THE TRUE BASIS OF REDEMPTION
By A.P. Adams
Author of
The Spirit of the Word
Originally published in 1895
THE TRUE BASIS OF REDEMPTION
” If a man die, shall he live again? all the days of my appointed time, will I wait until my change come. thou wilt call and I will answer Thee. Thou wilt have a desire to the work of thine hands” (Job 14:14-15)
HERE, in this passage is expressed, THE TRUE BASIS OF REDEMPTION,-”THOU wilt have a desire to the work of thine hands.” (Job 14:14, 15) It is only as we recognize man as the work of God that we can understand his redemption. When I say man I mean, not merely Adam, the first man, but all the redeemed, as finished, in the image and likeness of God. To the whole redeemed race, thus finished, the words of the apostle are applicable,-”We are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which GOD hath before ordained that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2: 10) Hence in order to understand Redemption we must understand Creation; for the former is simply one step in the process of the latter. Let’s look then first at the subject of
C R E A T I O N
The common idea is that God created man perfect and complete in the garden of Eden, and thus started him all right; but evil invaded that peaceful and blessed retreat, successfully assailed the man and the woman, and the dreadful consequences were sin, alienation, the loss of Paradise and universal death. Thus was God’s handiwork marred and his plans disarranged, and now he must commence all over again, as it were, first, to repair damages and then to carry out his original plan as best he can. This is the common idea among the great mass of Christians, and yet the simple statement of it as above is enough to make one suspect that the idea cannot be just exactly right. Is it so?-that God is altogether such an one as ourselves?-whose plans may be upset?-whose will may be thwarted?-who may be compelled to change his plan because of some interfering agency or evil power entering in and for the time being getting the better of him? Is it so? Why, no, we say; and yet what shall we do with the Bible story of the “fall of man” as we term it? Shall we make God responsible for it? If his will was not thwarted in that terrible fall, must we say that it was in accordance with his will? Many cannot say that, it seems blasphemous; and yet either that is true, or else his will was thwarted and his plans disarranged and upset by an evil power, mightier, or for the time being more cunning than himself. What shall we do in this dilemma? How shall we untangle this seeming snarl? Let us see how the Bible helps us.
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