He Created Me For A Purpose

Although hundreds of reporters were on the scene, many daily newspapers omitted mention of this remark & the unusual applause. The ”Rocky Mountain News” & “The Washington Post,” which sent 6 reporters to Littleton, forgot to mention that Mr. Graham even spoke at all. I wonder why?

ILL. William Bennett, former Cabinet Secretary of the Department of Education, wrote: “If these kids were walking around that school in black trench coats, saying ‘Heil Hitler,’ why didn’t somebody pay attention? I guarantee you if…Cassie Bernall…& her friends had been walking through that school carrying Bibles & saying, ‘Hail the Prince of Peace, King of Kings,’ they would have been hauled into the principal’s office.”

APPL. Folks, the result of the last 35 years or so is not that we have a society that is atheistic. We have a society that is polytheistic, that believes in almost anything & everything. New Ageism, eastern mysticism, & all kinds of things have flooded into our culture. So it is important for us to understand the basics of our faith.

PROP. As we look at Genesis 1-2 this morning, I want you to see that: “We are created for a purpose.” And to show that, let’s note 3 very special truths that come from these first two chapters.

I. WE ARE UNIQUELY SHAPED BY GOD

A. The first truth is this, “We are uniquely shaped by God.” Job 10:8 says, “Your hands shaped me & made me.” Now when I read that I get a mental image of God as a Potter bending over a potter’s wheel. He takes a lump of clay & begins to form & fashion it into whatever He chooses. Usually, a Potter would be making a bowl, or perhaps a pitcher.

But God is making people, molding & fashioning us. Genesis 1:27 says, “So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male & female He created them.” And because He created us in His own image we are not only like Him, but we are capable of thinking & feeling like Him, & our emotions are similar to His.

Genesis 2:7 says, “The Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground & breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, & the man became a living being.” So the very breath of God is in each of us.

The Psalmist said that God formed & knitted us together while we were still in our mother’s womb. He fit the bones into the joints, & put blood vessels & muscles into place. He created & shaped each of us to be unique. That is what the Bible teaches.

B. Now that is very different from what the theory of evolution teaches. It teaches that we’re all just accidents, we just happened. There was a big bang or explosion in the universe, & the earth spun off & became a little planet where the atmosphere was just right for life to happen.

Soon there were little cells swimming around in the ocean. Then they came out of the ocean, & then pretty soon here we are. And even though we’re at the peak of this evolutionary process, we’re still just an accident that happened.

ILL. Maybe you’ve heard about the gorilla in a zoo holding a Bible in one hand & a book about evolution in the other. He was looking confused, so someone asked, “What are you doing?” The gorilla answered, “Well, I’m trying to decide if I’m my brother’s keeper or my keeper’s brother.”