'Appreciating God's Love'
A) Man Created From Dust
Gen 2:7 And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.
Adam was created from the dust of the ground, so Adam had the physical earthly body.
Gen 1:27 So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.
God created Adam and Eve in His own image.
God is Spirit
John 4:24 "God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth."
When God created Adam and Eve, each was given the spirit of man within their physical earthly bodies.
God is Love
I John 4:16 And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him.
Since God is Spirit and love, so when God created man, He put inside the spirit of man His divine love, thereby instilling within man the good conscience of perfect love.
I Cor 13:4-7 Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
B) Man Given Free Will
Gen 2:16-17 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, "Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die."
God gave Adam and Eve the *free will*, and even though He saw Eve picking and eating the forbidden fruit, He did not stop her nor prevent Adam from eating it. Adam willingly submitted his free will to God until his sin.
Note God will not take away the free will given to man nor force His will upon man.
The Will of God
Mat 7:21 "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven."
As Christians, God expect us to willingly surrender the free will given to us so that He can help us to do His will. Otherwise we cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven.
*His will* includes the keeping of His commandments, instructions, laws and words of our Lord Jesus and the Apostles' Epistles of the New Covenant of Jesus' blood.
Note - Not the Mosaic Law for it was made obsolete by the death of Jesus.
I The 4:3-6 For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified.
C) The Carnal Man
Gen 3:6 So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate.
Adam fell because his carnal nature (flesh) was greater than their love for God. This carnal nature is now in every human.
I John 2:16 For all that is in the world— the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world.
Mind and Wisdom of Man
Gen 3:22 Then the Lord God said, "Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever"—
Since Adam knew good from evil, God allowed him to make his own decision.
Flesh against Spirit
Gal 5:17 For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish.
The spiritual Adam was the good conscience from the divine love of God. The Carnal Adam was his selfish flesh.
