Man, His Nature, Possibilities, and Destiny
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Man, His Nature, Possibilities, and Destiny
Truly wonderful was the honor bestowed upon God’s creature, man, made in the image of God, upright in character, upright in form, of a nature like that of His Maker, made in God’s moral image, made glorious in physical likeness. We can not, however, argue for a moment that this invested man with immortality. If “made in the image of God” would mean that man was immortal, it would also clothe him with every other attribute of Deity. If we should say that man was made in God’s image, that God is immortal, therefore man must be; then we could as truly argue that as God is omniscient, and man is made in God’s image, therefore man must be omniscient; as God is omnipotent, man must be omnipotent. But this is absurdity itself, for we know that man has very little wisdom and very little power. All the physical attributes of man were dependent upon the most priceless of all attributes—character; and character must be the result of man’s choice. This is in every way reasonable and Scriptural. Gen. 2:7 is a more particular account of the creation of man. He was formed of the dust of the ground. He was a perfect man; a perfect human machine, ready to exercise all the functions of humanity, he lacked but the one thing, the vitalizing spark. God gave that in “the breath of life.” The text does not say, as some would have us believe, that the breath of life was an immortal soul or spirit, a separate entity capable of so existing in itself apart from the body. It was simply life, that which made man a living soul. For mark that it was MAN that was formed out of the dust of the ground; and that man which was formed out of the dust of the ground, became, through the breath of life, a LIVING soul. Before he received the breath of life, he was a LIFELESS soul. He was no more soul after he received the breath of life than he was before. In the one case he was a LIFELESS soul; in the other, a LIVING soul. So we have repeatedly in the Hebrew Scriptures the term “dead soul” as applying to man, one from whom the breath of life had been taken. If we should still argue that “the breath of life” implied that man was immortal, it would also prove the same thing of beasts; for man and beast “have all one breath.” Ecc. 3:19. In Gen. 7:15, 22 the same expression is used of the whole animal creation,—“all in whose nostrils was the breath of life,” or “the breath of the spirit of life,”—an even stronger expression. Therefore “the breath of life” signifies no more than this, that man was made alive by this act of God. It is used elsewhere as showing how frail man’s life is. “Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils; for wherein is he to be accounted of?” Isa. 2:22. When man has reached the possibilities of perfect character, his whole being will throb with life. Neither is it to be argued from the term “living soul” that man is immortal. The same term is applied to the very lowest animalcule, as for instance in Rev. 16:3: “Every living soul died in the sea;” also in Gen. 1:30 the term “life” in our Common Version is “living soul” in the margin. On the other hand the Scripture very clearly teaches that God is “immortal.” 1 Tim. 1:17. Nay, more than this, the same epistle declares that He “only hath immortality.” 1 Tim. 6:16. The human will put on immortality only when his character is finished and he shall be brought from the dead in Christ’s likeness. 1 Cor. 15:51–54. 1. How did man come to be? “And God CREATED MAN IN HIS OWN IMAGE, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them.” Gen. 1:27. 2. Of what was man made? What did he become? “And Jehovah God formed man OF THE DUST OF THE GROUND, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and MAN became a LIVING SOUL.” Gen. 2:7. 3. What possibilities were placed before him? “In the way of RIGHTEOUSNESS IS LIFE; and in the pathway thereof there is no death.” Prov. 12:28. “The heavens are the heavens of Jehovah; but THE EARTH HATH HE GIVEN TO THE CHILDREN OF MEN.” Ps. 115:16. 4. On what conditions were man’s possibilities and blessings assured? “And Jehovah God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: but 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.” Gen. 2:16, 17. 5. Who made opposite claim? “And the SERPENT said unto the woman, YE SHALL NOT SURELY DIE: . . . YE SHALL BE AS GOD, knowing good and evil.” Gen. 3:4, 5. 6. What did man do in response to this voice? “And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she TOOK OF THE God’s life is eternal life. God’s life is given in harmony with God’s law. In other words, His law is a living law; it is the channel of His life. “In the way of righteousness is life.” If man had forever lived in harmony with God’s life, he would have known no death. When he allowed his lower nature to reign, when he set his own will against the beneficent working of God’s will, he perverted God’s life. Life perverted brings death; righteousness perverted is sin. Man became a sinner and lost eternal life. Had he not sinned, there was the possibility before him of developing character entirely apart from sin. God placed man on probation. It was obey and live; it was just as truly, believe and live; for the only true obedience is “the obedience of faith.” Faith is the foundation principle upon which all right human character is laid. Faith in God meant a mind open to God, open to receive all that God had to give, open to all the infinite blessings of the universe, open to almost infinite possibilities and capabilities. Were it possible, even before sin entered, for man to develop a character in and of himself alone, it would have been a selfish character, and he would have boasted in himself; so also would his neighbor; and consequently, envy would have found place in God’s universe. But each developing a character by faith in God, by faith receiving of God’s life and blessing, would have given God all the glory. All would have been bound together in “the bundle of His life,” and all would have rendered glory and honor to the Creator. Each then would have found his highest happiness in blessing others. Consequently no one would have served himself; all would have served each one. So God planned infinite blessing and eternal life for His creatures; but as soon as man turned from God, all the blessings became curses. Upon Satan’s claim have been built all the various false philosophies in which the devil has ever since sought to undermine Christianity. God said, “In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” Satan said, “Ye shall not surely die! . . . ye shall be as God.” So he has led men to believe that they were not dying creatures, when God said they were; that they were divine, when they were only human; that they were immortal, when they were subject to death. All the false philosophies which lead men to build hope in themselves, in their own potency, are based on that falsehood of Satan. God sets before man the only hope, free, full, complete, all-sufficient in Christ Jesus; and everything that denies Christ Jesus is false. Upon that falsehood of Satan are based the false isms of the present day. Very sweetly and insidiously they come to us, just as Satan’s whispering came to Eve; but in Christian Science, in Spiritism, in Theistic Evolution, in New Thought, in Theosophy, in other false cults, philosophies, and isms, is found the baleful falsehood of self-salvation. The only way of life is righteousness; the only source of righteousness is Christ Jesus our Lord; the only way of obtaining it is by faith. Man lost morality, his character. He became a subject of Satan. He lost his dominion. He was king of the earth; God gave him dominion over it. He yielded that also to the tempter; and Satan told the truth that it had been “delivered” unto him. He did not recognize the higher truth that man held it by lease, the conditions of which were faithful obedience to God; that he ignores, and presents simply that which man forfeited to him by treason to God. Yet man lost it literally, and for a time Satan is “the prince of this world.” God suffers it, yet He overrules. Man lost life also,—eternal life,—and became a dying creature. God in His goodness did not leave His child in his misery. Right at that very time Christ our Lord stays the power of death and pours out anew His own life to the dying creatures. Then, too, came that prophecy that the Seed of the woman should bruise the serpent’s head. Around that Seed cluster all the promises of all the ages. Christ Jesus then gave Himself, “a Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” He just as truly gave Himself then as He did upon the cross. He became man’s servant, the Angel of God’s presence through the ages; and when He died upon the cross, it was but the climax of the gift which He had bestowed in the beginning for the sake of man. Faith brings man in direct connection with the Lord Jesus; faith brings into the soul the power of the endless life. Through faith God removes the sin, takes away the sinful, carnal heart, places within His own Spirit and life, and sets the soul in the highway of everlasting righteousness; and that same power which enables man to overcome character, will change the body of his humiliation and fashion it after the body of Christ’s glory when He shall come. Then the incorruptible character will be given an immortal body, and man shall reign forever. What a wonderful possibility is placed before the human! If he will but yield himself to the simple, perfect plan of God, he can overcome all the imperfection, and can be saved out of all its evil consequences. So those will be who yield to Him, for “this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith;” and that faith will culminate in man’s triumphant immortality, while sin and7all that is identified with sin will burn into utter nothingness in the blaze of infinite glory in which Christ shall come unto His own the second time. Not one sin shall mar all God’s universe; and in that very spot in His universe where the curse has been the deepest and the cruelest and the most corroding, where it put to death even God’s sinless Son, it shall be said for eternity, “And there shall be no more curse.” To that sinless, perfect inheritance, God calls all. “As I live, saith the Lord Jehovah, I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth. Turn ye, O turn ye, for why will ye die?”