VALLEY VIEW UNIVERSITY

DEPARTAMENT OF THEOLOGICAL STUDIES

COURSE : THEOLOGICAL STUDIES II

LECTURER : Daniel Berchie, Ph.D.

STUDENT: Stiven Jorge Lima dos Santos
COURSE CODE: RELT413
ID: 221TR01000474

The Nature of man

Introduction
My presentation is based in the seventh believe of the SDA church, which is the
“nature of man”, in this small work I am going to do an analyze on this particular
believe and bring out what I found based in the scriptures and what is not actually
having biblical foundations. I will critic this believe in a positive way, and show what
should be improved for it to be centered in the bible.

Creation of mankind
The seventh Day Adventists believe that man was created in the image of God,
after His likeness according to (Gen. 1:27), and because there are some passages just
like: (Ex. 24:9-11), (Ex. 33:20-23), (Dan. 7:9,10), (Col. 1:15) and (Heb. 1:13) indicates
that God has a personal form, so it shouldn’t be a surprise for us to understand that man
was created in the image of God. Another point that is accepted in the nature of man is
that, man has been created from the ground, according to (Gen. 2:7). The same passage
says that God shaped the man from the dust of the ground but he was still lifeless until
God breath into his nostrils the breath of life and he became a person which is translated
as “a living soul”, expressing the idea that we don’t have a soul within ourselves but we
the final product, we are a soul, the result of dust from the ground and breath of life
from God. The Hebrew word for soul is nephesh which literally means “to breathe” and
is the same Hebrew word used for living creatures such as births and all animals.
At the end of the creation of each animal the bible says that God created them
according to their own kind, expressing the diversity of live that God created, although
when we come to mankind, we cannot find the same expression, but the expression that
the bible says is that they were created in the image of God according to his likeness,
and when we go to the book of (Luck 3:38) he will lead us to understand that Adam was
“The son of God” expressing the idea that they a sharing something in common.
We also believe that the man was the highest point of creation and it was given
to him dominion over all the rest of the creation, he could rule over them as their master
for that was given to him by God, he should be a steward of God according to:(Gen.
1:27). And Adam was blessed and told to multiply and fill the earth so every man that
we can see on earth came out of Adam, we are all united in the same man that God
created in the beginning. According to (Gen. 1:28).
Man was created perfect and placed in a perfect environment although, by the
power of the free will conceived to him, he disobeyed God becoming a transgressor of
the law and as consequence he became a sinner, so man in no longer a perfect being but
a fallen creature according to:(Gen. 3:11-19). The sin of man then brought some
changes in the human nature and broke the relationship between God and mankind, and
also brought death, sickness, suffering, pain and a lot of others difficulties in the daily
life of each man
Mankind has the privilege to be reconciled with God through the covenant that
was made with mankind at the beginning when God promised to create enmity between
the woman and the serpent meaning that the descendants of the woman would not join
with the serpent which represents Satan.(Gen. 3:15) This covenant was ultimately
fulfilled through what Jesus has done for us in the cross, meaning that even though we
are no longer perfect beings, we can get perfection again through Jesus by accepting
what He did on the cross for us and deciding to obey him and his word through faith,
not by our own strength and then we will be free from sin and its consequences. (Gal.
3:29), (Gal. 2:19-21)

Conclusion and my personal evaluation

The believe in the nature of man is a biblical concept and it is based in the
scriptures, but in my view some passages were not given the due meaning in which they
stand in the particular context, the first one is the concept of man been created in the
image of God, the concept is biblical according to (Gen 1:27) but the interpretation that
God has a physical form and we are copies of that physical form is not stated in the text
and some texts used to support this ideas such as (Ex. 24:9-11), (Ex. 33:20-23), (Dan.
7:9,10), (Col. 1:15) and (Heb. 1:13) do not suggest that God has a physical form, but
that he has shown himself in a way that mankind could see him(Gen.32:30), because the
bible says that God is spirit(Math. 4:24), and even the text in (Col. 1:15), says that
Jesus, “He is the image of the invisible God” suggesting that God is not visible, but
through Jesus we could see his image, not because he has a physical form, but because
he has made himself visible.

The other challenge is concerning (Gen. 3:15) which is taken as a prophetic

covenant between God and humanity and in this covenant, we can see the serpent which
represents Satan is taken as enemy throughout the generations. But what we can see in
the text is not really a prophecy but a literal enmity between mankind and the serpent
which we can see even today.