MAN

1. MAN “God created man in his own image; he created him in the image of god; he created them male and female” Genesis 1:27

2. MAN Man is the special creation of God, made in His own image. He created them male and female as the crowning work of His creation. The gift of gender is thus part of the goodness of God’s creation. In the beginning man was innocent of sin and was endowed by his Creator with freedom of choice. By his free choice man sinned against God and brought sin into the human race. Through the temptation of Satan man transgressed the command of God, and fell from his original innocence whereby his posterity inherit a nature and an environment inclined toward sin. Therefore, as soon as they are capable of moral action, they become transgressors and are under condemnation. Only the grace of God can bring man into His holy fellowship and enable man to fulfill the creative purpose of God. The sacredness of human personality is evident in that God created man in His own image, and in that Christ died for man; therefore, every person of every race possesses full dignity and is worth respect and Christian love.

3. MAN • The creation of human beings represents God’s crowning act in creation. • Genesis 2:7 God “formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.” • Protagoras declared “Humans are the measure of all things. The Bible says we are not the measure of all things, for we are not even able to understand ourselves without God’s revelation. Ps 139:14-16 14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. 15 My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, 16 your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. Eph2:10 10 For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

4. The creation of man: -- “THAT THE CREATION OF MAN WAS PRECEDED BY A DIVINE CONSULTATION.” 1. This consultation was Divine. Held by the Three Persons of the Ever-Blessed Trinity, who were one in the creative work. 2. This consultation was solemn Man, unlike the rest of creation, is a being endowed with mind and volition, capable even of rebellion against his Creator. There must be a pause before such a being is made. The project must be considered. The probable issue must be calculated. His relation to heaven and earth must be contemplated. 3. This consultation was happy. The Divine Being had not yet given out, in the creative work, the highest thought of His mind; He had not yet found outlet for the larger sympathies of His heart in the universe He had just made and welcomed into being. The light could not utter all His beneficence. The waters could not articulate all His power. The stars did but whisper His name. The being of man is vocal with God, as is no other created object. He is a revelation of his Maker in a very high degree. In him the Divine thought and sympathy found welcome outlet. The creation of man was also happy in its bearing toward the external universe. The world is finished. It is almost silent. There is only the voice of the animal creation to break its stillness. But man steps forth into the desolate home. He can sing a hymn -- he can offer a prayer -- he can commune with God -- he can occupy the tenantless house. Hence the council that contemplated his creation would be happy.

5. THE creation of man… THAT MAN WAS CREATED IN THE IMAGE OF GOD THAT MAN WAS CREATED IN THE IMAGE OF GOD. Man was originally God-like, with certain limitations. In what respect was man created after the image of God? • In respect to his intelligence. God is the Supreme Mind. He is the Infinite Intelligence. Man is like Him in that he also is gifted with mind and intelligence; he is capable of thought. • In respect to his moral nature. Man is made after the image of God, in righteousness and true holiness. He was made with a benevolent disposition, with happy and prayerful spirit, and with a longing desire to promote the general good of the universe; in these respects he was like God, who is infinitely pure, Divinely happy in His life, and in deep sympathy with all who are within the circle of His Being.

6. THE creation of man… THAT MAN WAS CREATED IN THE IMAGE OF GOD THAT MAN WAS CREATED IN THE IMAGE OF GOD. Man was originally God-like, with certain limitations. In what respect was man created after the image of God? • In respect to his dominion. God is the Supreme Ruler of all things in heaven and in earth. Both angels and men are His subjects. Material Nature is part of His realm, and is under His authority. In this respect, man is made in the image of God. He is the king of this world. The brute creation is subject to his sway. Material forces are largely under his command. • In respect to his immortality. God is eternal. Man partakes of the Divine immortality. Man, having commenced the race of being, will run toward a goal he can never reach. God, angels, and men are the only immortalities of which we are cognizant. What an awful thing is life. • In respect to the power of creatorship. Man has, within certain limits, the power of creatorship. He can design new patterns of work.

7. THE creation of man… THAT MAN WAS CREATED IN THE IMAGE OF GOD The Divine image in man: -- It is not too much to say that redemption, with all its graces and all its glories, finds its explanation and its reason in creation. He who thought it worth while to create, foreseeing consequences, can be believed, if He says so, to have thought it worth while to rescue and to renew. Nay, there is in this redemption a sort of antecedent fitness, inasmuch as it exculpates the act of creation from the charge of short-sightedness or of mistake. "Let us make man in our image," created anew in Jesus Christ, "after the image of Him that created him." Notice three respects in which the Divine image has been traced in the human. • "God is Spirit," was our Lord's saying to the Samaritan. Man is spirit also. This it is which makes him capable of intercourse and communion with God Himself. SPIRITUALITY thus becomes the very differentia of humanity. The man who declares that the spiritual is not, or is not for him, may well fancy himself developed out of lower organisms by a process which leaves him still generically one of them; for he has parted altogether from the great strength and life of his race. • Spirituality is the first Divine likeness. We will make SYMPATHY the second. Fellow suffering is not necessarily sympathy. On the other hand, sympathy may be where fellow suffering is not. Love is sympathy, and God is love. Sympathy is an attribute of Deity. When God made man in His own likeness, He made him thereby capable of sympathy. Spirituality without sympathy might conceivably be a cold and spiritless grace; it might lift us above earth, but it would not brighten earth itself. • The third feature is that which we call INFLUENCE; the other two are conditions of it. Influence is by name and essence the gentle flowing in of one nature and one personality into another, which touches the spring of will and makes the volition of one the volition of the other. It is indeed a worse than heathenish negation of the power and activity of God, the source of all, if we debar Him alone from the exercise of that spiritual influence upon the understanding, the conscience, and the heart of mankind, which we find to be all but resistless in the hands of those who possess it by His leave.

8. THE creation of man… THAT MAN WAS CREATED IN THE IMAGE OF GOD Man in God's image: -- The small can represent the great. Is not the sun reflected in the hues of the smallest flower, and in the greenness of the finest blade of grass? Yet that sun is distant from our earth ninety-five millions of miles, and is larger than our earth one hundred thousand times. I. IN WHAT THE IMAGE OF GOD UPON MAN CONSISTS. 1. In the possession of moral powers and susceptibilities. 2. In the pure and righteous state of his whole nature. 3. In his relative position toward other terrestrial creatures. II. GREAT BLESSEDNESS WAS INVOLVED IN THE POSSESSION OF GOD'S IMAGE. 1. In the possession of the Divine image human nature had within itself a mirror of God. 2. It led to fellowship with, God. 3. It was a mirror of God to other creatures. 4. It was a mirror in which God saw Himself.

9. "The breath of God became the soul of man; the soul of man therefore is nothing but the breath of God. The rest of the world exists through the word of God; man through His own peculiar breath. This breath is the seal and pledge of our relation to God, of our godlike dignity; whereas the breath breathed into the animals is nothing but the common breath, the life-wind of nature, which is moving everywhere, and only appears in the animal fixed and bound into a certain independence and individuality, so that the animal soul is nothing but a nature-soul individualized into certain, though still material spirituality." - Ziegler.

10. The first covenant A covenant is a binding arrangement between two or more parties that governs their relationship. The word command is introduced at this point because it's God who makes the terms of the agreement. God is the Creator and man is the creature, a "royal tenant" in God's wonderful world, so God has the right to tell the man what he can and cannot do. God didn't ask for Adam's advice; He simply gave him His commandment. God had given great honor and privilege to Adam in making him His vice-regent on the earth (1:28), but with privilege always comes responsibility. The same divine Word that brought the universe into being also expresses God's love and will to Adam and Eve and their descendants (Ps 33:11). Obedience to this Word would keep them in the sphere of God's fellowship and approval. All God's commands are good commands and bring good things to those who obey them (Ps 119:39; Prov 6:20-23). "And His commands are not burdensome" (1 John 5:3).

11. The first covenant God placed two special trees in the middle of the Garden: the Tree of Life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen 2:9,17; 3:3,22,24). Eating from the tree of life would confer immortality (v. 22). Eating from the second tree would confer an experiential knowledge of good and evil, but it would also bring death (2:17). Since they had never experienced evil, Adam and Eve were like innocent children (Deut 1:39; Isa 7:15-16). When they disobeyed God, they became like Him in being able to discriminate between good and evil; but they became unlike Him in that they lost their sinlessness and eventually died. But why did God have to test Adam and Eve? There may be many answers to that question, but one thing is sure: God wanted humans to love and obey Him freely and willingly and not because they were programmed like robots who had to obey. In one sense, God "took a risk" when He made Adam and Eve in His own image and gave them the privilege of choice: but this is the way He ordained for them to learn about freedom and obedience. It's one of the basic truths of life that obedience brings blessing and disobedience brings judgment.

12. The first marriage Genesis 2:19-22 • At the close of the sixth day of Creation, God had surveyed everything He had made and pronounced it "very good" (1:31). But now God says that there's something in His wonderful world that is not good: the man is alone. In fact, in the Hebrew text, the phrase "not good" is at the beginning of the Lord's statement in 2:18. • What was "not good" about man's solitude? After all, Adam could fellowship with God, enjoy the beauty of the Garden and eat of its fruits, accomplish his daily work, and even play with the animals. What more could he want? God knew what Adam needed: "a helper suitable for him" (v. 18, NIV). There was no such helper among the animals, so God made the first woman and presented her to the man as his wife, companion, and helper. She was God's special love gift to Adam (3:12).

13. The first marriage - the dignity of woman Genesis 2:19-22 • The dignity of woman (vv. 18-22). The woman was by no means a "lesser creature." The same God who made Adam also made Eve and created her in His own image (1:27). Both Adam and Eve exercised dominion over Creation (v. 29). Adam was made from the dust, but Eve was made from Adam's side, bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh (2:23). • The plain fact is that Adam needed Eve. Not a single animal God had created could do for Adam what Eve could do. She was a helper "meet [suitable] for him." When God paraded the animals before Adam for him to name them, they doubtless came before him in pairs, each with its mate; and perhaps Adam wondered, "Why don't I have a mate?“

14. The first marriage - the dignity of woman Genesis 2:19-22 Though Eve was made to be a "suitable [face-to-face] helper" for Adam, she wasn't made to be a slave. The noted Bible commentator Matthew Henry wrote: "She was not made out of his head to rule over him, nor out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near his heart to be beloved." Paul wrote that "the woman is the glory of man" (1 Cor 11:7, NIV); for if man is the head (1 Cor 11:1-16; Eph 5:22-33), then woman is the crown that honors the head.

15. The first marriage - the dignity of woman Genesis 2:19-22 The sanctity of marriage (vv. 23-24). God's pattern for marriage wasn't devised by Adam; as the traditional marriage ceremony states it, "Marriage was born in the loving heart of God for the blessing and benefit of mankind." No matter what the courts may decree, or society may permit, when it comes to marriage, God had the first word and He will have the last word (Heb 13:4; Rev 22:15). Perhaps the Lord looks down on many unbiblical marriages today and says, "From the beginning it was not so" (Matt 19:8). His original plan was that one man and one woman be one flesh for one lifetime. God had at least four purposes in mind when He performed the first marriage in the Garden of Eden. First, He wanted suitable companionship for Adam, so He gave him a wife. He gave Adam a person and not an animal, someone who was his equal and therefore could understand him and help him. Martin Luther called marriage "a school for character," and it is. As two people live together in holy matrimony, the experience either brings out the best in them or the worst in them. It's an opportunity to exercise faith, hope, and love and to mature in sacrifice and service to one another for God's glory.

16. The first marriage - the dignity of woman Genesis 2:19-22 The sanctity of marriage (vv. 23-24). God's pattern for marriage wasn't devised by Adam; as the traditional marriage ceremony states it, "Marriage was born in the loving heart of God for the blessing and benefit of mankind." No matter what the courts may decree, or society may permit, when it comes to marriage, God had the first word and He will have the last word (Heb 13:4; Rev 22:15). Perhaps the Lord looks down on many unbiblical marriages today and says, "From the beginning it was not so" (Matt 19:8). His original plan was that one man and one woman be one flesh for one lifetime. God had at least four purposes in mind when He performed the first marriage in the Garden of Eden. First, He wanted suitable companionship for Adam, so He gave him a wife. He gave Adam a person and not an animal, someone who was his equal and therefore could understand him and help him. Martin Luther called marriage "a school for character," and it is. As two people live together in holy matrimony, the experience either brings out the best in them or the worst in them. It's an opportunity to exercise faith, hope, and love and to mature in sacrifice and service to one another for God's glory.

17. The first marriage - the dignity of woman Genesis 2:19-22 Second, marriage provides the God-given right to enjoy sex and have children. The Lord commanded them to "be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth" (Gen 1:28). This doesn't imply that sexual love is only for procreation, because many people marry who are beyond the time of bearing children; but the bearing of children is an important part of the marriage union (1 Tim 5:14). A third purpose for marriage is to encourage self-control (1 Cor 7:1-7). "It is better to marry than to burn with passion" (v. 9, NKJV). A marriage that's built only on sexual passion isn't likely to be strong or mature. Sexual love ought to be enriching and not just exciting, and marriage partners need to respect one another and not just use one another. Throughout Scripture, sexual union outside of marriage is condemned and shown to be destructive, and so are the perversions of the sexual union (Rom 1:24-27). No matter what the judges or the marriage counselors say, "God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral" (Heb 13:4, NIV)..

18. The first marriage - the dignity of woman Genesis 2:19-22 Finally, marriage is an illustration of the loving and intimate relationship between Christ and His church (Eph 5:22-33). Paul called this "a great mystery," that is, a profound spiritual truth that was once hidden but is now revealed by the Spirit. Jesus Christ is the Last Adam (1 Cor 15:45) and therefore a type of the first Adam.