New Wine , Old Wineskins

The first death occurs when God provides animal skins to cover the shame and guilt of the humans who were now under the curse of God.

Justice is swift and sure from God. Adam and Eve weren't allowed to plea bargain for a lesser sentence. 

But was this the FIRST death?

The innocent animals in place of Adam and Eve?

Didn't God say to Adam : in the day you eat of the forbidden fruit, you will surely die?

Yes . But they don't die physically for many years.

So the first death was the spiritual death of Adam and Eve. 

Because they trusted in  their own reasoning instead of the words of God, they died spiritually and lost communion with the Lord.

The only way that Adam and Eve escaped physical death on the day they ate the fruit was because of what God did on their behalf.

God is always the initiator in a rescue mission. 

Neither Adam or Eve called out to God during any part of their sin. They didn't say sorry or ask for pardon.

They shifted the blame to God , one another, or the serpent.

They refused to admit that they disobeyed God by misusing the freedom of choice given by God.

They should have been grateful for life and happy in their freedom, but freedom to choose does not bring happiness when bad choices are made.

Satan offers a counterfeit freedom that promises a person the freedom to define and live by their own rules.

God however says freedom is the power to do as God determines; not to do as we wish.

All people are worshipers- 

False worship occurs when a person's self is a god;  the true God is worshipped 

, but in a false way;  or worship of gods other than the God revealed in the Word of God.

The inerrant Holy Bible reveals truth concerning man's sin, God's holiness, and the justice and mercy that comes from grace alone.

The blood of animals only covered the sin, the blood of an innocent animal had no power to open the way back to the tree of life. Death remained.

No amount of self effort, including good deeds , religious rituals such as prayers, alms giving to needy people, or fasting can cancel the certificate of death that has been issued to each person born since Adam.

But God- ----

Remember the promise made to Eve? From her seed would be born One Who could legally cancel the death sentence and give new life - undo the works of satan - but the way seems incredibly radical.

Our own attempt to earn our freedom from the chains of sin only strengthens the chains- pride insists that we can better ourselves.

Angels can't rescue us- without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sin.

Hebrews 9:22 (NASB) 22 And according to the Law, one may almost say, all things are cleansed with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.

This leaves only one way-

God the just must also become the justifier!

The one thing that God could not put on display before Adam sinned was the mercy and grace of God.

All of the attributes of God have existed eternally- mercy didn't come into existence after man disobeyed the Holy God.

God doesn't need to give Himself mercy ; God chose to show mercy to the humans He selected from before creation.

God Himself  would exact justice for man's sin from the seed of the woman.

That child is the one called Jesus of Nazareth; begotten of God, not created or born of the will and sexual Union of a man and woman; the Holy One of God left the perfection of heaven, wrapped Himself in human flesh, born of a daughter of Eve yet with no sexual Union with a man or with God.

Jesus is the God/Man, the only person born of a woman who had not become pregnant by the seed of a man.

A virgin.

Thus Jesus was born free from the sin nature transferred through Adam.

So Who is Jesus? One day every tongue will confess Jesus is the eternal Son of God, the redeemer, the sin bearer for all who repent and place their trust in Jesus alone for their rescue from eternal death and punishment in hell fire.

What makes Jesus able to forgive sins and resurrect the dead? Isn't Jesus just another prophet sent from God?

No.

Jesus lived a perfect life as a man. No prophet ever said that about themselves.

What do I mean "perfect "? 

The Jewish laws reflect the character of God- what God is like. For example Moses wrote the commands of God and one commandment says don't tell lies. Why not? 

Because God cannot lie.

So Jesus never told a lie. That's more than I can say, how about you? 

The perfection God demands includes more than a list of "do this" and "don't do that ".

God demands that we do nothing but what we see the Father doing - no self will , no seeking identity or dignity from others or the things we can accomplish.

Jesus said, " I and the Father are One". 

That's perfection; willing submission to the will of God.

Can't all religions make it possible for people to submit to the will of God?

No, remember death is separation from communion with God. 

A person must first be brought back to life before the person can be restored to relationship with God.

Who can give life but God alone? And even if a person's good deeds could cancel out the bad deeds , would that deliver from the power of sin ? 

Jesus did more than take the penalty for sinners.

Jesus sets us free from the power of sin.

Jesus transfers us to a new kingdom of holiness . 

We are delivered from the kingdom of satan, the kingdom of darkness.

The prophets had written that one day God would enact a new covenant in which the law of God would be written on hearts of flesh and not stone tablets.

Every person with this new heart would know God. 

For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. - Jeremiah 31:33

And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD,' for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more." - Jeremiah 31:34

So how do you get a new heart ?

You must repent of your sins, trust Jesus alone for forgiveness and a new heart.

Jesus explains in John chapter 3 this is a new birth from above . 

We receive a new identity and are called children of God. The perfection of Christ becomes our identity. Because the Father is well pleased with the Son, all who have become children of God are acceptable in the Beloved.

 

Jesus told about why a person can't just add Jesus to their old life.

Here's the way Jesus told the story. Everyone in the first century understood the meaning.

Matthew 9:17 (ESV) 17 Neither is new wine put into old wineskins. If it is, the skins burst and the wine is spilled and the skins are destroyed. But new wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved."

Here is the message Jesus came to bring.

1.God is Holy and perfect in morality.

2. All humans fall short of the perfection that God requires to be in His presence.

3. Jesus is the eternal Son of God, one in essence with the Father and the Holy Spirit. If you get stuck trying to understand how God is One essence yet three persons please don't stop here.

Jesus is the One born from a woman, lived as a man who was tempted to rebel against the will of God, yet always obeyed the Father.

Jesus lived the perfect life we can't.

Jesus died as a perfect and a willing sacrifice in place of sinful man.

God put on Jesus His wrath against sinners. Because Jesus had no sin of His own Jesus was resurrected from the dead.

Several times before His death Jesus told the disciples and others that He was to die and on the third day rise from the dead.

Here is one place.

John 10:14 (ESV) 14 I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me,

John 10:15 (ESV) 15 just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep.

John 10:16 (ESV) 16 And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.

John 10:17 (ESV) 17 For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again.

John 10:18 (ESV) 18 No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father."

4. Responding to the above message.  Jesus is either a lunatic and all of the apostles and the other eyewitnesses of His resurrection were even worse lunatics because with the exception of John all the other apostles and Paul  were put to death for spreading the news we call the gospel.

Or Jesus is the person foretold in Genesis 3:15 and then throughout the remainder of the Old Testament.

Read the four gospels. Ask God to open your eyes and trust that God wants to save sinners.

Here is what Jesus said sinners (including you and me) need to do:

Mark 1:14-15 Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.” 

Contact me with your questions about anything you don't understand.

Why did God call my name? 

To restore me to communion with Himself and to begin the process of once again imaging His glory.

Many years later I read the answer to how God brings the lost sinner back to Himself. 

God continues to call lost sinners. 

Maybe He is calling you? 

John 10:27-30 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand. I and the Father are one.” 

Whose Fault?

Last post in "The Call" we

left our story with the guilty couple banished from Paradise and restricted from returning to eat of the tree of life.

We discovered that it was the serpent who lied and deceived the woman.

Rebellion against the command or law of God did indeed bring about a broken fellowship with God , the loss of the image of God's moral purity , and the consequence of death.

We use the word "sin" to describe living out side of the authority or rule or boundaries of God. Sin  includes any area of our lives  including our thought life as well as our actions.

You see mankind was not created capable to decide for themselves what things are good.

Mankind is dependent upon God to know even what things are good.

Last post we saw that God came to Adam and Eve to begin the process of reconciliation.

God's justice demands that all insurrection against the will of God is punished by death.

Man's insurrection was an act of treason against the kingdom of God.

The choice to obey the voice of satan ( the angel Lucifer who had staged an unsuccessful coup attempt in heaven) meant that Adam had chosen the kingdom of darkness.

Things look hopeless for the human race.

But remember the animal skins? 

And the promise to the woman about a man child to be born without a human father?

And this son would be able to rescue mankind from the kingdom of darkness and bring into the kingdom of heaven.

Before we discuss the rescue plan, I think many of you are not believing the truth about sin.

By that I mean how God thinks about sin, and how much we are under the power of death and sin even from birth.

Adam and Eve were created morally innocent, but they were not righteous in themselves. God had blessed them and told them to rule over the earth , to multiply the holiness of God on the earth by having children who would love and obey God. 

In addition God had given the man authority over the woman and the garden to protect them. 

Adam was to ask God how to live and never want to know how to live and not need God. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil was a test of Adam's relationship of dependence upon God and Adam's love for God as  shown by his glad obedience to God.

Adam and Eve were righteous ( without blame) as long as they obeyed God.

It took how many wrong things before the couple had to leave the perfect paradise of the garden of Eden? 

ONE! They ate some fruit from a tree they had been forbidden to eat thereof lest they die.

Allow me to return to the period of my life when I heard god call my name;

 this is about age 4. 

One day  I heard my dad's angry voice talking with my sister;  dad was getting ready to discipline my sister for something dad said she had done.

Someone had used something sharp and scratched on the front of a dresser drawer my sister's name ; this beautiful maple dresser had several drawers. One drawer was for my sister's clothing, another drawer was for my clothing.

My sister kept denying that she had done this. Then she was disciplined . She kept crying and said , daddy, I didn't do it. Now my dad was even more angry because he thought my sister was telling a lie. However dad realized she had already been punished.

Why would she tell a lie?

So my dad came to me and I was terrified. Dad asked me if I had done this. I didn't answer.  Dad then said just tell the truth and you won't be disciplined. So I confessed that yes I had done this.

My dad was shocked. No one thought I could read or write.

My older sister had been teaching me to read and to write the alphabet. I was not yet in school. 

Now let's think about this story. What was going on in my head that I would take a bobby pin and scratch and  ruin the finish on the front of a dresser drawer ~ not my drawer - but my sister's drawer. Her name on her drawer.

What other choices might I have made? Well I could have  asked  for a piece of paper and a crayon and practiced  writing my letters on paper. Or I could have scratched my name on my drawer; my name was shorter and easier to write. Or as soon as daddy  started talking to my sister,  I could've gone in the room and said , no , daddy , she didn't do it. I am guilty. Don't punish her.

So was this simply a childish mistake?

No.

Spilling milk is a childish mistake.

Thinking I could jump off a wall and fly like Superman is childish foolishness.

But I made the choice to let my sister be punished for something I did that was wrong.

Why did I do such a thing? 

My older sister was always very kind to me.

Let's look at my story and think about what we learned from the Genesis account of sin.

After Adam's  disobedience, Adam was no longer pure ; Adam had a sin nature. From now on Adam would not be capable of living a pure life.

Through Adam's sin, the default setting for all of mankind was set on self gratification and rebellion against the authority of God.

The Bible says that there is none who do right, no not even one.

Romans 3:10 (NASB) 10 as it is written, "THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE;

Romans 3:11 (NASB) 11 THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS, THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD;

So why did I do something like that? I was born in sin. I was born a sinner. I did a bad thing because I am not a good person.

But I didn't know that I had a black heart; it would be twenty three more years before I was rescued.

I would be surprised to learn of Someone Who was also punished unjustly for what I had done wrong. 

But He chose to take my punishment; my sister didn't willingly take my punishment.

I would find out who had called my name and what He wanted.

Next blog look for how can the dead be raised to life? 

What is the meaning of the first thing Jesus taught " repent and believe the gospel "? 

Kept by grace alone.

http://youtu.be/ebliEq3yMxU

The Call

Welcome

I have not posted in a few months. 

Today I want to continue the story we began in November called Paradise.

To do this please follow me back to a very early personal memory.

When I was about 3 years old, my family moved from a small east Texas town to a 74 acre farm about five miles from town.

I had many experiences there that helped shape who I am today.

One afternoon when I was playing by myself, I guess my older sister was at school and my little brother asleep or not inside the house- just myself and Mom, I heard my name being called. "Ann". I heard it a couple of times.

So I went to find my mom and ask her why she had called me. 

Mom looked at me and said, "I didn't call you."

Well, many years later I discovered who had called me and why.

Let's return to the story of the first humans, Adam and Eve.

Now the serpent was more crafty or subtle than any of the beasts that the Lord God had made.

And the serpent said to the woman, "Did God actually say 'you may not eat of any of the trees of the garden'?"

The woman replied to the serpent ,"We may eat of the trees of the garden, but God said ,'you shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die'."

But the serpent said to the woman, "you will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."

So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.

Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves  together to cover themselves.

The man and the woman heard the sound of the LORD  God walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze, and they hid themselves  from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 

And the Lord God called out to the man and said to him, "where are you?"

The man said, "I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself". And God said, "who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?"

Then the man replied, "the woman you gave to be with me – she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate."

So the Lord God asked the woman, "what is this you have done?"

The woman said, "the serpent deceived me, and I ate."

The Lord God said to the serpent, "because you have done this, cursed are you more than all cattle, and more than every beast of the field; on your belly you will go, and dust you eat all the days of your life; and I will put hostility between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel."

To the woman God said, "I will greatly multiply your pain in childbirth, in pain you will bring forth children; yet your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you."

To the man God said, "since you listened to your wife and ate from the tree whose fruit  I commanded you not to eat, the ground is cursed because of you. All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it.

The ground will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. You will eat bread by the sweat of your brow until you return to the ground, since you were taken from the ground. For you are dust and you will return to dust."

Adam named his wife Eve because she was the mother of all the living. 

The LORD God made clothing out of animal skins for Adam and his wife and he clothed  them.

The LORD God said, "since man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil, he must not reach out, take from the tree of life, eat, and live forever."

So the LORD God sent him away from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken.

The LORD God drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and the flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.

This story is found in the Bible in Genesis chapter 3.

To understand this story we need to know what happened prior to the story.

God is the Creator of all things.

Everything God created was good.

God created angelic beings who served God in heaven as spirit beings.

Angels are not made in the image and likeness of God.

God created the man from the dirt and from the side of the man, God made the woman.

Both are created in the image of God. Both have equal worth before God.

If you remember from previous posts, the man, named Adam, by God, had been given a command about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Simply don't eat thereof for  in the day you eat it you will die.

The woman had not yet been created when God told Adam about not eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

The man and the woman were created naked and were not ashamed.

Nakedness in the Bible meant to be known and so known that you were vulnerable. 

Would you still love me if you knew how I truly am? 

God both knew and loved the man and his wife; they were morally innocent and had nothing to be ashamed about in the presence of God or one another.

In the cool of the evening God would come to earth and have intimate fellowship with His own image bearers.

Let's look carefully at our story for today. The serpent first talked with whom?

The serpent actually only talked with the woman , Eve.

Where was Adam, her husband?

He was with her and heard the entire conversation.

Over whom did Adam have jurisdiction or who was under Adam's authority?

In the Bible if a person gives a name to someone or something that person is under the authority of the one who gives the name.

God named Adam. However Adam named the animals and Adam gave the name Eve to his wife.

Whose authority was the serpent under? Certainly under Adam's.

What reason might the serpent have had to talk with the woman and not talk with Adam?

What was the serpent's  reason for talking to the woman about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil?

The serpent tried to do two things - first to show that God is not good and secondly to show that God is not great or sovereign.

How did the serpent put doubts in Eve's mind about the goodness of God?

I hope you are looking in the story to find the answers for yourself.

The serpent said nothing about the tree of life which was also in the middle of the garden and which was not forbidden to eat.

The serpent implied that God was withholding something good from Adam and Eve because the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil would make them like God.

But they were already created in the image of God!

They already were superior to the Angels and to the animal kingdom.

They already had unbroken fellowship with God with nothing to hide from God or from one another - they were morally perfect in every way.

The freedom to choose does not always bring the happiness we might expect.

In the story this one act of disobedience of eating a piece of fruit that must've tasted good and looks good brought shame and guilt.

They did not become better - instead now they were morally defiled.

Spiritually they died. Communion with God was broken.

They came up with an idea of using fig leaves  to try to cover their shame.

Where was God when this took place? Did God know anything about this?

Yes of course God is everywhere present and God knows and sees everything.

What happened when the couple heard the sound of the Lord God in the garden that afternoon?

They ran and tried to hide behind some trees.

God came to Adam and said to the man "where are you?" 

Adam replied, "I was afraid because I was naked so I hid myself."

Now isn't that strange? Adam had put the leaves on his body and on the body of his wife  so they would not feel any shame. But in the presence of God both of them were terrified. It seems the fig leaves were not adequate to protect them from God's penetrating gaze upon their guilt and shame.

"Who told you that you were naked?" God asks Adam.

When did Adam become naked? He was created naked and before his disobedience, his nakedness- his being known by his wife or by God didn't bother him.

You see guilt and shame are first on the inside - they are not on the outside.

This is why nothing we can do can cover our nakedness; no good works or religious rituals or many prayers or acts of kindness- we still are afraid that if God of other people really knew us, no one could love us.

Did God know where they were? What was the reason that God called to the man? After all it was the woman who first took the fruit and ate and then gave to her husband. But God didn't talk first to the woman about this act of disobedience.

God comes to Adam so Adam can explain the reason why he disobeyed.

Have you eaten from the tree that I told you not to eat thereof?

God had said they would surely die if they ate from the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But they didn't die at least physically they didn't die. However spiritually they were dead.

Adam does not answer "yes" or "no" if he had eaten from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil ; he just says the woman , God, that you gave to me , she gave the food to me and I ate. Here we see the first evidence of blaming someone else for something that was done in disobedience to the command of God.

This was not just a lapse of memory. The act of eating the fruit for Adam was clearly rebellion against what God had commanded.

The woman didn't do any better when God questions her : what is this that you have done? 

The woman simply said that the serpent deceived me and I ate.

Neither Adam nor Eve seemed to think it was a big deal what they had done.

However each of them brought the curse on the earth and on their relationship with God and on their relationship with one another and that which they were created to do : the woman to bear children and the man to take care of the ground -now those things had a curse on them.

What other results do we see from the man's choice to exercise his own will in place of the will of God?

Satan, the deceiver, is using the body of the serpent to try and pursuade the humans to reject the authority of God to tell them how to live.

God puts a curse on the serpent and says there will be continual hostility between the offspring of the serpent and the offspring of the woman.

However God makes a promise to the woman that one day there will be a man child born from the woman who will crush the head of the serpent and the serpent will bruise the heel of this man child.

God also makes coverings of animal skins for Adam and his wife. He replaces their self effort to cover their sense of shame and guilt -( the fig leaves and the blame shifting) and, instead, God chooses to sacrifice an innocent animal in order to cover the disobedience of Adam and Eve.

What other choice might God have made? Of course to kill them. Instead the blood of the innocent animal was in place of the blood of Adam and Eve. You see the life is in the blood.

God speaks to himself actually saying now that humans have become like us we need to make sure they cannot eat from the tree of life and stay in this condition forever.

The condition God meant is he didn't want them to remain spiritually dead.

So God banished them from the paradise of Eden and put an angel to protect any attempt to return to the tree of life and eat from that tree. For one act of disobedience, the couple were kicked out of Paradise.

What can we learn from this story? And what does the story have to do with the voice I heard that called my name? God desires to have intimate fellowship with humans. God wants to restore the relationship that God once had with humans who are created to reflect the glory of God. 

The glory of God is His perfection of moral character. 

We call this the holiness of God.

After Adam disobeyed God , did Adam try to find God? No, it was God who came and called Adam's name ; this is true today . God, the father, calls the name of those that God is seeking to rescue from guilt and shame; from separation from God; from spiritual death - and to restore relationally as sons and daughters.

God wants to cover our shame and guilt.

How does God do this today? The next post we will talk about that and also what happened in my life as a result of hearing my name called. 

My mother had not called me; 

I knew it was God calling my name.

But why was God calling me by name?