Foundation for Understanding Salvation
The questions that we need to answer when witnessing to someone are:
- What is the problem? Sin
- Why does it matter if I believe anything at all or what particular religion I choose to follow? Because the Bible way of salvation is the only way of dealing with sin that God accepts
The Bible is the foundation for understanding salvation.
We by faith accept that the Bible is the Word of God.
- The Bible claims to be the Word of God
- The continuity within the Bible backs up its claims
- The evidences found in the world of science and nature can be seen to fit nicely into the Bible explanation of certain events and processes
- The accuracy of the prophecies of the Bible prove its validity
- The authenticity of its stories revealing the weaknesses and strengths of its main characters show it has been recorded by eyewitnesses that are truthful
The salvation message is not strictly contained in the New Testament.
Since Jesus Christ created me it matters what He thinks and says about me.
The first man Adam was created rightly related to God.
The whole creation was pronounced “very good” by God. ( 1:31)
Obviously something has changed, because apart from understanding God’s Word, people do not think rightly about God, nor do they live in right relationship with God, and they don’t realize how much their sin has offended God.
In addition, the world around us has been placed under the curse of sin evidenced by the suffering, disease, and death in everyday life.
Chapter three of Genesis explains to us what happened between God and His creation.
The Fall
Doubting the Word of God ( 3:1-3)
- Satan got Eve to begin thinking that God was not as good as she thought He was because He had held back from her the fruit of one tree in the Garden of Eden
- Eve alters God’s Word in her response, “neither shall ye touch it.”
- Doubting God’s Word always leads to its reinterpretation
- Satan tells Eve a bold face lie – “Ye shall not surely die”
- Satan’s false promise – “Ye shall be as gods”
- The only truth in what Satan said – “knowing good and evil”
- Eve was tempted to experience evil and see what it was like – but if she chose to do so it would be breaking the trust she had with God and would damage her relationship with God
- Here is the problem with sinful man – he wants to do as he wishes without consequences for sin but while still enjoying the goodness that comes from God
- Fruit was “good for food” – appealing to the physical, bodily appetites
- Fruit was “pleasant to the eyes” – appealing to the emotions
- Fruit was “desired to make one wise” – appealing to the mind and spirit, pride of knowledge and spiritual insight
- Parallel verse – 1 John 2:16
- Adam followed Eve’s invitation to partake of the fruit knowing exactly what he was doing
- It is as if they both made the conscious choice to try life without God for a while – to launch out on their own and take their chances
- Unfortunately they were not created to live apart from a right relationship with God and they immediately realized this after they sinned
- Shame (3:7-10)
- Man-made covering for their shame (fig leaves) – false religion of works
- Hid from God – man’s natural tendency and response to spiritual things
- Excuse making (3:11-13)
- Adam blamed Eve and blamed God indirectly in doing so – “The woman whom thou gavest to be with me,”
- Man still looks to blame others and God for why he is what he is
- Eve blames the serpent and his deception
- The Curse (3:14-19)
- On the serpent – crawling on belly and bruising of his heel by seed of woman
- Woman – pain in child bearing and man would rule over her
- Man – ground would require great labor to harvest crops and he would return to the dust of the ground through death
- Paradise Lost (3:20-24)
- God shed blood of animal to properly cover their nakedness
- God drove them out of the Garden of Eden and banned them from eating from the Tree of Life guarded by Cherubim with a flaming sword
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