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God's greater Purpose • Jan 01st 1969

God’s Eternal Purpose: The Corporate New Man and Dominion – UCLA 1969

Eternal Purpose New Testament Old Testament

In this powerful 1969 message delivered at UCLA, Gene Edwards unfolds one of the most sweeping themes in Scripture: God’s eternal purpose .

Beginning in Genesis 1, Edwards highlights a startling phrase: “Let them have dominion.” God did not merely create an individual man; He envisioned a corporate man—a people bearing His image and exercising dominion over the earth. This purpose existed before the fall, before redemption, and even before the cross. Salvation, he suggests, was not the ultimate goal—it was a detour to restore something far greater.

Turning to Ephesians 3:11, Edwards points to the phrase “the eternal purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord.” God’s intention was always to have a man on earth who would:

  • Bear the image of Christ
  • Subdue the enemy
  • Exercise dominion over the earth

But Adam, the “old man,” failed. He did not eat of the tree of life. Instead, he chose the tree of knowledge—introducing division, human systems, and religious structures built by fallen life.

The story of Scripture, Edwards explains, becomes a battle over “real estate”—a conflict not between God and Satan, but between man and Satan. From Eden to Babel, Egypt, Babylon, and finally Revelation 18, the struggle centers on whether God will have a corporate people who live by divine life instead of human systems.

Jesus Christ came as the Son of Man, exercising dominion over the enemy. Yet He did not remain alone. After His death and resurrection, He placed His life into many believers. In Ephesians, Jew and Gentile are made into “one new man.” This is not an individual—it is the corporate Body of Christ.

The church, as this new man, shares Christ’s authority. Whatever dominion Christ obtained, He gave to the church. The eternal purpose of God is therefore fulfilled in a people—not organized by human hierarchy—but built together in life, led by the Spirit, bearing Christ’s image, and subduing the enemy.

Edwards contrasts the “old man” (human life building religious systems) with the “new man” (a corporate people living by Christ Himself). Babylon represents man’s religious effort; God’s call in Revelation remains: “Come out of her.”

The message concludes with a stirring vision: a church built not on doctrine, hierarchy, or human structure—but on the living Christ as life. A corporate new man, joined together in love, reflecting Christ’s image, and exercising dominion on earth.

This is God’s eternal purpose.

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You may not believe that God wants a piece of real estate. Well, just listen to this. God had a piece of real estate called the garden, and when man fell, God chased him out. Then God saw this earth become so terrible that he had to destroy everything on the earth, and he got his real estate back through Noah. And Adam isn’t our first father, Noah’s our first father. If you trace your genealogy back far enough, we really all are akin to Noah. You don’t have to go back to Adam. We all came from Noah.

Alright, Noah got the real estate back for a little while, but by the time of the first, second, or third generation, it was going all over again. And God said, I am going to have a man on this earth who’s going to claim a part of this earth that Satan cannot say that is his. And God called out to Abraham, and He said, There’s Canaan. It’s land, and you take it. And Abraham took it. And Isaac had it, and Jacob had it, but Jacob lost it.

And they got lost in Egypt. This has been one big battle over a piece of land. And then under Moses, they came back, and through Joshua, they got their land again. Now listen, if you will read the word of God carefully from the beginning to the end, whenever God has the real estate, he is called God of heaven and earth. Go back through the scriptures and read it.

And whenever God doesn’t have the real estate, he is referred to only as the God of heaven. When the priest carrying the ark came into the Jordan River to claim it after Moses under Joshua, and the moment the feet of the priest touched the land of Canaan, and not until then, God was called the God of heaven and earth, because man had taken it back.

Then, under the Babylonian system, it was lost once more. The Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar came in and took Israel, took the people, and took them over into the Babylonian system, and they lost the real estate and godless call the God of heaven.

And if you will read the book of Ezra, and you will read the book of Nehemiah, because they were the ones who started to try to go back and get this piece of real estate again. Whenever they come back once more, and they go back into the old, torn-down city of Jerusalem, the walls are broken down, and the city is uninhabited. The moment they step in there and take that piece of real estate again, God is once more called the God of heaven and earth.

Alright, I hope without losing you now, let’s go a little further, because now we come back when all the strings begin to get tied together. Upon this earth, there was a group of people, man, a corporate man, who had the earth.

And they had dominion over Satan. I get so excited. He and he alone was that man on this earth. And he was the new man. And when he came to this earth, when the demons came up to speak to him, what did they call him? What did they call him? What did the demons call Jesus? They call him what? The Son of God, which he is. But what did he answer them? He said, in referring to himself, I am the Son of Man. Man. And whenever he cast out a demon, he cast him out as in the position of his manhood. And he had dominion over the creeping things. The Son of Man.

When Satan offered him all the kingdoms of the earth, which he claimed were his, he said, Son of God, if you will fall down and worship me, if you’ll turn this stone to bread. Jesus said, Man shall not live by bread alone. Man shall not live by bread alone. And in John, first John, there is a test as to whether a spirit be from God, or if it’s not from God. Do you know what that test is?

Huh? Who said this? Okay. The test is, will that spirit confess that the Son of God has come into human flesh? A demon will not confess that Jesus Christ is the Son of Man. He will confess he’s the Son of God. But if he confesses there’s a man on this earth that has power over him, Satan is defeated, and God’s purpose is. The battle for this piece of real estate on this earth is not between God and Satan, but between man and Satan. And I’m not talking about the old man. I’m talking about the new man, and we’ll get to that in a minute, I hope.

Do you remember when Stephen was dying? And he looked up into heaven? And he saw something in heaven? What did he see? And what did he say he saw? And what did he call him? I see the Son of Man. Listen, devils and kingdoms and principalities and dominions, you’ve had it. There is a man in heaven. Read it now in Ephesians, and from this day forever and ever, you will understand it. He put him over the principalities and powers and dominions in high places. He put him over all of them. He is in heaven as the Son of Man with power over Satan, as the Son of Man. As the Son of Man. As the Son of Man. Praise God.

Listen, after he died and rose again, he went to heaven. There is a man, not just God, but there is a human being above the principalities of this earth, and they are all under his power. A man. A man. But did you ever notice? Are you with me? You may not see it all yet, but you’re going to in just a minute. Do you see it so far? For God put man on this earth, and his eternal purpose was for man to have dominion on this earth, to have the real estate. And for man to subdue the enemy, and for man to bear the image of Christ.

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