BENEFITS OF DEATH - Death is A Transition Into Immortality
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How
joyfully and assuring would it be if we were to live forever in the Garden of
Eden; a space that is void of all the troubles, heartaches, problems, political
uncertainty, economic uncertainty, terrorism, but full of God’s glory, presence, goodness, blessings, covering,
provision, protection etc; a space that is similar to heaven. That was exactly
what God had planned for man when he created Adam and Eve and placed them in
the Garden of Eden.
The presence of the trees of life in the Garden of Eden was
an assurance to man that he was going to be an immortal being - Genesis 2:9
(KJV) “And out of the ground made the
LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food;
the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of
good and evil.” God never commanded Adam not to eat of the tree of life,
but rather admonished him not to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil
according to Gen 2:15 -17 (KJV) “And the
LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to
keep it. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, of every tree of the
garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and
evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou
shalt”.
In fact Adam was giving the freedom to eat of any tree in the
garden including the tree of life except of the tree of knowledge of good and
evil. However, when sin found its way into the heart of man through the
disobedience of Adam And Eve, God quickly sent his angels to protect the tree
of life so that Adam and Eve will not have
access to it and eat of it and live forever in their sinful state - Genesis
3:22 (KJV) “ And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to
know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the
tree of life, and eat, and live forever: Therefore the LORD God sent him forth
from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken. So he drove out the man; and he placed at the
east of the garden of Eden Cherubim’s, and a flaming sword which turned every
way, to keep the way of the tree of life.”
It does appear from this account
that man was supposed to eat of the tree of life in a state of sinlessness. However,
the disobedience of Adam and Eve opened man’s heart to sin and evil (Genesis
6:5). But God in his own sovereignty laid out a plan to restore man to his original
path that he digressed from; path of happiness and fruitfulness, dominion, authorities,
joy forever more which can only be actualized in our Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus
Christ came down to restore us to the original path “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man
cometh unto the Father, but by me.”
John_14:6 and “Neither is there
salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among
men, whereby we must be saved.” Act_4:12,
Jesus Christ is the only channel to the original
path; the path that Adam and Eve were walking in the garden of Eden; He died to
show us the way, so we must also die to ourselves to show others the way; we
must die to our selfness, greed, hatred, unforgiveness, sexual perversion,
envy, etc. On the way back to the original path through Christ Jesus we must
carry our own cross, as Christ himself carried His own cross; we must present
our bodies as living sacrifices in a way that is pleasing to God, as Christ
presented His own body as living sacrifice on the cross as well as realign our
motives to the precept and the ways of God.
Jesus
Christ’s death, burial and resurrection has potentially restored us a place of
immortality as it was supposed to be in the garden of Eden, the bible says in 1st
Corinthians 15:52 -54 (KJV) “In a
moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall
sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For
this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this
corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on
immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is
swallowed up in victory“.
The Immortality of man was accentuated by Jesus Christ when he gave this reply “Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye
are gods? If he called them gods, unto
whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken;” in John
10:34-35, but the caveat here is that this start of immortality can only be
restored to those who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as their Lord and
personal savior . The bible talks about the fact that those who believe in the
Lord Jesus Christ will Judge the world in 1Corinthians _6:2 (KJV) “Do ye not know that the saints shall judge
the world? And if the world shall be judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge
the smallest matters?”
Man was originally created and delegated by God to
be fruitful, increase and have dominion over this earth; as representative of
God on earth man was supposed to be the god of the earth, just like the way
governor Arden Clarke represented the government of the United Kingdom in then
Gold Coast (Ghana), man was supposed to reign on this earth as a god with a
delegated authority from God (Elohim), it was a delegated authority from an
Immortal God (Elohim) to potentially immortal beings, but unfortunately man lost this highest
position to Satan in the garden of Eden that is why Satan is currently referred
to us the god of this world according to 2nd
Corinthians 4:4.
However, the heartwarming truth for us who have come to
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as our Lord and personal Savior is that this
position has been restored to us one more time, the bible said “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that
heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and
shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.” John
5:24 (KJV). The restoration of the Tree of life in the
world to come, according to Revelation 2:7 (KJV) “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the
churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which
is in the midst of the paradise of God” and Revelation_22:14 (KJV) “Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to
the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city” should
give us a renewed hope and assurance to do the work of him who has called us in
the midst of challenges and even in the face of death threat. We should not be perturbed by
the antics of the devil to stop us.
We must have an assurance of a better a
better position in Christ Jesus as the scripture clearly says “We know that God, who raised the Lord
Jesus to life, will also raise us up with Jesus and take us, together with you,
into his presence. All this is for your sake; and as God's grace reaches more
and more people, they will offer to the glory of God more prayers of
thanksgiving. For this reason we never become discouraged. Even though our
physical being is gradually decaying, yet our spiritual being is renewed day
after day. And this small and temporary trouble we suffer will bring us a
tremendous and eternal glory, much greater than the trouble. For we fix our
attention, not on things that are seen, but on things that are unseen. What can
be seen lasts only for a time, but what cannot be seen lasts forever.” 2 Corinthians 4:15-18 (GNB).
We must do
the work of him who has called us into his vineyard according to our utmost
strength and capabilities so us to be fruitful and ready to account of our
talents and advantages we have in life; we must know that we are stewards of
the manifold grace of God and that we have to give an account of our
stewardship
This is very inspiring and an eye-opened article. It has educated me about the original plan God has for humanity and how it was aborted by the god of this word. In furtherance, it also clearly explained how God has or will restore us to our original state through our Lord Jesus Christ. Excellent.
ReplyDeleteMy questions are as follow:
God knows every thing: all-knowing God, yes i believe he is. Why should God add the tree of knowledge and evil knowing the implication from the begining?
Yeah, God is all Knowing, but He is also the creator and Sovereign; He has the right to do whatever he wants with his own and what he has created. I believe that the reason why God put the tree of good and evil among other reason was for man to pass his first moral test; remember man is a free moral agent and he has in him the potential to do the right thing by himself, but he also had the choice not to do what is right. Man had a responsibility to render implicit obedience to the creator of his being who is God.But take note human beings were created like God himself (we have right to do whatever we want, but we will account to God), we are not angels or Robot . There are still are a lot of modern day tree of knowledge of good and evil around and a lot of us are still eating the fruit of this tree; some of these modern tree of good and evil are; when we face with the temptation telling lies and then getting a contract and no one will know about it and there is another emerging tree of knowledge of God and Evil that i heard of - where pastors were copying during examination in a theological college here in Accra Ghana. Remember the case of Job in Job 1:8 -12 "And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil? Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, Doth Job fear God for nought? Hast not thou made an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he hath on every side? thou hast blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land. But put forth thine hand now, and touch all that he hath, and he will curse thee to thy face. And the LORD said unto Satan, Behold, all that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand. So Satan went forth from the presence of the LORD." In Job case he passed the moral test, his friends asked him to curse God, but he chose to obey and honor God in difficult times; once again he exercise his choice as a free moral agent.
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