You've heard us quote that line
before. A sinner is a sacred thing the
Holy Ghost has made himself. That's where that came from.
Joseph Hart. And there's nothing in the green
hymn 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 First Corinthians
fifteen with me. First Corinthians. Fifteen. As I said, this will. Lord willing,
this will be a two part message. It didn't begin that way. I intended
to. To do it all this evening, but. This whole story we're about
to consider takes. Takes in about Well, well over
7000 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 the two
part message I got went over to told I believe it was by the
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 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 sung, 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 twenty-two. This
is the text. Verse twenty-two, as in Adam,
all die. Very plainly, all in Adam die. All have anything, that have
anything to do with Adam. They're in Adam, who come from
Adam. Even so. In Christ shall all
be made alive. All those in Christ, all those
who come from Christ, shall be made alive. All right. Now this, that's a summary of
this chapter is, and he said in verse one, I declare unto
you the gospel. And most have taken it be just
the first four verses of this chapter. If you want a little
English lesson, there are several conjunctions. And each verse
and after after and for four, you don't stop. You don't stop
at verse four. Besides, there's a colon there. And you keep going. So this is the summary of this
whole gospel that he declares and throughout this chapter he
talks of things like this corruption. Immortality and immortality. Dishonor and honor. Things that
are natural things that are spiritual. Earthly and heavenly. Death and
victory or life. And so this is the true rags
to riches and bitter sweet 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
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. No mercy or appreciation of it,
except for those who are. Guilty center. I saw a poll that
they took. Of many. Concerning this coming
year, 2007. And they asked people what they
expect and expected. and whether they expected good
things or bad and the 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. And so, 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 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 good. It's not good. It's it's unspeakably
good. All right, let's go back to Genesis
chapter one. OK, let's go back to the beginning.
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 work. 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 beginning. OK. And we buy 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. Book of life. Been written by
God, we read it, we receive it, we believe. 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. 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. Chapter one is the chapter The beginning of creation in
the beginning God. Created 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 of said no God if this
this thing called the universe. David declare what I consider
the heavens. Moon, the stars and so forth. You've got to believe it's a
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. I believe in God
created all wise creator. You remember that illustration
of the man talking to this fellow that didn't believe The 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, it's a Rolex, you know, 22 jewels or whatever. Perpetual,
oyster, turtle, 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 and made clear by looking at it in. And the believer said to him
I don't believe that I don't believe. He said what I believe
about this walk. He said I believe that millions
billions of years ago floating out in outer space. Were mains
springs and stems and crystals and jewels and gears and 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,
well, how foolish can you be? You can tell that somebody made
that by the marvel of it. 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 marvel, in all its
glory, in all of its amazement, and especially this thing called
man, which David said, I'm fearfully and wonderfully made. The most,
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. 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
one, verse two, and the earth was without form and void and
dark, the deep and the spirit of God, capital S. You're not
reading it with me, some of them. And the spirit of God, capital
S. moved upon the face of the water. There's another person. I said, God, and here gives another
person the spirit of God. Verse three says, and God said.
That's the voice of God, God spoke the word. Right, there's the three persons
of God. Look down at verse. Twenty six. 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 persons.
You say, I don't understand. I don't either. But that's the way it is. John
wrote in the next, nearly the next to last book, there are
three that bear record in heaven. father word and how to go and
the story. In the beginning. I what's the
first thing God created. Now don't look. Light. The first thing God created what
you you can't everything begins with light. David said in the
song he said the entrance of our words. The light and John one scripture
says the light China in darkness are you with me here you know
you will have to be. This is a big sweeping saga and
story here. We've only been at it about ten
minutes. All right, 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 God doesn't have
an image. He just said he did. Didn't he? In our image, our
image of God, of the Holy Spirit, somebody in the Godhead has to
have an image. Yeah. You ever read that anywhere? That one of the persons dwelleth
all the fullness of the Godhead bodily? Christ. So, 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. All right. 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 want 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 a scripture said 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 great, this beautiful creation, God created everything, and then
he created man. He waited for the last six days
to create, 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. 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's
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 the. Chapter three. Talks about a certain and I don't
know what. Nobody. OK. We do know this was. We know
that this was like some of the more fallen angel don't ask questions
about will you know go to. read where our Lord talked about
him, we have to take the Lord Jesus Christ's word for it. No. 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. He said, I was
there, I beheld him, Paul was like, he's the one that cast
him down. And man has all kind of questions
about that, scoffs and mocks. Man's scoffing at Jesus Christ
as he's scoffing at him. And when he walked this planet,
they tried to stump him and they ended up confounded themselves. And man sure hasn't got smarter,
I think he's a whole lot dumber. And the reason being, he's rejected
of it. rejected truth, seen it not. Well, OK, where am I? Serpent, Lucifer, tempted. 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 transgression. She was tempted. Adam wasn't
tempted, the woman Satan did this by casting doubt
upon God's word that's how he began. This whole thing. The woman was deceived. Adam one. Is that right. You read. Is that important to know. You
know we're going to 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. Amazing. I know we have many questions,
but you can't can't ask him and I'm not sure what going to go
on. OK. Now, in chapter two. 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, OK? 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. You know what dead is, don't
you? Barnard used to say this for emphasis. 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. No, 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. I right now and I'm very. He didn't die that day lived
a long time physically. Then. What does God mean by. You know
when God told man that I don't think man had a clue what he
was talking about. I know it meant Adam didn't know
what death was he never seen him before he didn't what do
you mean death. What do you mean. that 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? Virgin used to say,
if you're wrong on the fall, you'll be wrong on it all. Everything
starts The whole gospel story starts here. First Adam. All human beings come from this
man called Adam. In Adam all die. Know what this says John Davis?
Know what this says Patrick Holland? In Adam all die. Paul spits several chapters in
Romans Describing this, explaining it, 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's right. When God saw man, his last creation,
when he saw, he said, very good. And I have to sin, it says over. Chapter six, God looked at man
and saw that the thoughts of his heart and imagination were
only evil. Continue. God said he's very, 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. Some of you understand what I
mean by that. Real holiness, God's holiness, cannot be tempted. God cannot even be tempted for
sin. This is why the second Adam has given us something that the
first Adam didn't have. This is why we have something
in the second Adam that we didn't have in the first. But man lost light. He became
darkness, his mind, his conscience, or his Understanding was darkening
truth man became start line began to live a lot of love. When Adam
saw and all these things are written up in chapter three it
says look at verse chapters three. Verse seven the eyes of both
of them were open 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. 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? And he was and he ran, he heard
God walking in the cool of the day. He heard the voice of God
walking, the voice of God walking. It's that word we read about
in chapter in verse three of chapter one, the word, the voice
of God walking. So the word. My flesh is crying. Who's who's rejoicing was in
the habitable parts of the earth. Now 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'd 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 him.
And he went and rejoiced in his presence. They never hid from
him. Now they're hiding from him like guilty, shameful. Well, something's happening.
Sin, sin. And then the Lord began to question
them. He said, who told you you were
naked? And the man said, verse 12, the woman he gave to me. Blame 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
one. It's her fault. Division. Blame. Shame. Ignorance. Sin. It's come over
there being. Sin. Sin is in it. And then, to make a long story
short, this thing called sin had entered this godlike 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? They shall die. It's going to get worse. You're going to get so bad that
God's going to cut his years short. A man lived nine hundred
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, sinful, vile
creatures all over the face of the earth. Just don't care for
God. Don't even give God a thought.
God knows 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. He created them for His glory. Well, they 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. 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 us? 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. And this whole thing had to unfold
for God to bring down this second Adam. second half. Well, very quickly, here's here's
the reason the way things reason things are the way they are.
OK, this was all an 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 and full of trouble. He's got this thing called sin
in it. And he's dead in it. All right,
let's look at the woman's trouble real quickly. All right. Some
of you, 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 that's really it. I did. I wasn't trying
to be funny. That's the way it is. A lot of women, if you're I don't
think it's funny. Verse fifteen, I don't blame
you for laughing, you're just real carnal. No, but look at
verse, our Lord said in chapter three, verse sixteen, 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 had never gone through
any of that. It had been painless, no tears,
no suffering, 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. I'm going
to greatly multiply. And from a lot of twelve-year-old
girl, you know, they start bearing children. There's nothing but
woman physical problem. Now, is there any other explanation
why this is the way it is and right here? That's what God said. She has
a greater source of really physical problems and trouble starts real
early. And 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. In station. No man woman came
out of man says God made her to help me but an actual equality
before God in God's eyes and so forth it was not one head
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. 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. And to be the breadwinner and so
forth. the protector and all of that
and the woman given qualities. Of motherhood and all of that
that men don't have and so forth. Nurturing quality 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 a man shall have the rule over you. I think
in this country, in our country, the female population is greater
than the male is. 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 Park, is this the way
you like it? Jerry do you see the wisdom of God and all that? God's people do. They wouldn't
change it. They wouldn't change it. That's
the way it is. And that's how you can explain a woman being
under a domineering man and get out of that and get right back
into another one. That explains it. She wants
to be. Ah well, that's all sin. That's what happened. All right,
how about man? Man's trouble. Man's trouble. 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
that I say. 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. The 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. 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. And sorrow shall fade of it all
the days of thy life, until you return to the dust. OK. So that's where these differences
came from. Do you understand a little bit now? Yeah, I know
you do you know these things for God said you will go back
to the best. Not talk about orange. This was
pain, sorrow, trouble, sweat. Do you go back to dust man create
God created man from the dust of the ground breathe into him
and became a living so. I became a living so. And over
there, we read in 1 Corinthians 15, it says the second Adam is
of quickening spirits. 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, begins with life, and
in chapter 50, the very last line says a coffin in the 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. You know what? 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, 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
it. Here are 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, going to do away with that sin, 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
what God was talking about, the second Adam. All right, stand with me. Let's pray. Our Father, we repent
of our sins in spiritual sackcloth and ashes and dust. The old saying, our saying is
dust we are and to dust we shall return. The man returns to his
earth. This is what we're made from
and this is what we go back to. We're a sinful base creature. All of sin comes short of thy
glory. And we all have part in it, partakers of it, Adam's sin,
his nature. And sin that our mothers conceive
us come forth from the womb speaking lies. We were born dead and trespassed
in sin. This we know. This we believe. This we have experienced. Make
everyone in here experience that, Lord. Know that. A sinner, as
we sang, is a sacred thing. The Holy Spirit is the one who
reveals it. And Lord, thank God. Thanks be
unto God which giveth us the victories through the second
Adam from above. Bring us back. to hear of thy
glorious remedy for sin, the Restorer, the Redeemer, the second
Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ. who came to restore us. Lord,
thank you for what we know. Forgive us for what we forget.
Forgive us of our sins against thee and thee only. We sin, have
sinned, and will sin in thy sight. Forgive us for Christ's sake.
It's in his name we're met here tonight. Amen. You're dismissed. That's 2,000 years. the whole book of Genesis, the
book of 2,000 years. And then the chapter, Exodus
2, Moses is born. It's that first generation.