To the book of Genesis, Genesis one, verse 24 and and we'll be
in verse 24 to chapter 2, verse three.
Last week we just started a brand new series after finishing
the book of James. We just started Genesis last
week and we made it to verse 23. And this morning we're going to
pick right up in verse 24 all the way to chapter 2, verse 3.
So let's read the text, open us in a word of prayer, and then we
will jump into the sermon this morning.
Genesis 1, beginning in verse 24.
And God said, let the earth bring forth living creatures
according to their kinds, livestock and creeping things
and beasts of the earth according to their kinds.
And it was so. And God made the beasts of the
earth according to their kinds, and the livestock according to
their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according
to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
Then 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
birds of the heavens, and over the livestock, and over all the
earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God.
He created him, male and female. He created them and God bless
them. And God said to them, Be
fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and
have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of
the heavens, and over every living thing that moves on the
earth. And God said, Behold, I have
given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all
the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit.
You shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth,
and to every bird of the heavens, and to everything that
creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I
have given every green plant for food.
And it was so. And God saw everything that He
had made, and behold, it was very good.
And there was evening, and there was morning the 6th day.
Chapter 2. Thus the heavens and the earth
were finished, and all the host of them, and on the 7th day God
finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the 7th
day from all his work that he had done.
So God blessed the 7th day and made it holy, because on it God
rested from all his work that He had done in creation.
Should pray with me Father, as we continue to work our way
through the creation story. I pray this morning that you
would give us insight into this topic of your image.
What does it mean to be made in your image and and what
implications does that have for us and how we live?
What does it mean that you made male and female and what
implications does that have for how we live?
What does it mean that you rested on the 7th day and what
implications does that have for how we live?
So Lord, as we answer, as we examine these questions and
attempt to answer them, Lord, would you please give us insight
into your word and help us to discern what creation is saying
about you? Lord, I pray this in Jesus name,
Amen. We have a lot to get to, so I'm
going to jump right in. I'm going to give you the
context if you weren't here. Last week we started a new
series on Genesis. We got through Genesis one, one
through 5, and lastly we talked about the first five days of
creation. Let me recount those to you
before we jump in. On day one, God made light and
he made day and night. On day 2, God separated the
waters below and the waters above.
God gave us oceans and an atmosphere.
On day three, God made separated the waters and the land, and he
made all the vegetation for the land.
On day four, God made the sun and the moon and the stars and
the sky. On day five, God made marine
life and all the birds of the sky.
And this morning we're going to get to the last two days of
creation, Day 6 and day 7. So let's start with the next
edition of the text. My goal in this is to exposit
the word and bring out its meaning, and then I'll give us
application after that. So let's start looking at verses
24 to 25. And God said, let the earth
bring forth living creatures according to their kinds,
livestock and creeping things and beasts of the earth
according to their kinds. And it was so.
And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds,
and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that
creeps on the ground according to its kind.
And God saw that it was good. So last week we saw that God has
made animals for the seas. God has made animals for the
skies, but now he wants animals on the land.
He says let the earth bring forth living creatures according
to their kinds. He starts with livestock.
The Hebrew word for livestock there is behema.
That's where we get the word behemoth.
It's often translated as cattle, but it's actually a pretty broad
term. It can refer to any 4 legged
animal. You also make creeping things,
our favorite reptiles, amphibians, and vertebrae's,
snails, snakes, lizards, turtles, caterpillars,
armadillos, and bugs as well. And then he made beast of the
earth. These are essentially wild
animals as opposed to livestock. These are wild animals, Cougars,
coyotes, lions, tigers, bears. And notice the narrator
emphasizes once again. He says it twice.
He says it with each each category.
God made beast according to their kind.
God made livestock according to their kind.
God made creeping things according to their kinds.
That's important. Why?
This invalidates scientists theory of common descent that we
all descend from one Organism. That's not how it worked.
God made everything according to its kind and for the 6th time
God saw that it was good. Let's look at verse 26.
A thank God said let us make man in our image after our likeness.
Now this verse raises all kinds of questions, all kinds of
questions. Let's try to break it down into
four parts. Part 1 Let us let's catch that
he said us. Now we all know from elementary
school we took we all took grammar and elementary school
that us is plural is not singular.
God says, let us, who is us? Who is us?
There are many theories, but I'll boil it down to two main
theories here. A, God could be speaking with
the royal we or the majestic we, right?
Kings talk like this, right? King says, shall we tax the
people, right? That's how kings talk.
They, they talk with a royal we. That could be what God's doing.
Or B. This could be the earliest
reference to what we know as the Trinity.
The New Testament affirms that Jesus was active in creation.
Colossians 116 For by him all things were created in heaven
and on earth. All things were created through
him and for him. So that us here could be
referring to the Trinity. That's what I tend to go with.
But you may decide to go with the royal we.
That's the first part. Second part, Let us make man.
Let us make man. That the Hebrew word for man is
a Dom. It's a generic Hebrew word for
mankind. Let's let us make mankind.
It's where Adam gets his name from.
Let's be very clear about this. God made man.
We did not evolve from an ape. God made us.
God made us #3 in our image. In our image, there's the plural
again, our image. I want you to notice that so
far, God has not made anything in his image neither the sun,
the moon, the stars, the trees, the plants, the fruit, the sea
animals, the birds, the land animals.
None of it is made in the image of God, except humans.
There's even a question of our angels made in the image of God.
That's very debatable. I don't know, maybe, maybe not.
I tend to lend not. But the only thing on this earth
that is made in the image of God is you and me, humans.
Now this raises an important question, doesn't it?
What does it mean that God made man in his image?
We all know that. We've all read that, we've all
heard that in the Bible, right? But have you ever stopped to
actually ask yourself, what does that mean?
What does it mean that we're made in God's image?
There are at least a dozen different theories out there.
Typically, when you think of something being made in your
image, it means it looks like the person, right?
Like if you see a statue, you can tell whose image it's made
in, right? This is George Washington, this
is Abraham Lincoln, this is Michael Jordan, right?
Like typically if you see a statue, you can see that statue
is made in this person's image. But God is a spirit, so how can
we be made in the image of God? We are we are flesh, so how how
can we be made as God? Many scholars suggest that we
reflect the image of God this way.
We reflect his image in our morality, our our sense of right
and wrong, and our ability to reason.
Our spirituality, our ability to relate to God, our aesthetic
sense, our judicial sense, all of these are qualities about
humans that reflect God. That's different than everything
else. I like what Martin Luther
writes. He writes this.
Therefore, when we speak about the image of God, we are
speaking about something unknown.
For not only have we ceased to experience it, but we
continually experienced the opposite.
My understanding is that the image of God was this, that Adam
had it in his nature to love God, to believe God, to know
God. That's a good summary by Luther,
that to bear the image of God means the ability to love God,
believe God, and know God. And then #4 he says let us make
them after our likeness. Now there is considerable debate
as to whether image and likeness have different meanings, right?
Are those different or are they the same?
And I read way too much on this. After reading it.
I personally don't think there is much difference in meaning
here. I think that they were are
referring to the same thing essentially, maybe with some
nuance differences and so forth. Let's look at 26B.
Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the
birds of the heavens, and over the livestock, and over all the
earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.
God declared that mankind would have dominion over all that He
has made this word dominion means rule, to rule over, to
dominate, to direct, to lead, to control, to subdue.
God gave us dominion over everything.
He gave us dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds
of the heavens, over the livestock, over all the earth,
over every creeping thing. Now, I always found that verse
kind of ironic and funny because I often feel like we don't have
dominion. Growing up in the South, I
didn't feel like I had dominion over the mosquitoes.
Here in the Pacific Northwest, I don't feel like I have dominion
over the crows who continually tear up my grass.
And when we had the food bank years ago, I did not feel like I
had dominion over the rats running around.
No matter how much I tried to beat them, they won.
But as my boy Moses likes to remind me that humans have
killed far more sharks than sharks have killed humans.
Fair. Look at verse 27.
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God.
He created him, male and female. He created them.
The narrator adds A poetic line here.
The first two lines form a chiasm.
Chiasm was like ABBA, the emphasis being on the image of
God. You see that there?
But I want to highlight this last line.
Male and female, He created them, not man and woman, male
and female, two different words. I want to point out four truths
from this statement really quickly.
Number one, God made gender. God made gender.
Now, unless there's anybody in the audience who's saying who's,
there is no distinction between gender.
I'm just going to use the word gender.
But the world wants to separate sex and gender.
I I think that's a, that's an illusion.
They're one and the same. God made gender.
This is not a social construct. This is designed by God.
God made this number two. God made 2 genders, 2 male,
female, not 3, not 4, not 34. Two #3 Gender is not assigned at
birth, it is created by God. And #4 both male and female
reflect the image of God. I've heard some crazy theories
out there. People say men reflect 50% of
the image of God and women reflect 50% of the image of God
and together they both know they both 100% reflect the image of
God. Male and female equally are made
in the image of God, no more, no less.
They both reflect the image of God.
Look at verse 28. God bless them and God said to
them, Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it
and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of
the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the
earth. This is the second time that we
see this word blessed here. Both times come right before the
same command. We saw it last week.
Be fruitful and multiply. Just as God commanded the birds
of the heavens and the creatures of the sea to be fruitful and
multiply, so God commands humans to be fruitful and multiply.
Again, I want you to see the connection.
The reason that we are able to be fruitful and multiply is
because God has blessed us. That is why procreation is not a
result of anatomy or biology or physics.
It is a result of God's blessing.
God has blessed us with the ability to do this.
Now one question that people will sometimes have with this
verse be fruitful, multiply is this does this mean we are
commanded to have children? And some of you women are like,
man, if that's true, I didn't get married.
I don't. No children for me.
Does this mean we are commanded to have children?
That question is beyond the scope of the sermon.
But for now, for now, I'll say this.
If you are married and if you are able to have children,
procreating is typically God's will for your life.
Procreation is typically God's will for your life.
You can see me at Starbucks later if you like.
For a longer explanation, look at verse 2931.
And God said, behold, I have given you every plant yielding
seed that is on the face of the earth, and every tree was seed
in its fruit. You shall have them for food,
and to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the
heavens, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything
that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for
food. And it was so.
And God saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was
very good. And there was evening, and there
was morning the 6th day. We learn here that part of God's
reason to make all of this vegetation is for food.
Every plant yielding seed and every tree with seed in its
fruit shall be for food. So God gives us blueberries and
raspberries and avocados, broccoli and green beans and
sweet potatoes and walnuts and almonds and pecans and chickpeas
and black beans and lentils. God made enough vegetation on
this earth that only will humans have plenty of food.
So will the animals. I want you to notice, no meat.
No meat. God originally made all humans
to be vegetarians and all animals to be herbivores.
If there was anything, if, if there was anything good that
came out of the curse, it was meat.
Now, at the end of all of this, God looked at his creation.
He looked at Jupiter and Mars. He looked at the trillions of
stars. He looked at Mount Everest and
the lizard, the Pacific Ocean and the Sahara Desert.
And not only was it good, he said, it was very good.
And that was the 6th and final day of creation.
Now we often talk about the seven days of creation, don't
we? So what did God do on day seven?
Look at chapter 2, verses 1 to 3.
Thus the heavens and the earth were finished and all the host
of them, and on the 7th day God finished his work that he had
done. He rested on the 7th day from
all his work that he had done. God bless the 7th day and made
it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he
had done in creation. The heavens and the earth were
finished. Imagine how that must have felt.
I don't know if you have you ever worked on a project like
something you've been working on like for a long time and you
look at it and you when you're finished with your like God
finished this universe, Imagine how that must have felt.
God just made an entire universe and everything in it.
What is he going to do next? What do you do next after making
the universe? He rested on the 7th day from
all the work that he had done. The Hebrew word for arrested is
Shabbat. That's where we get the word
Sabbath from. It means to cease or to stop or
to come to an end. Now did did God rest because He
needed the rest? Was he worn out from creating?
No and by no means. The Lord does not get tired.
So why did He rest? I think He rested for the same
reason that He made night. God is teaching us to know our
limits. God is teaching us to know our
need. Forrest, the narrator, says that
God bless the 7th day and made it holy.
Now it's interesting. For the first time in history,
God makes something holy. This is the first thing that God
consecrates and makes holy. The 7th day is holy God.
God's rest on the 7th day will become the foundation for the
Sabbath for thousands of years to come.
And we'll stop there with exposition application.
I have 10 points. And yes, if you're visiting with
us, it is not an anomaly to have this many points of application.
I know it's common. Pastors have three points.
I've had as many as 1510 points of application #1 God made over
8 million different types of life.
To say something about himself, God made over 8 million
different types of life to say something about himself.
I was looking up on Gemini this week.
I've switched over to Gemini ChatGPT.
I've broken up with ChatGPT. It's giving me way too many
wrong answers. I've moved over to Gemini's.
We'll see if this relationship works out.
I was asking Gemini this week. How many different types of life
are there? 8 million.
Now that's not 8 million units of life, that's eight million
types of life types. Why did God make so many
different types of life? Surely it was to say something
about himself. Which raises the question, what
is it saying? What does life on earth say
about God? We have not found really any
life in the universe yet, and yet here on earth we have 8
million different types. What does this say about God?
I thought of four categories. I'll give them to you really
quickly. I thought of four categories of
how life points to God. A Our God is a God of order and
purpose. Our God is a God of order and
purpose. Just consider the food chain as
one example. One example, the food chain.
In the 1920s, wolves had been almost wiped out from
Yellowstone National Park. As a result of this, elk
multiplied rapidly in the park. Because there were so many elk,
they over grazed the trees and all the shrubs.
Now in the past 20 years, they reintroduced wolves into the
park and it kept the elk population in control.
As a result of the elk population being in control,
trees grew taller. As a result of trees growing
taller, Beavers were able to return, who then built dams,
which then increased ponds and wetlands.
The ponds and the wetlands supported otters and moose and
trout. The wolves also reduced coyotes
which allowed rabbits and rodents to return and all of
this, it's because of God's order and purpose.
Often we can look at the so-called wolves and our life
and think, I wish they were gone.
I wish they would be gone, but they serve a purpose in our life
because God made them for a purpose.
Our God is a God of order and purpose.
B. Our God is a creative God.
All one has to do is go out into nature and see how creative God
is, especially in a place like Washington.
Just go out into nature and you will be fascinated with how
creative our God is. I find it interesting that many
of the people in this world who find, especially in in Seattle,
many of the people who find religion boring, church boring,
God boring are some of the biggest nature loving people out
there. Isn't that interesting?
I always found that ironic because God is behind all that
creativity, all the things that you love about nature, God is
behind all of it. How can anybody be bored with
our God? See, our God is both strong and
tender. There's a feature in Scripture
called zoomorphism. Anthropomorphism is when we
ascribe human characteristics. God.
There's a feature called zoomorphism where we ascribe
animal characteristics to God. God is likened to an eagle, a
bear, a hen, a lion. Why?
Perhaps God gave us strong animals to say something about
his strength. And perhaps God gave us tender
animals to say something about his tender care.
And D, our God is a God of design.
God is the original architect. He's the original engineer.
Speaking of woodpeckers, God designed this bird with a built
in helmet. I mean, that's fascinating.
The birds got a built in helmet in its head.
Did you know that there is a desert beetle that has
hydrophilic bumps on its back that attract water out of the
air and it will beat up on its back and when it gets enough,
it'll then just slide down its back into its mouth and that's
how it lives in the desert. All of this means that God has
designed you and me too, exactly according to His good pleasure.
You have been designed by God to his perfect pleasure #2 Even the
mosquitoes, cockroaches, rats, snakes, and spiders were good in
God's eyes. When we go back to Alabama,
we're going back in June. Every time we go back, I forget
how bad the mosquitoes are there.
They were just bugs in general. One of the things I love about,
I mean, I know we have some bugs here, but it's nothing like
Alabama. Like it's bad.
Sometimes you can look down at your leg and there will be a
dozen mosquitoes on one leg. And I think, you know, when I
look at them, I'm like, how is this good?
God? I remember when we used to have
the food bank. Some of you have been here for
like many years. You remember we used to have the
food bank. It attracted so many rats.
There were dozens of rats running around in our parking
lot. 1 time I walked out of that door and as soon as I opened
that door, there was a rat the size of a small cat that ran
right across my feet. And I was like, how is this
good? How many things in this life do
we see as a pest to be eradicated when God sees it as
an opportunity to be sanctified? Everything has a good purpose.
Just as mosquitoes, cockroaches, rats, snakes, spiders, they all
have a good purpose and the eyes of the of God, so does sickness
and suffering and trials and waiting and persecution and
loneliness and testing all have a good purpose in the eyes of
God. It all has a good purpose in the
eyes of God #3 Creation points to intelligent design, not
random chance. Creation points us to
intelligent design, not random chance.
I'm sure many of you have heard of an argument.
An argument for there being a God, and not just a God, but a
creator God called Pele's Watchmaker.
Sure, many of you, if you've taken philosophy before
apologetics or something, you probably have heard of this
argument. For here's what he writes.
Imagine walking across a heath and striking your foot against a
stone. If you were asked how the stone
came to be there, you might reasonably answer that it had
lain there forever. However, if you found a watch on
the ground, the same answer wouldn't suffice.
Upon inspecting the watch, you could observe several specific
characteristics. A You could observe its
complexity. It consists of many intricate
parts, gears, springs, glass. B.
You could observe its precision. These parts are framed and put
together for a specific purpose and see you can observe its
purpose. The parts move in a coordinated
way to produce a specific result.
Pele argue that the watch's conveyance of design is so
obvious that even if we had never seen a watch made or
didn't understand how it worked, we would still conclude that it
must have had a maker who comprehended its construction
and designed its use. He further argues that the human
eye alone, just the eye, is far more complex than a watch.
I had this thought just hiking a few years back.
I was hiking in the woods and you ever see a bridge that's
been made in a hiking trail? Like the it's got like the
planks are all the same length. It's got nails in it, It's got
hand rails, right? Does anybody like come upon that
and think, look, look at what nature has given us that that
metal would just fall right inside and the plank, Who who
thinks that? Do we not realize that somebody
built this bridge and yet atheist look around at this
world and say, look, look at what billions of years have
given us. Is that not ludicrous?
There is such design in this universe that there must be a
designer, an intelligent designer.
Now, I understand this, right? Some of you may be thinking that
doesn't prove the designer is the Christian God.
You're absolutely right, Allah could be the Christian designer.
I mean the the intelligent designer.
Pele's argument does not prove Christianity, but it does point
to us that there is a creator, there is somebody behind all of
this, and now the question is who is it?
Who is behind all of this #4 Humans have the unique privilege
of burying the image of God. Humans have the unique privilege
of burying the image of God. Neither the sun, the moon, the
stars, nor mountains or rivers or trees or land animals or
marine life, or the birds of heaven, none of it bear the
image of God. You see, we can look at Mount
Rainier. You ever on a sunny day here,
right? You're driving down I5 S.
You see, you know you come across and also there's not
Rainier and it's there. It is in all its glory and all
its majesty, and yet it does not come close to reflecting God the
way that you and I do. God made the world to display
his glory. God made humans to display his
image. Now, as I mentioned earlier,
this debatable as to exactly what that means his image and
his glory. Let's be clear.
It's available as what exactly this means, but I think it
includes everything from our morality.
Our morality is is, you know, like animals don't have a sense
of morality. The lion doesn't like feel
guilty for killing the zebra. Our reason, our spirituality,
our relational nature, our aesthetic sense, our sense of
beauty, our judicial sense, all of it is what it means to be
made an image of God. These are not byproducts of
civilization. The world will say, well, these
are just byproducts of of thousands of years civilization.
No, they're not byproducts of the Enlightenment or the
Renaissance or the printing press or the scientific
revolution or modern psychology. These are byproducts of being
made in the image of God. That's how we got here.
Were made in the image of God 5 The image of God should impact
how we interact, treat, and speak with the lost world.
The image of God should impact how we interact, treat and speak
with the lost world we are currently.
The Renton small group is currently reading a book in our
small group called The Gospel Comes with a House Key,
practicing radically ordinary hospitality and a post Christian
world. Now, while there are many parts
of the book I don't like, and I would not recommend the book to
anybody, sorry if you like it. One of my biggest takeaways from
the book is how much she emphasizes that lost people are
made in the image of God. She emphasizes this point
wanting us to see that all lost people are made of them is God.
Now, we all know that to be theologically true.
Like, yeah, yeah, I know that Matt, we all know that to be
theologically true. But isn't it very easily to
practical to practically forget this truth when we come across
certain lost people who rub us the wrong way?
It could be the thief, could be the drug addict, could be the
homosexual, could be the reckless driver, or the
Democrat, or the Republican, or the sex offender.
We never want to excuse anyone's sin, especially egregious sin,
but we must remember that all lost people, all people bear the
image of God, and this should impact how we interact, treat
and speak with the lost world number six.
The reason animal attacks don't happen more often is because God
gave us dominion over the earth. The reason animal attacks don't
happen more often is because God gave us dominion over the earth.
And Exodus 8 to 10, Egypt was plagued with frogs, gnats,
flies, and locusts. You imagine if that was a
regular occurrence. You imagine if like once a year
we were plagued with gnats or flies or frogs or locusts.
We just dealt with it in numbers 21.
Six serpents came out and bit people, and many died.
Imagine we live in a world where, you know, it's like
snakes on a plane, snakes in a church, right?
We just got bit by snakes all the time.
Second Kings 224, two sea bears came out of the woods and mauled
42 boys. And second King 1725, lions came
and killed some of the relocated Assyrian people.
And in Jonah 117, a great fish swallowed a profit.
Why don't these types of things happen more often?
Because God gave us dominion over this world.
God gave us dominion of. Now I know very well that shark
attack still happen, right? That's why you won't find me in
the ocean ever. Mountain Lion attack still
happen and snakes still bite people.
But imagine if God didn't give us dominion over this creative
world. Imagine if he didn't give us
this. Every time I see how many crows
we haven't seen, ever knows how many crows we have in Seattle,
we've got an exorbitant amount of crows in the city.
Every time I see how many we have, I think about that Alfred
Hitchcock movie The Birds, where the birds just, like, start
attacking people. And I'm like, what if that was
our life? It is a good thing that God has
given us dominion over this world, something we should be
thankful for. Seven Gender is not assigned or
constructed, it is created. Gender is not assigned or
constructed. It is created when I sign up for
my health insurance every year on Washington Health Plan
Finder. It asked me my name, my date of
birth, and then it asked me for sex assigned at birth.
I always find that hilarious. So I'm like, assigned by who?
The doctors society? I mean, if it's assigned by the
doctors, what are the doctors like?
Like had told me when I was born, you're a female assigned
by doctors society, my parents who who, who is it assigned by?
Assigned means that there's an assignor who assigned this.
Now, of course I put mail there. I put mail.
But as much as I think that question is crazy, the next
question is this. Are you pregnant?
I already clicked that I am male and then it says are you
pregnant? I I've wanted to click yes many
times. I just want to see what it says.
I want to see what it does. We are living in very confused
times, aren't we? Not confusing.
Let's be clear on this. Not confusing.
There's nothing confusing here. Confused.
The world is confused. We see in verse 27 that God made
them. Male and female gender is not
assigned. It's not constructed by society.
It is created by God. That's what the Bible teaches. 8
Singleness is a blessing. Marriage is a blessing.
Children are a blessing. Some people think of singleness
as a curse, right? It's a curse to be single.
But both Jesus and Paul tell us that it was a blessing.
They actually say it's a gift that not everybody can receive.
You are blessed if you can receive it.
Some people think that marriage is slavery.
Why? Why would I willingly choose to
enslave myself to this person? The Bible tells us that marriage
is a blessing. He who finds a wife finds a good
thing. A prudent wife is from the Lord.
And some people think that children are a burden.
Do you know what it costs to raise a child in this world?
Do you know what it costs to raise two children or 4?
But children are not a burden, they are a blessing.
Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them.
When God made male and female, he blessed them.
And right after he blessed them, what did he tell them to do?
Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.
The ability to be fruitful, the ability to multiply is a
blessing from God. We currently have 6 examples of
this blessing in our church. 6 So let me say to you all very
clearly, whether you are single, whether you are married, or
whether you have children, they are all a blessing in their own
respective all of them. 9 There are few things that remind us of
the goodness of God, like food. There are few things that remind
us of the goodness of God, like food.
We now see that part of the reason that God made all of this
vegetation was for food, both for animals and for humans.
Consider how the food reminds us of the goodness of God.
Growing up, I had never really tried Indian food.
And when we moved here, we went to this place, we got a gift
card, this place called Naan and Curry.
Man I thought I was in heaven. If you haven't tried I don't
even know if it exists anymore but non and Curry it is good.
I had never really tried good coffee.
I always had like gas station coffee Folgers we moved here.
I have tried coffee man that reminded me of the goodness of
God. Same is true of apple cider.
This in in the winter time you get some apple cider doughnuts
as an apple cider and good. I had never tried Brussels
sprouts or green beans like I had here.
All of it showed me the goodness of God.
When the Bible says taste and see that the Lord is good,
that's true both spiritually and literally.
And #10 last point, the Sabbath as a law, as a law is no longer
binding for Christians. The Sabbath as an example to
follow should be strongly considered.
Let me say that again. The Sabbath as a law is no
longer binding for Christians. The Sabbath as an example to
follow should be strongly considered.
A full doctrine of the Sabbath is beyond the scope of the
sermon. I can preach the whole sermon on
that. This and the reason it would
take that while is because this is a highly debatable topic.
Scholars debate over this as to whether we are legally were
lawfully bound to observe the Sabbath or not.
As I have researched this topic over the past 20 years, I have
come to this conclusion and it's OK.
This is it's OK if you have a different perspective.
This is not a point to divide over the Sabbath as a law is no
longer binding for Christians. I believe this is made clear in
Colossians 216 to 17 and Romans 14, five to 9.
I believe that point is made clear in those two passages.
But the Sabbath as an example to follow should be strongly
considered and the example is set by the Lord.
I think the most common reason that people give for not taking
a Sabbath, not not resting one day a week, but the most common
reasons are I don't need the rest.
You know, I mean, I, I, I, I feel fine.
I work some days a week and I feel good.
I don't, I don't, I don't need the rest.
Or I could be more productive, right?
Think about it. I mean, that's one seventh more
productive. It's a lot or take an entire day
off. It seems like a waste, right?
I mean, when I'm not working, if I'm not doing something, I'm
just sitting around just like twin my thumbs and I'm like, no,
I'm just wasting time. And I would just remind us all,
God didn't need the rest. The argument is I don't need the
rest. God didn't need the rest.
God did not feel the need to be more productive, and God didn't
think it was a waste to create in six days and rest on one.
He didn't find that to be a waste, and neither should we.
Brothers and sisters, the Lord's Day is still holy unto the Lord.
We should treat it as such. Let's pray.