The Purpose of Man, What We Believe, Part 19

The Creation of Man and the Purpose of Human Life

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God's will is seen different ways. There's an aspect of God's will where He lays out a plan. And part of what we'll see in Scripture is He does have a will that He is going to make happen. But He makes these things happen by working through people.

Welcome to The Wrap Report with your host, Andrew Rapoport, where we provide biblical interpretation and application. This is a ministry of striving for eternity in the Christian podcast community. For more content or to request a speaker for your church, go to StrivingForEternity .org.

Welcome to another edition of The Wrap Report. I'm your host, Andrew Rapoport, the president and executive director of both Striving for Eternity and the Christian podcast community, joined by my sidekick here, Bud the Wiser.

How are you, sir?

Greetings. I'm wonderful. Thank you for having me today.

So Bud may be a voice you're hearing if you listen to the Christian podcast community because he now has two of his own podcasts because he's just not busy enough. The Bud Zone, where he does lots of interviews, and a really bad one coming up and, you know, just released, I think.

So sorry about that, folks, if you're listening. Skip that last one.

It hasn't dropped yet. It's closed.

Well, it hasn't dropped since we recorded it. By the time this drops, it'll have just dropped.

By the time this drops, yeah. I gotcha.

Then we have your other one is Truth For You with your pastor, Andrew Smith and the preaching ministry. It's really his. It's his, but you're the guy that interviews him, so you guys do all the... I mean, all he does is preach and then show up to a microphone and talk.

You guys do all the hard stuff, right? Yeah. Like preaching, that's just easy, right? Well, what we're going to do today on The Wrap Report is to continue our study looking at the doctrine of man. There's a lot in this.

We're going to get into some issues. Well, we're going to get into some issues of the creation of man. I know there's nothing there that's disputed at all, just a little maybe. Some people believe in some theories like evolution.

Then we're going to get into what kind of the nature of man. What does it mean when we say that man is sinful? Is he born that way? These are the things that we're going to have coming up for you today on The Wrap Report.

But before we do, I want to let you guys know of two big announcements. We have an Israel trip coming, Striving for Eternity and CARM, Christian Apologist Research Ministry, Matt Slick. He and I are going to be hosting a tour to Israel in February 2023, from February to the beginning of March.

And so it is a 13-day Israel trip. There's a lot of information about this trip, and I do not want to take all the time to tell you that here, so I'm going to give you the website to go to. Go to 2023israeltour .com.

2023israeltour .com. You'll get all the details there. It is an expensive trip, and I get that. It's about $5 ,000 if you fly with us, a little over $4 ,000 if you don't. Now, if you do sign up, just know that we're trying to keep the cost down.

However, it's just an expensive place to go. So what's included? If you fly with us, either out of New York or LAX, your flight would be included in that price. But your hotels, the bus driver, the bus, the guide, you have to have an Israeli guide there.

We have an archaeologist that is coming with us that's going to be joining us for parts. That actually gets us in some areas where you need someone like that to be able to go see certain sites. So it's going to be 13 days.

Your breakfast, your dinners are included. One lunch is included. The hotel's all included. So I know it's expensive, but it is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and this will change the way you read your Bible.

So I really encourage you to go to 2023israeltour .com. Another thing is, if you are looking to evangelize specifically to Mormons, we are running a sale on the book Sharing the Good News with Mormons.

If you pick it up at strivingforeternity .org, we're giving 35 off when you use the coupon code LDS. It stands for Latter-day Saints. Now, you say, well, I really don't evangelize Mormons. Well, there's 24 of us that authored this, all taking a different tactic on how to evangelize, and many of them are good for anybody.

My tactic that I wrote on is open-air evangelism, and you'll see in there you could use that anywhere, not just with Mormons. So a really good book to have on hand. It gives you lots of great ideas for starting conversations to share the gospel.

So I encourage you to get the book Sharing the Good News with Mormons at strivingforeternity .org at the store, and use the coupon code LDS. Well, Bud, let's get into our topic for today. What we're doing is going through the section on Striving for Eternity's website, What We Believe, that folks, if you want to follow along, just go to strivingforeternity .org.

Hit the About button under there. You'll see What We Believe. Open up the section on the doctrine of man, and we're going to read the second and third paragraphs here, and we're going to hope to get through all of this, because they're packed with a lot of stuff here that's going to open up some discussion.

Yeah, they really are. The second paragraph is one sentence, so I'm curious to see if we'll make much progress through that.

You're saying we might just get one paragraph because it's that packed.

We might get one sentence done, but, you know, this might be highly exegetical. Here is the What We Believe, beginning paragraph two. God's intention in the creation of man was that man should glorify God, enjoy God's fellowship, live his life in the will of God, and by this accomplish God's purpose for man in the world.

Parenthetically, you reference Isaiah 43, 7, Colossians 1, 16, and Revelation 4, 11. Paragraph three. The sin nature is that reality that has been imputed directly from Adam to every individual since Adam, except Jesus Christ, referencing Romans 5, 12 through 19.

The whole human race exists seminally through Adam as the head. Thus, there is a seminal universality of humanity. The nature that each person, with the exception of Christ, possesses is the sinful nature passed on from Adam to each generation.

By this nature, all men are guilty with race guilt through Adam. The sin nature is inherited, and each person is guilty at the point of conception.

Creation, Evolution, and the Scientific Record

Okay, so as we look into this first part, God's intention in the creation of man, so we could just stop right there, what are we saying? This is eliminating the idea of evolution. People will say that evolution is a natural process.

Now, those who would believe in what is referred to as theistic evolution, in case you ever hear that term, is the idea that God used evolution to create man. But what is evolution? Evolution is the idea that there's natural processes that could occur in what we do see is adaptation.

Now, this would be considered evolution as well. So let me give some specific terminology, and I'm going to define them so we can use these when discussing with folks. Christians will often talk about terms of microevolution and macroevolution.

Those terms really would be, scientifically, they're referred to as special evolution or general evolution. So special evolution or microevolution is what we see in science. We see small changes. We have DNA of a mother and DNA of a father.

As they have offspring, the offspring gets a combination of DNA. If there is a trait within the DNA that is stronger, that gets passed on to the children. If there's one that's weaker, it could lose that information.

This is one of the things we know with DNA. You lose information. You say, wait a minute, Andrew. You're saying there's no way to gain information in the DNA. Well, actually, yes, there is. There is a way to gain information in the DNA, and the way that that is is through a mutation.

So mutations do occur. We get additions to the DNA, and basically, you have to remember, mutations are most often harmful. And so those are that we end up seeing this special evolution or microevolution.

And what people extrapolate is that the fact that we see it in these small changes must mean that general evolution or macroevolution must also be true, that you can actually see one kind of animal change into another kind of animal.

In other words, you start with two pairs of wolves. You put one up in Alaska and one in the Sahara Desert. What's going to happen after many generations is those in Alaska are going to lose the information for short hair.

Why? Because the short-haired dogs are going to die out earlier. And so the trait that's going to be passed on is long hair, opposite in the Sahara. So you end up seeing that that is a loss of information that can occur.

That is special or microevolution. What we don't expect is that at some point a dog gives birth to a cat. Now, I like to word it that way, folks, because when you're talking to people that believe in evolution, they'll say that that's ridiculous.

Well, actually, what they usually say, the way I word it to make it really be ridiculous, is I don't expect to kiss a frog and it become a prince. That's a fairy tale. Give it millions of years instead of a kiss and we call it evolution.

Therefore, evolution is a fairy tale for adults. But you think about that. A frog should be able to give birth to a human being over millions of years. And people will say, well, that's not the way it worked.

No, no, but it could be that way, can't it? Because their idea in this natural process is frogs would just be reproducing and they would gain information that would eventually lead to different types of animals, kinds of animals, to eventually become human.

Now, it's amazing that when you word it that way, the evolutionists tell you you're being ridiculous. And yet that is actually what the process is, that one type of animal can become another kind of animal.

Now, I'm saying kind because that's the biblical terminology. In scientific terms, it would be in the family level, roughly about that. But we have the dog kind and the cat kind and things like that, and we don't see the mixing of them.

We do see many different types of cats. But we don't know where it started. But what we do know is that they all have certain elements that are watered down from the original parents. So what is it saying when it says God's intention in the creation of man?

Well, this first states that God created man. He's the one that did this. This wasn't through a process, a natural process. So people say theistic evolution. They're trying to say God used the natural process.

That can't be. God didn't use the natural process. He created. He directly created Adam and Eve. And so the first thing that this, just mentioning the creation of man, eliminates the idea of a natural process, which eliminates both theistic evolution and evolution.

Now we're dealing with the biblical view. By the way, folks, if anyone ever challenges you when it comes to the creation of the universe or the creation of man, just remember, scientifically, there is only one source that we have for the creation of man.

Why do I say this? Because, well, when it comes to science, we use the scientific method, which means you have to be able to create a scenario. You have to be able to observe the scenario, and you've got to record that and be able to repeat it.

Well, let's see. Who was there when man was created? Oh, God. And he wrote it down in the Bible. And he not only created Adam, but he created Eve. So he even repeated it. So the only scientific source we have for the creation of the universe or the creation of man is Genesis chapters 1 and 2.

So if people want to appeal to science, they actually can't appeal to the scientific method for their arguments. They're appealing to a historical science, what they believe back in history based on what they see today.

We have the only scientific record of the creation of the universe and the creation of man in Genesis 1 and 2. So right off the bat, by saying that God created man, we're eliminating certain things in this doctrinal statement.

This is what the doctrinal statement is here for, to say not only what we do believe, but eliminate what we don't. But now notice, God's intention, God had a plan. Now, I know, folks, I get it. There's many who, you know, but I'm sure you've seen the gospel tract, and many of you listening, you've probably seen it.

God had a hole in his heart. Well, okay, they don't say it that way. Right? You had the God-shaped hole in your heart, but is it really that God created man because he needed fellowship? Oh, my goodness.

Did God need any fellowship?

Did God need man? Let me think. This is a hard one, Andrew. You're not supposed to give me these difficult questions. No.

Not at all. No, God does not need us. God had fellowship within the Trinity. He created us to put his attributes on display. He just chose to. He didn't have to, but he did have an intention. What was God's intention for creating man?

Now, some would say, well, God's intention was to make us suffer because there's suffering in this world. Well, suffering in this world comes with God giving Adam and Eve the free will to choose. We'll get to that in the next paragraph, what that actually means.

Maybe if we get to it this week. You might. But, folks, Bud does not believe we're going to get through one sentence if you haven't picked up on this, and there's a chance he's right. But what we end up seeing is that God had an intention, and it was not to make man suffer, but that comes with not being a puppet, by the way, folks.

If God didn't give us a will to choose to sin, we would be puppets. That would be the argument then. We have no choice. God gave us a will. But what was the purpose of it? Well, we say here, God's intention in creation of man was that man should glorify God.

That's the first thing. Some of you may be familiar with catechisms, where it's a question-answer type of thing where you train children. And the shorter catechism asks, what is the purpose of man? And it is to glorify God.

This is right where we're getting this from. And this is the first thing, because this sets everything in place, folks. People have asked me why I think the Church is so anemic in our culture today. This is the answer, right here.

Because people have lost what God's intention for man is. God's intention for creating human beings was not to glorify human beings. It is not to glorify self. It's to glorify God. That is our purpose.

Our purpose is that you and I would glorify God in everything that we do. Now, that radically changes a lot of different things. It should. It should radically change the whole way you think about life.

Definitely change the way people go about church. Now, Bud, I know you're in a solid church, but I also know you've been in other churches. Have you been in churches where most of the singing, where you're supposed to have the time where you're singing praise to God, and most of the songs are about self?

Oh, yeah. Oh, my goodness. That's one of the things I think you and I talked about. You really don't even have to wait for the preacher to get to the pulpit, if there is even a pulpit in some of these churches, rather than just a stage.

You really just need to listen to the music, and you can tell immediately what kind of environment you're in. Is it one that's worshiping in reverence before God, and you're worshiping God? Or is it one that's, wow, this is an experience about me and for me and designed for me?

No, that's not what worship is. You can call it worship, but it's not.

Even some of those songs, what you end up realizing is the songs that are about God are about what God did for me. Yeah, yeah. So understanding why God created us, this ends up changing even the way we're going to look at church.

What are we going to sing? How are we going to view life? Our life is to glorify God. Isaiah 43 .7 says, Everyone who is called by my name and whom I have created for my glory, whom I have formed, even whom I have made.

Now, notice the way that Isaiah is saying this. What's grounding this? It's the fact that God created us. That gives him the right to say, I've created you for my glory, and therefore that is our purpose.

He's the creator. He gets to dictate why he created us.

Yeah, and I would just add to that, kind of tagging on to the comment that you made that that reality, that this was the intent of God to glorify himself. Certainly you can go back and look at Genesis 1, like 26, in my image.

So there's a lot inherent in the image that a man is made in, in the image of God. But that it ought to affect every part of our life. Paul in 1 Corinthians talks about whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all of it for the glory of God.

Verse 31, I think. But everything about our life should be done for the glory of God, to the glory of God, in light of the glory of God.

And it's because he's the creator, right? That's what gives him that right that he deserves the glory, because some people argue that this seems selfish. God is selfish. He wants all the glory for himself.

But he has that right. Just like a parent has the right—. Sorry, government, sorry, I know you think you have the right to own children, to tell children what to do. You know, Disney thinks they have the right to tell our children, you know, what to do or how to live.

The reality is parents have that right, because the children are the offspring of the parents. That's what gives the parent that right to instruct their children. It's not the government's role. It's not the village role.

It's the parent's role, okay? It's not Disney's role or anyone else's. It's not the teacher's.

It's the parent's role. This is a statism-free environment. Yes.

I mean, but you see how understanding this, it radically changes the whole way of people's thinking, right? A statist type of thinking is, well, it's for the betterment of the state. But where does the state get that right?

They don't. The parents have that right by being the parents. God has that right because he created us. Colossians 1 .16 says, For by him all things were created, both in the heavens and the earth, visible, invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities.

All things have been created through him and for him. Everything that's created has been created through him and for him. Because it was created through him, that's why it's created for him. So God has the right to demand from us that we glorify him because he is our creator.

In Revelation 4 .11, Bud, that you referenced earlier when you were reading it, states this, Worthy are you, O Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and because of you will they exist and were created.

Notice how John is explaining this in Revelation. He is rooting it in the fact that because God created all things, that gives him the right to receive that glory because everything that exists, exists because of him.

Because he created it. So when we talk about God's glory, this is essential to understand. It's essential to understand because if you get this wrong, we were mentioning, you look at the applications with the statists.

What's the problem that they have? The problem that they have is they have this idea, who owns the children? The state rather than the parent. And that is a core issue that becomes something that causes such a divide that we have even in our country right now.

Is the question of who has the right to instruct the children? Now look, I don't agree with the way some people instruct their children. However, it is their children. They're not my children. Now, if it's coming to where they're abusing the children, I think we need to stand up.

By the way, folks, when you're trying to teach a five-year-old about sex, you know, all this stuff going on with genders, I put that in the category of abuse. Okay? It's grooming. That's what it is.

And so what we end up seeing is as we look at this stuff, we have to be aware that the parent has that right because they're the parent. And we get into all kinds of issues when we don't realize that we were created for the glory of God, but not just the glory of God.

But that is the necessary starting point to understand the rest of this. To understand the rest of what we're going to argue here, if you don't have this part right, you're going to have problems in the next.

And this is why when we're joking about the gospel tract, that I argue that God has a human-shaped hole in his heart. Yeah. Because that's really how they word it, that, oh, God needs our fellowship.

If your starting point is man and glorifying man, even though no one ever says it that way, then you're going to come to the point that God had a need, and God needed man. When your starting point is that we were created for God's glory and God didn't need us, then when we get to the next section, which is that God's intention in the creation of man was that he should glorify God.

Second one, enjoy God's fellowship. Now, notice how this is worded. And this is a key. This is worded very specifically. It's God's fellowship that man enjoys, not man's fellowship that God enjoys. That's a huge distinction there.

We did not put that in there lightly because we're, again, trying to address this whole idea of who is at the center? God. God is the one that's at the center. And so it's God already has the fellowship within the Trinity, and he does not need man's fellowship, but he created man to enjoy the fellowship he already has within the Trinity.

He's welcoming us into that fellowship. It's not that he needs the fellowship with us. Folks, I don't know how much clearer I can put this, but maybe you could think of a way. God? Well, let me ask it in a question.

What does God need? The answer? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. God doesn't need anything. He is. We need him. He doesn't need us. And so when we look at the fact that we enjoy God's fellowship, it's the idea that God already has that fellowship.

We get to enjoy that. Right? So back to the catechism question. What's the chief end of man? Let's test Bud here. You're the Reformed guy. You should know all these catechisms, right?

Oh, well, you know. Yeah, to glorify God and enjoy him forever.

And that is exactly what we're listing here, is that shorter catechism answer. Right? So the glorifying of God, enjoying him forever. We enjoy him forever because we first glorify him. And we can't glorify him until, well, we'll look at the doctrine of salvation in months to come.

But we have to first be his children, which not all of us are. I know this surprises folks sometimes, but I don't know if you've run into it. I know I've run into it, especially with Mormons who will say, well, we're all God's children.

Yeah. That's not what John 1 .12 says. But to those that have the right to be called the children of God, well, who has the right to be called the children of God? Those that believe in his name. Not by blood, not by, you know, so it's not by your works, your genealogy, your wishful thinking, but of God.

It's God who does that. And so what we end up seeing is we were created for fellowship, but a lot of people think that we are created for the fellowship that we share as human beings. And that's not actually what we're saying here.

We're saying that we get to enjoy God's fellowship. He created us so that, yes, we get to fellowship with one another, but that's just a foretaste. For the believer, the best relationship we can have here on earth is just a foretaste of what that fellowship with God is like.

And that's what we are created to do is to enjoy his fellowship. So glorify God and enjoy him forever is covered. But anything you want to add on the fellowship?

No, I think you've covered it. The important point is that God did not need us, and this is grace given to the creation man to enjoy him. It's not reversed.

Correct. And getting this, we're kind of pounding this, folks, for a reason. If you get this wrong, you get a whole lot of other things wrong. There is a whole lot that we see in Christianity right now where the focus has become on getting a big church, having numbers in the church, trying to get those numbers up there.

And because of that, what ends up happening is they're sitting there, and instead of saying, what glorifies God, it's how do we get people into the pews? And so that radically changes the way we do church.

That's going to then affect the way you're going to live your life, because a church that's focused on just getting people in the door to get big numbers in there so we can get a big budget and be able to do more things for God, well, if you have left that first issue, is anything else you're going to do, you're really going to be on the right path?

I mean, you're doing all this and we're going to do this so we can do the work of God, but the work that God has for you to do is to glorify him. And so you just skip that initial thing. Yet you're on a road.

You're just on the wrong road because your starting point was off. Once you got onto the wrong path, it doesn't matter how long you go on that path. You're just still on the wrong path. The path that God has for us is that we glorify him.

And so everything we do should be on that path, saying that we start with that. So if you don't have a big church, okay, are you glorifying God? That's the question, because once you have people in the church who say, well, we got to get people in here, well, what are we going to do?

Well, we're going to come up with music that's going to get people revved up and they're going to feel good. Okay, okay, that's good. But not everyone sings really well. Okay, well, we need some people up there on stage that they're going to be the ones to do the singing because that way everyone feels good.

And if you don't sing well, you could just sit there and listen to them sing and get the emotional vibe going. Yeah, feeling good. But then what's going to happen when you come to the sermon? Well, a sermon can't be that convicting because you just got all the emotional vibe going good because we got to get people in the pews.

So what's going to happen when you start doing convicting message? Well, that's going to totally kill the vibe. So what do we got to do? We got to be motivational speakers. You see, Joel Osteen has a lot of people in those pews.

Well, they're not really pews, but in the chairs. Yeah, in the chairs. But they're not glorifying God because it may get people motivated. It may do wonders for people's emotions. But what it isn't doing is what God calls them to do.

And that's the difference. We're emphasizing here that the necessary starting point is that we were created to glorify God. Everything else follows from that. Everything else flows from that. So before we get into the next one, we'll take a time just to give a word to our sponsor, MyPillow.

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Gravity. Yeah. But I can confirm it is a wonderful night of sleep. All right. So as we get back to this, the first thing that we were created for, God's intention was we were created for His glory, so we would glorify Him.

Second, that we enjoy His fellowship. A third is that we live to live His life in the will of God. So we are to live, in this case, our life, right? Man was created to live his life in the will of God.

So there's two things here. One, God's will comes before our will. Now, you are going to have that sense if you start with that we're created to glorify God. If that's not your understanding, then you're not going to be looking to God's will first.

You're going to look to our will. Now, this enters a question, though. So, Bud, let me ask you. When we talk about the will of God, this gets into an interesting dilemma for some. Some people say, well, if God has a will, that means He must be either controlling everything, so He determines everything and we have no say in anything.

It's just God's will just forces everything. There's those that will go to that extreme. There's those that would say that, well, if God wills something, like He wills all men to be saved, it means that all men will be saved even if He doesn't force it to happen.

And then there's some who will say on the other extreme that, well, God has a will, but it's just kind of wishful thinking. He doesn't really have a plan for it. He doesn't really know how it's going to happen.

It's just His desire. Which one of those or none of those would you say are right? What is this idea of a will of God?

Well, you wrote your doctrinal statement, but my presumption would be that what you're speaking to there is the decorative will of God. He has given us decrees. He has given us instructions because I thought when you were speaking to this, you're going to go off into.

A lot of people think this is sort of navel-gazing mysticism, and that's how I determine what I feel God wants me to do. And I had a vision or I got a dream or, you know, not at all. He's given decrees.

He's given ordinances. He's given laws. He's given mandates and commissions and instructions. And all of that is in the revealed Word of God. So you have to go to Scripture to determine how do I live my life according to the will of God?

That's it.

God's Will, Human Choice, and Superintending

Yeah. We first have to know that God's will is seen different ways. There's an aspect of God's will where he lays out a plan, and part of what we'll see in Scripture is he does have a will that he is going to make happen, but he makes these things happen by working through people.

There's times where he will lay things out knowing the way people are. I talked about this last night. I was with a couple, and they were a young couple. They're thinking of having children, discussing kids and raising kids, and one of the things I said is that when our children were little, we told them what to do.

Our will became their will because we're the parents. But as they got older, we changed that because we wanted them to think and make choices on their own. So I told the story of how my son at one time, he wanted an allowance.