1 Corinthians 13, abundantly, agape, ahaba, Attributes of God, authority, beloved, blessed, blood covenant, breath of life, consecrate, consecrated, covenant, created, diving in, domain, dominion, earth, exceedingly, fellowship, Genesis, God, Holy Spirit, Identity, image, intimacy, Jesus, lifestyle, likeness, love, psalm 91, relationship, secret place, the Church, wwjd - March 23, 2023

Identity

"Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over [a]all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” (Genesis 1:26 NKJV)

Image - צֶלֶם - Tselem - Same word in Hebrew used to describe idols

Likeness - דְּמוּת - demuwth - modeling, shaping, and resembling in the same manner of.

dictionary definition - of the same form, appearance, kind, character, amount.

“And God blessed them, and God said unto them, be fruitful, and multiply and replenish the Earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the see, and over the fowl of the air, and every living thing that moves upon the Earth.” (V. 28)

A blessing is a special favor, mercy, and benefit or gift bestowed by God.
After God created man, He COMMANDED blessing
over them. When God speaks, things are created.

When God speaks, life is formed in different aspects.
When God spoke this over man, He was telling us what to do.

As the King of His creation, He has just given authority to man over the territory of the Earth. And when God commanded man to fill the earth and subdue it.

The Hebrew translation for fill the earth is mālā', which means to consecrate.

To consecrate means to make or declare sacred; set apart or dedicate to the service of the God.

"Thus the heavens and the earth, and all the host of them, were finished." (Genesis 2:1 NKJV)

Hosts - צָבָא - ṣāḇā' - organized army of angels.

The angels were given dominion over the realm of heaven, while humanity was given dominion over the realm of earth.

Everyday, in the Garden of Eden, God came down to walk side by side with man, to fellowship with him and seeing the consecration of the territory God gave to rule over.

After Satan usurped our authority, he brought doubt into our minds and has been using it since.

Doubt causes you to question the directions given to you, as well as preventing you from speaking and declaring by questioning you through your thoughts. That is why Paul says to bring every thought captive to the obedience of Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5). Because of this, Satan gained access to what was our territory and dominion.

After Satan fell from Heaven and took one-third of the angels with him, he had access to not only the spiritual realm, but the earthly realm as well.

Because of this, alongside the usurping of our authority, he started fighting against the angels of God to gain territory over the earth through the spiritual realm. Since, everything happens in there before it is manifested on the earth. We see the evidence of that during the time of Daniel's fast, which lasted 21 days.

"Then to Adam He said, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’:“ Cursed is the ground for your sake; In toil you shall eat of it All the days of your life...In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread Till you return to the ground, For out of it you were taken; For dust you are, And to dust you shall return.”" (Genesis 3:17, 19 NKJV)

The result of man's doubt, caused them to question God and resulting in death.

because of this, God created a plan of redemption and cursed the enemy for usurping man's authority.

"So the Lord God said to the serpent: “Because you have done this, You are cursed more than all cattle, And more than every beast of the field; On your belly you shall go, And you shall eat dust All the days of your life. And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, And you shall bruise His heel.” (Genesis 3:14-15 NKJV)

The only way to redeem mankind and bring him back into what was usurped, had to be done through a blood covenant.

Because of the blood covenant that God made with man, not only are we made in the exact image and likeness of the Creator of all things, but we have been given the power and the authority on the earth.

A covenant is an agreement between two or more individuals or groups that establishes their relationship between each other. According to David Dean (2014), an understanding of covenant is essential to understand the scriptures and God's interaction with human kind, nation of Israel, and the church. Throughout the scriptures, there are at least six different covenants that God created with certain people during the canonical history. Each covenantal relationship that was created, set up for the next one to be established and fulfilled (Barrick, 1999).

The covenants that are extensively emphasized are the Adamic, Noahic, Abrahamic, Mosaic, Davidic, and new covenant. In each of these covenants, God initiates, establishes, and fulfills the covenants either with a person, a group of people, or the whole world conditionally or unconditionally. The biblical concept of covenant involves God’s promises to certain individuals, people, and the world. As each is made, the next becomes even more detailed than the previous in the commitment of all of creation being saved through the Abrahamic lineage.

The new covenant is the final contract between God and man, in the canonical text, which all other covenants created lead up to.

“To give a human example, brothers: even with a man-made covenant, no one annuls it or adds to it once it has been ratified. Now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, “And to offsprings,” referring to many, but referring to one, “And to your offspring,” who is Christ. This is what I mean: the law, which came 430 years afterward, does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void. For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise. Why then the law? It was added because of transgressions, until the offspring should come to whom the promise had been made, and it was put in place through angels by an intermediary. Now an intermediary implies more than one, but God is one. Is the law then contrary to the promises of God? Certainly not! For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed be by the law. But the Scripture imprisoned everything under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.”(Galatians 3:15-22).

The initiation of the covenant started as soon as man sinned (Genesis 3:15). It shows us how much God cares about us and how much he wants us to be rescued from our bondage of sin and death. He wanted to fulfill the promise he made to Adam, and he finally gets to come through with it in this new covenant.

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16 ESV).

The establishment of the covenant was done through the death and resurrection of Jesus on the cross of Calvary with the promise of eternal life for those who believe in him as Lord. Along with the establishment of the church and the promise of the Holy Spirit, the third Godhead of the Trinity is an unconditional promise to the world.

“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” (Jeremiah 31:31-34 ESV)

This passage gives us the knowledge of God vowing an upcoming point in time when he will renew his covenant with the church so that his own covenantal authenticity brings his people to a full realization of redemption through him. Therefore, the purpose of initiating, establishing, and fulfilling these covenants, God intended to establish a relationship with mankind and ultimately their redemption.

In the time of the Old Testament, as well as in tribal lands today, blood covenants between tribes are very common. As part of the ritual, the head of each tribe exchange their armor, weapons and crops. Signifying that everything one tribe has, also belongs to the other. And in times of war, one tribe will stand by the other tribe till death, no matter whose fault it is. Then, a cut is made on the wrists of both tribal leaders and connected. Doing this states that they are now as one tribe. And the only way out of the covenant is death. We see a similar act made between David and Jonathan, hence why Mephibosheth was given a seat at David’s table.

And so, through this blood covenant that God made with man, He takes on everything that we have. All of our sin, sickness, pain and our rags and we put on His robe of righteousness and His armor. And on the cross, one hole in the wrist for God and the other for humanity.

Because of this covenant, The authority given to us in the conception of our creation has been expounded.

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God." (John 1:1-2 NKJV)

"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." (John 3:16 NKJV)

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, 4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, 5 having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, 6 to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved." (Ephesians 1:3-6)

When God created us, He created us to be holy and blameless before Him in love, but after the fall, God made a plan of redemption to be adopted as children of God through Jesus and we become His beloved.

In which, we now have regained the authority over our domain, but in greater measure and over the realm of heaven as well. Through Christ, we have beaten death and only through Him can we finally consecrate the earth.

Through the mandate of humanity from its conception, through the power and authority given to trample on serpents and scorpions bring the good news of the Kingdom of Heaven. In the consecrated place, all things must bow before the name that is above every name, whom we represent. All sickness, death, and lack must bow. Every knee must confess that Jesus is King over all.

Through Christ, being heirs to the Throne of Heaven, means that you are a real life prince/princess.

This tells you who we were created to be and the abilities we have as His image-bearing created ones. But this still does not answer why we were created. God already had billions of angels created to worship, so what was the purpose of creating humanity? The answer to this is so simple, yet so profound. In the Hebrew alphabet, every letter represents a picture, word, numeric value, and spiritual meaning. We see the examples of that through different scholarly studies. For example, in the name of God, YHWH (יהוה), the pictorial definition comes out to be "Behold a hand, behold a nail". When combined, the meaning of the names of Adam to Noah in Genesis 5 in chronologic order is a paraphrased version of John 3:16.

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." (Genesis 1:1 NKJV)

Earth - 'eretṣ - אֶרֶץ - God's secret place for Him to be in.

“For you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God” (Exod. 34:14).

"He who does not love does not know God, for God is love." (1 John 4:8 NKJV)

"He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty." (Psalm 91:1 NKJV).

And the depth and intensity of the love of God can be seen in John 3:16 and 1 Corinthians 13 as explained in a previous blog. Because He is the definition of love itself, that He Himself cannot contain, we were created for the sole purpose of of being loved by Him in that which was the secret place for HIMSELF TO BE IN!

The place that God Himself calls sacred, was where He chose to form us. Through earth, which was spoken into existence by His WORD. With His fingertips, He formed man. And with HIS Spirit, breathed life into us.

Just WOW!

References:

The Holy Bible

Barrick, W. D. (1999). The Mosaic Covenant. The Master's Seminary Journal, 10(2), 213-232.

Dean D. A. 2014) Covenant, conditionality, and consequence: new terminology and a case study in the Abrahamic covenant. Journal of The Evangelical Theological Society [serial online]. June 2014;57(2):281-308. Available from: ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials, Ipswich, MA. Accessed July 12, 2017.

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