You've heard us quote that line
before. The sinner is a sacred thing. The Holy Ghost has made him so. That's where that came from.
Joseph Hart. And there's nothing in the green
hymnal that even comes close to this, except Hart the herald
angel sing. Second Adam from above, reinstate
us in thy love. But this is a very good, very
good hymn. All right. Go back to 1 Corinthians
15 with me. 1 Corinthians 15. As I said, Lord willing, this
will be a two-part message. It didn't begin that way. I intended
to do it all this evening, but this whole story, to consider,
takes in about well over 7,000 years. So it can't be told in
40 minutes. The half certainly has not been
told, and not even a fraction will be tonight. So we're going to do a two-part
message. I went over to Tobe. I believe
it was Brother Don Bell. In a note I wrote to him that
I went over to Genesis and began to look at this story of the
first Adam. And Adam all died. And stayed
there too long. And didn't leave myself enough
time for to deal well with the second Adam. So Sunday, Lord
willing, we'll continue this. The truth, which is the gospel,
is a true rags to riches story. A true bitter sweet story. The gospel is the story of man's
fall in Adam. You cannot understand the gospel
nor appreciate it unless it is what we just sang. You cannot
understand nor appreciate or really believe the gospel unless
you know something about and have experienced something of
this fall that man took in the garden. The gospel is the story
of man's fall in Adam and his rise in Christ. Look at verse 22, this is the
text. Verse 22, as in Adam, all die. Very plainly, all in Adam die. All that have anything to do
with Adam, or in Adam, who come from Adam, die. Even so, in Christ. shall all be made alike. All
those in Christ, all those who come from Christ, shall be made
alike. Alright, now this, that's a summary
of this chapter is, and he said in verse 1, I declare unto you
the gospel. And most have taken it to be
just the first four verses of this If you want a little English
lesson, there are several conjunctions in each verse. And, after, after,
and, for, for. You don't stop at verse 4 besides
there's a colon there and you keep going. So the summary of
this whole gospel that he declares And throughout this chapter,
he talks of things like this, corruption and incorruption,
mortality and immortality, dishonor and honor, things that are natural,
things that are spiritual, earthy and heavenly, death and victory,
or life. And so this is the true rags
to riches, and bittersweet story. Our gospel, the gospel, begins
in darkness. Now, understand what I'm saying.
It begins in darkness and ends in light. In other words, it
begins with death and ends in life. It begins with sin and
it ends in righteousness. There's no good news, as we said.
There's no gospel, no good news, without first the bad news. Or
else the good news is not really good news. There's no mercy or appreciation
of it except for those who are fallen, guilty, sinner. I saw
a poll that they took of many concerning this coming year,
2007. And they asked people what they
expect and expected, whether they expected good things or
bad. General consensus was among people
that most expected gloom and doom for the coming year. Gloom and doom. Well, I thought about that. I
thought it depends on how you look at it. Depends on how you look at it. Concerning this earth, yeah,
it's a doomed place. Whether it'll be this year, I
don't know. But it will be. The trump shall
sound. It shall. And then it'll be over. The Lord will fold this thing
up like a vesture, He said. Melt away, we read that Sunday,
with a fervent heat. But if you look at, or look to,
the Lord, It's not doom. It's not gloom. It's unspeakably
good. All right, let's go back to Genesis
chapter 1, okay? Let's go back to the beginning.
You can't tell the gospel without starting in the beginning. The
beginning. You know, mankind, man doesn't
have any answers, really, or any hope. These people who said
gloom and doom, they don't really have any hope. Because, number
one, man rejects this book. Man doesn't believe this is God's
Word. So where is he looking for for his answers? He's looking
within. Or he's looking to other men.
And man doesn't know the end because he doesn't know the beginning.
You know what the word Genesis means, don't you? It means the
beginning. Okay. And we, by God's grace,
through this Book of Life, you know that's what this is, this
is the Book of Life which God Almighty wrote. The Book of Life. It's been written by God, we
read it, we receive it, we believe it. We can go back to the beginning
like we are now, and we can see why things are the way they are.
We have no trouble seeing why things are just the way they
are because God said, we're going to see in a moment, in a few
moments, Why things are the way they are. Why women are the way
they are. Why men are the way they are.
Why the world is the way it is. The scriptures tell us that.
Those things. Then you can look in the chapters
in the middle and then go all the way to the last chapter and
we can tell what's going to be in the end. Through God's Word. Chapter 1
is the chapter In the beginning of creation,
in the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. There's
no way to understand this vast mystery called the universe,
planet Earth, mankind, life, without God, without a creator. Is there? A fool would say no, God. This
thing called the universe, David declared, we're not considering
the heavens. the moon, the stars, and so forth. You've got to believe it's the
work of a marvelous, magnificent, infinite Creator. Don't you?
There's no way. There's no way to come in close
to understanding anything about it except believing God created
it. Oh, wise Creator. Do you remember
that illustration of the A man talking to this fellow that didn't
believe that God created all things, and he asked him to show
him his watch. You remember that? No? Good. I'll tell it again. It's one of the best I've ever
heard. A believer was talking to another man who did not believe
that God created all things. And he asked the man, do you
wear a watch? And the man said, yes, I do. He said, may I see
it? The man said, sure. He took it off and handed it
to him. The believer looked at it and he said, that's a fine
watch, beautiful watch. The man said, sure is, a Rolex,
you know, 22 jewels or whatever, perpetual, oyster, pearl, you
know, all that stuff. And the believer said, do you
believe this had a wise, skilled craftsman who made this and created
it? Oh, he said, yes, yes, handmade.
Switzerland, handmade. It's clear by looking at it,
isn't it? And the believer said to him,
I don't believe that. I don't believe that. He said, what I
believe about this watch, he said, I believe that millions,
billions of years ago, floating out in outer space, were mainsprings
and stems and crystals and jewels and gears and watch bands and
all this stuff floating around in outer space and there was
a huge bang. Boom! And now you have your watch. I thought you said you hadn't
heard it before. Well, the fellow whose watch
it was, he said, How foolish can you be? You can tell that
somebody made that by the marvel of it, the skill of it and so
forth, the beauty of it. You can tell. You're a fool to
believe such a thing." He said, no. The man said, no. Thou art
a bigger fool than I to believe that this vast thing called the
universe, in all its complexity, in all its marveling, in all
its glory, in all of its amazement, and especially this thing called
man, which David said, I'm fearfully and wonderfully made. God's crowning glory, that is,
of creation, mankind. To believe that man just evolved
from a soup, you're a fool. There's only one way to understand
something of this vast thing called the universe and creation.
God. In the beginning, God. And God
doesn't go into great detail. We couldn't understand it. He
wrote enough for us to know and believe, didn't He? In the beginning,
God created all things. All things. God created. And it says, I'll never forget
the first time this was brought to my attention. Look at it,
in the beginning God, verse 1, verse 2, and the earth was without
form and void and darkness upon the face of the deep, and the
Spirit of God, capital S, you're not reading it with me, some
of you, and the Spirit of God, capital
S, moved upon the face of the water. Now there's another person. I said God, and here it gives
another person, the Spirit of God. Verse 3 says, and God said. That's the voice of God. God
spoke the word. Right there is the three persons
that God had. Look down at verse 26. And God said, let us make
man. I thought God was one person.
He is. But it says, let us. You know, there's three verses.
You say, I don't understand. I don't either. But that's the way it is. John
wrote in nearly the next to last book, there are three that bear
record in heaven. The Father, the Word, and the
Holy Ghost. And these three are one. In the
beginning, God. Alright, what's the first thing
God created? Get out and don't look. Light. The first thing God created. Why? Everything begins with light. David said in the Psalms, he
said, the entrance of thy words giveth light. Light. Light. The light, in John 1,
scripture says, the light shineth in darkness. Are you with me
here? You're going to have to be. This
is a big, sweeping saga and story here. We've only been at it about
ten minutes. Alright, God began this whole
thing by creating light. And John 1 says, light shineth
in darkness, capital L, and the light was a person. Christ is all in all. We're going
to see that. All right, keep going. In verse 26, he said,
let us make man in our image. Hang on. God's spirit. God doesn't have an image. He
just said he did. Didn't it? In our image. Our image of God and the Holy
Spirit. Somebody in the Godhead has to
have an image. Yep. You ever read that anywhere? That in one of the persons dwelleth
all the fullness of the Godhead bodily? It's Christ. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. Look
at verse 27. God created man in his own image,
and the image of God created he him. In Hebrews 1, it says
Jesus Christ is the express image of God. The only begotten Son,
or that is bodily image of the Father, full of grace and truth. The image of God. Jesus Christ. Alright, it says in verse 27,
male and female created he them. He called the male and female
man, both of them. These two were one. Male and
female created him. Co-equals. Yep, co-equals. They were male and female. We're
going to look at this a little more later. Male and female according
to gender, but in equality, they were equal, they were same. Because
God calls them man, both of them man. Mankind. The image of God. Each with qualities
given to them, but equal. equal. And as I said, Jesus Christ
is the express image, as the scripture says, the express image
of God. And in him dwelleth all these
qualities of mankind to the fullest extent. A man, the God-man. And later, we'll see this more
in the next message. Well, this glorious beginning,
this beautiful creation, God created everything and then He
created man. He waited for the last six days
to create man. And man was His crowning achievement,
if you will, in His own image, that is the image of His Son,
Proverbs 8 says that I was with him before there was ever earth,
before the mountains. I was with him, brought up with
him, daily his delight. My delights were with the sons
of men and the rejoicing in the habitable parts of the earth.
Christ, every bodily appearance of God throughout scriptures
is Jesus Christ. Write it down. Write it down.
OK. But God created man and mankind,
man and woman, put them in this gloriously beautiful garden,
this carnal utopia. Glorious place. They were both
naked, nothing to be ashamed of. Clothes are a result of sin. Matthew Henry, I believe it was,
pointed out so astutely that it's amazing that man is so proud
of what He only needs because of his shame. That's irony, isn't it? Anyway,
this glorious and beautiful beginning, this beautiful creation of God,
mankind, his most glorious creature, was in a garden like God, God-like. Godly. God-like. Without sin,
dwelling in righteousness was ruined by sin. Man fell from glory to shame,
from life to death. And the only way to explain the
mystery that is mankind, now listen to what I'm about to say,
the only way to explain this mystery that is mankind, mankind
is both beautiful and it is ugly. Mankind is both good, yet he
is supremely evil. Mankind is both noble, yet he's
base. Mankind is a higher creature,
yet really he's more beastly than the beast. That's a paradox,
isn't it? The only way to explain this
mystery called mankind is to follow man. The only way. of Genesis. It talks about a
serpent. And I don't know what form this
was. Nobody does. Okay? But we do know this was Lucifer.
We know that. This was Satan, the son of the
morning, a fallen angel. Don't ask questions about, well,
you know, go to Isaiah 14. Read where our Lord talked about
him. We have to take the Lord Jesus Christ word for it. He spoke of the fall of Lucifer.
And once again, and I keep saying this because everything we believe
is a person, Jesus Christ. We believe what we believe because
God came down here and told us. And we believe him. And he said,
I beheld Satan fall as lightning to the earth. Didn't he? He said,
I was there. I beheld him fall as lightning.
He's the one that cast him down. And man has all kinds of questions
about that, scoffs and mocks. Man is scoffing at Jesus Christ
as he is scoffing at Him. And when He walked this planet,
they tried to stump Him, and they ended up confounding themselves,
didn't they? And man sure hadn't got smarter.
I think he's a whole lot dumber. And the reason being, he's rejected
all that. Rejected truth, receiving it not. Well, okay. Where am I? The serpent, Lucifer,
tempted the woman. This is important. Paul wrote
about this, some things hard to be understood, but he wrote
about it. He said the woman being tempted was in the transgressions.
She was tempted. Adam wasn't tempted, the woman
was. Satan did this by casting doubt
upon God's Word. That's how he began this whole
thing. The woman was deceived. Adam wasn't. Is that right? You've read it. Is that important to know? God's
going to explain to us why things are the way they are for that
reason. The man willingly, willfully
took part with her. He saw what she did and he willfully rebelled against God's plain
command and entered with her into this sin against God. And you and I have seen before
how that in itself is a picture of Christ, isn't it? Amazing. I know you have many questions,
but you can't ask them and I can't answer them. We're going to go
on. Okay? Now, in chapter 2, verse 17,
God Almighty, before the woman was deceived and the man partook,
God Almighty warned, 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. Let's read that again, okay?
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. Die. Does everyone in here know
what die means? D-I-E. Something dies, what does
that mean? It ceases to exist. It dies. Dead. You know what dead is,
don't you? Barnard used to say this parenthesis. Graveyard dead. Stinking dead. Now we understand,
don't we? No life. Dead. Do you have a
margin, a reference in your Bible next to that? If you have a Cambridge
Bible, perhaps a Nelson, something else, it says this, doesn't it? Beside it. It says dying. thou shalt die." Well, that's
good. That's good, too. Dying, thou
shalt die. That explains man. Now, Adam
did not die physically that day, did he? He did not die that day. He lived 969 years, didn't he? No, 930 years. That right? 930 years. He didn't die that day. He lived
a long time, physically. Then what does God mean, die? You
know, when God told man that, I don't think man had a clue
what he was talking about. I know he didn't. Adam didn't
know what death was. He'd never seen it before. What
do you mean death? What do you mean? Did Adam die? God said he would. He sure did. How? Spiritually. Spiritually. He lost the life of God. If you don't understand this,
you don't understand anything else. Right? Spurgeon used to
say, if you're wrong on the fall, you'll be wrong on it all. Everything
starts here. The whole gospel story starts
here. The first Adam, all human beings come from this man called
Adam. In Adam, all die. Remember what this says, John
Davis? Remember what this says, Patrick Holland? In Adam, all
die. Paul spits several chapters in
Romans describing this, explaining what it means to die. Being dead
in sin. This thing called sin entering
into this creature and killing him. Making him dead to God. That's what that means. He lost
the life of God, which is righteousness. Everything about man became wrong. Not right, wrong. Everything
was right. When God saw man, his last creation,
when he saw it, he said, very good. And now after sin, it says
over in chapter 6, God looked at man and saw that the thoughts
of his heart and imagination were only evil continually. God said he's very bad. Everything about him. Man lost
purity. I don't say holiness because
God is holy. Now listen to me. I don't say
holiness because, well, I do and I don't, and some of you
understand what I mean by that. Real holiness, God's holiness,
cannot sin. God cannot even be tempted to
sin. This is why the second Adam is giving us something that the
first Adam didn't have. This is why we have something
in the 2nd Adam that we didn't have in the 1st. But man lost light. He became
darkness. His mind, his conscience, or
his understanding was darkened. Truth. Man began to live a lie. Love. And all these things are
written of in chapter 3. Look at verse 3. Verse 7, the eyes of both of
them were opened after they sinned against God. It was willful rebellion
against God. And I don't have time to go into
that, but they knew that they were naked. They sewed fig leaves
together. And you know the significance
of that, don't you? Tried to cover themselves before
God with fig leaves. Boy, something bad has happened
to this noble creature, hasn't it? Where is his mind? What happened
to him? Think he's going to hide his nakedness from God with fig leaves? And he ran and he heard God walking
in the cool of the day. He heard the voice of God walking. The voice of God walking. That's that word we read about
in verse 3 of chapter 1. The word, the voice of God walking. You see, the Word made flesh
as Christ, whose rejoicing was in the habitable parts of the
earth. And he came, the Lord God, walking in the cool of the
day. And Adam and his wife hid themselves
from the presence of the Lord. They had never hidden from the
Lord before. When the Lord came, they ran
to him. They wanted to see him. They
were naked. They were delighted. They were
ashamed. They were delighted to see. And he then rejoiced in his presence. They never hid from him. Now
they are hiding from him like guilty, shameful. Well, something has happened,
hasn't it? Sin. Sin. And then the Lord began
to question them. Who told you you were naked?
And the man said, Verse 12, the woman he gave to
me. He blamed this woman. When God
first presented her to him, he said, that's bone of my bone,
flesh of my flesh. Called her woman because she's
taken out of man. Isha. Delighted, oh, this is the love
of my life. This is me. This is part of my
wife. It's her fault. Division. Blame. Shame. Ignorance. Sin has come over
their being. Sin. Sin has entered. And then, to make a long story
short, this thing called sin had entered this God-like creature
called man. And in sin and all its blackness
and wickedness, Scripture talks about the exceeding sinfulness.
These are just the seeds of it. All right? Dying, thou shalt die. It's going to get
worse. It's going to get so bad that
God's going to cut his years short. A man lived 900 and some
odd years, you know, until he got worse and worse and worse,
and God said, I'm going to cut him short. Three score and ten. That's all I can take of you.
Honestly. And the exceeding sinfulness
of sin would not be fully known until many years later, until
there were many, many, many of these creatures, these sinful,
vile creatures all over the face of the earth that just don't
care for God, don't even give God a thought. God is now still
the Creator. God is still the Provider. God
is still the King. God is still the Lord and Master.
God still provides. God still has. It's just of His
mercy. It's of the Lord's mercy that
He didn't take that first man and woman and destroy them right
there. What need did God have of that man and that woman? What
need did He have of them? He didn't create them because
He needed them. They created him for his glory. Well, they
sinned and fell and came short of his glory, didn't they? They
dishonored God. They shamed God, didn't they?
They brought reproach upon God. What further need did he have
of them? But God, here's another part of God's glorious character
that has never been seen. God is merciful. God is gracious. God is long-suffering. And God
has a purpose in all this. to bring forth His greatest glory
of all. You see, that's the first man.
But with Him, long before He created this man, is the second man. You know,
but the first was not really first. This is the mystery in
the stand. Would you come up here, please,
and explain this to the rest of them? The first man is not
really the first. Although he's called the first,
and there's a second. God had this other man, like
David, you know. King, waiting in the wings. And
this whole thing had to unfold for God to bring down this second
Adam. The second Adam. Well, very quickly. But here's the reason things
are the way they are. Adam and Eve was the beginning
of all sin and sorrows, toils and troubles. Man, Scripture
says, is born of woman, from here on out will be a few days
full of trouble. Why? He's got this thing called
sin in him. And he's dead in it. Alright,
let's look at the woman's trouble real quickly. Alright? This ought
to be real relevant to you. Woman has two troubles, basically.
Childbirth and man. It's not funny, really. It's
not funny. But that's really it. I wouldn't
try to be funny. That's the way it is. A lot of women think it's funny. Verse 15, I don't blame you for
laughing. You're just real carnal. No, but look at verse, our Lord
said in chapter 3, verse 16, unto the woman he said, I will
greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception. In sorrow thou
shalt bring forth children. Had not Adam sinned, Eve sinned,
Eve would have had a child pain free. She would never have gone
through what women go through monthly. She would have never
gone through any of that. It would have been painless. No tears, no suffering, no sorrow.
It would have just been a joyful, nothing but a wonderful, beautiful
experience. But God said, now because of
this, you're going to have nothing but pain and trouble. It will
greatly multiply. And from like a 12-year-old girl
until they start bearing children is nothing but woman physical
problems. Now, is there any other explanation
why this is the way it is than right here? Huh? That's what God said. She has
a greater source of really physical problems and trouble that starts
real early. Why? She was in the transgression. And God dealt with her first,
didn't he? He dealt with her first. And then in verse 16,
he said, so childbirth and all things that go with it, and thy
desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee. I said before they were equal,
and they were. I believe, I really do believe that physically they
were both completely, perfectly equal. In station, no, the woman came
out of man, it says God made her to help meet, but in actual
equality before God, in God's eyes and so forth, there was
not one ahead over another. They were perfectly equal. They
had their station, man, woman, Man, wife, so forth, and they
both loved it, and there was no problem. And now sin comes
in. And now God said, this is the
way it's going to be. It's going to be a man's world. And I'm going to make the woman
the weaker vessel. That's the way it is. Anybody got any problem with
that? You better not, it's your fault. That's right. That's right. And
God made these differences between male and female. It all resulted
from sin. And we're going to see later
on how that in Christ there's no male or female. He's going to change it all back. And really already has. There's
no head over another in Christ. But one head. I told one of the
brethren, in Christ we're all female. The bride. Weaker. Yes. I was talking to
somebody. We were talking Sunday at the
table, what it was. And we were talking about these
things called hormones. And you know, this is mankind's
way of explaining it. hormonal differences and all
that. We see right here, God tells
us where it all happened. Call it what you will. Estrogen
or testosterone or whatever it is. But man is a physically stronger
creature. That's the way it is. That's
the way it has to be. To be the breadwinner and so
forth. The protector and all of that.
And the woman is given qualities of motherhood and all of that
that men don't have and so forth. Nurturing qualities. All of these
differences that must be. That must be in God's wisdom.
That's the way it is. But it's all resulted from the
fall. From the fall. But this thing, what our Lord
said is, man shall have the rule over you. I think in this country,
in our country, the female population is greater than the male in it.
Why don't women take over? It's a man's world. Man's the
dominant creature. That's the way it is. Don't let
your feminist side come out now. Don't do it. Mary, is it the
way you like it though? Hannah Parks, is this the way
you like it? Sherry, do you see the wisdom of God in all this?
Hannah, do you? God's people do. They wouldn't
change it. They wouldn't change it. That's
the way it is. Can you explain a woman being
under a domineering man and get out of that and get right back
into another one? She wants to be. Ah well, that's all sin. That's what happens. Alright,
how about man? Man's troubles. Man's troubles. And to Adam he
said, verse 17, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice
of thy wife, and hath eaten of the tree of which I commanded
thee, say, and thou shalt not eat of it. Cursed is the ground
for thy sake. In sorrow shalt thou eat of it
all the days of thy life." In other words, you're going to
be digging in the dirt for the rest of your day. Digging and
digging and digging and digging and digging and digging. You're
going to wake up in the morning and you're going to start digging. And she's going to sit home with
babies. And you're going to go out and dig. And you're going
to complain, you're going to bust your knuckles, and you're
going to sweat and sweat and work all day long, twelve hours
in the day, our Lord said, but you're going to keep doing it
until the day you die. Dust you came from, that's what
you're going to work in. And thorns and thistles, it's
going to be nothing but trouble. And the sweat of your face, you're
going to eat your bread. Don't complain about it. Because
it's our fault. Right? That's what happened. In sorrow shalt thou eat of it
all the days of thy life, until you return to the dust. Okay. So, that's where these differences
came from. Do you understand a little bit now? I know you
do, you know these things before. God said, you're going to go
back to the dust. God talked about thorns, thistles,
pain, sorrow, troubles, sweat, until you go back to dust. God created man from the dust
of the ground, breathed into him, he became a living soul. Alright, he became a living soul.
And over there we read in 1 Corinthians 15, it says the second Adam is
a quickening spirit. There's a difference. And this whole story ends up
this way, at least in the book of Genesis. Over in chapter 50, it ends up,
it says in the beginning, God created. It begins with life.
And in chapter 50, the very last line says, a coffin in Egypt. It started out wonderfully. Gloriously. Life. And all the expectations
of it. Like some of you with young,
expecting young children. All you have is great expectations.
And there will be good times. But there's going to be pain.
And great sorrow. And trouble. All because of sin. Now, you know why. And it all
is going to end in a coffin. Or does it? Or does it? Oh, no, no, no. Before God kicked the man and
woman out, and it says He drove them out of that garden and put
a flaming cherub where they couldn't get back in, Before he drove
them out, he made this glorious promise. And a few people understand
this. You're the chosen few. God said
to the woman, or God said to both of them really, the woman's
seed. It's going to come something from
a woman. Born of a woman. Made of a woman. seed and woman that's going to
undo everything that Satan did. He's going to crush his power. He's going to do away with that
sin. He's going to restore everything that man lost. Bring him back. Resurrect him back to the life
of God. And it's the second Adam. That's
who God was talking about, the second Adam. And Adam all died. Now you see why it's going to
take two messages. We've got to spend the whole next message
on the second atom. So tune back in, okay? All right,
stand with me.