“What is man that You are mindful of him,” David asked in Psalm 8:4. He asks further, “...and the son of man that You visit him?” David understands that man was made to have dominion over the works of God’s hands. Why would God have such an interest in man? All things (on the earth) were put under his feet (Psalm 8:6). It’s hard to appreciate what we have been given.

What is hard to believe is yet another piece of knowledge about man. “You have made him a little lower than the angels; You have crowned him with glory and honor.” Paul writes this in Hebrews 2:7, quoting from Psalm 8:5. The probable meaning is that it refers to inferiority of rank. This is the obvious sense of Psalm 8. The meaning is: God had made man but a little inferior to the angels in rank. While he is inferior God still exalted him almost to their rank. Some of the obvious differences are that we are comparatively weak, feeble and able to die. Nevertheless, He had given him a dominion and a rank almost like that of the angels. Notice, God crowned man with glory and honor (verse 5).

So man was given an extraordinary place in God’s creation. What God is stating is that man has been given a place in God’s heart, to have a relationship with Him that no other being has. That was the question: “What is man that You are mindful of him?”

It’s too bad that man doesn’t know who he is. When you lose the knowledge of God you also lose the knowledge of who you are. You weren’t made to be without God. Get rid of God and you diminish yourself.

Paul, being the thinker he was, observed that “although they knew God, they did not know him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish thoughts were darkened ... and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man - and birds and four-footed beasts and creeping things” (Rom 1:21-23).

Man doesn’t know who he is. He doesn’t know who God is. When the great Creator God reveals Himself to you, you begin to understand why He brought you into existence. God reveals that He made man to have a relationship with Him, a relationship that God will have with no other, and that is to be one of His sons or daughters. Not just created by Him, but to give you a future, in an eternal relationship, communicating with Him on His level. Man’s ranking in the universe is extraordinary. In the future, He will bring many sons (and daughters) to glory. Those will be of the highest order -- children of God, destined to love Him and carry out His will forever.

Could this be why God says even the very hairs of our head are numbered. Why such concern about any man or woman? Because any human has the potential to be the son or daughter God has always wanted.

The devil wants you to forget about God. He wants you to sell out your birthright, as it were, your future, your destiny, for a fructose high. God has put us here on this earth, where the devil is, and allowed him to form a world for us to live in where we will have to choose. Is it hard? Yes. Should anything separate us from God’s love and God’s purpose? Nothing should. But sometimes it does. That is the tragedy of it all. Sold out everything for a pittance!

How disastrous it has been that man does now even know who God is. How limited must each human entity be who does not know God and not being able to imagine what God has in mind for him or her.

Don’t let anyone tell you different. Your future is bright, beyond anything the “eye can see, or the ear heard, or has entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love him” (I Cor. 2:9).

When you really know God, you know who you are.