An Altogether New Creation
Through God's eternal love and grace, man can return to his original condition and become a new creation through baptism.
G.W. North emphasizes that humanity, originally created in God's image, fell from grace and lost its rightful position due to disobedience. In our fallen state, we often rely on inadequate substitutes for true life, but God's grace offers a path back to our original purpose. Through baptism, we symbolize our rebirth into a new creation, reflecting the transformation that occurs through Christ. This rebirth aligns us with God's eternal principles, restoring us to the state of being as it was in the beginning with Adam. Ultimately, the sermon highlights the profound love of God that enables us to reclaim our identity as His creation.
Text
Man, the end-product of God's original creation and His crowning glory fell from the condition in which God created him and thereby forfeited the position he held. Almost immediately from the beginning he broke with the God-given means and principles of life, Being now fallen and quite ignorant of what he is doing, he readily improvises means of his own creating, or else accepts substitutes for reality which are totally inadequate for his needs. But God in His eternal love has given us grace to return to the original truth.
By the operation of those same unchanging and eternal powers, man is brought back into line with God and His principles of working in the original generation/creation.
As we know, when being baptised by man a person is baptised into the water as from without and/or above the water and rises from it again. By the whole symbolism it is as though he comes up then a new creation. This is because by Christ's baptism, of which water baptism is a picture, he has been brought up into the Spirit a new-born spirit, and this being so, everything is as it was in the beginning. For this is how it was also with Adam -- he was both created and born.
His body was formed and shaped from dust, but he himself was created a living soul as (a) spirit was engendered within that earth by the direct inspiration of spirit into dust by God; the man Adam was begotten.
Sermon Outline
- I. The Fall of Man
- A. Man's original condition and position
- B. Man's fall and forfeiture of position
- C. Man's improvisation and acceptance of substitutes
- II. God's Eternal Love and Grace
- A. God's provision for man's return to original truth
- B. The operation of eternal powers for man's restoration
- III. Baptism and the New Creation
- A. Symbolism of baptism and the new creation
- B. Christ's baptism and the new-born spirit
- C. Restoration to the original state
Key Quotes
“By the operation of those same unchanging and eternal powers, man is brought back into line with God and His principles of working in the original generation/creation.” — G.W. North
“By Christ's baptism, of which water baptism is a picture, he has been brought up into the Spirit a new-born spirit, and this being so, everything is as it was in the beginning.” — G.W. North
Application Points
- We must return to God's original principles of working and reject our own improvisations.
- Baptism is a symbol of the new creation, where we become a new-born spirit.
- God's eternal love and grace provide the means for our restoration to our original state.