The following is an edited version of the lecture given on 10th September  2006 in the series entitled "In the Beginning."   Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.    (1 Corinthians 15:58)   God Speaks through the Old and New TestamentsIf we carefully examine the Old Testament beginning with Genesis, we find that it contains many lessons for Christians living in the age of the Church. If we are not careful, however, it is easy for us to be mistaken and misunderstand certain parts. If we examine carefully and attempt to understand the stories recorded in the Old Testament and what they contain, we can see the Bible reveals that an end will come to the life that we are now encountering-in other words, the period of time in which we are now living-and when that end comes, it will mark the beginning of a new period. There are people in this world who claim that there has been a gradual process of evolution from the amoeba, to the ape and the anthropoid, and finally man. There are many people who live their lives without any idea of where they originated or where their lives began. Since we know the Bible, however, we have read the line at the very beginning that says, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Genesis 1:1) and from this we have come to see that God created this world. Also, God tells us clearly in Genesis chapter 1 that He created man; man did not evolve gradually from some other creature. It is true that some people say that the days referred to in Genesis are not the same period of time as the days with which we are now familiar, and to back this up, they quote the verse that says, "With the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day"   (2 Peter 3:8). The Bible says, "So the evening and the morning were the first day," (Genesis 1:5)  and, "So the evening and the morning were the second day." (Genesis 1:8) If we consider this more deeply, we can see that when it says "one day," it means one day. This first chapter of Genesis is telling us that tremendous events took place within those one day periods. However, since people interpret the Bible on the basis of man's concept of time, using scientific measures of decaying matter, etc., they come up with tens of thousands of different interpretations.So then, what kind of time period are we living in? On the sixth day God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth." After God had created Adam in His own image, He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life (See Genesis 1:26-27 and 2:7). God did not think that it was good for Adam to be alone, so He caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam. Then, as Adam slept, God removed one of his ribs and from it He created Eve. When Adam awoke from his sleep, he did not wonder how he fell asleep, but seeing that a woman was beside him, said, "This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh" (See Genesis 2:18-23). This incident reveals to us something that is very similar to the age in which we are now living. Also, as we read through the Bible, we come across a man named, Joseph. After Joseph who had been in prison interpreted the dream of the chief butler, he should have been released from prison right away by the chief butler who was restored to his office just as Joseph had interpreted his dream, but Joseph was not freed for another two years. It was only after another two years had passed that he came to stand before Pharaoh, and then was given the Egyptian woman, Asenath, to be his wife. In the same way, about four hundred years passed between the end of the book of Genesis and the beginning of the book of Exodus, and about four hundred years passed between the last prophet and the time when John the Baptist and Jesus appeared on the scene in this world. Also, it was during the time when the nation of Israel was being heavily oppressed by the Roman Empire that Jesus was born. Jesus said that He was the Son of God and the Lord of the Sabbath. (See Matthew 12:8) When asked, "Are you truly the Son of God?" and "Are you really the Christ?" His answers were very clear. In Galatians it says, "When the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman" (4:4). As indicated by this verse, Jesus was born in a way that was completely different from the ways of this world; He was born through the body of a virgin who conceived by the Holy Spirit. This is what is recorded on the first page of the New Testament. The reference to the Seed of the woman in Genesis chapter 3 looks ahead to the time when Jesus would be born in this way. "And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed" (Genesis 3:15). Throughout the Old Testament, it is revealed right before our eyes that this woman is an image of the nation of Israel. The woman who appears in Revelation chapter 12, clothed with the sun and with a garland of twelve stars on her head, the woman who also appears in Revelation chapter 12 verse 5 where it says, "She bore a male Child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron," is not Mary; this woman is a reference to the nation of Israel as it is reflected through the Old Testament. The woman by the name of Mary is a shadow of the nation of Israel who gave birth to Jesus Christ. She was also the one who was put to use in order to give birth to Jesus-who was God the Son-in this world. She was nothing more, and nothing less than that.Jesus who was with God- "being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person" (Hebrews 1:3),  just as Joseph left the land of Canaan and went far away to Egypt, and there met the woman by the name of Asenath, was born into this world as a human being through the body of a woman, and here He met the Church, His bride. Also, as we take a look, one by one, at the many prophetic passages throughout the Old Testament we can see the relationship between the older and the younger son. Jesus Himself said, "Many who are first will be last, and the last first" (Matthew 19:30). In the same way, the Jews as a nation were the ones who were inspired by God's word, received and recorded God's word, and went through many incidents in order that God's word might be continued, but then they had Jesus Christ crucified, and, as a result of this the gospel was passed on to us-the Gentiles, who knew nothing about the Scriptures-through the writings of the apostle Paul. After the day of Pentecost, it was initially the Jewish apostles who experienced being born again, and then it was through Peter that the gospel was first spread to the Gentiles. It was the apostle Paul, however, who had the role of spreading the gospel far and wide and revealing to the world the secret of the Church. So in the letter to the Colossians, the apostle Paul wrote, "the mystery which had been hidden from ages and from generations" (1:26). This was not revealed to the generations that came before. The Jews who lived in Old Testament times recorded the words of the Scriptures, observed the laws and performed the sacrifices, but they were not aware of the tremendous secret that was hidden within the events of the history through which they themselves were going. Even though they recorded and read the events by which their forefather, Jacob, struggled with his older brother Esau and in the process became the heir and received the blessing, they did not know what it all meant. The secret of the Church that was hidden in God is the secret of the body that God had planned in His heart before the creation of this world. This is the secret of the Church. So man was created in the image of God the Son who would some day come to this world in the body of a man, and this is the direction that history has taken.  The age in which we are now living-the age in which we might say that the Church is walking its path-is one that God had planned before the creation of the earth, and it is an age in which this body is being built up one cell at a time. The Bible tells us that as these stones (i.e. cells) are piled up they are being formed into the temple (See Ephesians 2:20-21). As we read the passages in the New Testament that talk about the Church as the body of Christ, we can see the significance of the age in which we are now living. When we study the Old Testament, however, it is easy for us to set such matters aside and become caught up in the Old Testament stories in and for themselves. Of course, if we have a good knowledge of the Old Testament, it will help when it comes to understanding the Bible as a whole. The more we know about the Old Testament, however, the more we need to find answers in the New Testament. Similarly, no matter how much interest we may take in reading the Old Testament and even if we know and have memorized the stories of people like Adam, Noah, Abraham and David, if we do not turn to the New Testament to find out what was in the heart of God as He controlled and managed these events, we end up only understanding half of what the Bible is saying. Some people think that the teachings in the New Testament are very important and need to be considered in a serious manner because we are living in the age of the Church. However, in the process of understanding the answer that is given in brief in the New Testament, it is possible to make the mistake of remaining ignorant of the words that God spoke through the Israelites in the Old Testament and the historical events through which God guided them, and not be able to understand what was in God's thoughts in regard to those events. For example, even people who pride themselves in being born again may be deceived and stumble over the words recorded in the New Testament that say, "He who endures to the end shall be saved" (Matthew 24:13). Such people take these words on their own and claim that a person who does not live as he should after salvation will not be raptured, or they say that we will have to go through the tribulation anyway and only those who manage to survive through to the end of it will be saved. There are many people who put forward doctrines like this, that are contrary to the faith we have received through the Bible once for all. They advocate these new doctrines and follow them in their lives. So, in the Bible, the apostle Paul asks us to, "Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth" (2 Timothy 2:15).   The Serpent's Deception of Eve: A Lesson for the ChurchSo far we have studied carefully the relationship between Adam and Eve and the method by which the serpent deceived Adam and Eve, leading to the fall of the whole of mankind. For us, living as we do in the age of the Church, the first step to understanding and learning more about the Bible is realizing that we are sinners. As a result of this, it often happens that we read in the Bible that we have all become sinners because of Adam and we just focus on this one aspect. We think that Genesis chapter 3 tells us how we became sinners, and that is all.  If, however, we read through Genesis chapters 2 and 3 and then take a look in the New Testament, we find, through the lips of the apostle Paul, that there are some things that God wants to ask of the members of the Church who have fellowship together in the age of the Church.Let's turn now to Second Corinthians chapter 11 and read from verse 1.   Oh, that you would bear with me in a little folly - and indeed you do bear with me. For I am jealous for you with godly jealousy. For I have betrothed you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. But I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. (2 Corinthians 11:1-3)   It says here, "As the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness." Eve was deceived by the serpent, she picked and ate some of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and she also gave some to Adam to eat. The problem arose because Adam ate of the fruit. Let's turn now to Hosea chapter 6 verse 4. "O Ephraim, what shall I do to you? O Judah, what shall I do to you?"When it says, "O Ephraim," and "O Judah," here, these words are addressed to Israel. Ephraim was Joseph's youngest son, but he is referred to in the Bible as the firstborn of Jacob. Jacob's firstborn son, Reuben, lost his birthright because he had relations with his father's concubine and so Joseph's son Ephraim, who was born in Egypt, was made Jacob's heir. Joseph had two sons-Manasseh and Ephraim-but when Jacob gave them his blessing, he crossed his arms as he did so and thus Ephraim became Jacob's heir (See Genesis 48:12-20). In First Chronicles it says that Reuben was originally the firstborn, but his birthright was given to Ephraim because he committed adultery (See 1 Chronicles 5:1). So when we read through the writings of the prophets, we often come across the phrase, "O Ephraim." We should think of this as indicating that the words are addressed to Israel as a whole. Also, the land of Israel became divided with Israel in the north and Judah in the south. So when the Bible says, "O Judah" we can take this also as meaning Israel as a whole. So God was saying to the Israelites here, "What shall I do to you?"   "For your faithfulness is like a morning cloud, and like the early dew it goes away. Therefore I have hewn them by the prophets, I have slain them by the words of My mouth; and your judgments are like light that goes forth. For I desire mercy and not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings. But like men they transgressed the covenant; there they dealt treacherously with Me." (Hosea 6:4-7)   These words are addressed to the Israelites who rejected God's word and persecuted the prophets. God commanded the prophet Hosea to go and find a wife of harlotry and have children by her. The words that this prophet Hosea recorded came to be the book of Hosea in the Bible. These words were addressed to the nation of Israel which appears in the Old Testament as the wife of God. In the New Testament, the virgin who is to be the wife of God's Son, Jesus Christ, is the Church, but in the Old Testament, it is Israel that appears as the wife of God. God said of Israel, "I am married to you" (Jeremiah 3:14). When God saw the Israelites going along the wrong way, worshiping idols and Gentile gods, and playing the harlot, He called out to them saying, "O Ephraim, O Judah."   "But like men they transgressed the covenant; there they dealt treacherously with Me."   In Korean, it says "Adam" instead of "men." When we think about Adam, we only think about how he sinned by eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and how as a result, each one of us individually has also become a sinner. We often forget, however, that there is a direct connection between the many sins shown through the history of the nation by the name of Israel and this incident of Adam disobeying God's word and eating the fruit of the knowledge of goo

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