Genesis 1:1-24
In these initial verses, God is a creator. He has a thought in mind as he begins to implement, design, and build this thought into reality. Each step along the way, He stops and observes His work, finding favor in what He sees. But then there is a point when He senses what He’s created is a living organism in need of leadership. He creates our very first leadership team, Adam and Eve.
Genesis 1:26
26 Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”
This team was designed to lead in the same fashion and mindset of God. It was inherent in the character to lead, to manifest the desires of God. After all, Adam and Eve were made in God’s image. God’s desire for His creation affected every decision these leaders made.
So, what was God’s intent when He created the earth and all that is in it? Was God bored? What was His vision?
Genesis 2:1-3
2 Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array.
2 By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so, on the seventh day he rested from all his work. 3 Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.
If we read no further than this, God was pleased at what He created. It was a fully complete and functioning environment. So, what does the leader do that very next day? He was, after all, told to rule over this new creation.
How does He wake up and face a new day? How does He begin to rule? How would He make rules or laws concerning this new phenomenon, this complex system?
So Adam and Eve were to rule, govern and set the laws by which this new creation was to operate. To do so, they would have to fully understand the heart and mind of the creator, in whose image they were made. They would have to ask themselves, “What does God want us to do with this?” It was truly a blank slate. Where would you start?
Genesis 2:25
25 Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.
Up and until prior to the fall, everything was going fine. Adam and Eve had no negative emotions. Life was good; the hardest thing to date they had to do was to name the animals. Where did they even get the words to name them? They, themselves, were a new creation with no history in their memory banks. It was pure creativity at its best.
There couldn’t be a wrong answer as there were no prior answers by which to compare. Every decision had to be like God’s. When God sat back to observe, He said, “This was good.”, how was “good” defined? Man hadn’t even seen “bad” yet!
Man must have had an emotion inside that was triggered to generate a feeling of good that would affirm His decision. Who would He be worried about pleasing? Did He and Eve debate over the names? Did they fight? They were given free will from the beginning to name their choices, but you have to be reminded they were created in God’s image.
We don’t know anything about God at that time, except He created the heavens and earth. So, when God created us, He planted within us His character, something similar to His image. And image, of course, is not referring to only the visual. God’s character up to that point only reflected a decisive God, a creative God, and an emotional God. After all, He experienced the feeling He called “good.” He was caring and willing to share by giving a part of His leadership away. After all, did God really need men to rule over the earth?
Yet I must assume that when man was made, there was a gene in us that could be summoned if called upon to doubt or to question. For Satan had to find a weakness to exploit us. He had no history to condemn us yet, he had nothing to use to compare Adam’s image to — no means to create insecurity. He didn’t have negative emotions to cause Adam to misuse. No, he just had the possibility of doubt to exploit.
I concur that if Satan attacks us today – and if we are to shed any negative thoughts from the past or any image management issues, we too are left with the ultimate deciding moment each time.
That is doubt.
Did God really say “Promise, perform, become all that is written,” or didn’t He? For if He did, then it is not a leap of faith, but rather a sound leadership decision to choose His ways. We were made in His image, after all.
Just a Thought…
