From
Broken To Restored
No, this is not a story about Humpty Dumpty where we
experience a fall and then get put back together again. It is a story about
being broken even before we are born. It is also a story about God’s
restoration process after that fact. Yet, how is it possible that we are not
born good? We know from a biblical perspective everything God created was good
and when it came to humans, His creation was very good.
Excerpts from Genesis 1:
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,[a] and over all the
creatures that move along the ground.”
27 So God created mankind in his
own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.
28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in
number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the
sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the
ground.”
29 Then
God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth
and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all
the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the
ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green
plant for food.” And it was so.
31 God saw all that he had made, and it
was very good. And there was
evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.
So, somewhere along the way humans went from being very
good to being very broken and sinful in the way they thought and acted toward God
and others.
In Chapter 3 in the Book of
Genesis, Satan convinces Adam & Eve that they
needed more than just God and His provision. At the time God provided for everything,
including food, companionship, work, pleasure and eternal life. Satan tempted
and convinced Adam & Eve that they needed to be like God, having their eyes
opened, where they also could know about good and evil. The one tree that God
told them not to eat from became the meal that brought sin into the world. Adam
and Eve both disobeyed God and ate the fruit and now we and all of God’s
creation continue to experience the consequences of that sin.
Genesis
2:15-17 New International Version (NIV)
15 The Lord God
took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And
the Lord God commanded
the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”
Who would think that from this one event the world would go
from paradise to a place where brokenness, sin and death would taint all of God’s
creation? Yet, history reflects how God’s creation is breaking down. History shows how and why a sinful human race continually
runs away from God to act on their own sinful desires. History shows people
rejecting and even hating God, their Creator, who breathed life into them. What
many people don’t realize is that they too have been deceived by the real enemy
of humans and God. This enemy is Satan himself.
Not much has changed since the Fall. Only through the recent
technological explosion, the internet and social media, have we been able to
find more ways to hate God and others.
Each person alive today reflects a broken
and sinful nature inherited from the “Fall”, thanks to Adam and Eve’s original
sin.
This sinful nature inherited from the Fall
affects all that the mind perceives, one’s actions, heart and motivation. The
problem is that every person affects every person. It is way too convenient to
blame others without owning up to one’s own responsibility for how they speak
and act. It is common place to see other people’s broken and sinful nature and
point to them as the problem. Yet, the
real problem is us and we have a responsibility to find the right way to
counteract the damage from the Fall that has affected our lives.
The Good News is God has given us the help
we need. The Bible helps us see the damage from the Fall and then shows us that
Jesus was God’s antidote for the consequences of having this original disease,
the sin nature.
The
First way Jesus helps us is that He can forgive our sin. Through His work
on the Cross, one’s sin has been paid for. Therefore, God no longer finds those
who receive Jesus’ work guilty of sin. God invites those who believe and
receive this work of Jesus into His eternal family.
Second, those who are followers
and believers in Jesus receive God’s helper, the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit
plays a powerful role in changing us from the inside out. This supernatural
indwelling of the Holy Spirit has the power to conform us into a new creation
where the new self is more like that of Jesus. The old self still exists and
can rear its ugly head from time to time, but for the most part, those led by
the Spirit, are living out the new life God desires for His people. Referred to
as the Fruit of the Spirit, those born again reflect love, joy, peace, patience, kindness,
goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. (Galatians 5:22-23). Those
guided, taught, and counseled by the Holy Spirit lead changed lives and are now
more focused on being God-centered over self-centered. God’s people don’t
always do a good job in living this out, but it is truly their desire to do so.
Third, those who are followers
of Jesus have a new identity and a new purpose, instead of an identity of sin,
brokenness and separation from God, Jesus replaces the old self with a new
self, an identity affected by supernatural love, grace and hope. God desires to
restore His people back to Himself. One’s desire as a follower of Jesus should
be to honor and revere God with love, gratitude, and service, all the while
reflecting Christ-likeness toward others. Our salvation, our perspective and
attitude define who we are and can help others in seeing God for who He really
is. The truth about God - He loves His people and wants to rescue then from sin
and death. Those restored are God’s people, set apart to Him for His pleasure
and good purpose. What followers of Jesus can accomplish with God’s help and
power, will have an eternal impact. With a new God given perspective, a follower
of Jesus will view everything including eternity in a new and profound vertically
focused light. This perspective will affect every aspect of a believer’s life
even in the midst of one’s greatest difficulty.
If you are struggling
with life join the club. Everyone faces the difficulties and sufferings that
can be attributed to the Fall. Jesus never said that life would be free of
hardship. He did say that with God’s
help we will find a new life, a new hope, a new heart, a new perspective and a
new purpose.
Jesus tells us about His role in salvation:
John
14:6 New International Version (NIV)
6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No
one comes to the Father except through me.
The Good news about following Jesus:
John
8:12 New International Version (NIV)
12 When Jesus spoke again to the people, he
said, “I am the light of the
world. Whoever follows me will
never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.
Jesus refers to the Living Water/Holy Spirit as the one playing the
life changing role in one’s new life in Christ:
John
4:14 New International Version (NIV)
14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will
never thirst. Indeed, the water I
give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal
life.”
John
7:38 New International Version (NIV)
38 Whoever believes in
me, as Scripture has said, rivers
of living water will flow from within them.”
The Apostle Paul unpacks a new life in Christ:
Romans 8:1-2: “So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to
Christ Jesus. And because you belong to him, the power of the life-giving Spirit has freed you from the power of sin
that leads to death.”
The
problem and the solution:
Romans
6:23 New International Version (NIV)
23 For the wages
of sin is death, but the gift
of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Proof of God’s love for
us:
Romans
5:8 New International Version (NIV)
8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in
this: While we were still sinners,
Christ died for us.
John
3:16 New International Version (NIV)
16 For God
so loved the world that he
gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
The way to be rescued:
Romans
10:9-10 New International Version (NIV)
9 If you declare with
your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in
your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are
justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved.
Through Jesus,
God has the perfect way to take our broken and sinful nature and restore us
back to Himself. God, through His amazing love and grace, gives people the gift
of faith that rescues us from the consequences of the Fall. This gift from God cannot
be earned or purchased. It is only
through Jesus’ work and righteousness that we can be restored back to God and
saved from our sin.
Ephesians
2:8-9 New International Version (NIV)
8 For it is by
grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so
that no one can boast.
A believer’s life exemplifies
a lifelong process called sanctification.
This process can be quite painful as one goes through shedding the old self in
order to experience the blessing of being a new creation. This process also
leads one to be set apart to God for His purpose. If you are truly a believer,
the pain you experience from dying to self will ultimately benefit you and
others who will notice the beauty of your transformation reflected in your
Christ-like humility, heart, mind, words and actions. When God sheds light on
one’s sin, that awareness will be painful yet at the same time will begin the
road to restoration. The Apostle Paul in his letter to the Romans explains that
suffering has a purpose:
Romans
5:1-5 New International Version (NIV)
Therefore, since we have
been justified through faith, we have peace with God
through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2 through whom we
have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now
stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. 3 Not
only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces
perseverance; 4 perseverance,
character; and character, hope. 5 And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s
love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who
has been given to us.
When a believer follows Jesus,
they will suffer for the sake of the Gospel (Good News). They will also suffer
while dying to their own self-interest. Jesus even told His disciples that they
would be persecuted.
John
15:20 New International Version (NIV)
20 Remember what I told you: ‘A servant is not
greater than his master.’ If they
persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my
teaching, they will obey yours also.
But Jesus also said this:
John
16:33 New International Version (NIV)
33 “I have told you these things, so that in me you
may have peace. In this world you
will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
Jesus wants His disciples
to know that it is better to desire what He offers which is eternal over what
the world offers which ultimately leads to sin and death.
When we truly follow Jesus, we deny
ourselves the sinful life which is filled with suffering and brokenness in
order to inherit a life of joy and purpose which includes suffering yet filled
with God’s good purpose.
Romans 8:28 New International Version
(NIV)
28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him,
who have been called according to his purpose.
Mark
8:34-37 New International Version (NIV)
34 Then he called the crowd to him along with his
disciples and said: “Whoever wants
to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35 For whoever wants to save
their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me
and for the gospel will save it.36 What
good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? 37 Or what can anyone
give in exchange for their soul?
When we are in the true broken
state, we will experience the eternal consequence of our sin which is eternal separation
from God. When we are restored, eternal
life with God begins and everything makes more sense due to God’s love, grace
and eternal perspective.
One always has the
opportunity to ask God to change their life.
Beginning with the gift of faith, God will unveil the broken nature of
the old self as well as begin the process of restoration back to Himself. Eventually,
when one experiences a softening of the heart, they will come to a point where they
will ask for God’s forgiveness and receive Jesus’ work on the cross that saves
them from sin and death. With Jesus as Lord and Savior, one’s transformed life
and new identity in Christ is shaped by the presence and power of God.
Suffering will always
play a role in a believer’s life. Yet, at the same time, everlasting joy is the
constant in the midst of a follower of Jesus living in a fallen world.
You see, God loves us so
much He makes it known that we can find restoration in Christ Jesus while still
in our broken and sinful state. We don’t have to search for it. God finds us
where we are and presents us with the gift of faith that leads to eternal life.
The question is, will we take it? If we do, we will go from broken to restored.
Blessings………………..Dave
