PARADISE WAS LOST

The Bible tells the tale that something terrible happened within humanity. The Reflection Of God Became Impaired By Sin. That happened in the paradise lost story, when Adam and Eve got the whole ball rolling. Like a snowball on a hill, it got larger and large affecting us all. Mankind today is only remotely like the ideal humanity portrayed by the psalmist in Psalm 8. The original Adam and Eve was ideal humanity. The human possessed the God-given capacity of self-determination, which meant that he and she had freedom to choose to obey God or to disobey. To disobey would be a violation of the relationship with God. When the original humans from whom we came, chose to disobey God, that act of rebellion defaced the image of God in the human and has affected the entire race. Long after creation, Solomon observed the tragedy that man did not remain as he was created. "This only I have found: God made mankind upright, but men have gone in search of many schemes" (Ecclesiastes 7:29).

CHARACTERISTICS OF GOD THAT HE SHARES WITH US

Having mentioned the big ticket characteristics of God yesterday, such attributes as self existent, eternal, omniscient, omnipotent, self sufficient, time transcendent and non corporeal which belong exclusively to him, there are other qualities of God of which there was intended to be a reflection in the human. Some of these are intellectual attributes like knowledge and wisdom, and moral attributes such as righteousness, holiness, goodness, love, grace, mercy, longsuffering, truthfulness and faithfulness. And there are volitional attributes like reasoning, ability to choose, to decide and even to cause. Humanity was created to have relationship with God because of this resemblance and to desire to worship God and to have ability to serve him.

WHY WE ARE ALWAYS IN GOD’S MIND

What is man that you are mindful of him? That’s the question and it’s posed by a male using a male pronoun but I want you to know this is not a gender specific question. This is the use of the word ‘man’ to denote “humanity” the species. It is as the Psalmist answers the question that we find direction to the person whom we can be like. Always keep in mind that Genesis 1:26 carries God’s intention to create humanity in his image.

The first thing you have to note in the question is the evidence that in all of God’s creation, humanity has a special place. “What is man that you are mindful of him?” Think of the remarkable aspect of the scientific world of which you are aware. Besides the solar system and the planets, the honeybee and the gathering of pollen and production of honey which is edible is a remarkable thing. A typical hurricane produces the energy equivalent of 8,000 one megaton bombs. At over 2000 kilometers long, The Great Barrier Reef is the largest living structure on Earth.

Alright, in light of the absolutely astounding things that God has created, why is the human so important in God’s estimation? And the answer is – because the human is specially designed. And God (Elohim) said, 'Let us make man in our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth' (1:26-28). What is the design? The human was made to bear the image of God, to resemble God, to be like God. In our existence we are supposed to reflect the infinite person who created us. Both God and humans are persons, have personhood, personality and that distinguishes us from non persons. So bearing the image of God pertains to qualities of personhood. God the person has attributes. God has graciously chosen to share with us some of his attributes. Of course there are some qualities that distinctly belong to God and these he does not permit us to share. For instance He is self existent, eternal, omniscient, omnipotent, self sufficient, time transcendent and non corporeal.

IT IS CONFOUNDING TO KNOW GOD IS INTERESTED IN US

The Bible records that God is the maker of this universe and it bears his imprint. Genesis 1:1 tells us "In the beginning God (Elohim) created the heavens and the earth."

Humanity has learned so much and keeps learning. In December 1995 the Hubble space telescope did ten consecutive days of photography through a slice of the heavens no wider than 1/25 of one degree, equivalent to the size of a grain of sand held at arm's length. Through the telescope astronomers looked deeper into space and exposed greater detail than ever before attained by optical astronomy. Then in January 1996, at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society the astronomers excitedly poured over a mosaic of pictures and counted 1,500 to 2,000 galaxies, some so far away that they are four billion times fainter than the dimmest object the naked eye can see from the ground. With that achievement the estimated galactic population of the universe has multiplied to 50 billion, five times as many as previously estimated.

Shouldn’t we echo the question that David wrote long ago. "When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him. You made him a little lower than the Elohim[1] and crowned him with glory and honour. You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet: all flocks and herds, and the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, all that swim the paths of the seas" (Psalm 8:4-8).

[1]The Hebrew Elohim denotes God, yet in Jewish tradition, in the Septuagint, the Syriac version and the Targum it is rendered angels. Hebrews 2:7 quotes Psalm 8:4-6 and refers this scripture to Jesus, the representative of all mankind. It appears that originally the psalmist spoke about the status of humanity and the Hebrews’ author applies it to Jesus in reference to his incarnation.

TO UNDERSTAND WHO WE ARE, WE MUST UNDERSTAND GOD

To understand who we are, we must understand who God is. Psalm 8:1 says, “O Lord our Lord, how majesty is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens.” God is the ultimate reality, existing in and of himself with an infinite existence that is unlike any other being in the universe. He is without a beginning and he doesn’t have an end date. God has personality and the essence of God is distinguished in three persons, a trinity of persons, who are neither three gods or three parts or modes of God but rather are coequal and coeternal.

David wrote this psalm to praise the incomparable Creator of this entire universe. How big a deal is that?

We view the sun positioned in the heavens of our planet. The sun is 865,000 miles in diameter. If we create our own scale, reducing the sun to the size of a beach ball two feet in diameter, we can commence a staggering comparison. You step off eighty-two paces (a pace being two feet long), and put down a mustard seed to represent the first planet Mercury. Sixty more steps and you put down a beebee for Venus. Walk seventy-eight more paces and for earth you put down a pea. One hundred and eight steps further you will be at Mars and you will put down a pinhead. Then you may scatter some fine dust to represent asteroids and mark off seven hundred and eighty-eight more steps and mark Jupiter with an orange. Nine hundred and thirty-four steps further and for Saturn you put down a golf ball. Another two thousand and eighty-six steps and Uranus will be marked by a marble. Two thousand three hundred and twenty-two steps more and you mark Neptune with a cherry. That will have taken you two and one half miles and you aren't even near Pluto. However, if you swing this two and one half mile arm around you will have a mass surface of five miles in diameter and that will represent our solar system. You will have to travel another six thousand seven hundred and twenty-two miles on the same scale before you meet another two foot ball to represent the nearest other star.

GRASPING HOW MUCH GOD CARES FOR US

To best understand that God infinitely cares for each of us, I must begin with the Big Picture. Somewhere in the broad window of pre-history God determined to create humanity and a world in which the species would live. You and I are sitting in different places, a library, a living room, a Starbucks, some place where we can read. That’s the small picture. The big picture is that we are at this moment part of a whole human history. Human history had a beginning and it has always been moving toward a target. It is a matter of design, and this design originated with God. That design bears upon the theme that intrigued David, the psalmist, shepherd, soldier and king of ancient Israel. He wrote memorable conversation to God which is recorded as Psalm 8 in the Book of Psalms of the Old Testament.

8:1 O Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory above the heavens.
2 Out of the mouth of babies and infants,
you have established strength because of your foes,
to still the enemy and the avenger.

3 When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,
4 what is man that you are mindful of him,
and the son of man that you care for him?

5 Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings
and crowned him with glory and honor.
6 You have given him dominion over the works of your hands;
you have put all things under his feet,
7 all sheep and oxen,
and also the beasts of the field,
8 the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea,
whatever passes along the paths of the seas.

9 O Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!