Beloved, listen with your spirit to the word of God: “But now I come to Thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy made full in themselves” (NASB, John 17:13).
Beloved, your Heavenly Father created the earth, its galaxies and space – Creation — and gave it as a gift to mankind. It was a gift to be shared. Yet, the key and the choice to share lay in the hand of man. Father locked Himself and His ancient enemy out of Creation. Heavenly Father placed the key in the hand of Adam, the father of mankind. That key was an act of obedience. In the time during which Adam used choice to obey Father’s one command, Creation existed open and unified with Father and His abode in Heaven.
Father’s ancient enemy wanted access to mankind and Creation. He found opportunity to tempt Adam and his wife, Eve, to hand over the key. Through lies and deception, he gained entrance to talk with them, tempting and deceiving them to disobey. When they bit the bait, Father’s ancient enemy gained legal access to mankind and Creation. Now, Heavenly Father was locked out from mankind and Creation; sin and death entered.
What resulted was a massive divergence and shattering from your Heavenly Father’s goodwill and design – and the union of Heaven and Earth broke. The spirits of mankind were broken and died. Because your Heavenly Father designed mankind and Creation so marvelously well, it took hundreds of years, at first, for death to completely kill their bodies. Creation suffered as well – the union of life with Heaven and its beauty, symmetry, synchronization, goodness, expansiveness, joy, peace and hope, and more, lay broken in ruins.
Your Heavenly Father’s ancient enemy ruled over mankind as a tyrant, using them ruthlessly as his slaves and caring not when they suffered and died. Further, the presence of his evil in Creation moved it from the splendor of the refreshing, rested, peace-filled, life-filled existence of the Garden of Eden to desolate waste places.
Some courageous men, women, and children walked with your Heavenly Father through the generations until the promise came. The very promise on which Father caused Adam and Eve to hope at the very moment in the Garden when their sin received its sentence. Heavenly Father created for Himself a new DNA line through Abraham. Through this genetic line, supernaturally created and preserved in Israel by Heavenly Father, the promised one came – Heavenly Father’s own Son. The Lord Jesus Christ. The Messiah.
This mystery remained concealed in Father’s heart until the fullness of time: His Son came to Creation on behalf of mankind as the Last Adam (1 Corinthians 15:45).
Jesus entered Creation legally, born of a woman, as the promised “seed” who came to crush the head (rulership) of Father’s ancient enemy (Genesis 3:15). He walked with Heavenly Father in right-ness and peace, passing the test of temptation that the first Adam failed, and used the key of obedience with His choice, even to the point of death on the cross (Philippians 2:8).
Clothed in mystery until this point in history, Father revealed His plan in Jesus. Father so loved the world that He gave His only Son (Jesus) that whoever would believe – just believe and receive – would have eternal life (John 3:16). Father loved mankind, every one of us, and did not want us to receive the payment for our sins – death and eternal separation from Him (Romans 6:23). Instead, He gave the gift of eternal life through Jesus to every person who believes and receives (Romans 6:23).
In His obedience, Jesus lived a sinless life and carried our sins in His body on the cross as a ransom for every person who would believe and receive (Mark 10:45; 1 Timothy 2:6; Hebrews 9:15). Israel understood the significance of the blood. To provide forgiveness and excuse them from dying immediately for their sins, Father instructed them to take a lamb, kill it, and place its blood on the altar (Hebrews 9:22). Countless thousands of lambs died until Jesus came. Jesus, the Passover Lamb, gave His life one time for all (Hebrews 9:11-12; 24-28). He shed His perfect, incorruptible blood on the cross. That cross became the doorpost of the world, His blood giving life to every person who believes and receives. He is the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world (Revelation 13:8).
“So also it is written, “The first MAN, Adam, BECAME A LIVING SOUL.” The last Adam became a life-giving spirit. . . .The first man is from the earth, earthy; the second man is from heaven” (NASB, 1 Corinthians 15:45; 47).
In His wondrous wisdom, your Heavenly Father planned for the redemption of mankind and Creation before they even disobeyed and fell so greatly (Revelation 13:8). Father’s own Son, Jesus, who is the last Adam, came to earth to redeem the first Adam’s failures. Adam’s failure to obey opened the door to Father’s ancient enemy to release death and desolation to every person afterward as well as to Creation. With His infinite generosity, Jesus offered us the gift of His right life and redemption, ushering in a new day for us and through us to mankind and Creation.
This is an updated edition of a post originally published on Hope Streams
Featured Image by Vladimir Soares on Unsplash
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