In this two-part message series, we will take a look at the book of Genesis and re-learn how to be human. We are all human beings but have lost the owner’s manual somewhere deep in the bowels of our catch-all kitchen drawer. Through life experiences and outside influences, we have somehow picked up the idea that we need to prove that we are worthy of others’ attention, time and affection.
Message by Tom Fenske – July 10, 2016
GOOD – RECLAIMING OUR ORIGINAL IDENTITY
- When God sees you, He sees something very good.
Genesis 1:27,31 So God created human beings in his own image. In the image of God he created them; male and female he created them…Then God looked over all he had made, and he saw that it was very good!
Tov = Hebrew word meaning “good, valuable, desirable, complete.”
First and foremost, in the eyes of God, we are “meod tov” – very good.
- God wants us to be open and honestly ourselves.
Genesis 2:25 Now the man and his wife were both naked, but they felt no shame.
- We have to unlearn the “futile ways” of trying to be better than human.
1 Peter 1:18 ESV … knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold…
- To thrive in this life, you have to know deep in your bones that you are good, valuable, and unendingly loved by God.
John 3:16-17 For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him.
Questioning Our Expectations
1. Trust Over Worry
Jeremiah 29:11 “For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.”
2. Humility Over Pride
Genesis 2:7 Then the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground. He breathed the breath of life into the man’s nostrils, and the man became a living person.
Philippians 2:6-7 Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being…
3. Diversity Over Blandness
Ephesians 4:7 However, he has given each one of us a special gift through the generosity of Christ.
4. Mystery Over Certainty
1 Corinthians 13:12 Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.
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