[Paladin54]

Hello brothers and sisters, I just wanted to share something from a book our class read called "Total Truth". I don't know if you've read it at all, but the author made a very good point on how people receive the Gospel. For example, the reason that the "Fire and brimstone" preaching was so effective was because of the time period, since they had all grown up in Christian homes. Every person who heard these "Sinners in the hands of an angry God" sermons understood the Creation part of the Gospel (If broken down into 3 parts, the Gospel could be broken into: Creation, Fall, Redemption through Christ) . They realized that the Fall destroyed something very valuable (man), and that is why the Fall was so devastating.

Today, however, very few people are raised in a Christian background, so the Fall makes no sense to them since they know nothing of the Creation. If something of no value is corrupted, so what? However, if something of great value is perverted, then the magnitude of the fall makes sense to people. Do you think this may be why our reiterating these classic sermons has less effect than it did in the Revivals? I may be wrong altogether, I have seen little street preaching and have done none myself, but I don't see people understanding the message because we are jumping to the Fall instead of starting with the Creation. Isn't that the Gospel? "God made man in his Image, made perfect, man falls to temptation and sin enters the world, corrupting its seed. Then God incarnate, in his grief for the loss of his fellowship, pays the penalty for our sin so that we may become like Christ, and one day rule the world with Christ after Judgement. Isn't that the idea? If we leave out the first part, it makes little sense because they miss the idea "God loves you, he made you perfect (originally), but cannot look upon you because of your filth. Repent and come back to fellowship with God.

How can paradise be restored is paradise never existed in the first place?

Submitted for your review,
Paladin

I hope that I explained it well enough.