Someone recently wrote the following about a friend, an avowed atheist who said that she sometimes “wakes in the middle of the night, stressing over a bunch of deep questions: ‘Is this world truly the result of an accidental cosmic big bang? How could there be no design, no grand purpose to our existence and … Continue reading –>
Read for This Week’s Study: Gen. 1:26-28, Ps. 8:3-8, Gen. 2:15, Rom. 8:20-22, Exod. 20:1-17, Rom. 1:25, 2 Thess. 3:10. Memory Text: “Then God 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 … Continue reading –>
See other passages on restoring God’s image: Romans 8:29, Colossians 1:15, Colossians 3:9-11, 2 Corinthians 3:18, 2 Corinthians 5:17. Read Ellen G. White, “The Creation,” “The Temptation and Fall,” and “The Plan of Redemption,” pp. 44-70, in Patriarchs and Prophets. As a people, we have been called by God to work for others, for the … Continue reading –>
As we have seen, our world, though created perfect, had fallen, with devastating results. But God had not abandoned us to what would have been our fate, eternal destruction (the fate that science says awaits us). Instead, even before the world began, the plan of salvation was formulated (see 1 Pet. 1:2) and, at great … Continue reading –>
“My little children, for whom I labor in birth again until Christ is formed in you” (Gal. 4:19, NKJV). We were originally created as perfect and complete beings in a perfect and complete world. Unfortunately, this pre-Fall paradise was lost through sin, and the world as we know it is filled with death, violence, suffering, … Continue reading –>
Read Genesis 3:14-15. What does God mean when He says to Satan, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers” (Gen. 3:15, NIV)? What hope can we find here for ourselves? The word enmity in Hebrew shares its root with the Hebrew word hate and the word enemy.By … Continue reading –>
The Bible does not say how long a period of time existed between the finished Creation and the Fall. Days, weeks, years, we just don’t know. What we do know, however, was that there was a Fall, and the consequences were immediate and apparent. The first mentioned result of Adam and Eve eating of the … Continue reading –>
The Bible says that humanity was originally created in the “image” (Gen. 1:27) of God. An image may be either two-dimensional, such as a mirror reflection or photograph, or three-dimensional, such as a statue or hologram. An image can also be intangible, such as a mental image, an idea that we have in our heads. … Continue reading –>
Read for This Week’s Study: Gen. 1:26-27; Deut. 6:5; Gen. 3:8-19; James 4:4; Gal. 4:19; Mark 2:1-12; John 10:10. Memory Text: “So God created mankind in his own image, in theimage of God he created them; male and female he created them”(Genesis 1:27, NIV) . All one has to do is look around, at the … Continue reading –>
The Whole Gospel A pastor held up his Bible before the congregation. It was in tatters, full of holes. In seminary he and some classmates had gone through his Bible and underlined every passage that dealt with justice, poverty, wealth, and oppression. Then, with a pair of scissors, they cut out every verse dealing with … Continue reading –>
