BlessedExemple

When God first made people, His very first statement to them was incredibly insightful. He gave them a mandate—it’s the same mandate we live under today. This is what He said: God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground” (Genesis 1:28). The very first action was that God blessed us, humans. Then He gave them a mandate: They were to “fill the earth and subdue it.” At that time, the world was wild. There was the beautiful garden of Eden, where life, beauty, purity, and goodness flourished. And God wanted the people He created to go out into the wild world and subdue it so that it would be just like Eden. He wanted to spread the goodness of the garden to the rest of the world. Yes, Adam and Eve fell. The world broke. But the mandate is still the same—make the world as good as you can. God has put His very Spirit inside of us so we can know His thoughts and feelings and power as we do. This is a tandem adventure where we go with Him and spread His goodness. And we’ll find true blessing and meaning as we do what we were always intended to do.