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When we as mankind chose to eat of the wrong tree in the Garden of Eden, we lost our opportunity to be what God created us to be.  We “sinned and [fell] short of the glory of God.”  We could no longer be a vessel of the life of God.

So what now?

Is the noble dream of man being a vessel God could flow through lost forever?  Is all possibility of man intimately knowing his Creator gone for eternity?  Is man hopelessly lost?

Well, yes—and no!

Let me explain.  Looking at man’s situation from the human perspective, he is hopelessly lost.  He is filled with the selfish attitude of, “I want what I want when I want it.”  No one could pay man’s debt of one perfect life which was owed to God; no one would be able to break the cycle and come up with a perfect life.  Thus, from man’s viewpoint, there was no hope…

“But God…”

(Ephesians 2:4)

Because He still is, let us not make the mistake of looking at man’s state from man’s perspective.  Ultimately, we are not dealing with man here, we are dealing with God.  This is God Almighty!  This is the Creator God!  This is the infinitely wise God.  This is the God Who always triumphs!  This is the God Who never gives up on His dream!  This is “the Eternal Is-ness”.  This God always finishes what He starts!

So how does God go about finishing what He started?

He starts this restoration process by tapping a shepherd on the shoulder.  Moses, by name. This man’s attention is arrested by a bush that burns but is not banished.  As he investigates this mystery, God calls to him from the bush and commissions him to go into Egypt and bring out the enslaved descendants of Abraham, his forefather.  After overcoming Moses’ pleas of inability (no small task), He tells him to bring these millions out into the desert:  He wants to have a heart-to-heart talk with them.  And, though these people want deliverance from their hard bondage to Pharaoh, most of them have little remembrance of this God of their fathers.  Even though God called Abraham for the very purpose of teaching his children Who He was and about His plan for them, Abraham’s descendants had not continued to teach the next generation.  (Genesis 18:19)  Some of them were now so skeptical they had little respect for the agreement Abraham made with God many generations ago.

But God doesn’t have the short memory we do.  He still respects their agreement (called a “covenant”) and intends to carry out His end of the bargain.  He intends to use this nation to get His light back into the world.  And provided they are willing to be used by Him, He plans to reward them beyond their greatest imagination (Deuteronomy 28: 1-14).  He’s had a privileged plan for man all along to be a vessel of His life.  He is going to accomplish His plan!

However, the more immediate problem is that mankind has forgotten that God thinks this way.  In fact, man has forgotten most of what God thinks—about most things!  In the beginning God had taught the early generations on the earth that the fathers were to teach their children Who He was (Psalm 78:5-6).  But with the sin principle at work in man he often got distracted (sometimes for a lifetime) and simply did not do this all-important task.  Thus, as time went on, ignorance grew and the knowledge of Who the Creator was and how He thought was mostly lost.

This is still true—except for those who have surrendered to Jesus Christ as their personal Master and Deliverer from the selfishness caused by sin.

Have you surrendered to Christ?

Think about it; because if you don’t, someone else will do your thinking for you—and for your children!  And you won’t like what that brings to you.  I’m Don Pinson; this has been Think About It.

(This message has been taken from our book Why God Birthed America.  You can order a copy of Why God Birthed America HERE)