When God created Adam, He placed him in a world He defined as being very good. With the breath of God, Adam awoke with a body and a spirit. Adam possessed the image of God. This image has the capacity for intimate, meaningful relationships with God and fellow man. This image could perform beneficial work that has meaning and purpose. Work that would be fulfilling. The image also has a capacity for creativity and power. It can accomplish a plan with a purpose. The image was to be immortal with the full awareness and appreciation of eternity. This image also fostered a thorough knowledge that man was more than a physical being. A man was also a spiritual being, and within that spiritual part is where access to contentment existed. Adam was complete, as God intended; his body and his spirit were alive and well. But, like all men since, Adam wanted more. He turned his back on God and, in the process, opened the door for humanity's ongoing struggles. Since that time, man has been living with a fractured image.
This book explores the struggles we all face because we live with a fractured image. We all wrestle with the pain of feeling isolated and alone. We all struggle with our meaning and purpose. We are all crushed by an awareness of our weakness and how powerless we are where it matters. We all walk under the dark cloud of our mortality as we work hard to deny our eventual demise. We struggle under the weight of emptiness with a felt distance between ourselves and our creator. These are the burdens we all share. These burdens cause unbearable pain and cry out for relief. We now live our lives focused on personal comfort at any cost. We become self-centered and self-protective. Our actions only increase our awareness of our isolation, meaninglessness, powerlessness, frailty, and emptiness.
The image was to be our glory but has become the source of our anguish. In our suffering and turmoil, there is some good news. God has provided a path of reconciliation so we can live today as God originally intended. We do not have to remain stuck in the mud of relentless misery.
This book is a unique evaluation of what occurred to man when sin entered the world and the image of God in man was fractured.
Through the work of Christ, our God-image can be restored.
We live in an age of abundance. We have a wealth of food, distractions, entertainment, possessions, and an overabundance of information. We have all we could need, but we still want more. With all we have, you would think we would also have an abundance of contentment. Instead, we have a wealth of discontentment. It does not matter if you have a lot or have just enough to survive; we all struggle with the same significant issues. Suicide and addiction rates are climbing as we continue to anguish amid our affluence. We struggle with factors that have been the cause of turmoil since the days of the first man, Adam. So, you may be wealthy, or you may be impoverished, you may be famous, or you may feel insignificant. Your status does not matter; we all struggle with the same issues. We all wrestle with the pain of feeling isolated and alone. We all struggle with our meaning and purpose. We are all crushed by an awareness of our weakness and how powerless we are where it matters. We all walk under the dark cloud of our mortality as we work hard to deny our eventual demise.
We struggle under the weight of emptiness with a felt distance between ourselves and our creator. These are the burdens we all share. These burdens cause unbearable pain and cry out for relief. We now live our lives focused on personal comfort at any cost. We become self-centered and self-protective. Our actions only increase our awareness of our isolation, meaninglessness, powerlessness, frailty, and emptiness. So, we push and strive even harder. We treat obstacles as offenses and become bitter in our relentless striving for comfort. As we reach out for support, what we get in return is misery. This overwhelming misery is experienced emotionally and physically and does not have a successful psychological or medical cure. So, what is the answer to this plague of despair?
When God created Adam, He placed him in a world He defined as being very good. With the breath of God, Adam awoke with a body and a spirit. Adam was different from the rest of the animals. Adam possessed the image of God. Somewhere in the intricate sequencing of humanities’ DNA is the original God-breathed image. This image has the capacity for intimate, meaningful relationships with God and fellow man. This image was made for beneficial work that has meaning and purpose. Work that would be fulfilling. The image also has a capacity for creativity and power. It can accomplish a plan with a purpose. This image was made to be immortal with the full awareness and appreciation of eternity. The understanding of death was not part of this image. This image also fostered a thorough knowledge that man was more than a physical being. Man was also a spiritual being, and within that spiritual part is where access to contentment existed. Adam was complete, as God intended, his body and his spirit were alive and well. But, like all men since, Adam wanted more. He turned his back on God and, in the process, opened the door for humanity's ongoing struggles. Since that time, man has been living with a fractured image. The image was to be our glory but has become the source of our anguish.
In our anguish and turmoil, there is some good news. God has provided a path of reconciliation so we can live today as God originally intended. We do not have to remain stuck in the mud of relentless misery.