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Gen 1:24-25 "And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so. 25 And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good." In this passage God makes three types of animals: cattle - large quadrupeds; creeping things - reptiles; and beasts of the earth - all others. Evolution is refuted again: reptiles did not become birds or anything else. Each of the three types is made "after his kind". We know from observation that there are also subsets within the three kinds. It is interesting to observe what happens when man attempts to cross-breed between species. While something may be reproduced, it is a hybrid. Man can cross-breed a horse and a donkey but the offspring is a mule - it is sterile and cannot reproduce itself. Several years ago doctors at Loma Linda Hospital in California transplanted a baboon heart into a little girl. They gave the girl drugs to suppress her body’s natural reaction, but her body did reject that heart and she died. Scripture states repeatedly that the life of the flesh is in the blood (Lev. 17:11) and man and animals do not have the same blood. As a former cancer patient, I am very grateful for doctors. Having said that, in recent years doctors have been trying to play God. We have seen in vitro fertilization, fertility drugs, etc. Some of these modern medical practices have resulted in serious ethical, moral problems. When the doctors perform an in vitro fertilization, they do not just fertilize one egg, they fertilize several. The issue is the beginning of life, which according to scripture is at conception. I don’t think it makes any difference if that conception occurred in the usual way or in a dish in a laboratory: a life has begun. While a few of the fertilized eggs are implanted in the woman, the rest are frozen and stored for future use. This became an issue in England several years ago. A law had been passed that these zygotes could only be stored five years unless the parents contacted the storage facility and made arrangements for further storage or donation. When the first five-year deadline arrived many of those zygotes were destroyed. Lives were aborted that were never implanted in a mother in the first place. Does that make it right? Not if life begins at conception and conception is the fertilization of the egg. The real problem is that man’s technology has progressed beyond man’s ability to deal with the results in a moral, ethical manner. In his attempt to be god, man has crossed a line that should not have been crossed A few more words about doctors. While I truly appreciate modern medicine’s ability to help the sick, I also think we should realize that doctors cannot heal. Only God can heal: doctors destroy. If you have a bacterial infection and visit the doctor, he prescribes antibiotics that attack and destroy the germs that have invaded your body. Surgeries are performed that cut away and remove diseased or injured body parts. The flesh that is cut is then sewn up and the patient waits for it to heal - it is God who heals. Which brings up this question: is it God’s will to heal? Yes. Sometimes he does it through a miracle - an instantaneous event, but the usual way is different. If you have ever had a cut on your finger, you know that the cut gradually healed. Why? Because God created our bodies to heal on their own. While doctors can attack or remove the cause of the problem, it is God who heals. Man is not God and never will be. The final act of creation, which also occurred on the sixth day, was the creation of man. Gen 1:26-27 "And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." The word here translated as God is the Hebrew word Elohim. It is a plural term, meaning it includes at least three entities. The passage says let US make man in OUR image. Here at the very beginning of the Bible we see the triune God present and speaking. He said, let us make man IN our image. According to Heb. 1:3 Jesus Christ is the EXPRESS image of God. The word man is the Hebrew Adam. Adam was created IN the image of God which means he was created IN Christ Jesus. Adam was created as a Christian because he was the body of Christ. Speaking of Christians, 1 Cor 12:13 says, "For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit." Verse 27 says, "Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular." It was this being part of the body of Christ that Adam would fall from, and it was restoration to this same body for which Jesus died. IN our image does not have to do with appearance but with position. God said let us make man AFTER our likeness. This is a reference to resemblance, not duplicate. If we were to make a copy of a color photograph in a black and white copier, the basics will be visible in the copy but it will not have the clarity, depth and vibrancy of the original. I don’t think this phrase has as much to do with appearance as it does with personhood i.e. the triune nature of God. Christians worship ONE God eternally existing in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In the same way, like God, we each exist as one person who will exist eternally in three parts: Spirit, soul and body. Everybody who has ever lived will be resurrected and will live eternally. The difference is WHERE we will live. Humans are essentially spirit - answering to God the Father; we each have a soul - answering to God the Holy Spirit; and we each have a body - answering to God the Son. Like God, we are triune beings. At death the spirit and soul separate from the body, but none of the three parts stops existing. In the same way, at the crucifixion, Jesus was separated from the Father and the Spirit (My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?). In verse 26 God says, "and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth." Here God prepares to give man dominion over all the life created to this point and over the land. The outer space area is excluded because man cannot dominate what he cannot naturally reach; the atmosphere and the seas are excluded because man cannot dominate the weather. But man would be in control of animal and plant life. In these endtimes man does travel into space, and some believe man can have a direct effect on the weather through technological means, i.e. scalar weapons, HAARP, etc. In my opinion the jury is still out on those ideas. "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." Notice there are two references in this verse to God creating MAN, Adam, in his own image. The third clause says simply "male and female created he them." That third clause adds the word female and it does not use the word image. As we will learn later, Adam was created out of the dust of the earth, but Eve was created out of Adam. They were both created in the image of God, in Christ Jesus, but there was a slight difference. We will learn that Adam had a special responsibility that Eve did not have, and that he failed miserably. Gen 1:28-31 "And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. 29 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. 30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so. 31 And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day." These verses record God’s instructions to Adam and Eve. Notice the words, "And God blessed them, and God said unto them." God is speaking to two people here. The verse doesn’t say him or her, it says them. In this verse God is addressing both Adam and Eve. This will be important later. God says, "Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it." God does not give any limits to population growth. He does not tell them that the earth will only support a population up to a given size. God created the earth to bring forth abundantly: if managed properly, subdued, there will be enough food for all. In recent years some folks have proposed that there are too many people on earth. There’s a field in Elberton, Georgia in which a group of people have erected a monument called the Georgia Guidestones. Called an American Stonehenge, the monument consists of five upright granite stones, each more than sixteen feet high with a capstone set on top. Engraved on the stones in five different languages are the ‘new’ Ten Commandments for the new age of reason. Commandment number one reads: "Maintain humanity under 500 million in perpetual balance with nature." Currently earth’s population is more than six billion people. In order for this first item to be implemented, earth’s population would have to be reduced by 5½ BILLION people. How might this be accomplished? AIDS? Wars? Nuclear, biological and chemical weapons? The coming New World Order is the prophesied antichrist system and it will be a totalitarian government. In the past when totalitarian governments have come to power they have murdered resisters in their own countries. I think the endtimes population reduction may include at least the following: the rapture could include 600 million people - a tenth (tithe) belongs to God; of those that remain, Rev. 9:18 says one third will die - another reduction of 1,782,000,000; the removal of the wicked at the second advent appears to be fifty percent (Matt. 24:40-41) - another reduction of 1,809,000,000, leaving 1,809,000,000. Not accounted for are those who die from wars and persecution, and let’s not forget the judgment of Babylon in which an entire nation, less those raptured and the Jews who flee to Israel, will be destroyed in one hour. I don’t believe the goal stated on the Georgia Guidestones will be met, but there will be a large reduction of human population during those days. Click here to learn more about the Georgia Guidestones. God told Adam and Eve to "be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth. To REplenish something means to refill something that was once full and became less full or empty. This is another indicator of an earlier creation, and it also parallels the Great Commission that Jesus gave the church. Adam and Eve were to fill the earth with others like themselves: CHRISTIANS. God’s will has not changed one little bit. He intends to have an earth filled with people who worship him because they want to, and this will finally happen during the millennium. God told Adam and Eve to "subdue it." This is very interesting. All the animals were tame, there were no thorns or thistles, there was no curse at all. Yet God said "subdue it". Subdue what? Subdue anything that was not living under God’s direction and control. This is a hint of trouble to come - but Adam and Eve were right here given authority to deal with it - or rather him (Satan). "And have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over EVERY LIVING THING THAT MOVETH UPON THE EARTH." Adam and Eve were to dominate, to have the rule, over all life. Although they didn’t know it yet, there was a living thing that was able to move upon the earth that was not under God’s control. We will learn that these people were created with intellect. When the time came they were to recognize a certain someone, take up their authority and dominate him. God’s will has not changed. In verses 29-30 God gives instructions as to what man and beast were to eat: "And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. 30 And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so." As we all know, it will be the eating of a certain a piece of fruit that will cause the fall in Chapter 3. Notice exactly what herbs and fruit Adam and Eve could eat: "every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed." Notice a key factor: at this point God was speaking to Adam and Eve together and there is no restriction regarding what could NOT be eaten, only instructions regarding what COULD be eaten. In verses 11-12, on the third day, God had said, "Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so. 12 And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good." All the trees that appeared on the third day bore fruit with seed in it, and on the sixth day God gave Adam and Eve, together, instructions regarding eating fruit from those trees. We also see that at creation both man and animals were vegetarian and, for man at least, this would continue until after the flood (Gen. 9:3). In vs. 31 - God gives a general approval of everything he had made and it is a little different than what scripture says regarding the other days. On days one, three, four and five, scripture says "And God saw that it was good." But here, "And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was VERY good." Everything necessary was now present and approved. "And the evening and the morning were the sixth day." This is the introduction of the number six in scripture - six is the number of man - and we see it again in Rev. 13. The mark of the beast is 666 or three sixes. When we see words or numbers repeated like that the result is usually exponential. In the case of 666 it is three sixes - the perfection of man in his rebellion against God, i.e. man at the point where he thinks HE is God. I bring that up because Jesus is the alpha and omega, the first and the last: He is revealed in Genesis and Revelation and everything in between.
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