It is the ultimate challenge of faith – the greatest quandary one faces when it comes to believing in God. It has sparked numerous discussions throughout history. It has pulled some further away from the truth that is faith in God, while drawing others closer to the amazing reality. It is the ever-puzzling question of how it is that God – Creator of the Universe, Master of all - loves man.
Simple and sinful, vain and insignificant, and yet still a part of the great schema of the created world, man could be considered the blemish, the stain, upon the perfect world that existed. But it is this paradox – this absurd reality that God made man – that provides the greatest comfort for those who believe. For in knowing that humans are sinful and wicked, and knowing that God still provides and loves, it is assured that there is a greater force at work – that there was a specific purpose, an absolute reason for human existence. God created man out of a desire for man -out of sheer, perfect, unconditional love - and in creating man established the ultimate purpose, the proper autonomy of a person: to serve, love, and know God.
The Word of God – the most sacred and holy Bible – begins with the magnificent account of creation. In five days God created night and day, birds of the air, creatures of the sea, and plants and vegetation to fill the land; after these five days of intense work, God gazed upon the things He had made and decided to “…make man in our image, and after our likeness…” (Gen 1:26.) Considered the epitome of creation, the moment God brought forth human life to His perfect and undefiled earth signifies a most significant expression of God’s unconditional and perfect love. The fact that God thought it necessary to create something that was in His image – something that would have elements of Himself – is the first instance where God shows a desire for man. There was no immediate need for man. God, being the ruler of all things, could have ordered creation in such a way that animals and vegetation would have no need of human interference. In essence, God created man because He wanted to.
The question is why. Why would God want man? What good does man do God? God has everything at His disposal – He created it, so it is naturally His and most specifically good – so man can give no things to God. There is no equal partnership, no balance of give and take between humans and God. Quite simply, God gave everything to man, so what could man possibly give to God? John Paul the Second, in his teachings on the Theology of the Body claims, “The reciprocal gift of oneself to God – a gift in which man will concentrate and express all the energies of his own personal and at the same time psychosomatic subjectivity – will be the response to God’s gift of self to man.” [i]
This is what man can give to God, the only thing man could possibly give – himself. When the gift of self is given to God, when all things of the world become secondary to the worshipping and loving of the Highest Power, things are in order and as they should be.
Adam and Eve could have been the perfect examples of giving this “reciprocal gift of oneself to God.” In the perfect world, the utopia of Eden, they had the chance to live in this state of giving themselves to God forever. But human error, the innate humanity and ability to fall into sin, overwhelmed them causing God to “[drive] out the man,” and marked man’s soul with the stain of original sin forever (Gen. 3:24.) Some argue that God, being omnipotent, knew man would sin all along; that He intended for them to sin and desired nothing more than to see them suffer and eventually turn to Him, begging for redemption and salvation. But this turns God into a manipulative, egotistical deity likened to the mythological Athena and Zeus who sought to toy with the lives of the simplistic mortals roaming the unruly earth, and God – the Father Almighty – is anything but scheming and arrogant. God created man with the ability to rule himself. He gave humans free will, the potential to decide things of one’s own accord – to control one’s own life. This free will is what caused Adam and Eve to sin, not a calculating nature of God’s.
So the question arises, why would God create man with free will? If God’s entire purpose in creating humans was to establish a people that would seek to serve and worship Him always, then why would He not control man at all times? Why would He give humans the chance to control themselves? Because God wanted man to choose Him. That is to say, God gave man free will – the potential to chart one’s own course in life – so that man would have to openly acknowledge and accept God, seeking to love God the same way that God loves man. God did not want a world filled with people blindly following Him…what sort of a testament of faith is it when one believes something that is forced and could never be questioned? So God gave the gift of free will, hoping – knowing – that many would discover the truth in believing and loving Him.
It is when man recognizes and acknowledges that the free will he has been given is meant to lead him to God – that he is supposed to freely will himself to loving and serving God – that the truth of faith and the reality of life is shockingly revealed. Psalm 8, a psalm of God’s divine majesty and man’s human dignity says, “What is man that you are mindful of him…?” (Psalm 8:4.) The psalm sings of the great wonders of the earth, the marvels of creation that man pales in comparison to. And in marveling over the magnificent creation that is the world, man recognizes what his purpose is, to sing out “O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth!” (Psalm 8:9.) When man looks at the world and the beautiful things God has created, he is hard pressed to find an excuse to not worship and praise the Almighty Father. It’s in recognizing man’s simplicity and undeniable humanity that leads to an unabashed worship of the everlasting God.
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God’s desire for man – His love of the human person- does not stop merely in knowing that He granted man the opportunity to willingly choose Him. The epitome of God’s love and desire for the well-being of man is shown with the life, death, and resurrection of His son, Jesus Christ. Pope Benedict XVI, in his powerful book Jesus of Nazareth, writes,
“What has [Jesus] brought? The answer is very simple: God…Jesus has brought God and with God the truth about our origin and destiny…”[ii]
The existence of Jesus Christ – with His miraculous life, sacrificial death, and redemptive resurrection – brings the truth of God into the world tenfold. The very fact that God manifested Himself in the world, choosing to send His son – a being absolutely human and completely divine – shows that God wanted man to know Him. By sending Jesus, by giving Jesus, and by raising Jesus, God gave the world undeniable proof that He wants man to love Him…that He desires nothing more than for us to desire Him.
God’s want for us – His ultimate wish for us – is that we want Him. Our function in life is to serve God – to give the gift of self - and in so doing, we gain more than we could have ever imagined. The bumper-sticker Bible verse, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only- begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life,” is the blatant evidence that God gave the world Jesus so that we would come to believe and gain perfect and everlasting happiness with Him in heaven (John 3:16.) But it is the often overlooked verses following this inspiring favorite gives the undeniable purpose of Jesus’ existence. John chapter 3, verses 17 and 18 are very distinct with, “For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not condemned; he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God.” That is to say, because God sent us Jesus He gave us proof of His existence and His unconditional love, and any man who denies God after He has given us this gift of His son is damning himself. We cannot deny God’s love when we look at the gift of Jesus, so therefore we cannot deny loving God with our whole selves and giving ourselves to Him.
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God’s desire for man is shown through the creation of mankind on the 6th day of creation. It is further evidenced in that He provided man with free will, giving man the chance to determine his own fate and control his own life. And God’s want of man reaches its epitome with the life, death, and resurrection of His son, Jesus Christ. Man finds solace and comfort in knowing that God desires man, wanting him on His earth and existing amongst His creation, but is further challenged to reciprocate that love and give of himself for the greater glory of God.
[i] John Paul II’s Theology of the Body: Man and Woman He Created Them 68:3; published 1986
[ii] Benedict XVI’s Jesus of Nazareth pg. 44; published 2006.
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