God Became Man - Why?
by Ed Stevens
God, who made heaven and earth also made man, as the Bible declares. When God made man "in His own image", He "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul". Genesis 1:27; 2:7. In so doing the eternally existing God imparted to mankind (His "offspring", Acts 17:28, 29) also His attribute of eternal existence. This is a very solemn fact! Man does not die like an animal to extinction. Would Adam and Eve have lived on forever if they had not sinned? The answer must be, Yes. But they sinned in disobedience and immediately they died spiritually in separation from God's fellowship and brought upon themselves and the entire earthly creation a bondage-curse. Romans 8:20-22, R.V. Man must needs wrestle with the cursed ground "in the sweat of thy brow" to sustain physical life, anticipate physical death, later to be resurrected bodily into a worse or better eternal existence. Gen. 3:16-19; John 5:19, 28; Rev. 20:4, 5, 15, and many other verses.
In love to man God drove him out of the Garden of Eden in which was "the tree of life", "lest he put forth his hand and eat also of the tree of life and live forever", under the curse. Adam was a created "son of God" (Luke 3:38) and as such God loved him and all his children—his descendents. He desired restoration of man's fellowship with Him and deliverance from the curse. But how was this to be accomplished? It could only be brought about by man becoming perfect in a sinless standing before God, with judgment against man's sin annulled by the penalty for it being paid in full. Man's total disability for this is evident, for not only is he "yet without strength" but also "dead in trespasses and sins". Romans 5:6; Ephesians 2:1. However, if there could be found one man in the human race that could meet these necessary conditions to save man from his lost estate, our just and holy God "in His kindness and love toward man" (Titus 3:4), decreed that by that one man salvation for the entire human race could be secured. His plan "before the foundation of the world" (Rev. 13:8) for a substitute as the only alternative, was that He himself would enter the human race in the person of His Son, to be born of a virgin and named Emmanuel, meaning, "GOD WITH US". Isaiah 6:7; Matthew 1:23.
"When the fullness of the time was come, God sent His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons". Galatians 4:4, 5. He "was made in the likeness of sinful flesh" and was "made a curse for us . . . on a tree", that sinful flesh might become born-again "sons of God". Gal. 3:13; John 1:12, 13; 3:3-8. Marvelous truth ! This gracious one man plan for the salvation of all men who will receive it by faith in this one man, Jesus Christ, is explained in Romans 5:12-21, as follows in part:
"Wherefore, as by one man (Adam) sin entered the world and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned . . . For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many . . . For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ. Therefore, as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came unto all men unto justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous."
Please notice, nothing is said about works being necessary on man's part to receive this gift of righteousness. See Ephesians 2:8-10; Galatians 2:21; 3:21; Titus 3:5.
Yes, God "so loved the world that He gave (or offered up) His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." John 3:16. This "life" is more than merely existing, reader friend; it is "reigning in life" in God's "Paradise". If unsaved won't you humble yourself in true penitence as a sinner-child of Adam and believingly receive what God is offering you in free grace? It's up to you to choose between "life and death", the latter being "the second death" —existing in conscious eternal separation from God in a "place prepared for the devil and his angels"; in "the blackness of darkness forever". Rev. 20:14; 21:8; Matt. 25:41; Jude 13. Being made a free moral agent (in God's likeness here), able to choose or reject, choice must be made as to two eternal destinies. Time is shortening fast to Christ's return in fiery judgment upon all unbelief, the one sin for which He did not make atonement. II Thes. 1:7-8; Rev. 19:11-18.
"He that believeth on Him is not condemned; but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." John 3:18.
"Believe (now) on the Lord Jesus Christ (that He 'died for (your) sins, according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day') and thou shalt be saved." Acts 16:31; I Cor. 15:1-5.