What Is A Christian? Part V

What Is A Christian? Part V

Before we look at how to obtain Christ-in-you, the new birth spirit, which then makes one a Christian, I would like to point out that simply obtaining this spirit of God and then going no further with it is not God's primary will:

I Timothy 2:4

Who will have all men to be saved, and [emphasis added] to come unto the knowledge of the truth.

God desires for all men to be saved.  Will everyone choose to be?  No.  But that is His desire.  For those who do choose to be saved, He desires that they come unto a "knowledge of the truth."

This word "knowledge" is the Greek word epignosis, which means "a precise or further knowledge, a thorough acquaintance with; true knowledge".

God does not want us just to be saved, which is a spiritual event; He wants us to come unto a full and precise knowledge of the truth, His Word.  This requires a learning effort.

There are many people in the world who have become Christian but have not had access to a full and precise knowledge of His Word, or they simply do not bother to learn it.  Subsequently they do not believe to evidence the greatness and power of what they have on the inside out into their lives and daily living.

As you will recall, Adam and Eve were formed, made, and created.  They had body, soul, and spirit.  If this is true then why does man today need to be saved?   Why does man need to (re)acquire the spirit of God?

To answer this we must go back to Genesis.  When God was finished forming, making, and creating Adam and Eve, He then gave them a mandate:

Genesis 1:26-28

And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

Man was second only to God. Why? Because he had the spirit of God, which was his direct communication to Him, and this was what separated him out from the animal kingdom, who were only body and soul.

Man had only one restriction:

Genesis 2:16, 17

And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:

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.

When God says "in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die", that means "that day you will die, for sure". Not tomorrow, not next year, but that very day. What part of Adam and Eve died, for they lived many more years after the original sin? It wasn't their body or soul; their death was a spiritual one. They lost that spirit of God. The results of their disobedience to God was catastrophic, not just for themselves but for their progeny, which just happened to be every human being.

They had no connection to God and were now limited to information gathered by their five senses; their bloodstream was now tainted; sin now existed on earth; the fruit of the earth now had thorns and thistles; and instead of walking in confidence and power, they now walked in fear:

Genesis 3:8-10

And they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God amongst the trees of the garden.

And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou?

And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.

There was now a gulf, a void, a chasm, that existed between God and man. Man's spiritual connection was now gone. Man was now reduced to just body and soul, living by what we would today call "trial and error", or "the school of hard knocks".

Romans 8:22

For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.

However, God did not give up on man. Ever since the fall of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, God worked to bring about the reconciliation, the reconnection, between Him and man -- to span this chasm separating God and man.