According to the Scriptures

Guest (Male): Speaking for a moment about what brought him to Christ, here's Pastor Damian Kyle.

Damian Kyle: When I became a Christian, the thing that brought me to Christ was not my sin. It probably should have, but that wasn't the greatest concern that I had in becoming a Christian. The thing that drove me, the thing that caused me to turn to God and to begin to seek him out and ultimately put my trust in Jesus Christ as my Savior and then to follow God, was this search for the meaning of life. What is the purpose of life?

Guest (Male): For life to be truly meaningful, it needs to have purpose. But what is the purpose of life? Put another way, why are we here? If we're just a cosmic accident, there's no purpose. But what if we were made by a personal creator God? Then and only then would there be a truly meaningful purpose. We'll hear about it here today on According to the Scriptures with Pastor Damian Kyle. Welcome to the program. We began last time to explore our origins, that we were made in the image of God. Today, as we conclude that teaching, we'll learn that we're made for a purpose.

Damian Kyle: It is fascinating to realize back in Genesis 1:1, the Hebrew word that is used for God there is the word Elohim. It's fascinating because in the Hebrew language, the name for God in the singular is El. Elohim is a plural name for God. In the Hebrew language, whenever you want to make something plural, you add an "im" to it. So you have a cherub, but when there's more than one cherub, they are the cherubim. When you have one seraph, it is seraph, but when you have multiple seraphs, you have seraphim. This is how the Hebrew language operates.

And so it speaks of God here, of the fact that God is one and yet somehow plural. Additionally, it's very significant that although the name Elohim that is used is plural in its form, in all of the rest of Genesis chapter one, it is constantly accompanied by verbs and adjectives that are in the singular. For instance, in Genesis 1:1, the verb "created" is singular. This is the way it is all the way through the entire chapter.

So you have this combination of plural and singular together, and it is all intended to communicate two truths about God that seem contradictory but are not. And that is that God is somehow plural and yet one. So in Genesis 1:1, God describes himself as a plural one. In Genesis 1 verses 26 and 27, God records a conversation for us that involved multiple persons within the Godhead.

In Deuteronomy chapter six, verse four, when God gives the great Shema to the Jews in order to reinforce the fact that he is one, he's careful to use a word that speaks of a compound unity. This is like a major "wow" related to the Bible. In all of this, even back in Genesis 1:1, what God is doing here, and it is so important for us as Christians to understand that, beginning all the way back with the very first verse in the Bible, God begins to lay a foundation for what he knew he would continue to develop then in the remaining revelation of his word, and that is that there is one God, but that he is triune, that he is made up of a trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

You say, why spend the time on that? Shouldn't that be a part of the Sunday evening service? Aren't you supposed to just tell us on Sunday morning how wonderful we are and how God is going to take care of us? I hope God smites me before that is the preeminent thought that I have on a Sunday morning or a Sunday evening. The fact of the matter is that every single one of us as Christians needs to not only understand that this is the truth about God, but to understand the biblical foundation for it.

Because if your view of the deity of Christ, the deity of the Holy Spirit, your view, your belief in the Trinity has not been challenged yet, it means you're not sharing your faith with people. Because you live in a world, as most of us know, we live in a world as Christians that rejects Christianity on the basis of our belief in the Trinity or the triunity of God, the deity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

This includes virtually all Jews. It certainly includes all practicing Muslims, all Jehovah's Witnesses, all Mormons. And then when they challenge us, we can be at a loss for words, even have our faith shaken related to it. But the evidence for the Trinity and Jesus's claim to be divine, to be one with the Father, it begins not only in the very first chapter of the Bible, but in the very first verse of the Bible.

We're told that male and female he created them there in verse 27. In other words, everything that I've said here, when he's talking about man at this point in Genesis 1, he's talking about man in the sense of mankind. Everything that he has declared here is true of both men and women, male and female. There's more to be said about God's mention of only two sexes here in this passage, but that'll have to wait for a future time.

Notice God's commission to mankind, and the commission is given in verse 26 and in verse 28 as well. And God gave mankind dominion over the animal kingdom, over the fish of the sea and all waters, over the birds of the air and of the land animals. And that dominion would have been exercised perfectly in the Garden of Eden before the fall of Adam and Eve and their sin in that garden.

But we still have that dominion that has been imparted to us. We possess that dominion even after the fall over the animal kingdom. But how we exercise it today is oftentimes very flawed and broken as everything else is post-fall. But still, it's important to recognize that we possess a capacity to dominate the world in a way that no part of the animal kingdom does.

Why if everything began and it was survival of the fittest and the evolutionary process, why would something as weak and feeble as us, if we were just members of the animal kingdom, be able to come to dominate the world in the way that we do? We have no claws, we have no fangs, we have no weaponry, we have no scale upon our body for protection. I mean any one of a thousand animals you would think would be predisposed by nature to end up dominating the world and even making us extinct as human beings in a process like that.

And yet we look around the world and we see that the world isn't ruled by brown bears. It is ruled and it is dominated by us. When you look around the world, you don't see zebras or lions or dogs building cities. Not one. I'm open to one. We don't see a single one. We don't see them developing art or culture. We don't see them worshipping God, their creator. And all of this is a testament to the precision of the Genesis account.

Notice that he, in verse 28, that God blessed the man and woman, telling them to be fruitful and multiply. And here he speaks of the sexual relationship between a man and a woman. It is important to realize that though God calls on them to be fruitful and multiply, that the fulfillment of this relationship, the sexual relationship between a man and a woman, it does not occur until he creates Eve and then establishes the institution of marriage, which we'll talk about another time.

Notice that God, in verse 31, his commentary concerning his creation upon its completion, including man, he declared that it was not only good, but he declared it to be very good. And again, remember that he said this about the world before the fall, he said this before Genesis chapter three that describes the fall of man and everything changing as a result of it until the world that we are in now is not what God intended it to be at all. And we'll talk about that again in the future. There is so much we'll get to in the future.

So a practical application related to our lives. Here you have Genesis chapter one, it ends with man. It ends with man not only created but uniquely in creation, uniquely engaged in a living, speaking, personal relationship with God. And that is the very thing that man was created for, was for that relationship. There's a song that's sung to God that's recorded in the other end of the Bible in the book of Revelation that captures this perfectly, Revelation chapter 4 verse 11.

And it declares, "The four and twenty elders fall down before him," that is God, "that sat on the throne, and worship him that liveth forever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying, Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power, for thou hast created all things," and then here it is, "and for thy pleasure they are and were created." We were created by God and created for his pleasure. We've been created to bring pleasure to God in a uniquely as human beings in a personal relationship with him.

Now, since we've been created for relationship with God, until we are engaged in that relationship, there will always be an emptiness in my life as a result. There will always be that gnawing sense that there must be something more to life than I have experienced. And the reason that we feel that is because there is something more to life than I have experienced and it is the most important thing of all, the very thing that I've been created for, and that is a relationship with God.

And you watch people all over the world run, and I know all about it, run from one occupation to another, one get-rich-quick scheme to another, one hobby to another, one fad to another, one interest to another, one relationship to another, one philosophy or religion to another, and all of it is a testament to a search within our lives. It's all a testament to that emptiness and to our search for some kind of an ultimate fulfillment in our lives concerning the meaning of life and the purpose of life and to somehow enter into that and then experience the peace that we're confident that once we discover it will become ours.

It has been very well said that each of us has been born into this world with a cross-shaped hole in our hearts that can only be filled by Jesus Christ himself. That nothing else in the world, not all of the world put together, if it were to be poured into that hole, could ever satisfy that emptiness, that loneliness, that longing that we possess. Only God, only Jesus can satisfy that need and to fill that emptiness.

And until we're saved and we're reconciled with God, there will always be a fundamental loneliness in our lives, a loneliness that sense that I've been created for even more in terms of relationship, a loneliness that no husband, no wife, no children, no parents, no friends can ever satisfy or bring to some kind of an end as it relates to our lives. We'll always be lonely and empty at our core, at our deepest level, until we enter into that relationship that we've been created for with God.

St. Augustine said it perfectly when he said so many years ago concerning God, "Thou hast made us for thyself, and the heart of man is restless until it finds its rest in thee." Rest is a wonderful thing. I don't think the average person is even remotely conscious of the restlessness that is in a human life until we enter into the rest that is found uniquely in God.

And how we educate ourselves to exhaustion, we relationship ourselves to exhaustion, we drug and drink ourselves to exhaustion. We look in all these different places to try and satisfy this longing that is within us. All of this is very, very personal for me. I never get tired of speaking about this very subject. Because when I became a Christian, the thing that brought me to Christ was not my sin. It probably should have.

But that wasn't the greatest concern that I had in becoming a Christian. The thing that drove me, the thing that caused me to turn to God and to begin to seek him out and ultimately put my trust in Jesus Christ as my Savior and then to follow God, was this search for the meaning of life. What is the purpose of life? And here I am at the age of 25 and I'm looking around. Karen and I were married now for a number of years. We had a house that we were buying in a lovely part of California. Had two cars, both of them paid for, one child and another child on the way.

And I looked at all of it and I thought to myself, all I can do is upgrade from here. And if this has not satisfied, if this has not supplied ultimate meaning and purpose to life, does not explain those things for me, then I know simply doubling down in that direction is not going to provide the answer for me. And I remember telling Karen one day, I'm going back to church. And I had been raised for a time in my youth in church, so I knew where to go. And went back to church and then committed my life to the Lord.

God did not make me to be a person that could live life and eat, drink, and be merry, tomorrow we die, to live life without understanding its ultimate aim, its ultimate purpose. And this is the ultimate aim and this is the purpose.

There's the observation of the man who declared concerning his alarm clock, "It tells me when to get up, but it doesn't tell me why to get up." And it is the same frustration of course that King Solomon expressed in the book of Ecclesiastes. He decided though he was raised in a godly background that he was going to find the meaning of life under the sun. Not the Son of God but under the sun of creation. I'm going to find the meaning and the purpose and satisfaction related to these great questions in life in the context not of God, but in the context of the created world.

And he searched high and low and everywhere you could possibly search in life. And his conclusion was that life under the sun, life lived in the context of the creation without coming into contact with God, it is empty, it is frustrating, and it is meaningless. And in Ecclesiastes, Solomon never finds satisfaction. He never finds the meaning of life in the context of the created world.

But he did find it. And he tells us where he found it in the closing couple of verses of those 12 chapters of Ecclesiastes and he said, "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is man's all." In other words, it is found in a personal relationship with God that is then marked by obedience to his commandments.

The Westminster Shorter Catechism captures it perfectly. The question is asked, "What is the chief end of man?" And the answer is given, "Man's chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever."

And if you are not yet saved, put your faith in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And then you will experience a spiritual birth. The Holy Spirit will come into your life and then you will enter into the relationship with God that you have been created for and that you have been looking for all of your life and which nothing else in the world can replace or satisfy.

God loves you. He made you. He is your creator. But he wants to be more than your creator. He wants to be your Savior and he wants to be your Lord. And the stakes are enormously high. They are eternally high, that you give him that place in your life. Think of it, to begin a personal relationship with the God who created you and the creator of the heavens and the earth. And it's all there just a prayer away. And then to know him with the intimacy that comes with knowing him as Savior and as Lord. Enter into the life that God has for you.

I think for those of us who are saved, to just stop for a moment and remember your life before you were a Christian. Remember that emptiness. Remember that loneliness. Remember your story of how much of the world in your wisdom and your ways and experiences you tried to pour into that cross-shaped hole and none of it could satisfy. And it was the grace of God that none of it could.

Until we finally came and put our trust in Jesus himself. And then to think about what happened in that moment. Yes, we still have all kinds of problems in this life. We have problems like everybody else has. God doesn't promise that we won't. But the one thing that we don't have is we don't have a sense of emptiness and loneliness as we once did. We aren't still on the search for the meaning and the purpose of life.

And God has introduced a satisfaction, a recognition that we are home, that we are engaged in life at its highest this side of heaven because of our relationship with Christ. And to just glory in. I mean, you think about the problems that we all face, the decisions that we face in life, the challenges that we face in life.

But on top of all of those things, we are not dissatisfied and still in the midst of that search. God has brought this deep spiritual satisfaction into our lives and he has blessed us immeasurably in doing so. So much to be thankful for when that search is over and that search has brought us to him. Hallelujah.

Guest (Male): Hallelujah indeed. Thank you for listening. This is According to the Scriptures. Pastor Damian Kyle is in the early stages of our brand new series called Gleanings from Genesis. Interested in a copy of this message? Here's where to reach us for the ordering details. In the 209 area code, it's 545-5530. That's 209-545-5530.

You can also listen online at accordingtothescriptures.com or oneplace.com. I'm delighted to say that you can also stream and watch Pastor Damian's studies through Roku and Fire TV. Look for the Calvary Chapel Modesto app in your favorite app store.

If you appreciate According to the Scriptures and you'd like to see it continue on this station and others like it, there's a place to donate at accordingtothescriptures.com. We'd also like to hear how the Lord is using the program in your life. You can write to According to the Scriptures, 4300 American Avenue, Modesto, California. The zip code is 95356. Or you can email us through our website, accordingtothescriptures.com. Pastor Damian Kyle will present more Gleanings from Genesis next time on According to the Scriptures, the daily radio outreach of Calvary Chapel Modesto.