Riddle: Who Am I?

This riddle was written by a lady in California, in 1890, in response to an offer from a gentleman in Philadelphia, that he would pay anyone $1,000 who could write a puzzle he could not solve. He failed to solve it and paid the money.

A Poem Of Biblical Proportions

Adam, God made out of dust,
But thought it best to make me first.
So I was made sometime before man,
To answer God's most holy plan.

A living being I became,
And Adam gave to me my name.
I, from his presence, then withdrew,
And more of Adam I never knew.

I did my Maker's Law obey,
Nor never went from it astray.
Thousands of miles I go in fear,
But seldom on earth do I appear.

For purpose wise which God did see,
He put a living soul in me.
The soul in me, God had fed,
Until, finally, the soul had fled.

I am the same
As when first made.
Without hands, feet, or face,
I travel on from place to place.

I labor hard by day and night,
To fallen man I give great light.
Thousands of people, young and old,
Will, by my death, great light behold.

No right or wrong can I conceive,
The Scriptures I cannot believe.
Although my name therein is found,
They are, to me, an empty sound.

No fear of death doth trouble me,
Real happiness I'll never see.
To heaven I shall never go,
Nor to hell far below.

Now when, these lines, you slowly read,
Go search your Bible with all speed.
For that my name is written there,
I do, honestly, to you, declare…

"The answer is one word!"