Every fall in the Northern Hemisphere, we are treated to a vivid display of brilliant reds, yellows and oranges among trees that shed their leaves before the winter months. For many of God’s people, this is a beautiful backdrop on the way to and from the Feast of Tabernacles. In peak season of the color change, the vibrant colors can make the trip unforgettable.
But these colorful leaves don’t last long. Soon after peak season ends, they brown, dry up and fall off. It’s a powerful reminder of a main lesson of the Feast of Tabernacles: Physical life is temporary.
Spirit life is different. God is immortal; He doesn’t grow old or even get weary (Isaiah 40:28). Angels are also immortal spirit beings (Hebrews 1:7). Not even the evil angels, the demons, die.
But God made physical life, including human life, to be temporary. We are made of physical matter, the dust of the ground (Genesis 2:7). God deliberately created us this way. Do you know why?
Answering this question is important to appreciate your physical existence and the unique benefits that come with it. If we don’t know why we are physical, we can come to view our temporary life negatively as our bodies grow old, slow down and wear out.
You can get a glimpse of where disdain toward physical life can lead in Job 4. In this chapter, Eliphaz hears a spirit lie about God having contempt for mortal man. The voice in Eliphaz’s vision asks, “How much less in them that dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, which are crushed before the moth? They are destroyed from morning to evening; they perish for ever without any regarding it” (verses 19-20). In the view of this immortal spirit, a human life is unworthy of attention because man is nothing better than a “house of clay,” here today and gone tomorrow.
Notice how the New Living Translation translates the next verse: “Their tent-cords are pulled and the tent collapses, and they die in ignorance” (verse 21). Here man is referred to as a tent. It’s an analogy used in other scriptures to illustrate the temporary life of a human being. For example, in 2 Peter 1:14 the Apostle Peter, near the end of his life, refers to himself as a tabernacle. Yet in Eliphaz’s vision, the symbol of a tent is used in a derogatory manner.
How do you view your mortal, physical life? Do you understand and appreciate why human beings can be compared to a tabernacle or a house of clay? Are you making the most of your physical existence?
Matter Changes
In a sermon on Oct. 16, 1982, Herbert W. Armstrong asked the following questions regarding man: “[W]hy did God make him mortal? Why did He make him of matter, instead of spirit?” Notice his answer: “Well, if man chose the wrong way, if he did the wrong way, he could change; he could repent and matter can change!”
Think about the changes that will take place on Earth during the Millennium. Deserts will blossom with roses (Isaiah 35:1). Oceans will shrink. Mountains will be threshed (Isaiah 41:15). The nature of animals will change (Isaiah 11:6-9). Earth will be transformed into a completely different planet; it will turn into a global Garden of Eden. These changes are possible because it is all made from physical matter. Matter changes constantly.
This quality of physical matter is even more important for man. It allows man to achieve his incredible human potential!
Mr. Armstrong described this potential in Mystery of the Ages: “Why did the Creator God put man on the Earth? For God’s ultimate supreme purpose of reproducing himself—of re-creating Himself, as it were, by the supreme objective of creating the righteous divine character ultimately in millions unnumbered begotten and born children who shall become God beings, members of the God Family.”
This ultimate supreme purpose is recorded in the first pages of the Bible: “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them” (Genesis 1:27). God created us in His likeness with the opportunity to take on His character so we can be born into His Family. This required man to be made from matter.
Mr. Armstrong continued, “This supreme purpose required … that man be made first of matter so that, if he was led into Satan’s way of ‘get,’ he could be changed, converted to God’s way of love, or if he refused to change, his life would be blotted out without further or continuous suffering just as if he had never been.”
Physical matter can be destroyed. If a human being refuses to live God’s way of life, he can be “blotted out” rather than live a miserable existence forever in disobedience. This would not be the case if man were made a spirit being.
Mr. Armstrong explained further, “Spirit beings, once a finished creation (as were the one third of the angels who became evil characters), could not be changed! Spirit, once its creation is completed, is constant and eternal—not subject to change. But physical matter is constantly changing.” This shows that God’s decision to create man out of physical matter was an act of love and mercy. We need to have this ability to change.
Change Matters
God also created man out of matter so if man did sin, he could repent. Ever since Adam and Eve sinned in the Garden of Eden, mankind has been led into Satan’s way of get. Romans 3:23 says we all have sinned, which means we all need to repent. We should
count it as a blessing that we are physical and have the opportunity to repent of our sins.
Notice Mr. Armstrong’s description of repentance in The Incredible Human Potential: “It is a turning from the self-centered way of vanity, selfishness, greed, hostility to authority, envy, jealousy and unconcern for the good and welfare of others to the God-centered way of obedience, submission to authority, love toward God more than love of self and of love and concern for other humans equal to self-concern.”
Repentance means change. It is a change of heart, direction and mind. We are different after we repent. We think differently and live differently.
The conversion process that follows repentance also means change. These are the kinds of change God wants from human beings. Repentance and the change that follows is inspired by God. It comes as a result of God working in your life (Romans 2:4).
Not all change that a human being is capable of making is good. You can change from obeying God to disobeying God. You can change back to old ways or old habits. But when you allow God to work with you and change you to the God-centered way of obedience, submission to authority, and love toward God and fellow man, then you are making the most of your physical existence. You are fulfilling your purpose for being a physical being made from dust.
Master Potter
“But now, O Lord, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand” (Isaiah 64:8). Because you are a house of clay, God can mold and shape you like a potter does.
This process begins in earnest at baptism when you receive the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38). It is through the Holy Spirit that God works in your life to mold and shape you. Through His Spirit, God can change the way you think and live so you can think and live like God.
“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:10). God’s work with man did not end with the creation of Adam. Those who have God’s Holy Spirit are His workmanship. As we submit to God and are led by His Spirit, God continually guides and directs us. This leads us to make the right kind of changes in our life. He teaches us, corrects us and tests us to make those changes stick. Those changes become who we are.
This is how we are prepared to achieve our incredible human potential and be born into God’s Family.
Physical Life Is a Blessing
We should not view our temporary physical life negatively. It was an act of mercy and love for God to create man out of physical matter. God does not look down on us because we are made from dust. He keeps this in mind as He works with us.
“Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. For he knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust. … But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him, and his righteousness unto children’s children” (Psalm 103:13-14, 17). God does not share the contempt for human beings that the spirit in Eliphaz’s vision expressed. He remembers that we are only physical beings, and this informs the mercy He extends toward us.
God knows how weak a physical being is compared to a spirit being. He knows our limitations, and He promises to help us. He promises to heal us (verse 3). He promises to give us strength when we are weary (Isaiah 40:31). He wants us to prosper in our physical life (3 John 2). He will give us all the help we need to achieve our incredible human potential.
That doesn’t make living a physical, temporary life easy. There will be aches and pains. There will be days you are tired and weary. You will age, and eventually your temporary life will end. But if you let God mold you, shape you and change you, then this physical life is a blessing that leads to that ultimate blessing: a joyful life as an immortal spirit being in submission to God. That is something far superior to a temporary physical existence. So go after making the changes God shows you, so you can be born into God’s eternal Family!