Fall: God Judges

Tom Shrader walks through Genesis 3 to explain how Satan's temptation of Eve—appealing to the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—led to Adam's sin and the corruption of all human relationships with God, self, others, and creation. The Fall is presented not as ancient history but as the only coherent explanation for the restlessness, selfishness, and brokenness visible in every human life and in the world at large. Shrader closes by pressing listeners toward the Gospel, pointing to Genesis 3:15 as the first promise of Christ and calling those without faith to trust Jesus as the only cure for the sin that no amount of money, education, or achievement can fix.

“Sin is the problem and it's so important to have an accurate diagnosis, and then an accurate cure — you get the diagnosis wrong, then the cure will be wrong.”

— Tom Shrader

Series: Doctrine

Recorded: 2011 at East Valley Bible Church

Duration: 44 min

Themes: sin, temptation, brokenness, judgment, the fall, shame, gospel, hope, feeling unworthy, struggling with shame, questioning why the world is broken, new believer, seeker, someone doubting faith, young adult, struggling with identity

Scripture: Genesis 2:16-17, Genesis 2:25, Genesis 3:1-15, Genesis 4, Genesis 5:1-3, Genesis 9:6, James 1:14, 1 John 2:15-17, Matthew 4, Romans 5:12, Romans 3:10, 1 Corinthians 11:7, James 3:9

Theological Themes: hamartiology, original sin, protoevangelium, total depravity, genesis 3, federal headship, redemption, human nature

Full Transcript

Open your Bibles, if you would, to the book of Genesis. If you don't have a Bible, raise your hand. The guys will bring you a copy, and you just grab it, and you open it to page 1 or page 2, whatever we're going to look at today. I got an email that came through this week. Let me read it to you. And I hope it represents a whole bunch of you. You need a Bible, raise your hand really high. As people come in, too, they're going to have to get to those seats that are in the middle. Easiest way would be if you would move over. I know you're not going to want to do that, so you'll have to stand up and be uncomfortable. But just note that you chose that. Could have moved over. I got this email. Wow, what an amazing series. Thank you for this series. Thank you for all the prayer support. It just clicked. As I was thinking and thanking God for his body and his blood, for me, a light came on. All these years, I've not felt very valued or worthy. And we're years of believing a lie. My life has value because I'm made in my triune God's image. So that's what we talked about last week. The series has been a good one. It started with this idea of here's God. He's a triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. One God, three persons, eternally in existence, always separate. So somebody the other day was trying to explain to me, and you've heard this probably illustration before, the Trinity is like water. It can be in the form, and then it can be a liquid, and then it can freeze, and it can be solid, or put heat in it and it's a gas. Well, the problem with that illustration is when it becomes solid, it ceases to be liquid and gas. When it becomes liquid, it ceases to be solid and gas. When it becomes gas, it ceases to be liquid and solid. And God never is the Holy Spirit for a while, and then the Father for a while, and then Jesus for a while. So every illustration kind of breaks down in this whole thing. You might go and say, OK, here's Tom, who is at the same time father to his kids, husband to his wife, and friend to millions. OK, you could probably use that as an illustration. But you see what I'm trying to illustrate there? The tension in this. So then the second week, we talked about revelation, said this is Bibles, the Word of God. And then we talked about creation. We really looked at Genesis chapter 1 and chapter 2. And then last week, I really had the privilege of taking us through the fact that God made us in His image, that we are not little gods, but we reflect some of the attributes of God. It's as though that's what that idea of made in the image is, the idea of reflecting that, or the idea maybe of a mirror as we reflect that back. We are made in His image. Now, this week, we get to talk about, really, Genesis chapter 3 and its effect on us. I want to read you a fairly long quote from Ray Stedman as he does his introduction into Genesis 3. He writes this, we come to Genesis 3 with a heightened sense of anticipation. In many ways, this is the most important piece of information ever conveyed to man. Here is the ultimate explanation for the tensions this morning among the nations. Here we have the answer to the eternal why that arises in our hearts in times of tragedy or sorrow. Here is the explanation for over 100 centuries of human heartache, misery, torture, blood, sweat, and tears. Here's the reason for the powerful fascinations that drugs hold for people, for the passion of power and the lure of wealth and the enticement of forbidden sex to young and old alike. Here is the only reasonable answer for the existence of these things in the world today. And here's an exercise. We're going to do it in a minute. And I've challenged you over the years to do this. He says this, remove this chapter, Genesis 3, from the Bible. And the rest of it is absolutely incredible. Ignoring the teaching of this chapter in history and the story of humanity becomes impossible. It becomes impossible either to understand or explain. He means the world around us. The most striking thing about this chapter is that we find ourselves here. You can't read through this chapter without feeling that you've lived it yourself, because, of course, you have. This account of temptation in the fall is reproduced in our lives many times a day. We have all heard the voice of the tempter. We have all felt the draw of sin. We know the pang of guilt that follows. In the sense, this is a timeless truth, perhaps that the word certainly speaks rationally. He said, this actually, he's talking about Adam and Eve, actually occurred, it actually happens, and it happens continually. He closes, he said, in that sense, there's no chapter in the Bible that's more up-to-date and more pertinent to our situation than the third chapter of Genesis. Now, what I thought was interesting, and I remember that quote from years ago. I remember the first time, a little autobiographical, kind of let you see into my psyche. The first time I studied Genesis chapter three was a huge moment for me, because a lot of things came together at that point. The reliability of Scripture, the explanation for the world we live in, the understanding of myself. And I did, and it's very easy to do. I did exactly what Stedman suggested. Genesis chapter two, you have it in front of you. You know it, because we've been studying it for about two weeks. God creates, and then he makes man in his image. He gives him some instruction. Really, one thing he forbids. He gives him positive instructions. I want you to take dominion over creation. I want you to rule over it, subdue it. And then in chapter two, verse 16 and 17, and we'll come back and we'll look at it a little more in depth in a minute. He says, don't eat from that tree. And the end result of all of this in Genesis 2.25 is that the man and his wife were naked and not ashamed. They were innocent. There is a word that we find in Scripture, and it's a word that we use over and over again. It's the word shalom. And it means

The World as It Was Meant to Be

Peace, for sure, but it's far more than that. The word carries with it the idea of wholeness or completion. Genesis 2:25 is shalom — man living in harmony with God, with himself, with the only other person around, Eve, and with creation. If you skip Genesis 3 and turn to Genesis 4, instead of shalom — peace, wholeness, completion — you find murder, betrayal, hatred, anger, jealousy, and pride. In short, you find rebellion against God.

Remembering what we just read that Stedman wrote, let me read to you from the opening paragraph of the book we are using — the doctrinal companion book to this series, written by Mark Driscoll and one of his associates. He says this:

> Something has gone terribly wrong, and everybody knows it. The Bible reveals that God created this world in a perfect state, and upon the creation of man and woman, God declared his entire creation is very good. This intended state of perfect beauty in all things is described in the Old Testament as shalom. Even those who do not believe in the Bible persist in longing for a shalom on earth, a happiness on earth, a peace on earth, because deep down in God's image bearers, there's a faint echo of Eden and how things are supposed to be. Yet, no matter how much money we spend or how many elections we hold or how many organizations we start or how many blogs we write or how many complaints we air, how many tears we cry or how many wars we wage, boredom, annoyance, misery, fears, tragedy, suffering, injustice, evil, sickness, pain, and death continue unabated.

That should gel with your experience of the world around you. All the times we ask, "Why would God create a world where —?" and then fill in the blank with some tragedy, some suffering, some injustice — the answer is: He didn't. Adam becomes our representative. In Adam, in the garden, he represents all of us who would ever live.

Sin Enters the World

Adam was given an option. He was created in this place called paradise, created without sin — but the moment we reach Genesis 3, we see sin enter the world. Look at Genesis chapter 3, verse 1. I want to spend a little time understanding this story and then consider what its implications are for us.

"Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made." The word "serpent" means literally "a shining one." He is crafty, cunning, subtle. We know from the balance of Scripture that this was Satan, though we cannot know that from this verse alone. You might read it in, but you would be bringing in knowledge from elsewhere. We know Satan appears often as an angel of light, as a subtle serpent, as a roaring lion — and here he comes as a shining one, crafty.

We need to try to approach this with fresh eyes, because we tend to read it and immediately think, "Watch out, watch out, watch out." If it were a play, we would see Satan enter and hear the ominous music — but none of that is in the text. Satan comes and Eve does not recoil in horror. She is attracted to him, the shining one.

Satan's Strategy: Questioning God's Word

"And he said to the woman, 'Indeed, has God really said that you should not eat from any tree in the garden?'" Look at what he does. This one called the crafty one, the subtle serpent — Jesus called him the ruler of this world, Paul called him the god of this age, and Martin Luther said there is not on earth his equal. One man has written that he has the ear of humanity and whispers into it a lie, an outrageous but very attractive lie that makes man drool with desire.

We studied the book of James some months ago, and we spent time on James 1:14 — you do not need to turn there. "Each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. And when that lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death." That is exactly what we see here in Genesis 3. There is something external enticing something internal.

It is really beneficial to understand the dynamic of all of this. What Satan does here is really his standard operating procedure. Jesus calls him a murderer from the very beginning, and the first thing Satan does is question Eve about what God said. "Did God really say that? Were those His exact words? And beyond that, is that really something you would expect a God to do? This is a God who said He loved you — if God loves you, why would He put any restrictions on you, Eve? If God really cares for you, why would He want to keep anything away from you?" So the seed is planted.

Eve's Response and God's Actual Command

Eve responds: "The fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat, but the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, 'You should not eat it or touch it, or you will die.'" Now turn back just a page or so to chapter 2, verse 16, because here is God's actual command — given to Adam and presumably communicated either by God again, without record of it, or by Adam to Eve.

"From any tree of the garden you may eat freely, but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat from it, for in the day you eat from it you will surely die."

The Serpent's Strategy

Many people put a lot of emphasis on how Eve added to the word of God — "don't eat from it or touch it" — and see that as a warning about the danger of adding to Scripture. What she is communicating, and what God communicates, is simply: don't have anything to do with this. Don't lead us into temptation. So she responds and says that is pretty much what He said.

The serpent then looks at her in verse 4 and says, "You surely will not die." Notice what he does. He replaces questioning and doubt with a very bold statement. Then he speaks quickly: "God knows that the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God and you will know good and evil." He is essentially saying, "Eve, do you understand what's going on here? This God you think loves you mustn't love you very much. He's a jealous God. He doesn't want you to be like Him."

And now we have in front of us the very issue of the first sin ever committed — and really, at its core, the issue of all of our sin. It's about who you are going to believe. Who is your God? Boldly and slyly: you are not going to die. But God has said you are going to die. It's really that simple.

Take this out of Genesis for a moment and place it in your own life. Here is what God says is true, and then you try to come up with some way to rationalize it away. God says if you do it, it's wrong, and the rationalizations in between don't really matter. The serpent promises that you will be like God and know good and evil. And in a sense they do become like God in that they now understand good and evil — but they look at good and evil, and at all of life, through a distorted view.

The Lust of the Flesh, the Eyes, and Pride

First John chapter 2, verses 15 through 17 speaks directly to this. John writes: "Do not love the world nor the things of the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world. And the world is passing away." When John talks about the world here, he means the world system — the thought processes and beliefs of the world — and the physical world as well, which is driven by that same thought process.

Now look at Genesis chapter 3, verse 6: "When the woman saw that the tree was good for food" — the lust of the flesh — "and that it was a delight to the eyes" — the lust of the eyes — "and that the tree was desirable to make one wise" — the boastful pride of life — "she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate." The same three categories John identifies in First John are present at the very first temptation.

Satan does not deviate much from that pattern. If you go to Matthew chapter 4, where Satan is tempting Jesus, you will see the same process: lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, boastful pride of life. It is absolutely predictable how he is going to work in your life. Though he may be disguised as an angel of light, he will come in those same three areas.

Knowing the Play

In my senior year of high school I was the second-string quarterback. The kid ahead of me was a terrific player — a pre-season All-State quarterback who went on to play college football. So it was pretty safe that unless we were way ahead or he got hurt, I wasn't going to have to play, which was a comfortable spot to be in.

What I had to do each week was learn the opposing team's offense and run it against our first-team defense. We played a team called Davenport Central, which had produced players like Roger Craig, Curtis Craig, Jim Jensen, and others. Davenport Central had a counter play they ran that was extremely effective — an inside handoff as you came down the line. They ran that play and they killed you with it.

So here is what we would do with that play and others. I had a friend who was a halfback — the fastest guy on the team, though he didn't like to get hit. We'd run the play, I'd hand it to him, I'd turn around, and he'd be gone. And then the coaches would say the words you never want to hear: "Run it again." By that point the defense had lost the edge of not knowing what was coming, because now everybody knew. So we'd come back and run it again, and about the time I got the ball to him there would be three guys waiting — a huge advantage for the defense.

One day the coach said "run it again," and my friend said quietly, "Don't run it." So I looked at him and we adjusted. We faked the handoff his way, then hit him on the outside — and there was nobody out there, because everybody thought the ball was going inside. We were reprimanded for being disobedient, but the point was clear: there is a tremendous advantage when you know what play is coming.

not merely a possible helper or sexual object but also a temptation to them to aggress upon his property, to use him sexually without his consent, to seize his possessions, to humiliate him, to cause him pain, to torture and to kill him. Freud wrote that. He's not a Christian. He doesn't believe in the Bible. He's just looking at what's plainly before him. And what's plainly before him is that human beings are broken.

The Distortion of the Image of God

So the question arises: does the Fall mean we are no longer made in the image of God? The answer is no. In Genesis chapter 5, verses 1 through 3, Genesis 9:6, 1 Corinthians 11:7, and James chapter 3, verse 9, we are told that you and I are still made in the image of God. But that image is now distorted.

Look at four areas. Our relationship with God is distorted — so what does Adam do? He hides. Our relationship with ourselves is distorted — we don't see ourselves as we really are, and we begin to cover up. Our relationship with other people is distorted — they were naked and innocent, and now they are grabbing for fig leaves, covering themselves, hiding, no longer willing to be real with one another. And our relationship with all of creation is distorted.

Watch how fast this unfolds. Verse 9: "The Lord God called the man and said to him, 'Where are you?' And he said, 'I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid myself.'" And God said, "Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?" And the man said — and you know this — "The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate." It's her fault. See how distorted we are already? It's not my fault, you can't blame me, it's her fault.

Then the Lord said to the woman, "What is this you have done?" And she said, "The serpent deceived me, and I ate." In a sense, what she is saying is: God, it's the serpent You created, and in a roundabout way, it's Your fault. Regardless, it is anybody's fault but mine. See how quickly everything gets turned upside down?

The Normalcy of Walking with God

I have always been intrigued by verse 8 — they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day. That must have been the norm. I don't have any sense of a time frame here. I don't know the time between Genesis 2:25 and Genesis 3:1. I don't know how long Adam and Eve were in the garden, naked and innocent, before the serpent came. Once the serpent came and dialogued with Eve, I don't know how long it was until she looked at that tree and that fruit. Did she look at it for a day, a week, a month, a year? My suspicion is not too long, but I don't know that. All I know is that in that moment, everything got turned upside down.

Let me read you the sentence we started with: something is terribly wrong, and everyone knows it. That is the world we live in, and we see it at different degrees.

What Freud Saw Without the Bible

Let me read you a quote from Sigmund Freud. He said this: "Men are not gentle, friendly creatures wishing for love who simply defend themselves if they are attacked, but that a powerful measure of desire for aggression has to be reckoned as part of the instinctual endowment." What he was saying is that we are naturally aggressive, naturally pushing outward against others. He continued: the result is that their neighbor is to them not merely a possible helper or sexual object, but also a temptation to aggress upon his property, to use him sexually without his consent, to seize his possessions, to humiliate him, to cause him pain, to torture and to kill him.

Freud wrote that. He was not a Christian. He did not believe the Bible. He was simply looking at what was plainly before him. And what was plainly before him is that human beings are broken.

Satan's Playbook Has Never Changed

Now let's go back to where we began. Satan says, I'll tell you the play. It is going to be the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, or the boastful pride of life. He was confident enough to run that play with Adam and Eve. He was confident enough to run it with Jesus. He is confident enough to run it with you.

What we see happen very quickly after the Fall is that pride replaces innocence and humility. Eve eats, Adam eats. Look at verse 7: "Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings." Remember chapter 2, verse 25 — they were naked and it did not bother them. Now they begin to cover themselves.

Then look at what happens next. They hear the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. Just stay there for a moment. D.A. Carson writes, consumed by one's own self-focus, we desire to dominate and manipulate others. He is talking about this very incident. Here, he says, is the beginning of fences, rape, greed, malice, bitterness, and war.

Sin Entered Through One Man

What has happened is this — and we don't fully understand it until we get to Romans chapter 5. Romans 5:12 says that with one man's sin, Adam's sin, sin entered into the world, and with sin, all of us have died.

And on page 149 of the Driscoll book, D.A. Carson writes this: "The heart of all evil is idolatry itself." Here is the phrase: it is the de-godding of God. It is the creature swinging his puny fist in the face of his Maker and saying, in effect, if you don't see things my way, I'll make my own God — I'll be my own God.

That is what happens. That is what is going on in Genesis 3. And you inherit that. That is the explanation for your life and for the world around us. We will come back and close this loop in a moment.

The Diagnosis of Sin

Not only a possible helper or sexual object, but also a temptation to them to gratify their aggression on him, to exploit his capacity for work without compensating him, to use him sexually without consent, to seize his possessions, to humiliate him, to cause him pain, to torture and to kill him. Who has the courage to dispute it in the face of all the evidence in his own world and history? Here is what Freud is saying: if we have ever been able to have enough empirical data to prove a fact, it is that man is by nature a sinner. That is what is wrong.

Why does an athlete who is making millions of dollars go and snort it all up his nose? You are Bernie Madoff or one of these guys — Martha Stewart — you see it all the time. You have all this money, so why do you need more? You have a beautiful wife, beautiful kids, a beautiful family, a beautiful life, but that is not enough. You have to have the secretary too. You have a wonderful husband and all that goes with it, but you are not satisfied. You have to go back to school, get your degree in psychology, so you can go out into the world and feel significant. You are a kid born in a great place, given great things, and yet there is something in us that is incurably restless.

We want to control. We want to dominate. I was with somebody not long ago and they said, "So-and-so is a controller." But everybody I know is a controller. I do not know anybody who is not a controller. Some are obvious about it, some are quiet about it, some are aggressive, some are passive-aggressive. Everybody wants their own way. And you see this most blatantly when we are in a position where we can be dominant by virtue of that position — a husband with a wife, a parent with a child, a boss with an employee. What is in us that causes that?

The Answer in Genesis 3

This is the answer: Genesis 3. I am made in the image of God. God's perfect representative sinned, and when he sinned, it affected all of us. So all of us are born with this sinful nature. I know how sad that sounds, and it ought to raise the question: how does it get fixed?

In a picture of God's grace, He tells you in Genesis 3, verse 15, that He will put enmity between you — speaking to the serpent — and the woman, between your seed and her seed. That is called proto-evangelism. That is the first promise we have in Scripture of Jesus' coming — "her seed," the virgin birth. So we look around the globe, we look around this country, we look at our families, and we see that something is wrong. It is called sin.

How We Respond to Sin

We can respond to sin in a whole variety of ways. We can say it is really no big deal. We can say we are victims. I always felt bad for Adam and Eve, because their instinct would have been to say, "I am a victim of my socioeconomic background" — but paradise is a problem. They did not have parents to blame. They quickly learned, though: it is the woman you gave me, it is the serpent you created. We can laugh sin off or minimize it. We can say, yes, we know we are guilty, but offer no repentance. We can talk about it as a disease and explain our behavior away. We can say it is an intellectual problem — I do not know enough — or an economic problem — I do not have enough.

You Can Be Good Without God?

This morning, as I do almost every day, I went through USA Today and the Wall Street Journal. In USA Today this morning there was an article titled "Atheist Fourth of July: One Nation Under Godless." It is a story about how an atheist organization spent $23,000 on a campaign to have, in 27 towns, pilots tow banners reading "Atheism is Patriotic — God Bless America." They ran into a problem, though: even the pilots they had hired were atheists and said they did not think they wanted to do it. The organization made up 15,000 buttons for people to wear. You may remember when we were kids there were "I Am Loved" buttons — these say "Happy Human." The idea, as I quote from the article, is to wear the pin on Monday to provoke conversation about the motto, and the motto is this: you can be good without God.

That may sound radical to us, but a lot of the world buys it. Even many who say they believe in God would quietly go along with the idea that they can be good on their own. Here is what the Bible says: "There is none good, no, not one" — Romans 3:10. "None good, no, not one. There is none who understands, none who seeks after God. All have turned aside. Together they have become useless. There is none who does good, no, not one." This is a — no pun intended — typically human thought: I can be good without God.

What they are really saying is that they can do good things. They can not believe in God and still cut their neighbor's grass. They can not love God and still take food to people who are hungry. They can not believe in God and still intervene when somebody is knocking down an old woman. That is not the issue. What God is saying is that our hearts are polluted — that even when we do acts that are good by human standards, they are filthy rags to God.

An Accurate Diagnosis Requires an Accurate Cure

Here is the whole point of today: sin is the problem, and getting that right is critically important. Susan and I — and I have certainly learned this in the last almost seven years now with the doctor — you have to have an accurate diagnosis before you can have an accurate cure. Get the diagnosis wrong, and the cure will be wrong. If you are here today and you know Christ, you have already embraced this. But I know that on a Sunday morning at Redemption Gilbert, we have a whole number of people who are not yet followers of Christ — maybe

The Problem and the Solution

Maybe you've been here all along but never made this transition, never had the lights go off. Maybe you're here for the very first time and somebody brought you. Whatever the case, I want to tell you something: though I have not yet had the chance to meet you, let me tell you what your problem is. The problem in the world is sin, and your problem is sin. The solution is Jesus. Your solution is Jesus.

I got a call one day from a guy who said, "I want you to meet with a friend of mine — he's all messed up." I said okay, so I went out. I've never had this happen before and never had it happen since. I sat down, and the guy said, "Let me tell you about me," and he just started. He told me about screwing people in business. He told me about his wife, he told me about his girlfriend, he told me about his kids, he told me about drugs, stealing, and porn. It was just like that — bing, bing, bing, bing — as if he never took a breath, just kept coming and coming and coming. He finally stopped and said, "What do you think?" And I said, "I don't even know the problem, but I know Jesus is the answer."

Sin Distorts Everything

That's what we learn here. Why is your first flinch to lie? Why is your first reaction when a friend is successful to be jealous? Why do you gossip, and why is that a trial? Why do you care about the Casey Anthony trial, really? Why is that interesting to you?

Why, when you're in a discussion with your spouse and he or she says "you always do this," do you — if you're a pro, like I am — focus and go, "Always? In every time, every situation, every day, every minute — always, always, always? No, answer me: always?" Why is that? Why, when somebody comes with a criticism, can you not hear it? It's sin.

Sin gives you a distorted view of God and a distorted view of yourself. I've discovered that in terms of managing and dealing with people — we just can't see ourselves as other people see us. We can't often see ourselves accurately. We're in relationships and we're always holding back. You never tell the truth completely, do you? We're a mess with the creation. That's why working the soil is now toil.

Your Problem Is Sin — Your Solution Is Jesus

So you're here today, and your problem is not money. If your problem were money, then money would be the answer. Your problem is not that you're not educated enough — if that were it, then education would be the solution. Your problem is sin, and the solution is Jesus.

Does that mean your world is going to be smooth and easy and simple now? No, because you're still a sinful person living with sinful people in a fallen world. You're still going to have those same sets of challenges. You're still going to die physically. You've been redeemed, and now God is in the process of restoring, but that restoration doesn't take place for us until we die and then He comes again.

To those of you who are here today feeling that something is missing and something is clicking — right now it's tracking with you, it's making sense, it's explaining why you've met all your sales goals and your quota and yet you're not satisfied. You got the girl you thought would make you happy, the house you thought would make you happy, you got what you thought would make you happy — but you're not happy. Why? Because your problem is not a housing problem; it's a sin problem. You will never have enough of a person, place, or thing to fill that desire that can only be met with a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

What Do You Do?

So you're here today and you're asking, "What do I do?" If you're one who knows Christ as your Lord and Savior, you draw near to Him. You continue to understand that He is your Lord, Master, and Savior. Over the next four weeks we'll look at the covenants that God makes, then at Jesus — God becoming man — then at the cross, and then at the resurrection. That is the solution.

But you may be sitting there saying, "I can't wait four weeks. I don't have four weeks to wait." All of a sudden you see your problem, or God seems to be doing something in your life where you now see that there is this problem. What do you do? You put your faith and trust in Christ — believing that you are who He said you are, and that He is who He says He is.

As a practical help, there will be men and women at the front of the room after this service who are there for exactly that purpose — whether it's five, ten, fifteen, twenty minutes, or an hour, they're here for one reason: to be God's instrument to minister to you. Talk to them. Or if you're a guest, talk to the person who invited you here today about what it means to know Christ in a personal way.

Responding in Worship

For us now, we celebrate God's solution through communion, and then we respond in two ways beyond that — through music and worship, and then from now until we gather again next week, we understand that we have the privilege of being God's hands and feet, salt and light to the world around us. Our worship isn't limited to this place or this day. Everywhere we go, as part of our active worship, we present our bodies to God and He uses us in ways frankly beyond anything we can imagine.

Let me pray as Matthew comes to lead us in communion. Father, thank you for these amazing truths. This totally makes sense to me — I don't know if it's because I've been around it for a while, or because I'm familiar with it and accept it. God, I'm just grateful that Your word makes sense, that as Your word is applied to our heart by Your Spirit, we understand ourselves, the world, You, and the people around us. I pray that for those right now who maybe feel some level of tension or even conviction, that You would give them the courage to move and respond to this word — to talk to somebody at the front afterwards, or to talk to the person who brought them here today. God, thank you for loving us enough to tell us the truth about who we are. We pray this to You in Christ's name, amen.