BOOKLET 3
Understanding life
Chapter 1: Different kinds of life Chapter 2: The Giver of life Chapter 3: Which way of life?
Chapter 2: The Giver of life
If you want to know how you can find true meaning in life, then you must seek to understand the way that God has created us. He is the Giver of physical life and also the Giver of spiritual life, which will bring true meaning and joy to our hearts.
God is not only powerful in His ability to create this world, He is also perfectly wise and perfectly good. What He has created is very meaningful and He wants to bring deep meaning to all those who truly want it.
When God created the world, He created physical objects like the sun and the moon and the stars as well as mountains and rivers and oceans. He also created plants and animals which have physical life and which can reproduce themselves. After all this, God very specially created man and woman. "And God created the man in His image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them" (Genesis 1: 27). This was different from the way He had created the plants and animals.
However, this did not mean that the first man and woman were created morally good like God. They were created such that they could become morally good like God if they were to obey God and follow Him and His ways. God had created them with spirits that could make moral choices, whether to choose the path that is good or the path that is not good. God gave them the choice whether to follow Him or to go their own way. Adam and Eve chose to go their own way, in disobedience to God, and their hearts, their spirits, became morally bad instead of becoming morally good.
Today, God is still creating man and woman in His image. He is still creating us with a spirit that can choose whether we will follow Him and become good or go our own way and become morally bad. In James 3: 9, we are warned against the evil that our tongue may speak and we are told, "By this we bless the Lord and Father, and by this we curse men who have been made according to the likeness of God." We also can become morally good like God if we obey Him, trust Him and follow Him in His ways.
Another aspect of having been created in the image of God is that it is possible for us to have a deep relationship with God. God has created us with a spirit which not only can choose what is morally good but which can also relate with God deeply according to kindness, unselfishness, love and purity of life, if we follow Him and receive His life.
Having been created in the image of God, we recognize, deep within our hearts, the God who has created us. However, when we have chosen to go our own way, our consciousness of God and our awareness of Him grow dim. We also seek to run away from Him. In such a state, we may even wonder whether there is a God who has created us, and whether we could have come about by chance events producing the body and the life that we have.
God in His mercy and grace continues to speak to us and help us though we have disobeyed Him. The way that He has created the world around us helps us to recognize Him as our Creator.
How do thousands of feathers of the birds form such beautiful patterns? New feathers also replace old ones regularly. The feathers must be placed with great accuracy, with the same colours at the right positions.
God as the perfect Artist arranged the feathers to show this beauty in the patterns!
The beauty of the butterflies also shows the handiwork of God as the great Artist. The beautiful colourful patterns of the wings of butterflies are the result of many thousands of tiny scales on the butterfly wings being arranged with very great accuracy.
The colour pigments and the structures of the scales bring about the beautiful patterns.
Would you expect chance events to produce such beautiful patterns in these birds, butterflies and other animals we see?
Suppose, one day you go with a friend to a park and both of you notice leaves and flowers on the ground forming the word, WELCOME. What would you think?
If you see this pattern as you walk into the park, what would you think?
Your friend says that after so many years of trial and error, at last by chance the wind has managed to blow the leaves and flowers to the right positions, to produce this "WELCOME" message. Would you agree or would you think that someone arranged it?
When both of you are going home, you pass by the same spot and you see that the leaves and flowers are now facing you with the word, GOODBYE.
What would you say if you see this pattern?
God has left so many of His "footprints" in the world around us that we can be very clear that He is the Creator and the Giver of life.
During my studies in medicine, I have been deeply awed by the greatness and wisdom and power of God in the way He has created the human body. I came to know that our lungs can expand so that we can absorb the oxygen that we need because our lung cells produce "surfactant", a chemical substance that helps the lungs to expand by reducing the surface tension of the liquid lining our lungs. Without this, our lungs would collapse and we would die. (Surfactant is a very complicated substance, with many atoms joined together accurately and specifically in various components. Enough of it must be produced, and regularly replaced, for the body to function normally. Prematurely born babies who do not produce enough of surfactant may suffer from what is called Neonatal Respiratory Distress Syndrome. Others of all ages who do not have enough effectively functioning surfactant during severe stress, injury and infection, may suffer from Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome. Both of these conditions result in difficulty in breathing and may lead to death if not treated.) This is only one of many thousands of substances that must be present in our body for it to function well so that we will not die.
When God created us and allowed us to make our choice whether to obey Him or not, He gave us a conscience in our spirit so that we can recognize what is the right path and which is the wrong way. Even a little child knows it is wrong to be selfish and unkind. However, we readily choose the selfish way because it is enjoyable for the moment.
From all this, we can see that we are very different from animals. We have been created for different purposes. When God created plants and animals and man, he intended that plants should be food for animals and for man.
These beautiful apples have life, and they are meant for food!
In Genesis 1: 29, 30, God said to the first man and woman that He created, "Behold, I have given you every plant bearing seed which is on the face of all the earth and every tree which has in it fruit bearing seed; it shall be food for you. And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the sky and to every creeping thing on the earth in which is life, every green plant is for food."
Later, God told Noah, after the flood, "Every moving thing that is alive shall be food for you; just as the green plant, I have given you all things" (Genesis 9: 3). We see then that animals are created with a different purpose from man. They form part of the world we live in, and they also provide food for us, but we must not ill-treat them. They are able to move about and to reproduce but they only have physical life which is present in the physical body when it is alive.
God also created man with a physical body which has physical life similar to that of animals in many ways. However, God's main purpose for man is not the physical life but the moral and spiritual life. He created man in His image by creating a spirit that is capable of making moral choices and able to receive spiritual life from God. This spirit is also called "the inner man", which dwells in the body. The body is also called "the outer man" (2 Corinthians 4: 16). God wants to help us to become morally good, like Him. This takes place in our inner man, our spirit.
In Booklet 1, we saw that the Lord Jesus teaches us that we do not have life in ourselves and we need life from God. He was speaking about eternal life, which is the life of God. This is not physical life but the spiritual life from God. As human beings with a spirit, we will not find deep and lasting meaning in life until we choose to come to God, obey Him and trust Him and receive this spiritual life from Him. We then become spiritually alive and we become His children.
Although our spirit can receive spiritual life from God, if we do not come to Him, we will not have life in our spirit. If we choose to go our own way, death will come to our spirit. This does not mean that we would not be able to recognize moral and spiritual things. It means that our spirits would not have the life of God but would instead be working against God. Instead of becoming good, we would have become morally bad.
The evil one, Satan, is a spirit. He does not have a physical body. He can understand spiritual things but he is spiritually dead and he brings spiritual death to all who follow him. This is because he rebelled against God, chose to go his own way in a very serious manner, and has become very evil.
What is the difference?
In what way is man like plants and animals? In what way is man different from plants and animals?
Why did God create us differently? Why is this difference important? What does it mean to you?
When your Creator you choose to obey,
His life, to your spirit, will come, and stay!