Regeneration is man’s re-genesis. The
human species was designed to live forever, but the sin virus became the
fittest, making mankind unfit to survive. By grace, for those who trust the
Lord God, He will again make repentant sinners fit again. Repentance relieves the stress of guilt and Christians
often live longer. In the eternal scheme of things, mankind will again survive as
the fittest.
Fitness is not achieved by their
own doing, but God doing His genesis thing again; not that He did it wrong in
the beginning, but that man was doomed to destruction because of free will.
Free will kills the species. The will of sinful man emancipates him from the protection
of God and endangers his survival. Those who are entirely emancipated are
doomed; they are no longer fit to survive!
Animals die because they can do as they will. Mankind dies when they do the
same. Authority is required to circumvent the entropy of the species – the propensity
for extinction. Mankind can take their advantage to reverse the dying process. Righteous
living extends the age of the species and the longevity of the soul - that which
only belongs to the species of men!
Returning to fitness is “regeneration.”
As Jesus said, it is “born again,” [i] and
is a re-genesis. Regeneration is not returning to how one once was, perhaps at
their birth, but the way the Designer created them. Longevity is determined by
how well people fit into the model. In Christianity, the model is Jesus the
Christ. [ii]
Adam, in his original condition was like Christ, being made in the very image
of God.
If the model is willingly copied,
there is a special reward for that – eternal life. [iii] Modeling
Jesus makes one more fit to survive. Mankind was predestined to conform to the
image of God’s person – Jesus. [iv]
In other words, mankind was designed to be perfect. Adam and Eve discarded that
opportunity. Jesus was of perfect design; but was strong willed. All others were
given free will. Jesus had that as well, but his will was stronger because it
was the will of God.
A weak will corrupted mankind. When
offered choices of pleasure or obedience to authority, the species with free
will most often prefers pleasure.
Truthfully, God likes that the human
species have pleasure but not to the neglect of Him. God has made it clear,
that as Creator, He demands reverence. [v] He
could have created mankind to be entirely submissive, but then that would have
been a lifeless species. The ability to exercise the human will makes man a peculiar
species. [vi]
Beasts may experience love; that is
not known for sure. Perhaps their kind of love is mere devotion to the person
who nourishes them. Perhaps that is the definition of love! If so, maybe beasts
are better at love than the human species. Man may be the only kind that fails
to love the very One who nourishes them. God gave mankind that choice. He could
have created automatons – those who would merely salivate when offered a
reward.
The human will is important. God
really doesn’t care if people do things their way; He wants them to be willing
to do things His way. That is the demonstration of love for Him. That willingness to please the Creator is
re-creation – called regeneration. Everyone is born to please themselves,
contrary to the Designer’s intent, but must come to understand, that pleasing themselves
rather than God displeases their Maker.
Why do people not believe in a Creator? Because if a Creator truly exists, they
must revere and love Him even more than themselves. Rather than doing God’s
will, they would rather do their own.
Of course, the excuse people use
for disbelief is that God doesn’t exist. With that thought, they are free to do
as they will, or as they please. Everyone doing what is right in their own eyes.
[vii] That
would be chaotic and is the way of Satan. Why do most not believe in Satan?
They think they are doing as they please when they are doing what pleases the
Devil.
The world has painted a fictitious
portrait of Satan. He is not a mythological horned devil with a pitchfork. He
is a beautiful but cunning angel [viii]
who wants God’s throne and kingdom. [ix]
Satan wants to be as God – as Creator - but he didn’t create anything.
Therefore, the world wants that people not take God as Creator seriously.
Belief in the Creation is serious business because that is how God is known to
exist. [x]
There cannot be regeneration without an initial generation. Genesis is the generation
of the universe. “Generate” means “to produce something” (Merriam-Webster Dictionary 2019) .
What produced the Big Bang? I must
be one of two things: (1) Nothing or (2) God. What generated the space for matter?
(1) Nothing, or (2) God. What produced life? (1) Nothing or (2) God. The production
of nothing, matter, and life must have the same cause. Was nothing the cause of
space, matter, and life, or was there a cause. Theologians of all persuasions refer
to the Cause as “God” and even polytheists have a chief god.
Regeneration is not correcting God’s
mistake, but mankind’s. Generation is the production of life, and regeneration
is extending the life and lives of the species. The granting of undeserved
longevity is called grace. That makes the Creator God a personal God!
Why would anyone despise their
father and mother? Most often it is because they have authority over the son or
daughter. Initially, children want love and protection; they prefer authority. Then
when they experience the pleasure of the world, they want more, but good
parenting means the parents want to keep their offspring safe. Good parents protect
their species and should because even the other species usually do that!
Since self-gratifying pleasure is
usually detrimental or even dangerous, parents want to protect their children.
Good parenting increases the chances of the species surviving. Like Adam before
them, children don’t understand the importance of surviving. Each wrong-doing
evaluates pleasure more desirable than abstention. Wrongdoers unwittingly
prefer pleasure to life itself; they prefer death to abstention. Of course,
they reject the idea that sin leads to death, but it does! [xi]
Likewise, the willingness to forgo the pleasures of life extends life eternally,
if done for right reasons – to please the Father.
Why would the Creator care what His
creatures do? Because He loves them so, and wants that none should perish, just
as any good father would want. [xii]
That’s why honoring parents is so important; it demonstrates reverence for the
Creator by revering the procreators.
Mankind was designed fit. That is without sin. Sin is an
unpopular word because it is a theological term. Think of “sin” as displeasing
the Creator by preferring independence to protection. Humans would rather
endanger themselves than heed God. As a parent how would that make you feel?
Any parent with rebellious children can answer that! Well, God has personality
as well; he agonizes over His creatures’ foolish behavior: “And being in an
agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of
blood falling down to the ground” (Luke 22:44).
Jesus – God Himself in the flesh –
was not fretting about his own death but was agonizing over concern for our
longevity. He wanted his species to survive to the extent that he generated flesh
for Himself, then killed it instead of his creatures.
Why did God die? That His species
live! Not only to increase the lifespan but to make them “fit” to live forever.
Rebirth, regeneration, or regeneration is intent. Rather than the destruction
of life at death, if in Christ, death is life: “To live is Christ, and to die
is gain” (Phil 1:22). What is gained by dying? Eternal life. The prerequisite for
that is trusting God that the species can be glorified and that He will do that
as promised.
“Glorification” seems to be of
utmost importance. Recalling that the human species was made in the image of
God, and in our image, people should
ask, in whose image are they? The
human species was made in the image of Jesus.
How can that be; Jesus had yet to
be Created? Well, God is not stupid! He knew how He wanted the Earth to appear
and had a model for man as well. God knew the appearance of His own flesh
before He put it on, and He desired that his living souls have the same fleshly
appearance.
Which came first; the chicken or
the egg? That applies to Adam and his brother Jesus. God planned their
appearance simultaneously; Adam was made in the appearance of God and God personified
Himself in the same fashion. [xiii]
Jesus is not another person, but is
the only “person” of God and has a human personality
in addition to spiritual character; he is the Son of God and the Son of Man.
Eternal life depends on whether
Jesus is recognized as God or not, and that mankind are not really gods, as they
perceive themselves to be. [xiv] Therefore,
the survival of the human species depends on whether Jesus is recognized as
Creator or not, because if He can’t Create, he can’t rec-create. [1]
Glorification is returning to the
original image in which Adam was made. Before sin, Adam was immortal, but disobedience
spoiled his flesh. God promised Adam reprieve in “five-and-one-half- days.”
2 Yea, the Word
that will again save thee when the five days and a half are fulfilled." 3
But when Adam heard these words from God, and of the great five days and a
half, he did not understand the meaning of them.
4 For Adam was
thinking that there would be but five days and a half for him, to the end of
the world.
5 And Adam
wept, and prayed God to explain it to him.
6 Then God in
His mercy for Adam who was made after His own image and similitude, explained
to him, that these were 5,000 and 500 years; and how One would then come and
save him and his seed. (1
Adam & Eve 3:2-6) [2]
The author believes that refers to
the “rapture” when the dead in Christ shall rise first followed by those living
at that time according to the Way of Christ. [xv] The dead shall receive gloried, incorruptible bodies – without sickness
or sin - [xvi] just
as originally designed.
Disorder causes unfitness and order
restores fitness. Disorder is mankind attempting to survive the world, and
order is God saving the fallen world. Mankind is one of the few creatures who are
set on self-destruction. Sinful behaviors cause that both physically and
spiritually.
[1] By
convention, capital letters are used for pronouns for God and not for Jesus, although technically, as Jesus Is God, pronouns in reference to Jesus should
be capitalized.
[2]
The Books of Adam and Eve are pseudepigrapha, meaning that their author and
dates are unknown. They are non-canonical sacred writings and should not be
considered on the same par as Holy Scripture. On the other hand, whoever the
writer and in their time, knew the purpose of Jesus quite well.
[i]
Gen 3:7
[ii] 1
Cor 11:1
[iii]
Rom 6:23
[iv]
Rom 8:29
[v]
Exod 20:3-4
[vi]
Titus 2:14
[vii]
Jud 17:6
[viii]
Ezek 28:17
[ix]
Isa 14:13-4
[x]
Rom 1:20
[xi]
Rom 6:23
[xii]
John 3:16
[xiii]
Heb 2:17
[xiv]
Gen 3:5, John 3:14
[xv] 1
Thes 4:16-17
[xvi]
1 Cor 15:52
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