Tag Archives: mary

You Have Free Will (A Christmas Message)

Posted on December 27, 2022 by bibleteacherorg

Adam and Eve have both free will and the image of God. God told Adam that he was free to choose to eat of any tree in the Garden BUT the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2:17). Someone asked me once, “Why did Adam have ONE tree that he could not eat of? Why did God even put that tree there?” Again, this is a fair question.

Free will assumes a person has a choice.

If I went to the market to buy bread, but say, only one type of bread – white Wonder Bread – was the only bread available. If that’s all you can get, there is no free will. Free will means a choice. If you had a Garden where absolutely everything is edible, you have no opportunity to exercise your free will. Free will would just be a blank concept, but would never be practically expressed. God gave man free will, then gave humanity a choice. Choose to do your job, and never suffer. Choose to disobey God and do the forbidden, then choose death over life (Genesis 2:17).

You know the story. Adam chose to disobey God. When you disobey God you lose His blessing. God has free will too. Humanity could enjoy the Garden while they obeyed the Owner of the Garden. But once they chose to reject God’s directive, they lost God’s blessing. God said to Adam:

Genesis 2:17-19 … cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; 18 Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; 19 In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground…

Man was creation’s caregiver. Because Adam fell into sin, creation fell into sin. The ground previously brought forth only fruit bearing plants. Now the ground is cursed – thorns and thistles along with other weeds come up. Man never had to use his sweat glands…. Continue reading →

Posted in Christmas, Christmas Sermons, General, Luke, Sermons Preached | Tagged Christmas, free will, Incarnation, Jesus, Lamb of God, manger, mary, salvation | Leave a comment

Mary said …

Posted on December 20, 2022 by bibleteacherorg

We have always lived in a world that has two views of God. The first view is the Subjective View of God. This is the most popular concept of God. In the Subjective View we believe that God exists for our benefit. This view creeps into the pulpits of many different Churches, even Baptist Churches. I have heard preachers say,

“God created Adam because God was lonely and needed a companion. After creating Adam, God saw that “it is not good that the man should be alone” (Genesis 2:18), so he made Adam a helper called Eve.”

What is foolish about this statement is that God has never been alone. In Genesis 1:26 God – the Hebrew Elohim – said “Let US make humanity in OUR image, after OUR likeness”. God has never been alone. God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God is complete in Himself. God created angels. He did not create out of a need for us. God created us for another reason, a reason the antichrists hate. God did not create us because He somehow had to do so or else He would suffer.

The Second View of God is the Objective View. In the Subjective View we say that God created us because He somehow needed us. In short, God exists because we exist. But the Objective View of God is that God created us because we need Him. We are incomplete without God. God made us in His image and in His likeness so that we could worship Him as God, and glorify Him for Who He is.

When we walk away from God we rip a hole in our very lives. We are made in the likeness, the image of God. We are not gods, but we were made to imitate and glorify Him.

Humans were created by Grace and Love flowing from God – but God does not need us to complete Himself. God lacks nothing. Our creation is an extension of God’s goodness…. Continue reading →