Book Excerpts

Introduction

God existed before time began. This eternal, I AM, nature of God is beyond our comprehension. It is much easier to get a glimpse of eternity to come, as the modern telescopes probe several billion light years into space, discovering immeasurable and incomprehensible universes beyond our solar system. Floating on the wings of imagination, into the glittering vastness of stars and worlds unknown, one can get a glimmer of what it will be like to be an eternal, immortal being, made in the likeness of God, unbound by the limitations of earth and gravity.

David had no Hubble telescope nor access to space probes when he looked up into the heavens on a starry night and declared:

O LORD, our Lord, How excellent [is] Your name in all the earth, Who have set Your glory above the heavens! When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, The moon and the stars, which You have ordained, What is man that You are mindful of him, And the son of man that You visit him? (Psalm 8:1b, 3, 4)

Dealing with eternity past is where faith comes in. We must start with the absolute truth and authority of God’s Word, which proclaims:

I am the Alpha and the Omega, [the] Beginning and [the] End,”says the Lord, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty” (Revelation 1:8).

And God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” And He said, “Thus you shall say to the children of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ (Exodus 3:14)

To declare I AM is to declare a state of eternal existence, of always being, past, present, and future.

On the basis of God’s eternal nature we can declare with assurance that the integrity of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit is absolute. The Oxford English Dictionary defines integrity as the condition of having no part or element taken away or wanting; undivided; completeness; original perfect state; unimpaired moral state, innocence, sinlessness; soundness of moral principle, the character of uncorrupted virtue, especially in relation to truth and fair dealing; uprightness, honesty, sincerity. Jesus asked His disciples a question to illustrate the integrity of the Father: “If a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone? Or if [he asks] for a fish, will he give him a serpent instead of a fish?” (Luke 11:11) One knows the answer would certainly be no. God also does not just do acts of kindness and love. He is love. He is kindness. He is compassion. With Him there is no wavering; He never changes.

Because of God’s almighty love, He has purposed that in the ages to come, He will grant redemption to every man, woman, and child, for indeed, Jesus Christ died for all mankind. (II Corinthians 5:15) There is no wavering with God, no shadow of turning, and the absolute integrity of God is the foundation for this great plan, setting the stage for the story of the creation of the heavens and earth and the ultimate culmination of His love and passion, the creation of Adam and Eve.

The purpose of this book is to find out who Adam really was, as God first created him and to examine all of the many things that were lost to him and Eve when they sinned. In so doing, the full redemptive work of the second Adam, Jesus Christ, can be revealed, showing the final, glorious victory of the restoration of everything that Adam lost, to all those who overcome.

Jacqueline's Story

How often has one taken something as truth just because a person in authority said it was so? When I was a young child, I never questioned what my parents told me. They were, after all, my parents and they were very old (in my eyes), so they must be right. An even more important authority, in my young mind, was my teachers. In public school most students assumed, as I did, that the things they were taught were true. In my home, if there was ever a question as to whom was right about something—mum or the teacher—the teacher always won out! So when I went to Sunday school, I always took Bible lessons as truth and never questioned them.

Still Loved

God did not forsake Eve, nor has He has forgotten her. She was the first daughter of Zion, made in the image of God. As we look at the verses describing the Daughter of Zion and the daughter of Jerusalem, who are synonymous with each other, keep in mind that the scriptures are often many-faceted. Some of these references are a look back to Eve and the events that followed her sin. Some are a depiction of Israel and Judah, with a forthcoming look at spiritual Israel, the Church of God. No matter what the generation, scriptures can have one or many fulfilments, and those that deal with the Daughter of Zion are no exception.

The Precious Blood oF Jesus

The seed of God the Father and the Holy Spirit was nourished in Mary’s womb and together they produced the blood of Jesus. The embryo was holy and the blood shed by Jesus Christ was holy. That is why the shedding of the blood of the Son of God was so critical to God’s plan of salvation. In the precious blood of Jesus was the genetic code of almighty God. It was the essence of God, an extension of His very existence. It was the only blood sufficient to take away the sins of the whole world. I Peter 1:23 declares that a believer has new life, “having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever.”

Fire and Water

The Holy Spirit is manifested in many different ways in scripture: as fire; wind; water; oil; the fruits of the Spirit; and various spiritual gifts. They are all attributes of the Holy Spirit, each one anchoring, teaching, and helping believers to grow in the faith of God. The Lake of Fire is descrip- tive of two of those attributes in particular; water and fire. Water is a familiar symbol of rebirth and fire is the symbol of refining purity and of the baptism in the Holy Spirit. Both work to bring every person into the image of Christ.

Panorama

The first Adam was created the first son of God, as Luke’s genealogy of Joseph ends; “the son of Adam, the son of God.” (Luke 3:38 NASB) Adam was made in the glorious image of God, his Father, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. He was called Lucifer, star of the morning, son of the dawn. He was given dominion over the whole earth; given power and authority as a king, and dwelt with God on Mount Zion. Adam and Eve established kingdoms, which they ruled together in peace and prosper- ity. They had free and full fellowship with God in the garden, where they would retreat to eat of the Tree of Life. Their coverings were the jewels described in Ezekiel 28, prepared for them by God; magnificent jewels set in gold. It is no wonder that man still aspires to possess these riches. How fitting that the second Adam, the Messiah, Jesus Christ, should come back to the earth and reign for a thousand years of peace. God’s creation will have come full circle, with Christ bringing to the world and to mankind the same perfection that Adam and Eve enjoyed, only with a slight twist. As the redeemer of the first Adam, Jesus will be proclaimed “KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.” (Revelation 19:16b)

When I began to see whom Adam really was, and to realize all that he had lost when he fell into sin, I was reminded of the letters to the seven churches in Revelation. The first promise to the overcomers in the Church at Ephesus was the right to eat of the tree of life in the paradise of God. Further to this, Jesus declares to the Church at Thyatira, “And I will give him the morning star.” (Revelation 2:28) Both of these promises are a direct restoration of what Adam lost. With great excitement I turned to Revelation 2 and 3, to discover that each of those seven promises is a promise of restoration and that the only way to understand them is to unlock the true identity of Adam, from the descriptions of him in Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28.

From this standpoint one can see the whole panorama of God’s won- derful plan. One can see God’s creation of light and darkness, good and evil, His creation of Adam and Eve, and the gifts and power He poured out on the children of His love. One sees the entrance into the world of the perfect, sinless gift of the second Adam, Jesus Christ, who redeemed all mankind unto God. The fulfilment of God’s great plan of redemption will be when the final triumphant cry is heard, “...The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ, and He shall reign for ever and ever!” (Revelation 11:15)