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I. Man
А. The creation of man
1. Man being created according to God’s image and likeness
а. To have man to express God
b. To have man to exercise God’s dominion
2. God placing man in front of the tree of life in order for man to receive Him as life
B. The fall of man
1. The first step of the fall
а. The cause
1) The serpent’s temptation
2) The woman’s assuming the headship
b. The process
c. The result
2. The second step of the fall
3. The third step of the fall
4. The fourth step of the fall
II. Salvation
А. God’s promise
1. The seed of the woman
2. The seed of Abraham
B. Salvation being in three stages
1. The initial stage
2. The progressing stage
3. The completing stage
III. Eternal life
А. The definition of eternal life
B. Laying hold of eternal life
IV. Believers
А. The baptism of the believers
B. The regeneration of the believers
C. The growth of the believers
D. The function of the believers
The Bible is not only a book about God; it is also about man. If you took away God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, and the cross of Christ from the Bible, the Bible would be an empty book. Likewise, without man, there is no one for God to speak to in the Bible. Therefore, just as God and the Lord Jesus have a special place in the Bible, so does man.
In the Bible, there is more written about man than about God. If we want to know man, we must study the Bible. No other book describes man as thoroughly as the Bible. Therefore, in order to know the Bible, we must know what it says concerning man.
[Man not only possesses the highest created life, but he is also made in God’s image and after God’s likeness (Gen. 1:26-27). Besides man, no other creature resembles God in image and in likeness. Man is the highest of God’s created things, and he is created in God’s image and after God’s likeness. In God’s creation, man is the best container prepared by God for His plan. In His plan God ordained that man would possess His life in order to be the brothers of His Son; therefore, in His creation, He caused man to have His image and likeness.
Image refers to the inward parts, such as the mind, emotion, and will. Man’s mind, emotion, and will, which constitute the intangible man, were created in God’s image. Therefore, human functions of thought, opinion, and love resemble those of God.
The image of God also refers to the characteristics of His attributes. The most prominent of God’s attributes manifested in man are love, light, holiness, and righteousness. When God created man, He created him in His image, according to the attributes of His virtues, so that man can express Him through these virtues. Thus, man has the desire to have love, light, holiness, and righteousness, and these virtues are sometimes expressed in his behavior. What man has, however, is only the image and not the reality. Man must receive God as his life and content and then God’s love, light, holiness, and righteousness will fill up and enrich the human virtues of love, light, holiness, and righteousness to become the reality.
Likeness refers to the outward body which constitutes the tangible man. Man’s outward body was created after the likeness of God. God has His likeness. Before God was incarnated to be a man, He appeared frequently to people in the Old Testament in the form of a man (Gen. 18:2, 16-17; Judg. 13:9-10, 17-19). The form of man is the form of God, for man was created after the likeness of God.]
The main purpose of God’s creation of man, a corporate man, is to express God (Gen. 1:26-27). [God did not create many men. God created mankind collectively in one person, Adam.] [Therefore, in Genesis 1:26 God said, “Let them” — one man, but the pronoun is them. This proves that this man is a corporate man.] [God created such a corporate man in His own image and after His likeness so that man might express God Himself.]
[God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion.” God created a corporate man to exercise His dominion (Gen. 1:26-28). The word dominion includes more than just authority. Dominion means having a kingdom as a sphere in which to exercise authority.] This corporate man is to use God’s authority to deal with His enemy, to recover the earth by conquering it, and to bring in the kingdom of God to the earth (Gen. 1:26-28; 3:1; Rev. 12:9).
[After God created man, He did not put the divine life into man. Instead, He gave man a free will; He wanted man to exercise the free will to choose, to take in His life. Therefore, He placed man in front of the tree of life.
In order to give man an opportunity to choose, God put the tree of knowledge of good and evil beside the tree of life. The tree of life denotes God as the source of life; the tree of the knowledge of good and evil signifies Satan as the source of death. These two trees signify the two sources in the universe.] Because God is great, He allowed man to choose. [It was according to such a principle that, in the garden of Eden, God put Adam in front of two trees; He wanted man to choose Him, to take Him as life.]
[After God made man, He placed man in front of the tree of life, that man might contact the tree of life and receive His life which is the uncreated life. But before man could contact the tree of life and join with God in life, Satan took the opportunity to come first. He tempted man to contact the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and caused man to have an illegal union with him. This became the first step of man’s fall.
According to the record in Genesis 3 through 11, mankind had four steps of the fall. The first step is the fall of Adam, which is recorded in chapter three; the second is the fall of Cain, recorded in chapter four; the third is the fall of the crooked and perverse generation before the deluge, recorded in chapter six; and the fourth is the fall of the whole human race rising up collectively to rebel against God, which is recorded in chapter eleven. These four steps of the fall continued one after another. In these four steps, Satan’s subtlety was exposed to the uttermost.]
Satan came to tempt man in the form of a serpent. He was crafty; he came in stealthily. [God clearly commanded man, saying, “But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die” (Gen. 2:17). But Satan said to the woman, “Hath God said?” Again, he said, “Ye shall not surely die.”] Satan caused man to doubt God’s word and His heart. However, the Bible tells us that heaven and earth shall pass away, but the Lord’s words shall by no means pass away (Luke 21:33). The Bible also tells us that God loves man to the uttermost (John 13:1). We should never doubt God’s word and His heart toward us.
[Another cause of man’s fall was the woman’s assuming the headship (Gen. 3:2-3, 6). Originally, God created only one man. There was only one head, not two. Adam was the head; Eve was not. Eve was built out of the rib from Adam’s side (Gen. 2:22). Eve’s head was Adam. The reason Eve was tempted by the serpent was that she assumed the headship, made the decision on her own, and fell into Satan’s snare. Even before she ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, she was already ensnared by the evil one. She passed over the man and assumed the headship to deal with the situation. This resulted in her being deceived. Thus, the Bible says that Adam was not deceived, but the woman being quite deceived was in transgression (1 Tim. 2:14).
Here we see a great principle. In the universe the unique Head is God Himself. Whenever we assume the headship in dealing with any situation, denying the headship of God and of Christ, we will surely be deceived.]
The best way to resist temptation is to call on the Lord Jesus, who is our Head, and pray-read His word whenever temptation comes. The Lord will defeat Satan and drive him away from us. We need to turn to Him all the time.
[The first step in the process of the fall was man’s failure to use his spirit. After man was created, he ought to have always used his spirit to contact God and live before Him. When man lives according to the spirit, he is preserved by God. But whenever man does not use his spirit to contact God, he bypasses God and puts God aside; consequently, he falls into the hand of the evil one.
The second step was the exercising of the soul (Gen. 3:2, 3, 6). When Eve spoke to the serpent, she firstly reasoned in her mind. Then she was tempted in her emotion and desired the fruit of the tree of knowledge. Eventually, she decided in her will to take the fruit and eat it.
The third step was the action of the body. When the soul is exercised, the body will naturally follow. The soul directs the body. When she was tempted this way, surely she would take and eat. Her taking the fruit to eat was the action of the body. First, the eye sees. Second, the hand takes. Third, the mouth eats.
In our daily living, we should use our spirit first, and then let our spirit direct our soul, which, in turn, directs our body. If we do not use our spirit but use our soul instead, we assume the headship and our soul takes the lead. Once the soul takes the lead, it will direct the body to do things that offend God.]
[The first result of the fall was that the soul was polluted, corrupted, and occupied. Even before Eve partook of the tree of knowledge, her mind had been polluted already. While she was talking to the serpent, the serpent’s concept penetrated her mind and defiled it. Hence, her mind was corrupted. Eventually, her mind was fully occupied by the evil one after she ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
The second result was that the body was changed in nature, having the element of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, the element of Satan, added to it, making it the flesh (Gen. 3:7). The human body originally created by God was pure. However, it now contains the evil element of Satan. This evil element is the indwelling sin which makes its home in man’s flesh. In Romans 7:17 Paul says, “So now it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells in me.” This evil substance, the nature of sin, has contaminated our body, making it flesh, full of evil and lust.
The third result was that man’s spirit was deadened, becoming insulated from God and losing its function toward God. Ephesians 2:5 tells us that before we were saved we were dead. We were not dead in our body or in our soul, but in our spirit. To be dead is to be without function or sensation. When man’s spirit was deadened, man no longer possessed the ability to contact God and fellowship with Him.
The fourth result was that the fallen man was constituted a sinner (Rom. 5:19). Due to man’s fall, a certain element has been injected into man, an element which the Bible calls sin. Romans 5:12 says, “As through one man sin entered into the world.” Thus, we all have been constituted sinners. Sin has already entered into us and become our subjective element within. Hence, we are not sinners because we sin; we sin because we have been constituted sinners.
The fifth result was that the fallen man was condemned (Rom. 5:18). We were all in Adam. The condemnation includes not only Adam but also the entire human race. The entire human race was condemned in Adam.
The sixth result was that the curse was brought in (Gen. 3:17-19). Because of one man’s sin, all of creation is subjected to vanity, groaning and travailing under the slavery of corruption (Rom. 8:20). The earth was cursed and it brought forth thorns and thistles. Furthermore, by the sweat of his face man will eat bread throughout his lifetime. These are the items of the curse brought in through man’s fall.
The seventh result was that man was cast out of paradise (Gen. 3:23-24). Paradise was the realm of life which included the tree of life and the sphere in which man may receive life. Thus, to be cast out of paradise means to be driven away from the sphere of life.
The eighth result was death (Gen. 3:19; Rom. 5:12). First, man’s spirit was deadened, and eventually his body will die. Through Adam’s transgression sin entered into the world and death through sin. Death reigns over all men (Rom. 5:14). Thus, in Adam all die (1 Cor. 15:22).]
The Devil caused man to fall further. Abel offered according to God’s way, but Cain presented an offering to God according to his own concept, thus departing from God’s way and creating his own religion. Cain became angry after God had no respect for his offering and, in his anger, killed Abel. Afterwards, he lied to God and became arrogant toward God. Apparently it was Cain who rejected God’s glad tidings; actually it was Satan who kept him from God’s way of salvation and caused him to fall further (Gen. 4:3-9).
[As a result of the second step of the fall, God pronounced a greater curse: man would till the ground, but the ground would not yield to him her strength. Furthermore, he will become a vagabond wandering on the earth, and he was cast out of the presence of God, unable to see God’s face (Gen. 4:11b-12, 14).
Eventually, Cain and his descendants invented a culture without God. This culture included building a city for self-existence, inventing cattle-raising for making a living, inventing music for amusement, and inventing weapons for defense (Gen. 4:17, 20-22). The further man drifts away from God, the less he has His presence. Having lost God, man was forced to invent a godless culture. This is the result of the fall of man.]
[In the first step of the fall, the enemy of God was outside of man. In the second step of the fall, this enemy was inside of man. Now, the enemy took another step, causing man to fall even further.]
Genesis 6 tells us that the sons of God, the fallen angels, married the daughters of men. This illegal marriage produced the flesh. [In Job 1:6 and 2:1 we are told that the angels are called the sons of God. Also, the Syriac Version of the Old Testament renders “the sons of God” as “the angels” in Genesis 6. The angels that married the daughters of men were those who did not keep their principality, as recorded in Jude 6 and 7. Some of the fallen angels under Satan came down to the earth and took human bodies. They formed illegal marriages with the daughters of men. They committed fornication through the bodies of men, so that the human race was no longer pure but became a mixture of human nature with the fallen spirits. Hence, God decided to send the flood to exterminate the human race.]
This fall resulted in the withdrawal of the Holy Spirit from man (Gen. 6:3) and the total destruction of all flesh except Noah and his family (Gen. 7:21).
The fourth step of the fall of man instigated by Satan was the open rebellion against God and His authority collectively. First, man conspired to rebel against God (Gen. 11:3-4). Second, man made bricks with earth by human labor. [According to the whole revelation of the Bible, God’s building has never been with any kind of bricks. God’s building is with stones. Man built the tower of Babel with bricks instead of stones. This means that man uses the misused earth plus human labor to replace God’s work.] Third, man built a city to have a man-made, godless life. Fourth, man built a tower to declare the renouncing of God, rejecting God and His authority. Finally, man made a name to deny God’s name, thereby denying God Himself. This rebellion resulted in God scattering man and confounding his language; thus, confusion was brought in to alienate man one from another.
[When man reached the fourth step of the fall, he had fallen to the uttermost, so that even God could not do anything to recover the fallen race.] Although these four steps of the fall took place in Genesis, their effect remained throughout the Bible and is still with man today. As a result, man is completely useless to God, unable to fulfill the purpose for which he was created. Man does not have God’s life to express Him; thus, man does not have God’s authority to represent Him. Rather, man came under Satan’s control. This is the condition of man. But God still loves man and wants to save man out of this pitiful condition.
[In His eternal plan, God planned to create all things and to have man to fulfill His eternal purpose. Furthermore, according to His foreknowledge and foresight, that is, according to His foreknowledge of man’s fall, He planned to redeem man after the fall. God’s redemption was neither an addition to His original plan, nor an afterthought to remedy the problem, but was planned and prepared from the beginning. In God’s eternal plan, He foreordained that after man’s fall, Christ would accomplish redemption. Therefore, in God’s view, Christ was slain from the foundation of the world (Rev. 13:8).]
[Redemption was planned beforehand and foreordained by God. Hence, before redemption came, in the Old Testament God promised it many times, clearly foretelling the different aspects of His redemption.]
[After man sinned and fell, God came in immediately to promise man that the seed of the woman would come. When He would come, He would bruise Satan’s head (Gen. 3:15). To bruise his head is to cause his death.
The seed of the woman is the Lord Jesus. Among the entire human race, only He was come of a woman (Gal. 4:4). He came to earth to undo the works of the Devil (1 John 3:8), that through death He might destroy the Devil (Heb. 2:14).
Therefore, at the time of man’s fall, God promised that Christ would come of a woman to destroy Satan, the one who deceived and damaged man.]
[Christ is not only the seed of the woman, but also the seed of Abraham (Gen. 13:15; 17:8; Gal. 3:16), as typified by Isaac. First, He brings blessings to the nations. Whether Jews or Gentiles, all will be blessed in Him (Gen. 22:18a). The blessing is the Spirit. Through faith in Christ, we have received the Spirit (Gal. 3:14). Second, He was offered to God, put to death, and resurrected (cf. Gen. 22:1-12; Heb. 11:17, 19). Third, He will gain the bride (cf. Gen. 24:67). This portrays Christ, as the One promised by God, bringing blessings to the nations, being offered even unto death, and being resurrected. After resurrection, He gains those whom He redeemed to be His bride (John 3:29; Rev. 19:7).]
[The full salvation of the Triune God comprises many items in three stages. The first stage, the initial stage, is the stage of regeneration. This stage is composed of redemption, sanctification (positional — 1 Pet. 1:2; 1 Cor. 6:11), justification, reconciliation, and regeneration. In this stage, God has justified us through the redemption of Christ (Rom. 3:24-26) and regenerated us in our spirit with His life by His Spirit (John 3:3-6). Thus, we have received God’s eternal salvation (Heb. 5:9) and His eternal life (John 3:15), and become His children (John 1:12-13), who shall not perish forever (John 10:28-29). This initial salvation has saved us from God’s condemnation and from eternal perdition (16, John 3:18).]
[The second stage of salvation, the progressing stage, is the stage of transformation. This stage is composed of freedom from sin, sanctification (mainly dispositional — Rom. 6:19, 22), growth in life, transformation, building up, and maturing. In this stage, God is freeing us from the dominion of indwelling sin — the law of sin and death — by the law of the Spirit of life, through the effectiveness of the death of Christ working subjectively in us (Rom. 6:6-7; 7:16-20; 8:2). He is sanctifying us by His Holy Spirit (Rom. 15:16), with His holy nature, through His discipline (Heb. 12:10) and His judgment in His own house (1 Pet. 4:17). He is causing us to grow in His life (1 Cor. 3:6-7) and transforming us by renewing the inward parts of our soul by the life-giving Spirit (2 Cor. 3:6, 17-18; Rom. 12:2; Eph. 4:23) through the working of all things (Rom. 8:28). He is building us together into a spiritual house for His dwelling (1 Pet. 2:5; Eph. 2:22) and maturing us in His life (Rev. 14:15) for the completion of His full salvation. Thus, we are being delivered from the power of sin, the world, the flesh, the self, the soul (the natural life), and individualism into maturity in the divine life for the fulfilling of God’s eternal purpose.]
[The third stage, the completing stage, is the stage of consummation. This stage is composed of the redemption (transfiguration) of our body, conformity to the Lord, glorification, inheritance of God’s kingdom, participation in Christ’s kingship, and the topmost enjoyment of the Lord. In this stage, God will redeem our fallen and corrupted body (Rom. 8:23) by transfiguring it into the body of Christ’s glory (Phil. 3:21). He will conform us to the glorious image of His firstborn Son (Rom. 8:29), making us wholly and absolutely like Him in our regenerated spirit, transformed soul, and transfigured body. He will glorify us (Rom. 8:30), immersing us in His glory (Heb. 2:10) that we may enter into His heavenly kingdom (2 Tim. 4:18; 2 Pet. 1:11), into which He has called us (1 Thes. 2:12). He will cause us to inherit His kingdom as the topmost portion of His blessing (James 2:5; Gal. 5:21), even to reign with Christ, to be His co-kings, participating in His kingship over the nations (2 Tim. 2:12; Rev. 20:4, 6; 2:26-27; 12:5), and sharing His royal, kingly joy in His divine government (Matt. 25:21, 23). Thus, our body will be freed from the slavery of corruption of the old creation into the freedom of the glory of God’s new creation (Rom. 8:21), and our soul will be delivered out of the realm of trials and sufferings (1 Pet. 1:6; 4:12; 3:14; 5:9) into a new realm, full of glory (1 Pet. 4:13; 5:10), sharing and enjoying all the Triune God is, has, and has accomplished, attained, and obtained. This is the salvation, the salvation of our souls, which is ready to be revealed to us at the last time, the grace to be brought to us at the unveiling of Christ in glory (1 Pet. 1:13; Matt. 16:27; 25:31). This is the end of our faith. The power of God is able to guard us unto this that we may obtain it (1 Pet. 1:9). We should eagerly expect such a marvelous salvation (Rom. 8:23) and prepare ourselves for its splendid revelation (Rom. 8:19).]
[Many Christians hold the concept that eternal life is a blessing given to the believers, in which they merely go to a heavenly mansion to enjoy a better life. When I was in Christianity, no one told me that eternal life is not a blessing, but that it is simply life. In our physical body we have a biological life (bios), and in our soul we have a psychological life (psuche). We had these two kinds of life before we were saved. But when we were saved, we received another life, the eternal life (zoe).
The eternal life is the life that is not only everlasting but eternal both in time and in nature (John 3:16, 36; 1 John 1:2). This life is unlimited both in time and in nature; hence, it is eternal.
The eternal life is the uncreated life of God (Eph. 4:18), the indestructible life (Heb. 7:16), and the incorruptible life (2 Tim. 1:10). Concerning the definition of the eternal life, I received much help through the writings of Watchman Nee, Mary McDonough, Ruth Paxson, and T. Austin-Sparks. Through their writings I came to know that to be regenerated is simply to receive God into us as our life, to receive a life that is divine, a life other than our human life.
The eternal life is the life that is in the Son of God and that is the Son of God (1 John 5:11-12; 1:2; John 14:6). This life is not only in the Son of God, but it is the Son of God Himself.
The eternal life is the life with which the believers are regenerated and which becomes the believers’ life (Col. 3:4a), making the believers the children of God (John 1:12-13) and the members of Christ (Eph. 5:30).]
[In 1 Timothy 6:12 the apostle Paul charged us to lay hold on this eternal life.
The New Testament teaches us that the eternal life has three stages, and these three stages are in three ages — the present age, the church age; the coming age, the kingdom age; and the eternal age, in the new heaven and the new earth with the New Jerusalem as the center. In the first age, the church age, we receive the eternal life. Thus, it becomes our life, and we enjoy this life and live by it. In the church age it is a matter of receiving the eternal life, but in the next age, the age of the kingdom, the eternal life is not for people to receive, but for people to enter into. In Matthew 25:46, those among the nations who are judged by the Lord Jesus to be “sheep” will enter into eternal life in the kingdom age. Thus, in the coming age the eternal life will become a sphere for people to enter into. In that age the eternal life will be given as a reward. In this age the eternal life is for us to receive as a free gift (Rom. 6:23b), but in the coming age the eternal life will be for us to enter into, not as a free gift but as a reward. This reward will be given to both the overcoming believers and to the “sheep” in Matthew 25 who paid a price to take care of Christ’s brothers during the great tribulation. Then, in the eternal age, that is, in the new heaven and the new earth with the New Jerusalem as the center, the eternal life will eventually be the consummated gift for all God’s redeemed people to manifest the Triune God for eternity.]
[It is by this eternal life and in this eternal life that the believers have been brought forth. The eternal life is crucial for the producing of the believers and for the building up of the organic Body of Christ.]
[The believers are tripartite beings of spirit, soul, and body (1 Thes. 5:23). The believers are redeemed, justified, and reconciled to God in Christ (Rom. 3:24; 5:10a). We have not only been saved; we have been redeemed, justified, and reconciled to God in Christ. The believers have been baptized into the Triune God to have an organic union with the processed Triune God (Matt. 28:19). In his Word Studies in the New Testament, M. R. Vincent, writing on Matthew 28:19, said, “Baptizing into the name of the Holy Trinity implies a spiritual and mystical union with Him.” Such a thought, such a revelation, has been lost in Christianity. Baptism is to baptize us into the Triune God that we may have an organic union with the processed Triune God.]
[The believers are regenerated in their spirit by the Spirit (John 3:5-6) with the divine life, which is Christ (Col. 3:4a), to be the children of God (John 1:12-13), having the divine nature (2 Pet. 1:4b), and to be the members of Christ (Rom. 12:5) in the union of the divine life. Regeneration takes place in our spirit. It is carried out by the Spirit with the divine life, and it makes us, first, the children of God, and then, the members of Christ.] The believers have been crucified with Christ, being terminated in their old man (Gal. 2:20; Rom. 6:6). [The believers have Christ living in them as the pneumatic Christ, the Spirit, indwelling them (Rom. 8:11).]
[The believers have been sanctified positionally by the blood of Christ (Heb. 13:12) and are being sanctified dispositionally by the Spirit (Rom. 15:16; 6:19, 22), that they may be renewed, transformed in their soul (Rom. 12:2a; 2 Cor. 3:18), conformed to the image of the firstborn Son of God (Rom. 8:29), and glorified (redeemed) in their body (Rom. 8:23) in the glory of the processed Triune God (17-18, Rom. 8:30). Although the believers have been regenerated in their spirit, their soul and body remain old. Thus, the believers need to be renewed, transformed in their soul, conformed to the image of the firstborn Son of God, and glorified in their body in the glory of the processed Triune God. The believers are tripartite beings composed of spirit, soul, and body. First, their spirit is regenerated, then their soul is transformed, and finally, their body will be glorified. Thus the believers’ whole being will be saturated with God’s splendid life. God’s life is a life of splendor, and that splendor is the glory of the divine life. When we are permeated, saturated, and soaked with the splendor of the divine life, we will be in glory. The believers are saturated with the dispensing of the divine Trinity in their tripartite being (Rom. 8:5-11), so that they are mingled with the processed Triune God. The believers are joined to the Lord as one spirit (1 Cor. 6:17).]
[The believers are the branches of Christ as the vine tree, the organism of the Triune God, to express the processed Triune God in bearing fruit for the increase of Christ (John 15:1-5, 8, 16). As the branches of Christ, the believers should live a fruit-bearing life for Christ’s increase. The believers are God’s New Testament priests of His gospel to offer the saved sinners as sacrifices to God (Rom. 15:16; 1 Pet. 2:5, 9). As the priests of God, the believers should have a sinner-saving service for offering sacrifices to God.]
