The Heart of God
“It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honor of kings is to search out a matter.” (Proverbs 25:2)
“Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.” (John 21:25)
GOD REVEALS HIMSELF THROUGH HIS CREATION
From Genesis the story of the ages is embedded in plain sight. Woven into the account of creation, the desire of the ages is portrayed. God revealed his heart in plain sight. God created Adam as an image of himself not just the form, not just the way that Adam looked but the desires of God himself are also embedded in Adam. God formed Adam for the purpose of good vs. evil. Two trees middle of the Garden of Eden testify to that. The tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. One represented eternal life through obedience, and the other represented death by disobedience. Adam was created to feel, understand and know God intimately. It is God’s desire to be understood. “Come now let us reason together. Though your sins be as scarlet they shall be white as snow”. Isaiah 1:18
IT IS NOT GOOD THAT MAN SHOULD BE ALONE
Paradise was created to define the things that God only knows, to teach them to another for all to see. “It is not good that man should be alone.” clearly defines God’s intentions. When God created Adam he created one of kind just like himself. For it is written, who is like the Lord our God? There are none like him! By saying this is not good, he also said this situation needs to change. To make this abundantly clear God had also created everything that has breath to find a mate for Adam. This presents a picture of God and a heavenly host of beings none of whom were found adequate of becoming the bride of God. God introduced Adam to every kind of creature that he had made. One by one, Adam paid enough attention to them that was able to name them each and everyone. Yet not one was found to be a suitable mate. Adam, like God, was not able to share his innermost being with someone like himself. God revealed through the absence of a mate the essence of his desire. God himself has a desire to be fruitful and multiply as he commanded everything that has breath to do so. God created Adam out of himself with the dust of the ground and with his own breath he made him a living soul.
THE RISE OF THE BRIDE
Adam was perfect and by proxy he demonstrated what God intended for himself. It was out of that perfection that fruitful multiplication ignited. God created a mate for Adam out of Adam’s own body. From a rib God formed Eve, the first born among many. A perfect mate. The desire of the ages had begun. There was perfect chemistry. The first look into each other’s eyes must have been a satisfaction that has yet to repeated. God had revealed his deepest desire. A bride without spot or wrinkle. One capable of sharing unity in perfect balance. Something that each of us deeply understands and none can achieve.
FREE WILL AND FOREVER
The relationship is pure but it is yet untested. God’s bride must be for eternity as a unification between a holy God and a bride who has a free will. The purpose of the forbidden fruit is to reveal why God had not created a bride instead of Adam, an image of himself. Sin is lurking at the door. God gave specific instructions to Adam and Eve never to eat of the fruit of tree of the knowledge of good and evil under the penalty of death. This was an absolute fact. There was another in the garden that already had knowledge of good and evil. The serpent who had already fallen and was against God, hissed in Eve’s ear go against God’s word and eat the forbidden fruit.
DILEMMA OF THE AGES
The dilemma is clear about the joining of perfection and free will. God is a perfect God that cannot associate with sin. How can God have a union with an equal bride that is free willed without jeopardizing his perfect deity? Each marriage since Adam and Eve has been a constant refrain attesting to that outcome. To remove the free will would make a bride essentially robotic. The only way to resolve this dilemma is to face sin and conquer it. Herein lies the purpose of God for all eternity. The victory of good over evil is the pathway to love everlasting. What is about to happen cannot be fathomed in a few verses.
THE HEIGHT OF UNDERSTATEMENTS
Eve had fallen and she knew it because she now had knowledge of her sin. She must have had pause to think about what she done and what it meant. When she got the courage to confess to Adam what she had done, the emotional event that transpired is unrivaled in human history. The single text where Eve gave Adam the fruit and he did eat is the height of understatements. Adam had just learned that his only God given mate on earth had just been sentenced to death. There was no undoing of the mistake. Then, in the image of God still unstained by sin, Adam made the only choice, the perfect choice. He chose to eat the fruit and leave his immortality behind. He would rather lay down his own life to be with her rather than lose her. You think not, “For God committed his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners Christ Died for us” “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life” Everything that has happened since and including the fall is all about the work of the only begotten Son of God.
THE SECOND ADAM
Where Adam was created with dust and breath of God, Jesus Christ was born of a woman’s flesh with the perfect male DNA provided by God himself. The virgin birth was no short cut. In human conception the female produces half of the genetic cells and the male produces half. God through many generations of obedience to law and feast and sacrificial offers was purifying the genome through the Jewish rite. There was a specific requirement of obedience passed down through generation until Mary met all of the human requirements. God miraculously provided the male gamete to merge with the flesh at the exact time. Every gene and chromosome was present when conception occurred. God provided the perfect deified male gamete, and Mary the female gamete fulfilling all of the law and the profits. God created spiritual reproduction through Mary like human reproduction through Eve. Each in their own rite gave rise to the first born among many. While Eve is the first vessel for the offspring of sin, Mary is the first vessel for the offspring of righteousness removing the stain of sin forevermore.
IT IS FINISHED
The condition of this world reveals what God has known about sin from the beginning. God created the world for this very purpose, not just to forgive sin, but abolish it forevermore. The body of Jesus Christ is the eternal bride of God, made perfect with the price of his life. His eternal purpose from the beginning has been to receive everyone that believes this to be a member of the Bride of Christ. He came to ransom everyone including Adam and Eve and you and me. Send an invitation to the highways and hedges that the Lord our God has taken a wife. The church is the bride. We that believe our death has been purchased by the blood of Jesus Christ are members of that body the eternal and perfect bride in him. Come and join in the marriage supper of the Lamb.
Who would believe that after the romance of the ages, that a God who created every living thing to be fruitful and multiply would deny himself of offspring in holy matrimony. God’s promise to Abraham that “your descendants will be as the stars in heaven are without number” will be fulfilled. It will require a universe with countless galaxies to contain the house of God. And we shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.