After the parents of the human race rejected the lifestyle of the Word (Who would later come to earth as Jesus Christ) they were driven from the Garden of Eden.  Following this the world experienced a population explosion and a wholesale rejection of God as their every thought, word and deed was evil continually (Gen. 6:5).  Only one man continued to serve God according to His Law.  For this reason Noah and his family were saved when God covered the world with water, thereby drowning all other living creatures.

After separating the three sons of Noah and sending them and their families into different parts of the earth they began to multiply and once again populated its surface with three races of people, each in its own geographic location and language.  Each group began to build their own cities, states and governments.  At this point the Word began to deal with a man named Abram whom He found to be trustworthy.  With this man, whom He renamed Abraham, He began to build a family of people with whom He would lead the world to Himself.  This family would be His “light to the Gentiles.”  “Gentiles” (nations, heathen) is the Biblical name given to those who are not part of the Abrahamic family.  Jesus Christ (the Word) promised Abraham that from him would come nations that would produce both material greatness and a Savior of mankind,  From Abraham came the nation known as Israel, meaning power with God.  Over time the fame of Israel’s God and his people spread throughout the known world.  Israel became the most powerful and blessed nation on earth.

As had most of those who had come and gone before her, Israel drifted away from her God (the Word Who would become Jesus Christ).  Many generations after her founding with the birth of Abraham and Sarah’s son Isaac, the nation called Israel found herself at the foot of Mount Sinai where their God came down in a display of fire, smoke and quaking earth.  From atop the mountain He spoke with Moses, the one He had chosen to lead Israel into the land He had promised Abraham his descendants would occupy.  The people of Israel promised this magnificent God that they would obey His “voice.”  He spoke to them His Ten Commandments, wrote them in stone with His own finger and placed them in an ark watched over by two angels.  So fearful was His voice that the people asked that He not speak to them directly, but that He relay His messages to them through Moses (Gen. 19:16-25; 20:1-19).

After He had delivered them from Egyptian slavery by way of many signs, wonders and miracles (1 Cor. 10:4), Christ’s chosen people rejected Him.  This seemed to be a common trait among the Israelites for they did it again many years later when they rejected Samuel as their leader.  Samuel could not be bought or persuaded away from the ways of the Lord.  The people wanted a king to rule over them, someone like themselves instead of someone like God, as Samuel was.  Samuel was distraught at being rejected by the people he had led so many years.  The Lord assured him that the Israelites had not rejected him, but had in fact rejected the Lord Himself as their Leader (1 Sam. 8:7).

Many generations later the Word would come to earth in the form of a man in order to lead mankind as one of them.  “And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the ONLY BEGOTTEN (at that time) of the Father, full of grace and Truth (Jn. 1:14).  The great God Who had created everything that existed chose to be conceived in the womb of a virgin by the Holy Spirit was born like every other human being having no superior powers except those He would gain through obedience to His Father.

This great God came to earth as a man like all other men in order to SAVE HIS PEOPLE FROM their sins, not IN their sins (Mat. 1:18-23) as we are told repeatedly by Satan’s false prophets.  The Word (the great Creator God) humbled Himself, gave up immortality, and came to earth to face what every man faces, and much more.  He knew that if He failed one time He would be disqualified as the Savior of mankind.  As He told John when He came for baptism, “… WE (INCLUDING JOHN) MUST FULFILL ALL RIGHTEOUSNESS ” as examples all men must follow in order to join him upon His return (Mat. 3:13-17).  Jesus–the Word, the God Who became a man–came to save those among mankind who would believe and obey His Words, which He received from the Father (Jn. 12:44-48).

The salvation Jesus promised obedient believers included the Gentiles (heathen) who would see and hear the “light” of His ministers, believe what they saw and heard and become spiritual Israelites by obeying His light (Law/Word/Truth).  Few, Jesus said, will do so in this life, thereby earning the right to join Him in New Jerusalem from whence He and they will rule the universe.  Read God’s Very Elect: Future Caretakers of the Universe.  Key word–Caretakers.  Jesus came to save “that which was lost”–MANKIND (Mat. 1-6,11).

STOP

Three days after His death, the Holy Spirit of God raised the God Who had become a man from the dead (Mat. 28:6).  This MAN sits at the right hand of the Father in heaven where He serves both man and God: “For there is one God (the Father), and one Mediator between God and men, the MAN Jesus Christ” (1 Tim. 2:5).  Did you catch that.  Jesus of Nazareth is still a man as He sits beside the Father in heaven.  This means that those who walk as He walked through this life will also, as men, become god-men in the Father’s coming kingdom.  God’s Very (human) Elect, upon being born again at Christ’s return, will become gods as Jesus (the human) became a God.  He had to return to His God status, as do those who will join Him on His throne (Rev. 3:21).  Why?  BECAUSE ONLY A GOD CAN ENTER THE KINGDOM OF GOD AND ENTER THE FATHER’S PRESENCE.  Read Jesus of Nazareth: God, man or God-man.  As Jesus told Nicodemus, flesh and blood cannot enter the Kingdom of God–not now, not ever.  The Kingdom of God, where the Father abides, is in heaven at this time.  That kingdom, and that God, will one day come to earth.  Recall that Jesus said to Him in prayer: “… Thy kingdom come (to earth in the future), Thy will be done (in the kingdom) ON EARTH (IN THE FUTURE) AS IT IS (AT PRESENT) IN HEAVEN” (Mat. 6:10).  L.J.