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Welcome to the Daily Blade. The Word of God is described as the sword of the Spirit, the primary spiritual weapon in the Christian's armor against the forces of evil. Your hosts are Joby Martin and Kyle Thompson, and they stand ready to equip men for the fight. Let's sharpen up.

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All right, welcome back day two. Today we're gonna talk about the purpose of a man. What is the purpose of man? I mean, did God create man because he needed us? The answer is no. Was he lonely walking around in heaven thinking man, I got all this time and space. What do I do with it? The answer is no. That is not why God created us. Ultimately, like I said yesterday, out of an overflow of God's love for God's self, he creates image bearers of him and overflow God's love for God's self. He creates image bearers of him, both male and female for sure. And ultimately, the purpose of man is to bring glory to God.

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Now here's the question how do we do this? Well, post-resurrection, post the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, the way that we are to bring glory to God is ultimately through the Great Commission and the Great Commandment. The Great Commission is going and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Great Commandment is to love. That's right. It's to love God and love people. But what was the original design? Because the Great Commandment and the Great Commission. It doesn't make sense. Before sin entered the world, like Adam and Eve didn't have to go out and tell people about Jesus because they were walking around in the garden with God himself. So, originally, what was the purpose of man? And the ultimate purpose was to bring God glory. And what we're going to do is we are going to look at three things over the next three days that God gives to man to bring glory to God.

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We'll pick it up in verse 8 of chapter 2. It says this and the Lord, god, planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed. Now here's what I want you to notice is that the man was not created in the garden. Now Eve will be created in the garden, but Adam was created out in the wilderness. The first time I've ever heard this was John Eldredge's very famous book Wild at Heart. As you know, kyle and I are big fans of John Eldredge, and he is the one that pointed out the Lord is a warrior, the Lord is his name, and that you and I, as men, image bearers of God, have been created in his image. And maybe this is why we come alive in the outdoors, we come alive in the wilderness, we come alive in the adventure, because we were created in the wild, it goes on to say. And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. A river flowed out of Eden to water the garden and there it divided and became four rivers. And then the next bunch of verses just list those rivers.

Speaker 2: 2:50

Verse 15, the first thing that God gives to Adam, to man, is work to enjoy, it says the Lord. God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. This is known as the cultural mandate. The King James says that we are subdue and cultivate. That's what we are called to do. You see, work is not a result of the fall. Work is a part of God's original design for man.

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In fact, when I felt called to ministry and I went to my dad and said, daddy, I think I'm gonna go to seminary and be a pastor, be a youth pastor First of all, he and he said why in the world do you need a school for that? You only work half a day a week and study one book. And I was like I don't know, but I'm going. And then he said what do you want to do? And I said I'm going to be a youth pastor. And he thought I just wanted to play games my whole life. And he said something very profound. He said, son, as a man you don't get up and go to fun. You get up to us, and one of the things that he has given us is work to enjoy.

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Now, what I need you to understand is that, from God's perspective, there is no sacred secular divide when it comes to work. It's not like what I do is holy because I teach the Bible for a living, but what you do is somehow less than because you build houses. You see, actually every good and perfect gift is from above, and what we have been called to do as men is rearrange the things that have been created for human flourishing. So, first of all, you've got to understand regardless of what your job is, you've got to do it as unto the Lord, because you are a part of the cultural mandate. You see, you're not just building a house out of sticks and bricks, but God is using you to create an environment whereby he can raise up a family.

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You see, my daddy used to always say this too. He'd say men are like flatbed trucks they drive straighter with a heavy load, and a bored man is a dangerous, dangerous thing. And so we live in a world today that tries to get you to follow your passion. We're not even using that word, right? Passion is a Latin word which means to die on a cross, to crucify, to bleed for. So listen, you don't get up and go to fun. You get up and go to work. You need to figure out what God has called you to do in this world and be a part of the advancement of his kingdom by working as unto the Lord. The first thing in the garden that God gave this man was work to enjoy. Come back tomorrow, we'll keep going.

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Thank you for listening to today's episode Before you go. If you want to help equip other men for the fight, share this podcast around and leave us a five-star rating and review. Stay sharp.