Maybe all along we should have been asking ourselves the question: “what did Adam lose for us that at one time was apart of the humanity? Alongside this question, what did woman gain because Eve “was in the transgression”? Finally, where did Satan wind up trying to be smarter than God??
Man was made “in the image of God.” It is not even debated that man was not made physically in the image of God. Yet, man was the representative, shadow, likeness, of God. In what manner did this occur? Man was given the “likeness” of God at the start. As man was the highest of the high, among the creations of God, UNTIL Adam sinned. Since the coming of Christ, Christians are said to have a renewed image, and again be “in the likeness of God” (morally, intellect, skill), so man can so live to be “with God.” Unless we understand what this “image” means, we will never comprehend what the “likeness” must become. As the physical representative of God on the earth, man was THE power who could command all things, even angels? In what “pecking order” was man made? Do not all animals still fear mankind, all angels still are his servants? The apostle Paul writes that the “new man,” a creation by the same God, must be renewed in this likeness. Colossians 3:10; Ephesians 4:23-24 As to the “express image” which is applied to Christ, only, it teaches us that Christ was the same likeness, kind, being, or that He was God in a human body. Christ is the only being to be said to be in the express“image” of God. Hebrews 1:3. A like reproduction in every aspect of His being. (Compared to a graving tool that makes an exact mark, reproduction, symbol, the same in every respect.) Thayer, considered one of the greatest Greek scholars of all time, says this word charaktar (Greek word) represents something so exact, so much the same, it could be the engraving tool that made the mark instead of the mark, itself!! The character or expression of God that Paul expresses is the hypo-stasis (substance) of God. This hypo-stasis is essential to Christ; so that the likeness of the original becomes manifest, and is the perfect facsimile. It is like the sealing of a document by a king, it had to be so exact in every detail or the recipient would never know from whom it had origin!! Christ was and is the splendor of eternal light and the unsullied mirror of the energy of God, and the image of His goodness!! Christ had inherent splendor and exhibited splendor by definition of this word.. This is the Holy Spirit’s claim for the deity of Christ. He that denies this fact is said to be a “fool”! Psalms 14:1
Man, made in the image of God was made with the power, might, control, and glory of God. Paul paints this picture for us in 1 Corinthians 11:7 where he deals with man and woman. With this power and might Adam was over all animals as God would be; all would be subject to his command as they would be to God’s commands. Plants would grow at his command, all creation would be at his beck and call. Man was in a paradise with the power and might of God with the option to chose who he would serve and made the wrong choice!! Expelled from the first paradise, man would have no way back to this inconceivably beautiful place until invited and Christ, extended on Calvary’s tree: “Today, thou shalt be with me in Paradise.” Jesus claimed He is the Way back, and that NO MAN could come back to the Father, BUT BY HIM”!! John 14:6 Christ will make it possible for us to get to Heaven!! Man lost this image by sin (we can all now thank Satan for this, yea, go ahead and do what he wants you to do ) but “in Christ” we can have it back in the new creation, His spiritual world called the Church of Christ in which we can have “the Father and Christ who will come unto us and make their abode with us” (we all can thank God, the Father through Christ for this, Christ had to BUY our way out of this mess. We are the they who are ransomed)!! John 14:23; Acts 20:28; Matthew 20:28
We finally have found out what Adam cost us!!, but did he cost us?? If this is a cost I will gladly pay the debt for the value received!! Left here with the world at our feet is no way comparable to what is waiting the ransomed who remain faithful unto death!!! What is it to “gain to whole world and lose your soul; or what would a man give in exchange for his soul?” Matthew 16:26; Mark 8:37 Oh! What a plan, the mystery from the foundations of the world !! No wonder “eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man what God had in store for them that love Him!! 1 Corinthians 2:9 There are a few who “know in whom they have believed and are persuaded that He will be able to keep that which we have committed unto Him against that day.” 2 Timothy 1:12.
