Life began “in the beginning” with God.
John 1:1-5
John begins his gospel by explaining to us that the Word
was in the beginning and the Word was God. We know from John’s testimony, that
the Word that was God was in reality Jesus, the son of Mary, the Son of God. I
can imagine John, after many years, making the decision to write an account of
what had gone on in those amazing years that he walked with Jesus. In all
likelihood he would had in his possession a copy of Mark’s gospel as well as Matthew’s
and Luke’s. When we compare the Gospels we see that what he wrote was different
in style and in some cases in information provided. He didn’t need to do the
birth narrative. That had been well done especially by Luke.
John goes on to say that this “Word” was life! Not just
physical life that we experience as we breathe and move about but spiritual
life as well. Let’s look at the narrative provided by God through Moses.
The word that we translate “God” in the beginning of
Genesis is Elohim in the Hebrew. Elohim is a masculine plural noun. We know
that God is plural: Father, Son, and Spirit!
Let’s skip over the day-to-day account of the creation and
get down to our ancestry. The first chapter has an outline of mankind’s
creation. The second chapter has a more complete description. Now, let’s look
at the Scripture in Genesis 1:26-27
Then 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 birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth
and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” 27 So
God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and
female he created them.
Immediately we see God — Elohim — identify himself as a
plural being. “Let us make man” rather than “I will make man”. Yet, when he
referred to mankind — Adam — we have an interesting play on words “in the image
of God he created him”. The “image of God” describes mankind first as masculine
and then as “male and female” added to the formula. Then the word says “he
created them”!
Let’s move on past the summary account and go to the more
complete description of the creation.
Genesis
2:5-8 tells us, “When no bush of the field was yet in the land and no small
plant of the field had yet sprung up—for the Lord
God had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to work the
ground, 6 and a mist was going up from the land and was
watering the whole face of the ground— 7 then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the
ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a
living creature. 8 And the Lord
God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had
formed.”
Some Bible scholars believe that there are two different
accounts of the creation. I certainly do not agree with that! As I said, I
believe the first account is an outline and the second is a more complete
description. For those who think each day described in Genesis 1 really is a long
period of time that may have covered millions of years need the record to be
separated. What we see in Genesis 1 is the dividing of the land and the water
which left the earth wet and the seed placed in it would begin to grow. Genesis
2 describes exactly that scene. “No bush in the field was yet in the land.”
That was on the third day and mankind was made on the sixth day.
We do not have a clear account of the passing of time
following the seven days of creation. We do know that as beings were created
who breathed they received that breath from God. The man was left without a
companion of his own kind. Again, we do not know how long this situation
existed. Knowing men very likely a large amount of time had to pass before Adam
noticed that it was just him and God with all the rest of the creation around
him. What we do know, and that is all that is necessary, is recorded for us in Genesis 2:15-17 The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to
work it and keep it. 16 And the Lord
God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden,
17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall
not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”
The man had responsibility for working and keeping the
garden that God had made for him. We do not know exactly what “working” and
“keeping” consisted of. I don’t believe it involved hoes and shovels. At least,
not until after the Fall. There may have existed a more intimate relationship
between the man and the garden than we can understand. Perhaps, Adam spoke and
the garden responded. After all, he had been made in the image of God and God
had spoken it all into being! Staying with the concept that God said he had
created man in his own image there are some things, I believe, we can assume
from that statement. The life that man received when God breathed life into him
was God’s life. We really do not know much about how that life works. We do
know that the life of God is eternal. The wording “eternal life” seems not to
appear in the Old Testament. The lack of those two words together in the Old
Testament does not mean the concept of eternal life did not exist in Old
Testament times.
One of
the clearest examples is in the book of Job. We need to remember that Job’s
lifetime was very early in history. There appears to be no written scriptures. The
descriptions of animals found in the book might indicate a time before the
flood (Job 40:15ff). Job certainly had a belief that life goes beyond death.
Let’s look at Job’s testimony found in Job
19:25-27. “For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand
upon the earth. 26 And after my skin has been thus destroyed,
yet in my flesh I shall see God, 27 whom I shall see for
myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me!”
The first time I can find the two words together — “eternal
life” — is in the story of the rich young man. Eternal life was assumed by the
rich young man who came to talk to Jesus. That story is found in Matthew 19:16-22. As a religious person
the rich young man fully believed that he needed to do something in order to
have eternal life. He asked Jesus, “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have
eternal life?” Jesus’ answer doesn’t fully help us much if we think the way the
young man did. First, Jesus asked a question. “Why do you ask me about what is
good?” God is the only one that is good. It may be that Jesus was trying to get
the young man to say that he recognized that Jesus was God. After all, Joseph
had been told that the baby Jesus fulfilled the promise “the virgin shall
conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” which means
“God with us”! I believe we can quote the accounts found in the Gospels and the
Book of Acts openly because, as Paul would later say, “this has not been done
in a corner!” (Acts 26:26). There were no secrets.
The life that the young man was asking for — “eternal life”
— could only be God’s life.
Eternal life does not have a beginning or an end! When a
person comes to faith in Jesus Christ he or she does not receive an extension of
human life. That would be a very sad situation. We do not need our life
extended we need our life replaced! Salvation gives us God’s life and it is
eternal in both directions. We certainly can assume that John, the disciple/apostle,
was present when Jesus had this conversation with the young man.
John’s Gospel combined with his first small letter has the
phrase “eternal life” 22 times. More than any other book of the Bible.
After Jesus confronted the young man with his bondage to
material things the disciples were disturbed. They asked the troubling
question. “Who then can be saved?” You see, they did not have the wealth of the
young man in their hand but they had it in their hearts and they knew by that
time that what you have in your heart is what really counts. Jesus responded, “with
God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26). Jesus then assured them that
surrendering all to follow him will result in inheriting eternal life.
We need to go back to the Garden of Eden. There was one
tree in the garden that God had told Adam he could not eat of it because “in
the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” They did not immediately die
physically. However, they did die spiritually. And they did eventually die
physically. If they had died physically — we would not be here! Nor would there
have been any other people to occupy the earth.
We tend to forget that there were two special trees in the
garden. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the tree of life. Let’s
look at the tree of life. Adam and Eve were removed from the garden and an
angel was placed there with a flaming sword to keep Adam and Eve away from the
tree of life. If they ate from it they would live forever in their sinful
condition. Nothing could have been worse for them.
The tree of life will be restored to the people of God
after the return of Jesus. In Revelation chapter 22 the river of the water of
life will flow from the throne of God. That river will provide for the tree of
life that will bloom perpetually. From that time forward there will be nothing
accursed (Revelation 22:1-3).
I hope the background I’ve given you is enough for you to
understand what I’m going to say. In recent years, whenever I have the
responsibility of speaking at a funeral I try to be careful to include the idea
that death is a gift! In 1 Corinthians 3:21-23, Paul is writing to the church
in order to move them away from boasting in men. And he says that “all things
are yours”. With that statement he lists some of the men that the Corinthians
were looking to: Paul, Apollo’s, or Cephas. Then he adds words that indicated a
different concept. Not only are all of these leaders theirs but also the world,
life, death the present or the future — all are yours. We understand and rejoice
in life but not in death. Death serves an important purpose. It is either the
gate of heaven or the door of hell! As believers in the Lord Jesus Christ We
should be able to rejoice when it comes time to face death. F. W. Bourne tells
of the rejoicing in the heart of Billy Bray. Billy was a tin miner who was powerfully saved and became a preacher.
He could not be silenced! On the occasion of the death of his wife, Joey, we
are told. “The sickness of a child, the death of a wife, were powerless to
silence his voice, or to repress his joy. It is said that when his wife died he
was so overpowered with the thought of his "dear Joey" having escaped
from earth's toils and sufferings to the rest and bliss of heaven, that he
began to jump and dance about the room, exclaiming, "Bless the Lord! My
dear Joey is gone up with the bright ones! My dear Joey is gone up with the
shining angels! Glory! Glory! Glory!" "Here," he would say,
"we have a little bitter, but it is mixed with a great deal of
sweet."
Today it is very common to have someone refer to life as
the preferred choice over death. I try not to rebuke the person but I will
gently say something like, “Being alive, or on the right side of the grass,
means that I am not in heaven yet.”
In Romans 8:37-38, we are given a list of things, or
conditions, that cannot separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our
Lord. That list begins with “neither death nor life…”. Nothing can separate us
from the love of God.
During his life on earth Jesus told a story that usually
referred to as “The Rich Man and Lazarus”. Since it is considered a parable
most people believe that it’s just a fairytale. Well, I don’t believe that! If
Jesus tells a story it is true! During his time on earth he had access to
everything that ever happened and it was simply a matter of him choosing the
story to tell. Luke tells us story in Luke 16:19-31 let me summarize it for
you. There was a rich man who lived the life of the rich and powerful. There
was a poor man, named Lazarus, who sat by the rich man’s gate. The poor man
died and was carried by the angels to where Abraham was. The rich man died and
was buried in found himself in Hades. He was in torment and could see Lazarus
with Abraham far away. The rich man said that he was in flames. He asked
Abraham to send Lazarus to dip his finger in water and cool the tongue of the
tormented. When he found that could not be done he asked for Lazarus to go back
and warn his five brothers. Abraham’s reply was they have Moses and the
prophets and if they do not hear them they will not be convinced if someone
should rise from the dead. Exactly what Jesus did! He rose from the dead and
they still will not believe!
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