Gen 2:7And the
LORD God formed a man's body from the dust of the ground and breathed into it
the breath of life. And the man became a living person(NLT)
God breathed in man and
man became a living soul. Ever since then man has become the prime recipient of
all that God is. We were created in his own image and likeness; this means that
man has had every capability to respond to God.
Man became a living
person. This means that any life that was in man was God’s, any consciousness,
any influence to act was of God and of God.
Thousands of years later
Paul bears this in mind as he storms a pagan city of Athens and he addresses the people who have
never had any reference to the bible, nor were they expected to be in any way
religiously inclined to The God of Israel. Paul declares that in Him we live we
move and have our being.(Acts 17:28) Notice that Paul did not open any
scriptures but in he contrary he used one of the sayings of the famous esteemed
poets of Athens.
We can now bear witness to
the psalmist that everything testifies
to the greatness of our God.
PSALM 40:5 O LORD my God; you have done many miracles for us. Your
plans for us are too numerous to list. If I tried to recite all your wonderful
deeds, I would never come to the end of them. (NLT)
Or
together with Paul echo that in Him all things hold together.
Col 1:16-17 for
by him all things were
created, in heaven and on earth, visible and
invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities--all
things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and
in him all things hold together.
The integrity of the consciousness of
God
The integrity of image and
likeness of God is what Adam and eve enjoyed in the Garden of Eden before they succumbed
to the lie of the enemy and lost that glory. The first couple enjoyed a
consciousness that is full of God. Everything echoed the life of God. They
carried heir businesses in the Garden of Eden with all the dominion and
accuracy God had granted them. While such a grievous thing hit the entirety of mankind;
God still saw something valuable in man. He saw his image and likeness; he saw
his design in man. Man had become conscious of sin and fallenness but greater
than that is God’s love which looked beyond the frailty and the mess of man.
We could see glimpses of
the consciousness towards God being expressed by people who purposed to be
Godly I n the Old Testament. No one though has ever been fully conscious of
God. Not even the prophets, not even the great kings. No one has existed who
knows God fully.
2:9 it’s written, what no physical
eye has grasped (what no eye has seen implying what no eye has looked intently
and from looking derive maximum benefit) neither ear has heard (no one has
clearly grasped the communication of God that communicates his authentic
goodness upon mankind) or the heart of man conceived (no one has truly birthed
the fruit of God within himself) what the Lord has prepared for his people them
who have responded to love.(Kainos amplified)
I recently watched a movie
By Henry Forth titled 50 first dates. Henry falls in love with Lucy without the
knowledge that Lucy had an accident which would make her have short memory to
the extent that she forgot who he was and she would also forget who she is.
It was a touching scene to
see Henry Forth in undate himself with the duty of doing everything to bring
her back to remembrance,. He would do tapes that showed how they used to be in
Love, How she had an accident, How her family Loves her and are always around
her. He would even show her the tape of their wedding and her baby boy every
day playing it on a video for her to see and to remember.
Man seemed to have forgotten
who he is. That he came from God. That He is created in the image and the
likeness of God. By one mans sin came disobedience yet by anoher came life and
peace. Rom 5:12-17.
Indeed like Lucy all men
seemed to have wandered like lost sheep, we have lost the consciousness of God.
We have all gone astray (Isaiah 53:6). We have quickly forgotten the rock from
which we were hewn.(Deut 32:18). We all became unmindful of the rock Christ who
bore us. We forgot God who gave us birth. If such a great falling has endowed
mankind, then how can we synthesize the logic of God? How can we be conscious
of God and his goodness upon us?
Instead of man becoming conscious
of God and of who he is; man has become conscious of sin that he became one
with it. We became slaves to it that no amount of religious proclamations or
performances would save us from it. The default of any natural thinking is
apartness and fallenness. We would find it easy to be conscious of the dangers
around us, the vices and evil around. In Fact no one has ever gone to school to
practice the art of sinning. We were born with the inherent capacity to sin.
What now! Is this our
fate? Do we succumb to what we see in the world today? Thank God that in Christ
Jesus we are restored to our original innocence.
We who were once separate
in our minds; we who were consciously effective in the realm of sin have been
brought near by the blood of Jesus. Eph 2:1-10.
What a breath taking
recovery we have in Christ Jesus?
Romans 5:17 death
got the upper hand through one man's wrongdoing, can you imagine the
breathtaking recovery life makes, sovereign life, in those who grasp with both
hands this wildly extravagant life-gift, this grand setting-everything-right,
that the one man Jesus Christ provides?(message)
Why we have the consciousness of God
- Death got an upper hand through Adams disobedience. We could never know God because we had no consciousness of him. However a breath takng recovery has happened through the operation of God in Christ Jesus. We can know God we can be conscious of him.
- What more ! We can never compare what we lost in Adam to what we have recovered in Christ. God lives in us. The consciousness that brings this awareness is attested to us by the spirit. The spirit awakens consciousness of God in you; for his spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are the sons of God.
- We are the prime recipients of God’s unlimited life gift. Thanks to Christ we are redeemed. Our original innocence is rediscovered in one man Christ Jesus. We successfully echo what the psalmist was looking forward to
That blessed is the man against whom the Lord
counts no fault. We are blessed because God has erased the records of our wrong
doings in Christ. Col
2:13-15. Heb 10:14, we have been purified by a once and for all sacrifice from
a consciousness of sins we have been purged clean.
We ought to subscribe to the
hearing and the listening of the gospel that communicates to us God’s generous
and unlimited gift of righteousness. The church has been under a listening that
awakens a consciousness of sin. We have been inundated with the duty of
rescuing ourselves from sin and instead the church has thrived in the multiplication
of sin and godlessness; find out in part 2 what arouses the consciousness of
sin.
