Discussion on Man Pt 1

What I wanted to do, if you remember last week we talked about the person and being of the

Holy Spirit, and there are a number of different other things that we could talk about concerning it, but I thought to move on just for now, at least for a little bit, and then it'll come back around as we move forward.

So this morning I want to think about simply, and this really is just more of a conversation than anything else, but I really want to talk about man for a little bit, because I do think that it's important for us to have enough of a base of understanding, if you will, to be able to answer all the game -saying and falsehoods and different thoughts that people have surrounding man, and I don't mean just man, don't get me wrong,

I mean human beings, if you will, men and women, in all sizes, shapes, and dimensions, but just some thoughts about human beings, and I'd like to answer the question that really is, well,

I'm going to ask you to turn to Psalm 8, because there's a question that's posed, and I think as we go through this you'll see the point of it, but let's just, let's start at Psalm 8,

I got to check them off so I remember which ones we look at. So in Psalm 8 there's a question pretty much posed,

O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is your name in all the earth, this is

Psalm 8, you who have set your glory above the heavens and out of the mouth of babes and infants, you have ordained strength because of your enemies that you may silence the enemy and the avenger, and he says this, when

I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have ordained, what is man that you are mindful of, and the son of man that you visited him, you made him a little lower than the angels, you crowned him with glory and honor, so the question really is, what is man,

I mean, and if you think about it, there is such a multitude of answers that people come up with concerning, well, let me put it to you this way,

I want to look at it under three headings, the first is, how did we get here, the second is, why are we here, and then the third would be, what comes next, so how did we get here, why are we here, and what comes next, and if you were to ask the general public, if you will, people that are not as familiar with the

Bible, or unfortunately some people that even are familiar with the Bible, if you were to ask them those three questions, you would get a considerable amount of answers, you would get all kinds of philosophies, you would get all kinds of interpretations, you would get all kinds of, if you will, doctrines that people would come up with, and so, why don't consider man,

I'm not sure we'll get through them all this morning, but that's fine, but here's a point

I want to make, unless you really understand man, in the light of God, you're never really going to be able to have a proper understanding, in other words, if we are going to consider man, we have to consider him in the light of God, because God is the creator, and God is the sustainer, and God is ultimately what?

The judge. So, if you think about it, those three questions kind of line up that way, like, why are we here?

Well, we're here because God is the creator. How did we get here?

I mean, how did we get here? Well, God created us. Why are we here? Because God is the sustainer, and ultimately you and I will see that we're here for his glory, and then what's next?

And if you think about it, like I said, how many different avenues do people take, roads do people take to try to come up with the answers to that?

Some people will say it's just serendipity, it just happened, right?

Others will say it's all because of evolution. Others will say, like I said,

I think I mentioned it on Wednesday, others will say we were made by aliens, and then it just continues on and on and on.

So when you think about it, this question is really important for people to be able to answer.

And I'm going to say to you, if you can answer those three questions, how did we get here, why are we here, and what's next?

If you can answer those questions in truth, then you will have a relationship with God.

But again, it must be seen in the light of his truth, and only his truth, and not only that but his being.

So that's the question. What is man that you are mindful of? Alright, I want to go here now, since we're in the

Psalms, go to Psalm 14, and I really just want to look at one verse, but this verse is in a sense, full of other truths.

So look at Psalm 14, the fool has said in his heart, there is no

God. The fool has said in his heart, that there is no

God. Now, if you and I begin to think about it, and consider it, the

Bible has a definite definition of a fool, and as it says here, it's the one who says there is no

God. And I'm going to add to that, not only is it the one who says there is no

God, but it's also a fool, he or she is also a fool, if they don't worship

God the way God prescribes. So you think about that. So the Bible makes it absolutely clear that apart from a knowledge of God, apart from a true understanding of who made us, why we're here, and what's next, the

Bible declares that you're nothing but a fool. And define a fool.

How would you define a fool? We'll answer it once.

You can take your time with it. What is a fool? I mean, if you call somebody a fool today, what are you trying to convey to them?

That they're ignorant, right. That they lack knowledge. That they lack wisdom.

That they lack understanding. That they can't discern correctly. And so think about what we're saying now, that man apart from God has improper understanding, has a lack of discernment, cannot understand truth.

And when you think about that, I mean, I don't know about you, but nobody really wants to be called a fool.

Because it carries that connotation of somebody who is ignorant.

Somebody who cannot make right judgments. Now, when you think about that, if you had to give me the elements of a man, what would you say man is made up of?

I'll give you the first one. Man is made up of, one part of man has got to do with knowledge.

You thinking of anything else that makes up a man or a woman? His soul.

His soul. And I, in his soul he has, would you agree that he has a will?

He makes determinations based on whatever knowledge he has, he makes a determination.

And that sometimes is guided by his, put this word, and there's probably other words we could use, but he's guided by his affections.

Or you could probably say emotions.

Then if you think about it, man is basically, you could break this down further, but man really has the ability to think, he's rational, right?

And based on that knowledge, he makes decisions, there's a perception, and that many times it's affected by his affections or his emotions, or you want to use the term feelings, and you laughing?

Because I did that? Yes, feelings. Thank you. But really, if you think about that, that is the way we want to consider it this morning, that there was, there are these three parts of man, and remember what it said now.

The fool has said in his heart, there is no God. So he lacks knowledge, therefore he responds in the wrong way, and his affections or his emotions, they're bent, they're wrong, they'll never, to me it's like if you get on the road at the wrong place,

I don't care how fast or how far you go. If you're not where you ought to be, you're never going to find the location that you're trying to get to.

So think about it, in order for a man to understand himself, as I said, he has to understand himself in the light of God.

And if man doesn't get on at the right entrance, regardless of how fast or how hard he drives or how much power or how much effort he puts into it, he's never going to arrive at the right place.

And you and I need to think about that, and I want to, let me ask you to do this.

Go here for a second, Ecclesiastes chapter 7, because was this always the case?

Was it always that man had a wrong knowledge and therefore he couldn't make proper decisions and therefore his will and his affections were wrong?

So just look in Ecclesiastes for a minute, and I want to show you what

God declares, and again, what God declares is really the thing that we need to pay attention to and adhere to.

It should be here, okay, yeah. So just look at verse 29 of chapter 7, look what it says.

And you know what Ecclesiastes is about, it's about the vanity of life in comparison to a knowledge of God.

And then he says this in verse 29, truly this only I have found, God made man upright, but they, and who's the they, man, but they have sought out many schemes or many inventions if you will.

And that's the way, I think it's in King James it says inventions, but he's thought out many schemes.

So, let's go back to the garden for a minute. When man was before the fall, would we be able to say that man had a proper knowledge?

Yeah. Would we be able to say that his will was, in other words, in the garden before the fall,

Adam loved what God loved, didn't he? Yeah. Yeah. And his affections were towards God, right?

As soon as the fall took place, and as soon as man rebelled against God, what happened?

Well that's what this says here, look, God made man upright, and if you think about it, what did

God say when he made man? He said it was very good, there was nothing wrong,

I mean again, we've talked about this all the time, that when man was in the garden, there were no problems, there was no wrong thinking, he walked with God, God was always in his mind, there was fellowship, there was friendship, there was the ability to communicate, and what it says here is that man sought out many inventions, or as a result of sin, as a result of the judgment of God for sin, man no longer could think straight.

His knowledge was perverted. Now I'm not saying a man don't have knowledge, many people have lots of knowledge today.

Remember what it said now, the Bible defines a fool as someone who's not thinking right.

He cannot think right, and therefore, again, his will is messed up, his affections are messed up, and so when

Adam sinned, all of a sudden, schemes and inventions, just think about what happened with Cain and Abel.

Would Cain have killed Abel before the fall? No, but that became, his knowledge was warped, his will was misguided, his emotions and his affections caused him to do things that he ought not to have done, and you and I need to think about that, is that, and you think about it today, would we not say that man has still, man still today schemes out many inventions against God, right?

Whether it be, like I said, whether it be evolution, or whether it be

UFO, I mean, the amount of schemes and thoughts that people have are endless.

And yet, God makes this simple distinction, and God declares that the fool is the one who has, if you will, exchanged the truth of God for a lie, right?

And so again, when we talk about these three things, and when we talk about man, and again, men, women, whatever, we're human beings, their knowledge is no longer right, and their will is no longer right, and their affections are no longer right.

I was going to ask this at the end, but I'm going to ask it now, can you imagine if people had a right understanding of how we got here, why we're here, not think that that would impact this world that we live in?

It would be kind of like heaven. Thank you. It would. Yeah, absolutely. It would.

It would be right, and just as it was right in the garden, before man became a fool, so one day, someday, it will be again, right.

But man has, man is the, God is the victim, if you will.

Man is the criminal. Man offended God. God didn't offend man.

And yet, when you think about it, if we don't start there, if we don't start to try to understand things in the light of who

God is, then we're going to fall for a thousand different false knowledge, false thinking, false motivations.

The inventions are, again, the inventions are endless.

And you remember what Jesus said? He said that the way straight is the path that leads to life.

And what is it? Broad is the way, wide is the path that leads to destruction, and many find it.

Well, you know why many find it? Because many are fools. And again, does this offend people to say that they're fools?

Are we saying that man has no knowledge? I'm not saying that. I mean, if you look at the advancements that we've made, whether it be in technology, whether it be in medicine, whether it be in science,

I don't care where you go with it, but again, if God isn't the center, everything gets messed up.

And yet you and I need to understand that that was never God's intention. I'm not saying that God in his eternal decree didn't allow for it, but when

God made man upright, God said it was very good. People also deny, when they know the truth, they know what's right, and they'll deny so they can satisfy their flesh in some fashion or form.

Yeah, and again, because his affections and because his will and because his knowledge is perverted, well, guess what?

His actions are going to be perverted. So I'm glad you said it that way, because let's go to Romans chapter 1, and again, familiar to us as it ought to be, but when you start to link these things together, it presents a really clear picture and a vivid picture of the foolish man and how he has fallen, if you will, and it's affected all these areas, his knowledge, his will, his affections.

So in Romans 1, and again, we read it many times, but reading it now, it says,

I'll just pick it up in verse 20. For since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes are clearly seen being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead.

There it is. That's not the starting point. You're never going to get to the finish line.

You're running in the wrong direction. And then he says, so that they are without excuse, because although they knew

God, they did not glorify him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and here it is, their foolish hearts were darkened.

Professing to be wise, they became fools. That's not just people who live in this place or in this time or in this culture or in this custom.

This is affecting everyone, that the fool has said in his heart, there is no

God. And also, even the fool, a person is a fool if they don't worship

God right. They can acknowledge God, but if they don't acknowledge God for who he is, and that's the whole point, right?

God is manifested to them, and they're without excuse. And so they change the glory of the incorruptible

God into an image made like corruptible man and four -footed beasts and creeping things.

But you see what I'm trying to get us to think about? When we think about man, he has to be understood in the light of who

God is. And so when we see things take place in our world, when we see atrocities, when we see wrong judgments, when we see what we would say insanity,

I'll just give you an example. We still argue over men and women.

It's mind -boggling because if you consider for thousands of years, this never was an issue, right?

This is the new invention of man. This is the new scheme that there is no difference in the sexes.

To me, you're a fool if you think that, right? To the point now, it's absurd.

It really is absurd the things that people will fall for and fall into concerning man.

Again, as God has set it forth that there are male and there are females to the point now where we're not even willing to put on the birth certificate.

Guess what? We won't even put whether they're male or female. Does that not seem to us fools?

Why? Because people have sought out this new invention or this whole thing about...

Well, let me leave that one alone for now. But you get my drift?

Man apart from God is at best a fool even if he has knowledge.

And the problem with us is we consider knowledge in many times we consider knowledge in the wrong way.

We think it's more of what you know. Andy, my sisters in shamanism told you this before.

When you were talking Wednesday about peace, she thinks she's the most peaceful, most loving, most good.

So that's kind of what they teach them. And they worship all the roads lead to heaven kind of stuff.

It's so foolish. It's foolish. And she argues big time with me and she doesn't even argue with Sidney.

She argues with me a lot. She'll cut it down. Sidney will cut it. Like a chainsaw. Cut her kneecaps right out.

I'm just kidding. No, but it's true, right?

People come up with the wildest ideas. Again, the idea of evolution is one of the most foolish things that you can come up with because it leads from nowhere to nowhere.

I think serendipity is even worse. You're right. Because you argue with people and they have no answers and they go, oh serendipity, it just happened.

It just happened. It just happened. Are you kidding me? My mind goes...

Yeah, you just want to say you're a fool. There's 50 ,000 different kinds of birds and you're going to tell me it just happened?

It's just like when somebody says that, I'm just like, okay, we're done. Yeah, somehow we went from chaos to order and design.

And in order to make it feasible in some people's mind, now you have to extrapolate it over billions of years, right?

And then you got the nerve and I've talked to people. I've talked to people who say we're still evolving and one day we'll have more toes or we'll have more of this or we'll have more of that.

And again, if you understand the truth, you just want to look at them and say, man, you're dumb.

But we can't. We can't because again, it's all by grace.

But you see how to me it just spirals out of control unless your starting point is

God made us. Unless your starting point is that man was made upright and that he has sought out many inventions.

You look at kids today. We have two young kids that live across the street from us.

And I'm pretty sure they live with their grandparents. Well, they might be parents, but I think they're grandparents.

And they come outside and they play basketball and they play football in the street. They have the most disgusting mouths

I've ever heard from young people. I mean, all they do is

MF this and that and it's just, it sounds so foolish.

It sounds so ridiculous. There's no substance to it.

It's just blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I have a dude that I work with who's in the military and he's a senior chief.

Every, I swear, every word is F. I'm like, dude, don't you have any other vocabulary?

It's a military thing. He goes beyond military. He goes beyond military. Yeah, you see, that's all a result of, again,

I'm going to continue to say it. If you don't start at the right place, you never get to the right place.

You could bounce around and you'll drift here and there and all those things, but you're never really going to get to the point where you can cease from being a fool.

Because the fool has said his heart, there is no God. And that answers the question, what is man that you're mindful of?

Man apart from God is a fool. All right, let's try this first, Peter 3 .15.

And what I did was I tried to pull out verses that talk about how we need to be distinct to correct the fool by our knowledge, by our actions, by our affections.

So in 1 Peter 2, as Peter's addressing him,

I'll pick it up in verse 13. And he says this,

See, it runs straight through because God made us upright and we have twisted the truth.

We have exchanged the truth of God for a lie. And the lies just keep multiplying and keep spreading out.

And we ought to be those who can put to silence the actions and the thoughts of foolish men.

All right, go to 1 Corinthians 3 for a second. I think this is well worth our time to think about because this is a foundational truth.

You think about what Jesus says, you turn to 1 Corinthians 3. Think about what Jesus said. The fool builds his house where?

On the sand. The one who has right knowledge of how he got here, he builds his house on the rock.

He builds his house on a sure foundation. Listen, if you build your house on the sand,

I don't care how you decorate that house. Ruh -roh, it's going to go.

As soon as that wind blows, it's going down. And so when you think about it again, if the starting point is that man is made in the image of God, created by God, and we haven't even begun to understand the second question of why are we here.

And we'll get to that. I don't know if we'll get to it this morning, but that's fine. But anyway, 1

Corinthians 3, verse 18, look what it says.

Let no one deceive himself. If any one of you seems to be wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise.

For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God.

For it is written, he catches the wise in their own craftiness.

And again, the Lord knows the thoughts of men, that they are futile.

Wow, that's an indicting statement, if you think about it.

Again, you walk up to someone and you tell them, if you don't believe in God, you're a fool.

Or, if you believe in a God, but it's not the true God, you're a fool. We send our kids to college,

Henry, you were talking about college, right? Now they're indoctrinated, like I don't know if it's such a good idea to go to college.

I know it's not a good idea to go to college. Because of the indoctrination of the foolishness of men, the wisdom of Harvard, Yale, all these schools.

They say they've got so much wisdom, but they indoctrinate against God. They indoctrinate against God, you're absolutely right.

They can't answer those three questions. As many letters and degrees that they have, many of those people, especially in those universities, in academia, if you will, they can't answer that simple question.

I remember when that lady was up for Supreme Court judge, Jackson. And they asked her that question.

What is a biological woman? And she could not answer that question. Are you kidding me?

She didn't want to answer that question. She didn't want to, absolutely, I understand that. But the fact that you don't want to is really because of these two things, right?

And that leads to foolish thinking and foolish knowledge.

I mean, again, you want us to follow your thoughts on some of the most important matters, and yet you can't tell me the difference between a man and a woman?

Come on. And yet people applauded. People thought that was a great statement.

Oh, she was so politically correct and she was so... She's actually a judge now.

Yeah, I know. She got in. She got in. Isn't that crazy? She's not a normal judge of a

Supreme Court. A Supreme Court judge. Right? You can't go any further up the rung, right?

And yet, as I said, people applauded because when you're a fool, the company of other fools is not disturbing, right?

It's when you're in the light of a person who has true knowledge that all of a sudden it becomes a threat.

All of a sudden it becomes... You're at enmity with them or you have a way to try to argue with them.

That answers the question in part of how we got here.

Let's just... You were talking about colleges. How about people who send their kids...

How about parents as they start to raise their kids? Just think about it. How many people, when they're asked that question...

I talked to someone one time and I asked them how we got here. Who created us?

And the answer was that... And they were rather young and they said,

Mommy and Daddy told us that there was a big star and got together with a...

It was a man star and got together with a female star and that's how we got here. How did the stars get...

Again, if you don't start at the right place, you'll never get...

There was a saying at work that people always used to use. It says, if you always do what you always did, then you always get what you always got, right?

And if you start... And if you consider man apart from those three things, just those three things alone...

How did we get here? Why are we here? And what comes next? You'll never...

A Daddy star and a Mama star got together and all of a sudden, here we are.

To your point, just... Serendipity. Serendipity. It just went from chaos to, like I said, design and order.

But if you and I were to think about it, there's so much missing.

I mean, people want kids. As they're bringing their kids up, they'll start college funds. They'll push them for straight

A. And I'm not saying it's wrong. It's right, right? But you'll find some of them have the most foolish understandings and they push those understandings off on their kids to the point where, again, two stars got together or there was some slime in the universe at one point and that slime turned into gases and then the gases turned into a toad and the toad...

And we'd laugh. But not only is it ridiculous, people are gullible.

People are willing to sacrifice... Remember what we read in Romans.

They exchange the truth of God for the lie, right?

And that lie can be anything and usually is pretty extravagant.

Again, how many people will say that life started in the ocean without even the slightest bit of thought about where did the oceans come from?

It's so much easier being a Christian. So much easier.

No matter what, you carry on. You don't have to worry. Because you know

God's going to take care of it. That's exactly right. Every day you've got to think about when the stars are going to fall out.

You know what I'm saying? And that's what I was trying to say Wednesday. I'd put my head down on a pillow with no problem.

That's what I was trying to say Wednesday because that one scripture we looked at, and we're going to continue it again this Wednesday, the wicked are like the troubled sea.

They just cast up dirt and water. They cannot get it straight. And again, the

Bible makes no hesitation to call people fools and that it is much simpler, much more peaceful to know

I've been made by an infinite God and as we'll look at next week,

I know why I'm here. I'm here really to glorify Him and enjoy

Him forever. And I know where I'm going, just like Paul said. I know whom

I believed in. I'm persuaded that He's able to keep that which I've committed unto

Him against that day. And yet how many people, as they get closer to death, become more and more unraveled.

And yet we could say, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. We've got to stop.

Anyway, we'll pick it up next week. I want to answer the second question, and there's another set of scriptures that go with it about why we're here.