When God created man it was such an intimate, personal, and powerful display. The Scriptures say that God “formed the man of dust from the ground” (Gen. 2.7). This intentionality and intimacy is demonstrated in God making Adam. But then it is taken to another level when we read that the Lord “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.” God is the life giver; the source and sustainer of life (Col. 1:16-17). Apart from God there is no life. Far from existing by chance we have been given life with intentionality and beautiful intimacy. Sinclair Ferguson said that Adam was created with the kiss of God. It is truly beautiful to consider the love that overflows in God’s creation as he breathes life into Adam.
We something similar in the new creation. We know that by virtue of our sin we have been separated from God (Col. 1:21). Prior to conversion we are all dead in sin (Eph. 2:1-3). So what does God do? Jesus becomes a man, the second Adam, to live faithfully in every place that we fail. He loves God perfectly and loves neighbor perfectly. He is truly without sin. However, his life is set upon his hour. His soul vectors toward Calvary with divine initiative. He goes to that cross and is hung in between earth and heaven as the sacrifice for our sin. And there upon the cross, the life-giver gives his life. Jesus breathes his last. In order for the new creation to come, Jesus who is the life (Jn. 14.6) must die.
This is not the end of the story of course. On the third day Christ would be raised from the dead, as the first fruits of the new creation. In his wake innumerable sons of Adam would march to Canaan’s fair and happy land. In order to make this happen God the Holy Spirit would have to visit sinners like you and me with the same type of intentionality and intimacy demonstrated in the creation of man. God would take the the God-breathed word and put it in us giving spiritual life to a spiritually dead man. By the gust of gospel air we are made alive! As Paul exclaimed in 2 Cor 5.17, If anyone is in Christ–new creation!! We are part of this new creation. God has, through the gospel, made us alive in Christ (Eph. 2.8-10).
When you and I think about this we should have the same reaction to the first creation as to the second: humility. Just as God acted upon the freshly formed but lifeless sculpture in the garden so too it was God acting upon us in the new creation. We were yet without life until God gave it. May God forbid any boasting in our personal goodness, achievements, or merit. Apart from the grace of Christ we are nothing.
We ought to also have a high degree of gratitude to go with this humility. How kind and loving of God to come upon us in such a way as to give us unspeakable joy in the gospel?
We should also delight in the truth of God’s intentionality and intimacy with us. He comes to us, knowing our greatest need and gives us the remedy. In creation God created with a Fatherly kiss, so too in the new creation we come to life with the tender kiss of divine grace through the gospel.
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