GOD IS LOVE 1

– Our God is a loving God and His love is so tremendous that human’s language cannot describe it, but many don’t understand about it or appreciate it, including some Christians.

– Luckily for us, we have the Bible to help us knowing how wonderful God’s love is.

– We will study God’s love from the beginning of the creation of Adam and when we go along the human history we will learn some more of it.

– The first evidence showing God is love was the way He created Adam. The Bible tells us that God created Adam in His own image:

GENESIS 1: 27 – So God created mankind in His own image, in the image of God He created them; male and female He created them.

SÁNG THẾ KÝ 1: 27 – Đức Chúa Trời dựng nên loài người như hình Ngài; Ngài dựng nên loài người giống như hình Đức Chúa Trời; Ngài dựng nên người nam cùng người nữ.

– We humans can understand easily the love of parents for their kids as they see their children were born with their resemblances.

– As someone has put it, parents see their own images in their sons and daughters and that is one of the elements that make the parents’ love possible. Although we can love children who don’t look like us, but the love for those who bear many resemblances to our figures is often much more and deeper than for those who don’t.

– We like to look at our images. The thing that is most used in our home is the mirror. It’s not an expensive object nor valuable, but it can reflect our images back to us, that’s why it’s so important.

– Although God created the universe and the human world with many beautiful things, but they cannot compare with God’s image because He is glorious. And because His special love for human, He could not make Adam in any kind of image but His own.

– There are many verses in the Bible that describe God’s glory, like this one below:

PSALM 113: 4 – The Lord is exalted over all the nations, His glory above the heavens.

THI THIÊN 113: 4 – Đức Giê-hô-va vượt cao hơn các dân. Sự vinh hiển Ngài cao hơn các từng trời.

– According to the Bible, the Lord Jesus Christ is God Who took human form, and after He finished His ministry on Earth and ascended back to Heaven, the apostle John, in a vision of Christ on the island of Patmos, had described His glory like the shining sun at its peak:

REVELATION 1: 16 – In His right hand He held seven stars, and coming out of His mouth was a sharp, double-edged sword. His face was like the sun shining in all its brilliance.

KHẢI HUYỀN 1: 16 – Tay hữu Người cầm bảy ngôi sao; miệng thò ra thanh gươm nhọn hai lưỡi và mặt như mặt trời khi soi sáng hết sức.

– That was the reason that made Adam and Eve could not see their nakedness before they sinned. Because they were created in God’s image with the same glorious light like God, so when they were still sinless, they could not realize they were naked. God’s glory covered them like a robe of light. That light disappeared instantly at the moment they ate the forbidden fruit.

– We can understand the glorious form that Adam and Eve had before they sinned by looking straight at a light bulb that being turned on. We certainly cannot see what is inside it.

– When Adam and Eve committed their sin, they did not care much about the glorious outward that they had from God, but thought only about their desire, so it was like refusing to be God’s children, that’s why the consequence was death, because God lives forever and the same for those who are His children, too. And after they sinned they lost the shining as well and realized they were naked.

– Moreover, when God created humans, He also created the DNA inside their bodies in order to carry the personal traits from parents to their children. This make people being recognizable of belonging to a specific family.

– In the fifth Commandment, God wants everyone to honor their parents, as it was written in Exodus:

EXODUS 20: 12 – Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.

XUẤT Ê-DÍP-TÔ KÝ 20: 12 – Hãy hiếu kính cha mẹ ngươi, hầu cho ngươi được sống lâu trên đất mà Giê-hô-va Đức Chúa Trời ngươi ban cho.

– Keeping our parents’ resemblances is one of many ways to honor them. That’s why God forbid His children, both Israelites and Christians, to tattoo or alter our appearances, except for medical treatment reasons:

LEVITICUS 19: 28 – Do not cut your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves. I am the Lord

LÊ-VI KÝ 19: 28 – Chớ vì kẻ chết mà cắt thịt mình, chớ xăm vẽ trên mình: Ta là Đức Giê-hô-va.

– We can have a look at reality as an example to understand God’s love and Adam’s sin. In real life, there have been many people, because of some reasons, did not want to look like their fathers or mothers anymore, so they had plastic surgery to alter their faces, even their postures, trying to be a different person.

– People could talk about honoring their parents with food offering and burning incense after they died, but by altering their appearances, deep down in their hearts, they thought that their parents’ traits were not worth to be on their bodies. In God’s eyes, it is a form of dishonoring parents.

– Our lives and bodies are the proof our parents’ love and work, so when we alter them or put tattoo on them, we destroy the evidence of their love for us. That is the main reason God has given humans the law quoted above.

– Except the reasons of disability, injured or sickness, people should not alter their appearances and should be proud of resemblances to their parents. To be balanced, on the other hand, we have to confess that there are some people who were not a proud for their children to be like them.

– But God is Perfect, so Christians should always try to be like Him in every way possible, as the Word of God commands us to do:

1CORINTHIANS 11: 1 – Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ.

1CÔ-RINH-TÔ 11: 1 – Hãy bắt chước tôi, cũng như chính mình tôi bắt chước Đấng Christ vậy.

EPHESIANS 5: 1 – Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children.

Ê-PHÊ-SÔ 5: 1 – Vậy anh em hãy trở nên kẻ bắt chước Đức Chúa Trời như con cái rất yêu dấu của Ngài.

– Because of His love for humankind, God wants to restore us back to the original position as His children by commanding Christians to live according to the Bible’ standard. The standard helps us to be worthy as God’s children while still living in this life.

PHILIPPIANS 3: 21 – Who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.

PHI-LÍP 3: 21 – Ngài sẽ biến hóa thân thể hèn mạt chúng ta ra giống như thân thể vinh hiển Ngài, y theo quyền phép Ngài có để phục muôn vật.

– This is God’s promise to transform our bodies to be like Adam before he sinned, so that we can be suitable for the heavenly Kingdom, but while still being on Earth Christians must first live according to the Bible’ standard in order to transform our mind in the way God wants us to be:

ROMANS 12: 2 – Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is, His good, pleasing and perfect will.

RÔ-MA 12: 2 – Đừng làm theo đời nầy, nhưng hãy biến hóa bởi sự đổi mới của tâm thần mình, để thử cho biết ý muốn tốt lành, đẹp lòng và trọn vẹn của Đức Chúa Trời là thể nào.

– According to the Scriptures that were quoted above (1Corinthians 11: 1 and Ephesians 5: 1), Christians truly love God when we try our best to be like Him morally and godly, as being called sanctification. That’s why it is one of the requirements Christians must obtain in order to receive the salvation, to be God’s children in His heavenly kingdom.

– Thus, when Christians refuse to live a holy life according to Scripture’ standard, we are dishonoring Him as our heavenly Father.

– Moreover, when Christians refuse to live by the Bible’ standard, we refuse to be like Him, refuse to be worthy as His children and the inevitable consequence is hell, for there are only two places to go after passing this life. The other place is Heaven that reserved for God and His children only.

– It does not matter that we can follow the Bible’ standard or not, it’s the willingness to do it, then the ability will come later with help from the Holy Spirit, as Paul had proclaimed in his letter to the Philippians:

PHILIPPIANS 4: 13 – I can do all this through Him Who gives me strength.

PHI-LÍP 4: 13 – Tôi làm được mọi sự nhờ Đấng ban thêm sức cho tôi.

– Thus, as we study the creation story, we understand God’s love when He created Adam in His image, and we also know one of the ways we can honor God and our biological parents on Earth.

– Because God loves humans as such, we Christians should try our best to live a holy, godly life as His children, to glorify Him while living on Earth, and by doing so, preparing ourselves for the day we enter the heavenly kingdom and live there with God for eternity.

(will be continued)