Sermon
Fallen Mankind - The Object Of God's Love
September 2-3, 2000
Pastor Donald Sheley

I'm going to ask you to take your notes today. You'll notice the format is a little different. The reason being is we've been taking an 8.5 by 14 sheet and holding it this way, and we don't have a folder that holds that way so all of our folding was done by hand. And the office needed some help so I designed it so the folding machine can fold it, but I'm also next week we're going to change it because people made some wonderful ideas of suggestions. We'll take this format and then down the side we're going to have an area that's wide opened for you to put personal comments, because as you know as we journey along through our notes I often deviate from the notes and people have wanted someplace to scribble in some extra notes. So next week that format will change, and I think we'll all appreciate it.

We've been talking now for a number of weeks on this great text of the Bible, For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. Now we're taking our time because we're taking it almost one word at a time. We talked about the God of love, and we talked about the love of God, and then we talked about that term - so loved. And we used, remember, the story of Gomer and Hosea. Now today I want to move our lesson along. God so loved the world. Let's just take those two words and think about them for our message today. In our previous lessons we've talked about the God of love and the love of God, and when the Psalmist was contemplating about the God of love he penned these words; the Lord executes righteousness and justice for all who are oppressed. He made known His ways to Moses and His acts to the children of Israel. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding mercy. He will not always strive with us nor will He keep His anger forever. He has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor punished us according to our inequities, for as the heavens are high above the earth so great is His mercy towards those who fear Him. As far as the East is from the West so far has He removed our transgressions from us. As a father pities his children so the Lord pities those who fear Him. Those are David's thoughts when he tries to describe the God who loves.

You know, I say this, but we have new people with us constantly. Every word of the Bible is precisely chosen by the Holy Spirit. When David pens, as far as the East is from the West, he chose that designation purposely. He didn't say, as far as the North is from the South, because you can only go so far to the North Pole and then you start south. There's a limitation, 12,500 miles. But you put your finger on the equator and start going West, how far can you go West? For eternity. David says that's the distance God's removed our transgressions from us. There is no limitation.

Now when Paul is thinking about the love of God he writes, who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written: "For Your sake we are killed all day long: we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter." Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Great words, so descriptive of God's eternal love displayed in the person of Christ. Now here is the core of our message, the God of love focused His love on fallen man. Our Scripture text says for God so loved the world, and the word world in the Greek is kosmos and it's often used in a pejorative way in John to speak of the realm of unbelief, and it's synonymous in such cases with darkness. Jesus says in His prayer: "I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world." So the term world, as here used, must mean mankind which, though sin-laden, exposed to the judgment, and in need of salvation, is still the object of God's care. God's image is still, to a degree, reflected in the children of men. Now I'm going to hurry along, skipping down a couple lines.

By reason of the context and other passages in which a similar thought is expressed, it is probable that also here in John 3:16 the term world indicates fallen mankind in its international aspect. That is, men from every tribe and nation; not only Jews but also Gentiles, it includes all mankind. So the world is the description of men and women who are absorbed with and committed to the evil system and values of this present earth. John writes: "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world." Jesus said: "What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, and forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?" James warns: "You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God." That's clear, isn't it?

Paul reminds the Christians at Ephesus: "And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience; Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others." Paul admonishes the Christians at Rome: "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world. Paul said don't take on the value system of this world, it's the value system of fallen man. James says, if you love this fallen system living in sin, you will not have a love for God in you. And thus, as fallen men, Paul goes on to tell us what we're like as the result of our sin, as the result of our fallenness. Look what it says in Romans 3:10-18. Now here's the description of the fallen man that God loves, for God so loved the world, the world is fallen man. Here's the description of us: "As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. Their throat is an open sepulcher; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: Their feet are swift to shed blood; Destruction and misery are in their ways: The way of peace have they not known, There is no fear of God before their eyes." That's the description of fallen man, of us.

Now I want to hurry because time hastens so I'm going to skip to Page 4. Right at the top of the Page I said this is Paul's description of the world, fallen man, the world that God so loved that He gave His Son to die for. So I'd like in the next five minutes to have a theology class. We're going to ask questions and then give answers. Now here's my point, if I'm the object, as a fallen man, the object of God's love, what else does the Bible say about me? Because God must have a reason to love me. Well let's go to question number one, why was man created? God did not need to create man, yet He created us for His glory. Isaiah says, even every one that is called by my name, I have created him for my glory, I have formed him: yea, I have made him. Paul writes to the Ephesians and says: "In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will: That we should be to the praise of his glory. Why did God create you? Why did God create me? So that in everything I do I bring honor and praise to my creator God. That's the reason why I'm here. That's the reason why you're here.

Now the next question, what is our purpose in life? Our purpose must be to fulfill the reason that God created us - to glorify Him. And when we are speaking with respect to God Himself, now that's a good summary of our purpose, but when we think of our own interests, we make the happy discovery that we are to enjoy God and take delight in Him and our relationship to Him. Secondly, what's my goal in life? My goal is not only to glorify Him, but to enjoy the possibilities of a relationship with Him as my heavenly Father. And that should be my goal in life, to enjoy, to grow in spiritual life so that I find pleasure and joy in the presence and in my relationship with almighty God.

Now we come to the third question, and here's the one that always fascinates me, what does it mean when the Bible says that we were created in the image of God? Well the fact that man is in the image of God means that man is like God and he represents God. When God says, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness", the meaning is that God plans to make a creature similar to Himself. Both the Hebrew word for "image" and "likeness" refer to something that is similar but not identical to the thing it represents or is an image of. The word image can also be used of something that represents something else. So, I'm at page 5 now, theologians have spent much time attempting to specify one characteristic of man, or a very few, in which the image of God is primarily seen. Now let's put our notes down here just for a minute. What I'm trying to say is that is a phrase that we've wrestled with. What does the Bible mean when it says we were created in the image, or in the likeness, of God? What about me makes me like God? So the theologians line up and say, I have an answer. One says, God is a Trinity - God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. If God is a Trinity then man is a trinity - body, soul, and spirit. So both of us are made as trinitarian in the sense that there is that composition within the oneness.

Now as a teacher, if I had a blackboard here, you have to just imagine along with me. So I'm going to draw a diagram and I'm going to show you what, I'm going to put that in diagram form. First of all I'm going to draw a great big circle, and out here I'm going to write body, human body. Now under that I'm going to write, the way we function is through our senses so I'll write down we smell, we taste, we touch, we have these functions that make this human body function and our world. That's my body, now, inside that circle I'm going to draw another circle, and out here are I'm going to put soul. And under soul I'm going to have three subheadings, the intellect, the emotion, and the will. Now that's what makes us who we are. The way we respond to life, our intellectual input that gives us reasoning and sets up the way that we handle problems, and our emotions, our dispositions. That's us. That's me. That's you, and that's why there's this vast difference. We come from different dispositions. We have different degrees and inputs in learning, and to as a result, we make decisions differently, we emotionally respond differently than each other, and we think differently. But that's my soul, that's me. That's what the psychologists call the id. But inside that circle is spirit. So when the theologian finishes that then the other theologian comes along and says, but when you do that you're a trichotomist. In other words, you believe in three entities. Then he says, I'm a dichotomist. You say, well what's a dichotomist? Well tri means that there's three and the dichotomist says, no, no there's just the body, and the soul and the spirit are the same. So immediately, what I'm trying to say is when you start trying to figure out what are some characteristics that are like God, it doesn't take very long before your illustration begins to break down because others will have a different opinion.

So let's go back to our notes. In the middle of page 5, not the middle but top third it says, When Scripture reports that God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness", it simply would have meant to the original readers, "Let us make man to be like us and to represent us." Let's carry that a little further. Dr. Gresham Machen was the great conservative theologian in Princeton University. I think it was during the '30s, and he fought to retain the conservative explanations of theology in that great institution and he wrote many books. But one of them was entitled THE CHRISTIAN VIEW OF MAN. And this is what he says about the image of God. "The "image of God" cannot well refer to man's body, because God is a spirit; it must therefore refer to man's soul. It is man's soul which is made in the image of the likeness of God. But what was there in man's soul, as he was created, which was like God? Well, God is a person, or, rather, three persons in one God, and man is a person, therefore in that man is like God. What a stupendous mystery that is. Here is man, a finite creature, product of God's creative hand, walking here upon this earth in a body made of the dust of the ground. Yet this being, so contemptible as he might at first sight seem, possesses the strange and terrible gift of personal freedom, and is capable of personal companionship with the infinite and eternal God. That the Bible certainly means when it says that God created man in His own image.

Now let's stop there. He is saying that one part of us, one aspect of our nature, that makes us like God is our ability to make choices. Have you ever thought what a wonderful gift that is that God gave to us? We do have our limitations, but when you think that we have this marvelous gift to make choices in life. And we use choice every moment of the step in the journey. Well that's a gift from God, but God has that freedom of choice. But He gave us the gift of choice, which is a gift, we can turn around and use it against Him - and we do! Because you can choose to love God or you can choose to hate Him and reject Him. It's part of our likeness that gives us the capacity to turn against Him, which man did, but it's still part of that image. Now Dr. Machen goes on in his next point and he says, "When the Bible tells us that man was created in the image of God, it means more than that man had personal freedom. That, indeed, is a necessary element in what the Bible means by the image of God; but that is not all that it means. The Bible means also that man is created like God in that he was good. God looks at everything when He finishes and says, it's good. When He looked at man He said it was good. So part of our image, the basic construction of our nature is goodness. It's marred and it's terribly deformed by sin, but basically our nature is. That's why unbelievers can be very nice people and do wonderful things, and good things. And thus, there's that goodness.

There is a teaching, and I have to pause here, known as total depravity. You'll hear some theologians speak of it. What do they mean by it? Well they're saying this, that man is not depraved in the sense that there is not some goodness, because the image of God is still here. I mean, marred, yes, distorted, yes, but there's still that basic nature which is there. Total depravity says that in the fall when man sinned man lost every ability to come to God. Because I drew the picture and showed you that in his basic nature, his intellect, his will, and his emotion. First of all, his intellect was blinded by the god of this world. This marvelous capacity that has amazed the students of the human body, this mind, God evidenced this great tremendous knowledge in the garden when He said to Adam, just name all the things in the garden. God gave man this massive capacity to understand Him, and what happened in the fall, that knowledge, the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them that believe not. We've been darkened. Paul says the natural man understandeth not the things of the spirit because they are spiritually discerned. What happened in the fall? This knowledge was terribly affected and man lost that ability to know God. His emotions were affected. Now he has the lust of the flesh - murder, deceit, and you get all that long catalog of ugly sins. And his will has been distorted because now he's at enmity against God. That's what the fall did to this glorious image.

Just quickly to page 6. There are two other aspects that make us like God. Look at in Colossians 3:10 Paul speaks of his readers as having put off the old man and as having "put on the new man which is renewed in the knowledge". So this matter of spiritual knowledge was a part of the image of God. It was lost at the fall. Look at the next one down, Ephesians 4:24, Paul writes: "that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness." So part of that original creation of man had to be righteousness and holiness. Well you say, Pastor what's that? How was that displayed? And here is I think how it was. One of the things about the experience in the Garden of Eden, before Adam and Eve fell, they were unaware of any physical naturalness. But as soon as they sinned, the first thing they did was recognize whatever was there is gone and here I am in all my nakednesses, my humanness. What was lost? And I'll tell you, it was His righteousness and His holiness. I believe that Adam and Eve must have been clothed with the righteousness and the glory and the majesty of God, because Paul says that's how we were created - in righteousness and in holiness. And the fall took that away, and man losing that mark of, that identity of God's righteousness and holiness, here's fallen man. His mind has been blinded by the god of this world. He has lost his ability to fellowship in relation with God. His life now takes on the twists and turns of the lusts of the flesh because his will has been turned evil. That's fallen man. That's us. That's the world that God loves. We who have so allowed sin to take us from His presence.

Now I want to come back, just quickly. Every parent here understands this. You look at your kids, and they say, they bear my image. And I have watched parents as the children grow up and the children then go off and wander into the pathways of the ugliness of sin. I don't care how far that child wanders, that parent still loves them because they have the marks of the image of the Dad and Mom. And I believe that that's why John wrote, as far as we have fallen and how far that has been, so marred and distorted by sin, yet God looks on us and says I love you. Is there a story to wrap it all up? Yes. It's found in Luke 15. It's the story of the godly dad and the wayward boy, you call it the parable of the prodigal son. I don't think we should give him that much attention, the emphasis really is on the dad. Here's what happened. Jesus tells the story. And this boy, in Jewish time, in that time, the father could divide the estate. He always gave the oldest son two-thirds of the estate, and divided the rest for the children. That was called the birthright. So this young boy comes to his dad and says, Dad, I don't want to wait until you die to enjoy your insurance policy, so I want you to go cash it in because I want my part now. You wouldn't think much of a son who did that, but here's the story. Dad gets his estate together, provides the portion that he owes to that boy, the boy runs off and lives in sin. I mean, he goes to the lowest depths. He's down feeding pigs and that's something no Jewish boy should ever be doing. You don't feed them. You don't eat them, why should you feed them? And here he is feeding pigs. He's fallen. Finally there's a little line in the story, it says and when he came to himself, that's the turnaround. He said, look at, at home my dad's servants are far better fed then I am here. I'm going to go home. And when I get home I'm going to say, Dad, I really am a bad boy. I ran away. I've disgraced your name, I mean, he's going to really apologize to his dad.

But there's the other side. There's dad that's at home. And I want some painter to paint this picture someday. Here's dad sitting on the front porch of the old farmhouse in a rocking chair rocking back and forth with binoculars because he knows one day that wayward boy may come home. Sure enough, one day the boy comes home and his dad sees him. He runs after him. The boy starts apologizing and the dad says, no, no, servants! run and get a robe for this boy. You see, in ancient times a robe was a designation of dignity. And he said now put a ring on his finger, and when you wore a ring that was your signature. When you stamped the ring on that seal of wax that was your authority. Give this boy some authority. He's my son, and you make sure you put some shoes on his feet. Well why shoes? Well in ancient times you could go to a household and you could tell the difference between a slave and a son. The slave didn't wear shoes, the son did. That's why our wonderful black people sing the great old spiritual, all of God's children got shoes, because they know that shoes are the mark of sonship. This loving father takes the son who has fallen so deep and lived his sinful life, and said Son, here's your dignity back, here's your authority, and your my son. That's the world and that's the father who loves, and that's the meaning of the phrase, for God so loved the world. That's you and me. Amen?

Father, we have fallen. We know it. We live with our fallenness all the time. We fight this spiritual battle of knowing that we don't glorify Your name. We don't bring honor to You much of the time. We know that. Some of us have been in the pigpen of sin too long. When You have such glorious purposes for us as Your created beings. Thank you dear God for loving us when we are so unlovable. And everybody said, amen. God bless you.