We teach that God created human beings in His image and offered them eternal life, but because of Adam’s sin, humanity became cut off from God, spiritually corrupt, and doomed to death for eternity. Apart from Jesus Christ, every human being shares this fate and stands in need of God’s grace and salvation.

Humanity isn’t the product of billions of years of evolution; God designed and created humanity for a purpose. In Genesis 1:26, Moses wrote, “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’” Unlike the animals, humans are self-aware; we have superior intellect, free will, the ability to form complex relationships and a sense of morality.

God created Adam and Eve and offered them the gift of eternal life, but they chose the path of rebellion and sin. As a result, humanity experienced three distinct curses.

First, sin separated humanity from their Creator. God is holy and can’t abide the presence of sin. The prophet Isaiah wrote, “Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear; but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear” (Isa 59:1-2). So, God cast Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden and cut them off from His presence.

Second, human nature became thoroughly corrupt. People no longer had access to the power of God’s Holy Spirit to change their hearts and minds. Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?”

The third curse is death. In Romans 5:12, Paul explained, “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.” The doctrine of the immortal soul is an unbiblical, pagan myth; the Bible clearly teaches that the soul is mortal (Ezek 18:4). Death is the cessation of life, and the second death in the lake of fire means that people will cease to exist for eternity.

Except for Jesus Christ, who lived a completely sinless life, every human being suffers these three curses, but we can escape these plagues. Paul said, “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 6:23 NIV). Although we don’t deserve any mercy, God’s grace and salvation are freely available to everyone who is willing to repent of their sins and accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.

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All Scriptures are from the English Standard Version unless otherwise noted.