Title: God Made You - Read The Label
Bible Book: Genesis 1 : 27
Author: J. Mike Minnix
Subject: Creation; Made in God's Image; Life, Source of; Evolution
Objective:
God Made You - Read The Label
Dr. J. Mike Minnix, Editor, www.pastorlife.com
Introduction
Genesis 1:27, "So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them."
You can learn a lot about a product or item you purchase by simply reading the label, but beware because there are some crazy statements on labels and product instructions these days. I suppose the companies making and selling these products are trying to avoid legal issues and lawsuits by placing odd instructions on labels and documents for their merchandise. For example …
- A Wheelbarrow contained the following instruction: Not Intended For Highway Use.
- A Baby stroller directed the buyer to: Remove Child Before Folding.
- A Dog Medicine label read: Use Care When Operating A Car! (I haven’t seen a dog operating a car lately, have you?)
- A label on a Hair Dryer stated: Do Not Use While Sleeping.
- A Microwave Manual read: Do Not Use For Drying Pets.
Let me share one more:
- The Label on an Iron read: Do Not Iron Clothes While Wearing Them. When I read that one and figured there are some people who have actually tried to remove a wrinkle quickly by using an iron while wearing clothes. Don’t raise your hand if you are one who has done that!
What if God had put a label on you when you were created, what do you think it would have said? Perhaps it would have read: “Not Safe In Most Situations!”
Actually, the Bible is God’s manual for human beings, and we can state that is the human's user manual. Like the user manuals for most products, few people read God’s user manual for people. Sadly, most only read it when life has fallen apart, and by that time the person learns that following God’s instructions was the only way to have avoided the disaster in the first place.
Genesis 1:27 is a beginning statement about who we are, how we got here and what our lives are all about.
First, let us take note of …
I. The Blueprint From Which We Were Made
What blueprint did God use when He created mankind? When He created the Universe and our earth, he simply said, “Let it be,” and it “be-ed.” That is the way it reads in Hebrew. “Let it be, and it be-ed.” He said it and it became. However, we note in verse 26 of Genesis, chapter 1, that God held a counsel before he made the first humans. What did God say in His triune nature?
A. You are Made In the Image of God
He said, “Let us make man in our own image.” There was a counsel within the Godhead – the Trinity - concerning our nature.
Be sure to note that the Triune God made human life. God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit was involved in our genesis.
Genesis 1:21 states, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Then, in verse 1 of chapter 1 the Bible states, “The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.” So, there is the Father and the Spirit involved in Creation. But, note John 1:1-3, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.” There is the Son of God involved in creation. And, when it came to you and to me, God counseled and said, “Let us make man in our image.”
You have a label on your soul that says, “Made by Almighty God.” You are not an accident. Sometimes you will hear someone say, “My parents said I was an accident.” Well, your parents might consider you an accident in conception and in upbringing, but God says you are made in His image – you are no accident. After you get here you will create some accidents, but you are not an accident.
Being made in the image of God means that you have characteristics that are different from all other creatures on earth. These characteristics are observable and demonstratable. For example, you never saw a herd of cows singing the Hallelujah Chorus. Again, you never in your life saw a Mona Lisa painted by an Ostrich. You will never see a family of gorillas designing an automobile. As creatures created in God’s image we have a creative nature in our very genes. You were made by the creative God and thus you have a desire to create as well.
As a humanbeing you are different in your ability to learn. There are no colleges for collies. There are schools for squirrels. Animals can only learn by instinct, but you learn by intellect. You got that from God.
Your hand is different from all other creatures, for your opposing thumbs make you able to do things no other creatures on earth can't do. Your bone structure is different. You can stand erect and walk erect and sit comfortably with your legs crossed. That is because you are made differently than all other creatures.
A fabulously distinctive feature in the human is his face. Look at the expressions you can reveal by merely moving your eyebrows, your lips and even your forehead. If you look at an ape in front of you, you don’t know if he wants to hug you or hurl you over a banyan tree. Humans show emotion and feeling in their countenance. God made you to be like that.
B. You are Made By the Hand of God
God made you with more than mere words. He didn’t simply say, “Let man be,” but rather scooped up the earth and using the elements he had made, and with them he formed Adam. And what an amazing universe exists in your very being. We are told by scientists that 99% of our bodies is made up of six elements: Oxygen, Carbon, Hydrogen, Calcium, Nitrogen and Phosphorus. Yet, you have an additional five elements. In other words, you have eleven elements existent in your human body. As humans we have discovered 120 elements – with Unbinilium being the latest one discovered, though some new elements may surely be uncovered. To tell you how old I am, there were only about 96 elements on the periodic table when I was in school. So, you young students are required to memorize more elements than we were – sorry about that!
Now, back to what I’m sharing – you are a miracle. You are made up of simple stuff – the stuff that is on this earth. God made you from it. Yet, you are designed so that no other creature can match you in intelligence. God made you a little lower than the angels but far above all other living things. You are made by the Hand of God.
C. You Are Made In the Plan of God
God used the blueprint of his own nature to form you and to form me. This is a fascinating reality. What does it mean to be made in the plan of God?
It means that you possess certain qualities which your Creator possesses.
1. You have a mind.
You can think. You can decide. You can reason.
2. You have emotions
You can feel a wide range of emotions, each with several nuances that are unique to humans.
3. You have morality
You know right from wrong and you make judgments about what is morally and ethically correct and that which is evil, criminal or malevolent.
4. You have creativity
You can make things. You cannot create something from nothing as God did, but you can take matter and reform it into other things, some of which have no purpose except to appeal to your judgment of beauty. This is true of music, art, literature, etc.
In this sense, the awareness that you are created in the image and plan of God, you differ from animals. You will never see a buzzard painting the ceiling of some cathedral or sculpting a famous buzzard out of stone. You are different from the animals. You are made in the image of God.
Science says that you came from a mere single protoplasm – one incident back there somewhere in primordial time – a protoplasm appeared and began to develop, multiply and evolve. Everything living thing on earth came from that one small protein string, they tell us, and now here you are! And those people say that Christians are ignorant to believe that a Creator made us.
We say, “Read the Label.” You were made in God’s image and by His hand. Did you know that in your body there exists over 37 trillion cells? Yes, I said, “Trillion.” In Oyster’s textbook on the human eye, which was written in 1990, he quotes that the average retina in the human eye has 4.5 million cone cells and 90 million rod cells. That is just in the retina of your eye. Your eye is a camera, taking continual color pictures while the lens is cleansed by the tear ducts hour upon hour.
You are amazing. In your body, every hour, about 300 million cells die and are replaced by little factories within the cells. They never stop working, day or night. They began when you were conceived, and they will work till you are deceased. In fact, almost every cell in your body will die and be replaced every 7 to 10 years. God made you by His hand and you are a work of incredible processes that goes on each second of each minute of each hour of each day.
A poet wrote:
Where can a man find a cap for his knee,
Or the key to a lock of his hair?
Can his eyes be called academies,
Because there are pupils there?
What gems can be found in the crown of his head,
Who crosses the bridge of his nose?
Can he use when shingling the roof of his house,
The nails on the end of his toes?
Can the crook of his elbow be sent to jail,
If so what can he do?
How does he sharpen his shoulder blades,
I’m sure I don’t know, do you?
Can he sit in the shade of the palms of his hands,
Or beat on the drum of his ear?
Does the calf of his leg eat the corn of his toes,
If so, why not grow corn on the ear?"
Just admit it, you are fearfully and wonderfully made in the image of God!
So, we’ve seen the Blueprint when we were made, but now I want you to see …
II. The Blessing When You Were Made
Note in verse 28 of chapter 1 in Genesis that God “blessed” Adam and Eve and gave them dominion over the earth and that was in it.
A. God Spoke Good in Your Creation
The Bible says that God blessed the man and the woman. What does that mean? The blessing of God is something very important, for it signifies God’s love for you and God’s desire for you to reach your full potential. His blessing speaks of your primary place on His earth and in His heart, and we see that confirmed again and again in the scriptures.
In Genesis we read that God walked with Adam, and again we read that He spoke to Adam and to Eve. You alone were made to walk with God and to talk with God. You are unique in every way and you are blessed.
B. God Supplied Good in your Salvation
The blessing of God upon you does not guarantee success. Take an athlete as an example. One may be blessed with innate ability, but it takes dedication and work to bring out all the potential that lies dormant in that person. God blessed you with successful potential, but it is up to you to dedicate yourself to Him and to develop within His will your God-given potential.
Now, to be sure, we have all failed in the task of fulfilling God’s desires and plans for us. The story of Genesis is more than creation, for we discover in this Bible book that Adam and Eve failed God – they sinned against Him. We will look at this in another message but let me make it plain that God had a plan before the foundation of the world, and that plan was to redeem those who come to Him by faith from their sinful, fallen nature. God's plan was to save us from our own sin and that plan did not come about because God was caught by surprise when we failed Him. No, God had a plan before the world was made to redeem rebellious humans - and to do so at great price to Himself.
While time remains, let’s look at …
III. The Behavior For Which You Were Made
You were made to act in a particular way. You are not to do what you think is right, but you are to do what God tells you is right. This is seen in several things related to the creation of human beings.
A. Stewardship Behavior
God told mankind to take dominion of the earth but with that dominion comes responsibility. We are stewards of the earth and we are stewards of our bodies and lives. We are stewards of of our intellect and opportunities as well as stewards of our souls. Your soul is yours. What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his OWN soul? Your OWN soul! You will answer to God for your soul for He is the One who gave it to you. We have a stewardship toward our Creator, who gave us all that we possess.
B. Fellowship Behavior
You were made for fellowship with other human beings. “Male and female created He them.” We were made for fellowship. The most intimate of fellowship was to be reserved for marriage. “A man shall leave his father and mother and cleave unto his wife and the two shall become one flesh.”
We were made for fellowship in social, political, financial, domestic and international affairs. We are to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. Socially Adam and Eve were placed in perfection - an ideal place.
Also man had something to do for he was made to dress and keep the garden. He had a job to do and it was for God. Listen carefully – there is no higher purpose for any human being on this earth than to see your life as serving God. Whatever your occupation, your avocation is to serve and please God. In fact, you cannot be fully pleased and sense fulfillment in life unless you are seeking to maintain proper fellowship with God. Why do you think so many people with money, success and popularity end up on drugs, committing suicide or doing some really dumb things? They end up that way for the same reason that we all do some stupid things, because we fail to place a priority on fellowship with God and an honorable fellowship with others.
When God placed man in the Garden of Eden, He told the man to keep it. The word “keep” is the word “guard”. God told man to guard the garden, which indicates that part of his task was to keep an intruder out. Was this a warning that there was one who would come into the perfect garden to corrupt it? Perhaps! We must guard against one who would intrude into God’s garden – into our life of fellowship with God and with one another.
C. Relationship Behavior
We are to have a relationship with God. This is not just fellowship, it is relationship. We are to walk with God and talk with God. We are to realize that we came from God and to God we must return. We are spiritual and most develop our spiritual lives.
Let me finish …
Conclusion
There was a little boy who built a boat from a kit. One day while sailing his boat on a stream, it flowed away from him. He could not catch up with it and soon it was out of sight. The little fellow loved the boat and cried himself to sleep that first night. A few days later he was walking by a toy store and saw his little boat in the window with a sign on it that read, “Used Boat For Sale.” The boy went inside, paid the money and bought the boat. He came out of the store, hugged the little vessel and said, “You are twice my little boat. You are once mine because I made you. You are twice mine because I bought you.”
Dear people, every human being is made by God and everyone of us has sailed away from Him. He made us but we departed in our sins and rebellion. But, God sent His Son Jesus to redeem us - to forgive us and bring us back to a rigth relationship. When we turn to Christ in repentance from our sins and place faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, He redeems us – He pays for our sins through His own blood. You see, man's sin began at a tree - a mere piece of wood growing in the Garden Eden. Jesus came to die on a piece of wood - an awful tree - a cross, so that we might be forgiven. When I came to Him in confession and faith, Jesus essentiall said to me, “You are twice mine, for I made you and then I bought you!”
Come to Him today. Rededicate your life to the One who made you. Or, if you have never trusted Him as your Savior, do so today.
