“A Voice for the Gathering Saints”

Duane Stewart

“God’s Created Man”

God, the creator of all things, an eternal God who has no beginning nor ending. By being a self-sufficient one, there became a time and season when, in His heart, He desired to bring forth a visible creation in which to place a created man in His likeness and image. This created man, created for becoming the family of God, a family in which God was to live and manifest Himself through. A created man, who was to become many in number and to establish a visible kingdom on God’s visible earth, in this the created earthman would finally come into the fullness of God’s eternal purpose. That purpose was for the man to become fruitful and multiply, to replenish the earth, subdue it, and have dominion over it. In this purpose, God would mature the man and his offspring into a people of like nature with their creator God, after the expression of Jesus Christ the first-born son. This purpose, through a seven-day plan, is now coming to the fullness of those seven days, with the sixth day coming to its end as God completes the making of the man. Remember, a day in the Lord is as a thousand years, with a thousand years being as one day.

Therefore, we have a beginning in God as we read in Gen. 1:1-3, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. Then God said, let there be light; and there was light.” When God declares His desire for there to be light, He is expressing His eternal desire, from Himself, in all His fullness. Thus, He began to form or fashion that which His heart desired. The speaking forth of light first speaks to us of the illuminating power of God to enlighten creation to His will and purpose prior to the bringing forth of the manifestation. When God spoke in Gen. 1:26, “Then God said, Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” He was speaking of His eternal plan and purpose, which was to bring forth a man, an order of people that would have dominion, with God, over every level of life as it is involved with God’s creation. Man is to rule and subdue creation, including the aggressive fallen forces that would soon infringe upon it. In this God continues to speak forth His purpose by the bringing forth of His spiritual man as spoken in Gen. 1:27, “So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” Thus, the spiritual man of God’s creation, spoken forth to begin his journey, one that was to be finished as God processed man through the ages to bring forth such a manifestation of God’s likeness and image.

This spiritual man, though still spiritual in existence was to continue in his making from an invisible spiritual man until placed into a formed body from the dust of the earth. So again, God speaks forth His desire by the forming from the dust of the earth, the body, or tabernacle, for the spiritual man to dwell. Gen. 2:7, “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being”. This dust formed man, breathed into by God’s eternal invisible spiritual breath, begins now to live as Adam, the spirit, a soul and a body man, the visible creation of God. This is the results of God’s breath, His spirit, His life placed within Adam, that he might begin the process of subduing the earth in every order of his existence, having within him the nature of God. A nature, which was now to exercise itself, is maturing into the place of having dominion over God’s creation. In obedience to God, the very life of God was to enable man to replenish the earth. Men’s ability to sustain his role as God’s delegated ruler of the earth depends upon his obedience to God’s rule as King of all. His power to reign in life will extend only as far as his faithfulness to obey God’s governmental law, His purpose.

We should know and understand that the perfect will of God as the founding King of creation does not manifested in the presence of death, disease, discord, and disaster, as we observed it in the world around us today. The present visible world does not reflect the Kingdom order God originally intended and does not reflect His Kingdom purposed to be experienced on earth. Therefore, as a potter, God continues in the formation of man and His purpose in creation. God’s intended purpose, though not complete, it is ever increasing as the seven-day plan of God has not faltered, but is on time, just as God planned. In the completion of the plan, God shall finally bring forth His purpose and will in and through the man to manifest Himself. Isaiah 64:8 declares, “But now, O Lord, You are our Father; we are the clay, and you our potter; and all we are the work of your hand.”

With God as our Father, in order to understand who we are to become, we must know who and what the Father is. In searching the scriptures, we will find that God is not only the creator, but He is eternal, He is the Son, the provider, the healer, the sanctifier and the peace giver. He also is the righteous one, the most High, the Shepherd, our salvation, our power, the possessor of heaven and earth, the Almighty, and all love. This list could continue. As being the eternal possessor of heaven, the one who created all things, we can have this confidence, that there is a record of heaven abiding in God and He breathed a portion of heaven into humankind, into man’s soul. This record is that which makes up our mind, our will, our emotions, and our desires. I John 5:7 and 11-13 shares with us, “For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one. … And this is the testimony; that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God.” Eternal life, as used in this scripture, denotes not only physical life, but also spiritual life, which one can possess only through faith in Jesus Christ. Eternal life refers not only to duration of life, but also to quality of life. This includes the life of grace and the life of glory.

However, humankind, in his present fallen condition, finds himself locked in a mortal, corruptible, carnal condition. This condition has blinded humanity to his true self and his identity. Thus, this blinding condition means that humankind must awaken to his identity by knowing the record of heaven that is within him. As Isaiah 52:1-2 states, “Awake, awake! Put on your strength, O Zion; Put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city! For the uncircumcised and the unclean shall no longer come to you. Shake yourself from the dust, arise; Sit down, O Jerusalem! Loose yourself from the bonds of your neck, O Captive daughter of Zion!” Could it not be that Adam in his fall in the Garden of Eden fell from that place of glory in God, motivated by the blindness of the dust realm, that which is natural and carnal? This earthly mind-set, this fallen nature, passed down from generation to generation as it makes man prisoners to a carnal mind-set of darkness instead of walking in the glory of God. Unable to rule over God’s creation, man now, ruled over by the lusts of this fallen world until he repents and has an encounter with God.

This encounter, this awakening, when yielded unto, will enable man to walk a pathway chosen by God. However, God’s chosen pathway is a way that is foreign to the natural man and for this cause becomes one that deals with every aspect and mind-set of fallen man’s nature. It becomes a narrow way that the natural man does not desire to take. Matt. 7:13-14 declares, “Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it”. Nevertheless, thanks are to our God humankind can be forgiven. They can forget the past that has hindered them by focusing their eyes upon God’s divine goal. This divine goal puts humanity in a place of decision. As man receives revelation of his present condition and God’s desire for him, humanity chooses whom he will serve. The awakening power of God enables man to see the life-style God has planned for him. Instead of man’s goal being to fulfill successful carnal desires and earthly riches and fame, he can now choose to lay up riches of a heavenly nature. This life-style change can bring him into a relationship with the heavenlies while the earthly grows dim and passes away.

Zion, as spoken of in scripture, is the type God uses to bring man’s attention to that glorious place wherein God desires to dwell, that is God living in man, they becoming Zion, a first-fruits company. Jerusalem is a type God uses as a spiritual people who are to be wedded to God in union of spirit as His bride. In this, they are to become one with Him. Let us remember then from which man has fallen. With Zion, becoming the place wherein God desires to dwell among man in His victorious glory, and with Jerusalem a type of those who become the members of His chosen bride, but now separated from God because of the fall. Jerusalem had become an adulterous woman that now needed redemption. God is now calling forth His mighty men of Zion from a place of rebellion to come forth, to gain victory over all the enemies that motivate the fallen flesh man. God is sounding forth a call for the bride to purify herself that a union might take place to manifest God’s glory in all the earth. In this glory, man is to lay up heavenly treasures. Matt. 6:19-21, “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

As the word of God declares to us, that a double-minded man is unstable, the choices man makes determines his life-style. In this, where do your priorities lie? Have you invited God into your life to bring about such a change as this? Humankind, with opportunity to dwell in the life of God, must choose who they desire to serve. Man cannot serve two masters. Man will walk in the light, the truth, and revelation of God’s word, or he will walk in darkness. Matt. 6:22-23, “The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good (clear or healthy, heavenly), your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad (evil, unhealthy, fallen nature), your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!”

Remember, man cannot serve two masters. The things that this world offers are but temporal and shall pass away. However, unto him that keeps his goals heavenly and his eye single that one shall walk in the riches of the heavenlies, to know the treasures of his inheritance. Thus, while man must keep his eye single, he must also abide in the singleness of his eye. John 15:3-8 speaks on this wise, “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me, and I in him, bears much fruit, for without me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned. If you abide in me, and my Words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you. By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit. So you will be my disciples.”

Disciples are learners of Christ. They are learners that they might become the visible manifestation of that which Christ is. The key to success is to abide in Him. To attach yourself to Him in such a way that likens you to the branch and the vine. His life then flows in you in such a way that fruit begins to appear on the branch, the vessel. This fruit begins to manifest a nature that has no part in the fallen nature of humankind, but bears fruit of a heavenly nature, as God writes His nature in your heart, your soul. In abiding in Him, He reveals, by His spirit, the record of heaven to man. That, in the seeing thereof, man becomes the expression of that which is seen. That which man was with God in the beginning, redeemed man shall manifest in the end, for God has purposed it to be so.