fire of hell through the judgment.
Then, what kind of people is wheat that enters the heavenly kingdom and chaff that falls into hell? The wheat is those who have accepted Jesus Christ, love God, and live according to God's Word.
They are the ones who have diligently gotten rid of evil and recovered the lost image of God.
On the contrary, the chaff is those who have not accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Savior. They are the ones who live in untruth and darkness.
But the important thing is that not everyone who attends church is wheat.
Even though they profess with their lips they believe in the Lord, if they do not live according to God's Word but live in sins following the lust of the world, they are not wheat but chaff.
That is why Matthew 7:21 says, "Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven."
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, 1 Timothy 2:4 says, "[God] wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth."
God wants everybody to come to know His heart, become the wheat, and reach salvation. That is why He even gave His one and only Son Jesus for crucifixion.
Nevertheless, those who have not accepted the Lord as their Savior or those who still live in sins cannot recover the value of God's true children who are made in the image of God. They cannot become God's true children.
Since they cannot do the duty of men, they are no different than animals, and nothing but chaff. God cannot bring this chaff that has lost the value of men into the kingdom of heaven along with souls who have come out as wheat.
What will happen if God lets those who hate, envy, fight, and have all kinds of evil into the kingdom of heaven?
Then, the kingdom of heaven will no more be happy, beautiful, and glorious place.
So, what will happen to those souls who cannot come into the kingdom of heaven? Will they just be extinguished?
Even the souls who are chaff, since they have received the breath of life from God, exist forever and cannot be extinguished. So, there needs to be a place to keep them forever.
That place is hell. Those souls who have become chaff will be punished according to the wages of their sins in the eternal fire.
[Conclusion]
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, viewing audiences, so far, you listened about why God made men and cultivates them on this earth.
Now, can you answer to the question, "Why do we live?"
We live to become the wheat according to the purpose of God's cultivating us. First of all, we should believe in God the Creator, and then accept Jesus Christ as our Savior. Also, we should obey the word of God and change ourselves by the power of the Holy Spirit to live a holy life.
If you do this, God will recognize you as His true children with whom He can share His love. He will then later lead you into the beautiful kingdom of heaven and enjoy eternal happiness and joy with you.
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, there certainly are heaven and hell.
God has let me know a lot about heaven and hell through deep spiritual communication, and He has shown visions, too.
We published those contents into books, and there are many requests for this book from all over the world.
Right now, it is translated into English, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, Hindi, Tamil, and Russian, and translations into more languages are scheduled.
Heaven is such a beautiful and happy place. The almighty God decorated the heavenly kingdom in the best way for His beloved children.
Even the most magnificent place on this earth cannot compare to heaven, because the heavenly kingdom is made by God the Creator's wisdom and power that cannot be compared to the ability of men.
For example, gold, which is considered very valuable on this earth, is only the pavement of the road in the heavenly kingdom. Also, all kinds of beautiful jewels, pearls, and crystals decorate the houses so beautifully.
The color and luster of each of the jewel is completely different from that of this earth.
For example, the beauty of carnelian in heaven is just so different than that of this earth just as we cannot compare the luster of glass and diamond.
Even the glittering of tree leaves and the ecstasy of the scent of flowers in heaven are so magnificent and beautiful beyond human imagination.
In the Bible the apostle Paul said he had seen 'paradise', and paradise is the lowest dwelling place in heavenly kingdom.
Just by seeing the lowest level of dwelling place in heaven, he gained such great strength and hope. Even in such severe trials and persecutions, he could rejoice and give thanks and live for the Lord for his whole life.
Only if we know what kind of place heaven is, we can overcome any kind of difficulties on this earth with thanks and joy.
God is cultivating human beings on this earth to lead you and me to this kind of place.
He so eagerly wants to gain true children who resemble God and have holy and sanctified heart.
I hope you will realize why you are being cultivated on this earth through this message.
I pray in the name of the Lord that you will be able to live forever in the heavenly kingdom sharing love with God as His true children. |
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