The Garden of Beginning

In Genesis 2:16-17, God says to Adam “you are free to eat of any tree in the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

They were truly free to eat of any tree in the garden, we know that all too well. 

Yet, as God speaks in the language of freedom and the serpent speaks in the language of restriction—it is easy to miss what God was intending (apparently humans have been misunderstanding God’s intentions from the very beginning so join the club). 

Humanity was not being set up to fail by some malicious-intentioned God who created the tree of the knowledge of good and evil as a temptation in the first place. How many times have I believed the lie of the serpent that God designed me in such a way that He has set me up to fail—that God is against me? 

The difference between those statements that we should recognize is that one death is bodily and it is immediate—you are going to be dinner for the sharks. Period. 

It is quite apparent based on the successive sequence of events in the garden that the particular death being alluded to by God was not an Ananias and Sapphira or Mt. Sinai situation wherein it happened that human people immediately fell dead for disobeying and disrespecting God, or if any beast would even touch this mountain it would die upon contact. 

It did not happen this way in Eden. 

Adam and Eve could have immediately and physically fallen dead upon eating the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But they didn’t…?

Instead, we see that the “death” they experienced—this separation, this pain, this death to what is wholly good and perfect and truly free, this entanglement each one of us knows all too intimately—this death is far worse. Not only does it entail physical death, but it surpasses it. It makes you live and wish you were dead—it is to be dead inside while your body is still alive. 

Rather than bodily immediacy, it released a decaying permanency—a dry bones of the soul. To trust in deceit, to be ashamed of vulnerability (being fully known and seen), to prefer being hidden in fear, to preserve ourselves over those we should love, to believe forgiveness is beyond us and it is not ours to ask for or extend. To become and experience less. Far less than even the dirt from which man was made. 

But this death was not without expiration. The Lord put enmity between the serpent and the woman, not the man and the woman. Man has never been alone, not even under the weight of sin. 

Gen. 3:22 “Then the Lord God said, ‘Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever—‘ 23 therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. 24 He drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.” 

The Lord has always had every intention for the life, the living, the being truly alive of mankind. For the man to live forever in this state now of death, how unbearable a thought (ESV Study Bible, p. 57, ftnt. 3:22-4). The Lord wasted no time, for He would rather Himself experience death than have his creation, God’s Adam and God’s Eve whom he planted a garden of Eden for (Genesis 2:8) lest we forget, be forever under the curse of death they cannot overcome. If you have never said hallelujah or amen, now is the time. 

Human failure* was never in God’s design; God’s design has never failed because of humanity. 3:8 “And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, ‘Where are you?’”

He knew what they had done! How could He not? He knew! He knows. He knew, but He still clothed them. He knew, but He still chose to be with them. They knew that He knew, but what they did not know—what they lost within their newfound knowledge of the tree was the knowledge of Whose presence wherein they stood. 

Talk about a tree of life. Pleasing to the sight. You see, this is what we miss. Every. Time. There could have been a thousand gardens. There could have been a million trees. But there was and always has been only one TRUE blessing, one TRUE life-source, one TRUE giver, one WORTHY of all of our efforts after knowledge—the true gift of the garden was never the fruit, it was not man, it was the knowledge and presence and communion with the Lord God Himself. It is not about the bread and the wine, it is the knowledge and presence and communion with the Lord God Himself. 

Tree of Life? God created the tree so what does that make Him? God created a tree knowing it would be the one shifted into a cross upon which God Himself, the Messiah, would undergo this curse of death in totality that humanity became raveled within. 

Where are you? 

Where are you—why have you forsaken me? Where are you, God? This pain is too deep, these scars too wide, this abandon too intense! 

Where are you, child? Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat? What is this that you have done? You shall not be subject to the curse of sin forever because I AM the tree of life—my pain is too deep, my scars too wide, my abandon too intense. I AM the giver and I AM the gift! Come to me and thirst no more. 

3:10 “And he said, ‘I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” 

God has used His true freedom to be with us. He walked in the garden in the cool of the day, man and woman hid themselves. What has the Lord asked of you but to be naked before him? To be how you were made? To choose the Tree of Life. To walk in obedience. To choose the knowledge and presence and communion with the Lord God Himself. To be humble, not ashamed. Man was made from dirt, by God—not by mistake. To be known, not in fear. For not even the worst of deaths could cause you to be alone. Psalm 139:7 “Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? 8 If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!” To be apart from the Giver and the Gift, to be separated from the Lord God is to be without Life — this truly is the curse of sin and death. Hell and death has been overcome, yet does man still choose to eat of the knowledge of good and evil and to believe in deceit over the One Who Is? To hide themselves from truth, from the communion, the knowledge of God, from Life? 

We breathe in the breath of life, but do we exhale it? 

Though I may be dust, with dry bones in my soul, this death is not without expiration. 

Revelation 21:1 “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God Himself will be with them as their God. 4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.’ 

5 And he who was seated on the throne said, ‘Behold, I am making all things new.’ Also he said, ‘Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.’ 6 And he said to me, ‘It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of water of life without payment. 7 The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son. 8 But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.” 

Human failure was never in God’s design; God’s design has never failed because of humanity. God Himself will be with them as their God and death shall be no more.

Ask me where I am. 

Where are you? I am here.

I may be afraid but I know that I am created from dust by you to be with you. Deliver me from shame. I believe you. I long to know you and be with you, Lord. Breathe Life into these dry bones and show me what it means to take and eat of the Tree of Life which I confess that you are. I am in great need of the knowledge of you, I cannot be worthy of forgiveness on my own. I was not meant to be alone—I was meant for you. To be with you. Forgive me, have me. I am sorry for hiding myself in my disobedience and deceit. Create me anew, so that I may live in knowledge of you. Forever. 

Amen. 

*Failure of the irredeemable sort. This is what is meant in both usages included in the sentence. Yes, humans are created to walk with God and need relationship with Him — to thrive, live in it. Humans were not designed to fail in the truest, permanent sense of failure — that which is ultimate and cannot be redeemed or made right. God’s purposes have never failed in this way either.