The Bible is an incredibly important and precious book that records God’s heart, will and purpose for humanity and for the world. Although God is Creator (Genesis 1:1), man has been unable to interact with God directly as one would a parent because God is spirit (John 4:24) and we are flesh. God once dwelled on this earth and walked with Adam “in the cool of the day” (Genesis 3:8), but because Adam broke God’s command, sin came into the world and God, who is perfect and can not be with sin, had to leave (Genesis 6:3). Since then, death has plagued life. Man is born only to age, get sick and die. Can this really be the will of a loving Creator? What is God’s will? 

Although we can not interact with God face-to-face, God has given us something tangible that we can see, touch and read in order to help us understand His will and guide us back to Him - the Bible, or the word of God. According to John 1:1-4, God is the word and life, and nothing has been created without it. This is why anyone who has their hope in God must strive to understand God’s word above anything else. Let’s take a look at God’s story through the Bible. 

After Adam broke God’s command roughly 6000 years ago, the lifeline was cut and God left. Since then, God has been working to restore this lifeline by sending one person to make known to people God’s will in every generation. Nine generations after Adam, God found a righteous and blameless man named Noah who, in response to God’s command, built an ark over a period of 100 years pleading with people to board it so that they could be saved from the impending flood (Genesis 6). God had to eliminate sin from the earth so that he could return to His creation. However, out of everyone to whom Noah made God’s will known, only eight people - Noah’s family - believed in God’s promise and boarded the ark (Genesis 7:13, 1 Peter 3:20). To God’s dismay, Adam’s entire generation were put to an end through the flood. 

Sin remained and found itself in Noah’s second son, Ham. God cursed Ham through Noah and promised to make his descendants (the Canaanites) slave to his brothers. Because God can not lie, whatever He promises, He must fulfil, which is why we can confidently trust and stand firm in the promises of the Bible (Isaiah 14:24; Numbers 23:19). To fulfil this promise, God came to Abram ten generations later, promised him about future events (Genesis 15) and, after hearing the groaning of His people under oppression and slavery in Egypt generations later (Exodus 2), God appointed Moses as His messenger and commanded him to guide them to the Promised Land flowing with milk and honey - the land of Canaan. Although it was a physically arduous journey through the wilderness, God split the Red Sea, fed them manna and quail, provided them with a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire at night, and even drew water from a rock (Exodus 17). On Mount Sinai, God gave Moses the Ten Commandments, inscribed on two stone tablets, which Moses delivered to the people; the first and most important commandment, which God absolutely can not tolerate, being not to worship any other god because peoples’ hearts are always led astray from the true God in this way. When Moses came down Mount Sinai with the two stone tablets, he found the people worshipping a golden calf they had made for themselves (Exodus 32). Moreover, the people grumbled and begged Moses to take them back to slavery in Egypt where they used to sit round pots of meat. In spite of everything God had done, the people did not believe in God’s promise and chose to satisfy their own fleeting desires. God ultimately put an end to that generation, and it was their children who entered the Promised Land under Joshua. 

Soon after entering the Promised Land, God gave the people judges to rule over them. When the people didn't listen to God there was war with neighbouring nations. The people then asked for what the other nations had - kings. So God gave them kings. King Solomon, whom God had commanded to build a temple for God to dwell in, did so and he ruled over the people with God-given wisdom far surpassing that of any other person in history. Yet King Solomon, who had 700 wives and 300 concubines, was led astray into worshipping foreign gods and broke God’s commandment (1Kings11). God punished Israel by tearing it in two - northern Israel and southern Israel (Judah and Jerusalem). 2Chronicles documents how quickly the kings of Israel turned their hearts and the hearts of their people towards God by completely destroying their foreign gods, only to turn back to their false gods in times of comfort. God can not dwell with sin so He had to put an end to His own people by sending invading foreign nations of Assyria and Babylon who completely occupied the land and carried off the survivors into exile. As evidenced throughout the Bible, God’s heart is always to save, but it is the people who choose not to listen and to pursue their own will. 

God then sent prophet after prophet (Isaiah-Malachi) to make known to the people about a Saviour that would come in the future, but every prophet God sent was killed by the religious authorities of the time. 600 years later, God sent his only son, Jesus Christ, as the fulfilment of this promise, but the religious authorities hung him on a cross and crucified him. How did God feel watching his child bear the cross? How would a parent feel? 

Before Jesus bore the cross, he made a new promise that is recorded in the four Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John) and in the book of Revelation, recorded in AD95. Do you know this promise? In Revelation 21, God promises to return to His creation and end all death, mourning, crying and pain and to restore a world of paradise - Eden - that had ended in Adam's time (Revelation 22). 

★For those who want to learn this new promise, have had a long life of faith but have their prayers yet to be answered, are curious about Revelation, are waiting for Jesus' Second Coming or are curious about the mysteries of human life (birth, old age, sickness and death), you can register for Shincheonji Church of Jesus' online Bible Study Course, delivered by experienced lecturers free of charge⇨http://bit.ly/bible_061102 (English)

⇨http://bit.ly/shengjing_061102 (Chinese)