It's good to be back from vacation.
We were in mostly in at home, but over the weekend we were in
Spokane for a middle school basketball tournament.
And but it is good to be back with God's people worshipping
with you. We are continuing our study of
the book of Genesis. This coming Friday we'll be here
at 7:00 for Good Friday service. I hope you'll join us for that.
We'll be taking the Lord's Supper.
We'll also be doing a church wide fast that day.
If you'd like to participate with us, we invite you to.
And then next Sunday we'll have our Easter service and we won't
be in Genesis. We'll be probably in one of the
Gospels or maybe somewhere in the New Testament, but I'm not
sure yet. But that'll be next week.
And so let me encourage you to invite friends, family, Co
workers, classmates, either on Friday or Sunday or both.
But this morning we are continuing our study of the book
of Genesis that we started a few weeks back.
We've just made it through chapter one, and we just started
chapter 2, but this morning we're going to be in verses 4 to
17. I won't read the text upfront.
I'll read it as we go through it in the exposition.
So if you will pray with me and then we will jump into the
sermon this morning. Lord, as we prepare our hearts
for Good Friday, prepare our hearts for the resurrection.
Lord, we we take time this morning to see how all of it was
put into motion at the very beginning of your plan of
creation. Lord, that You would display
Your glory in the way in which You created this earth and all
the things that you made and how You created humans.
That would eventually lead to the most unbelievable miracle of
one of our descendants, one of humanity's descendants, God
taking on flesh and coming in the likeness of man, that He
would redeem man. And so, Lord, would you help us
to see this morning all of your beauty, all of Your plan of
salvation and how it started all the way back at the very
beginning. I pray especially this morning
God, as we look at this text that you would help us to see
you are a good father who gives good things to his children and
how you are not holding out on us.
I pray this in Jesus name, Amen. We've been going through Genesis
for a few weeks and I want to give the context before we jump
in. I'll have I'll give the context
first and then we'll do exposition of the text and then
I'll give us application. I do have 10 points of
application this morning. Genesis is just filled with so
much and so let's let's we got a lot to get to.
Let's jump in the context is the past two weeks prior to last
week, we've been looking at the seven days of creation.
Just as a refresher. On day one, God made light and
he made the day and the night. On day 2, God separated the
waters below from the waters above.
He gave us an atmosphere and he gave us oceans.
On day three, God separated the waters and the land, land here,
waters here, and he made all the vegetation on the land.
On day four, God made the sun and the moon and the stars.
On day five, God made marine life and the birds of the sky.
On day 6, God made land animals and he made the first thing in
his image, humans, male and female, He created them.
And then on Day 7, God didn't make anything because He rested
from all that He had made. And that's where we left off 2
weeks ago. We're going to pick right back
up again this morning with the exodus of the text.
So if you'll follow along in your copy of God's Word, Genesis
2, we're going to begin in verses 4 to 7.
These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they
were created in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the
heavens, when no Bush of the field was yet in the land.
No small plant of the field had yet sprung up, for the Lord God
had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to
work the ground. And a mist was going up from the
land, and was watering the whole face of the ground.
Then Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathe
into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a
living creature. Our text begins this morning
with this statement. These are the generations of the
heavens and the earth. You're like, what does that
mean? Generations of the heavens and
then what does that mean? This may not be the most helpful
translation by the ESV. Most translations have this.
This is the account or this is the record of the heavens and
the earth. I think that's how it should be
translated. This is the account or the
record of the heavens and the earth.
The reason he states this, the narrator states this is because
if someone had read chapter 1, imagine you read chapter 1 where
God created everything. They might have the question, So
what happened? What happened with all this
creation? God made this whole universe and
this world. What happened?
I want to know how the story, what happens in the story, and
this introduction here in verse 4 is basically saying this is
what happened. This is what became of all that
God created. Now this introduction tells us
that Genesis 2 is not a parallel account of creation as some make
it out to be. There are some scholars who
believe that Genesis 1 is one account of creation and Genesis
2 is a parallel account of creation.
I don't think that's the case. I think Genesis 2 is rather a
zooming in. It's a zooming in to to explain
what happened. And I think that introduction is
telling us this is the account of what happened with everything
that God created. Verse 5, the narrative says that
there is no Bush of the field and there was no small plant of
the field. Now that's interesting.
How do we reconcile this with day three and chapter 1, which
said that God made vegetation? Day three, God made vegetation
here he says there's no Bush of the field.
There's no small plant of the field.
How do we reconcile this? Victor Hamilton, who was a
commentator, has a helpful note here.
Here's what he writes. The plants the vegetation
referred to in Genesis 1 must be those that grow wild, those that
reproduce themselves by seeds alone.
The plants referred to in Genesis 2 must be those that
grow only as a result of human cultivation through planting and
artificial irrigation. It appears that these types of
bushes and small plants in Genesis 2 are the are only going
to come after the fall. I think it's part of Remember
when God curse man? We haven't gotten there yet, but
when God curses man and he caused them to work the ground,
there's thorns and so forth. These types of plants only come
from man's work, right? They don't naturally, they have
to be artificially through planting and irrigation and so
forth. Now, there are two reasons why
there is no Bush in the field and there's no small plants in
the field #1 God did not 'cause it to rain yet, it hasn't rained
yet, and #2 there was no man to work the ground.
This is assuming that it's still day three, right?
Still day three. And so there's no humans yet.
There's no one to work the ground.
So if God didn't 'cause it to rain, how did the fruit trees
and the vegetables get their water?
Text tells us that there was a mist that was going up from the
land and was watering the whole face of the ground.
There was a short window where it didn't rain in Seattle.
Three days later. God created a man to work the
ground. I want to draw your attention to
how God made man. Look at verse 7.
Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and
breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man
became a living creature. Notice this word formed.
The Hebrew word for formed is often used of a Potter.
God here is described as a Potter forming man, and God used
2 items. A He used the dust of the
ground. God had created the earth, He
took the dust from the earth and he used this to form man.
That's important. We'll see.
As is contrasted to how God made woman.
That's the first thing. The second thing is he used his
breath. God made man from the dust, but
what separates man from the dust is the breath of God.
It is only after God breathed into this man's nostrils the
breath of life that he became a living creature.
One last item I want to draw your attention to is I want you
to notice the name the Lord God. Did you notice that?
The Lord God? We didn't see that in chapter 1.
Now we do. It actually occurs 7 times in
our passes this morning. This is important because we are
now introduced to the covenantal name of God.
Some of you in your body, your Bibles may not do this, but most
Bibles do they when when you when the covenantal name of God
is used, it occurs in all caps capital L, capital O capital R,
capital D that's used to mean that's that's the covenantal
name of God. What we often translate as
Yahweh. What this tells us is that the
God who created the universe and chapter 1 is not a deistic God.
He's not a God who created everything.
And then he kind of sits back at a distance in his rocking chair
and just says, let's see how it pans out.
No, this is a God who is going to enter into a covenantal
relationship with his creation. We see that with this covenantal
name here. Look at verses 89 and the Lord
God planted a garden in Eden in the east, and there he put the
man whom he had formed, and out of the ground.
The Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to
the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the
midst of the garden and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
I love this statement. The Lord God planted a garden.
The narrator doesn't say God created a garden.
He says God planted a garden. He tells us where he planted
this garden. He planted in Eden.
And you're like, where is that? It says it was Eden, as though
we know where that is. Where is that?
We are not told. And we are told that it's in the
East. That's all we're told, nothing
more. Most scholars believe that Eden
is refers to a plain between the Tigris and Euphrates River in
southern Mesopotamia. That's probably the best guess
today. This will be modern day Iraq.
After planning this garden, the Lord puts the man that he formed
into this garden. Did you catch that?
Notice the man didn't find the garden.
God put him there. It wasn't as though Adam was
walking one day and he's like, oh, there's a garden, I'll live
here. No, God put him there.
After God plants this garden, the Lord God made to spring up
every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.
Notice these descriptions. Every tree.
Every tree was pleasant to the sight and was good for food.
We watch our family watches several cooking shows, and they
always say it needs to look good and it needs to taste good.
God's trees were both, the narrator tells us.
He takes the time to tell us out of all the trees in this garden,
maybe there were dozens, maybe there were hundreds, maybe there
were thousands. And there it takes time to tell
us about two specific trees right in the midst of the
garden. There's a tree of life and the
tree of knowledge of good and evil.
He does not explain what these two trees are yet, so I won't
yet. The converse 10 to 14 A river
flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and they were divided
and became four rivers. The name of the first is the
Paisan. It is the one that flowed around
the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold, and the gold of
that land is good. Delium and Onyx stone are there.
The name of the second river is the Gehan.
It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Kush.
The name of the third river is the Tigris which flows east of
Assyria, and the fourth river is the Euphrates.
So in this garden that God had planted, he created a river in
the garden and it was used to water the entire garden.
As this river flowed out of the garden, it divided and it
becomes four different rivers. The 1st is the Pichon.
It flows around the whole land of Havilah.
The scholars do not agree where this was.
Best guess is modern day Saudi Arabia or Yemen.
This is the land that's filled not only with gold, but filled
with good gold. It's also filled with dahlium
and Onyx stone. This river, as far as we know,
does not exist today. If you look for this on a map
you won't find it. Second is the Gehan.
It floated around the whole land of Cush most likely.
This is modern day southern Egypt and Sudan.
This river also most likely does not exist today.
You won't find it on a map. The third river is the Tigris.
This flows E to Assyria or past Assyria.
This river does still exist today.
It flows through Turkey, Syria and Iraq still today.
And the 4th is the Euphrates. This river also exists.
The Tigers and Euphrates are still there, and it flows
through the same three countries as the Tigris.
Look at verse 15 to 17. The Lord God took the man, put
him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.
And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, You may surely eat
of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of knowledge of good
and evil, you shall not eat. For in the day that you eat of
it, you shall surely die. Now there was a purpose for God
putting the man in the garden. It wasn't to eat all day.
It wasn't a bird watch, it wasn't to build a hammock and
sleep. God put the man in the garden to
work it and to keep it. Notice God will not work and
keep the garden. Man will.
God entrusted this garden to man.
The word for work. The Hebrew word for work is
normally translated serve, which means God made Adam to be a
servant. The word for keep carries the
nuance of protection, which means God made Adam to be a
protector and the Lord God commanded the man.
This is actually the second command given to humans after be
fruitful and multiply, but this is the first time that the word
command is used. It's mentioned.
I find it fascinating that the command actually begins with an
indicative. Before God gives the command, he
gives him an indicative. And here it is.
You may surely eat of every tree of this garden.
You may surely eat of all of it. Notice how God words this not
You may eat, He says. You may surely eat avocados,
yes, mangoes, yes, plums. You may surely eat of it all,
but there is not a period at the end of this indicative, but a
comma. But but remember that tree of
knowledge of good and evil? You're not allowed to eat from
that. You're not allowed to eat from
this tree. Why?
For in the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die.
Notice this word surely again. You may surely eat of this all
these trees, but of this tree, if you eat of it, you will
surely die. Now this is interesting, because
if I was Adam, I would have two questions.
What is evil and what is death? It's a tree of knowledge of God.
I know it's good, but what is evil and die what?
What is death? What's interesting is that God
doesn't explain to Adam what evil is, nor does he explain
what death is. He simply says do not eat of
this tree. If you do, you will surely die.
Now we still have the question of what is this tree, the tree
of? Not like what actually is this
tree? God has still not explained it
to Adam nor to us. But another character in the
next chapter will sort of, and I'll wait till then.
We'll stop there. Expedition application of the
text. I have 10 indicatives for us. 10
indicatives #1 God remembers that we are dust.
God remembers that we are dust. Lord willing, this year we will
have 6 new babies in the church. 6 Do you look at like the size
of our church? That's a lot.
We're going to like like grow by like 30% or whatever.
Some, some number. Which means that six couples in
the church will be experiencing parenthood either for the first
time or the second time. One of the hardest parts of
parenting is expectations for your children.
It's one of the hardest parts of parenting is expectations for
your children. Parents always have this tension
of having high expectations for their children, but also
remembering that their children, we struggle to live in this
tension. As parents, especially as your
kids get older, you struggle to live in this tension.
You have expectations, but you also need to remember that their
children, we struggle in this tension, but God never does.
God never does. Psalm One O 313 to 14 As a
father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows
compassion to those who fear him.
For He knows our frame. He remembers that we are dust.
Do you know why God never has trouble remembering that we are
dust? Because He created us from the
dust. When God made us, He did not
make us out of iron. He made us out of dust.
He made us as weak, frail creatures.
We are the ones who get confused and believe that we are made out
of iron. But God never has a wrong
perception of us, and that is a good thing because the psalmist
says that God's compassion is rooted in his creation.
God remembers the building materials that he used to form
us, and that informs his compassion.
He says. I remember what I formed you
from, and that informs my compassion #2 complementarianism
is rooted in creation, not culture.
Complementarianism is rooted in creation, not culture.
Now, I don't want to assume that all of you know what?
That that's a big word with all that means.
Complementarianism is the doctrine which teaches that God
intends male authority and his two primary institutions, the
church and the family. God intends male authority and
his two primary institutions, the church and the family.
Now let me back up and if I may, if I may, let me ask all the
wives in this room a question. Let me take a quick survey to
make sure. OK, let me ask all the wives in
this room a question. Why don't any of you have your
head covered? Wives, why don't any of you have
your head covered? Paul writes in First Corinthians
11/5. But every wife who prays or
prophecies with her head uncovered dis colors her head
since it is the same as if her head were shaved.
Jolene, why is your head not covered?
Why did I allow my wife to come to church with her head
uncovered? Because Paul's argument for head
coverings is rooted in culture. Paul's argument for head
coverings is rooted in culture. Now here's the follow up
question. In the past 15 years that I've
been here, why has a woman never preached A sermon from this
pulpit? Why has a woman never preached A
sermon from this pulpit? We might argue because Paul said
in First Timothy 212, I do not permit a woman to teach or to
exercise authority over a man. Rather she is to remain quiet.
But then couldn't we also argue that this standard, just like
head coverings, is also rooted in culture?
Couldn't we say that Paul is just as head coverings as
rooting culture? Isn't this also rooted in
culture? And the answer is no.
The answer is no. Why?
Because of what Paul says next. For Adam was formed first, then
Eve. That's what he says in first
Timothy 213. For Adam was formed first, then
Eve. We see in verse 7 in Genesis 2
that God made man first. We see in verse 15 that God put
man in the garden first by himself.
We see in verse 16 that God gives the command to not eat of
the tree first to him by himself.
Complementarianism is rooted in creation, not culture.
Many of you will end up leaving this church.
That's just the nature of our church over the next 5-10 years.
And you'll go somewhere. Don't let any pastor or church
or author tell you otherwise. Complementarianism is rooted in
creation, not culture #3 In the same way that Adam was dependent
on God to breathe physical life into his dead body, so we too
are dependent on God to breathe spiritual life and to our dead
souls. What good is an electric vehicle
without a battery? If you imagine you bought an
electric vehicle but it didn't have a battery in it, what good
is that? What good is a gas vehicle
without an engine? What good is a well without
water? What good is a lamp without a
light bulb? What good is a compass without a
needle? What good is a sailboat without
a sail? What good is a physical body
without life? When God made man, he did not
make a physical body, you know, like like made a corpse.
He didn't make a physical body and then say to it, all right,
let's see if science will take care of the rest.
Let's see if Mother Nature will cause this heart to start
beating. Maybe after millions of years
it'll start beating. No, God made this physical body
and the only way it was ever going to live is if God breathed
the breath of life into his body.
I love how this is beautifully depicted in Ezekiel 37.
God takes Ezekiel to a valley of dry bones.
God asked him a question. He says, Son of man, can these
bones live? I love the answer that is equal
gives. You could take it one of two
ways, but I love the answer he gives.
He says, Oh, Lord God, you know, you know, God tells Ezekiel to
prophecy to the bones, and the bones come together and sinews
and flesh and tendons and skin, they all come together.
And then here's the line. But there was no breath in them,
not until God breathed into them.
This physical picture in Genesis 2 and Ezekiel 37, it points us
to a greater spiritual truth that just as Adam was a dead
corpse apart from the breath of God, so we too were spiritually
dead apart from the Spirit of God.
God does not say to us, here's the gospel, now let's see if you
can find your way to salvation. That's like looking at a dead
corpse and saying, let's see if you can rise up.
They say the odds of filling out a perfect March Madness bracket
is 1 in 9.2 quintillion. There's it's so great that if
you do it, you get a billion dollars.
That's how confidence they are. You won't do this.
And those odds are better than us finding our way to salvation.
Brothers and sisters, God breathe life into our dead
souls. If you don't see your salvation
like that, it'll always be Yeah, yeah.
I was saved when I was 16. I grew up in church.
I got saved when I was like 12. That's how you'll view your
salvation. It won't blow your mind that you
were dead and God breathe life into your soul.
It'll just be ho hum. 4 God may not have placed you in a
beautiful garden, but he did place you.
God may not have placed you in a beautiful garden, but he did
place you. Do you ever existentially wonder
why you are who you are? I've thought about this as I was
like seven or eight. I don't know.
I've always been like an existential kind of guy.
Do you ever existentially wonder, like, why you are who
you are? Like, why am I male and not
female? Why am I-65 and not 5-6?
Why was I born in Alabama, not Colorado?
Why am I white and not black or Latino or Asian?
Why was I born in America and not Brazil?
Why was I born to a Christian family and not a Muslim family
or Hindu family? When Adam came to life, when God
breathed into his soul and he awoke for the first time, right?
And he didn't have a, he wasn't a baby, right?
He was a grown man. When he, when he first had
existence, he was a grown man. When he came to life, he, he
looked around, he discovered he was in a beautiful garden.
How did he get there? Did he stumble upon it?
No. Did he build it for himself?
No. Did he buy his garden
citizenship? No.
How did he get in this garden? The Lord God planted a garden in
Eden in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed.
Verse 15. The Lord God took the man and
put him in the garden. Adam got to the garden because
God put him there, and you and I got to where we are because God
put us there. Your life is not the byproduct
of thousands of choices. Do not look to your parents or
your grandparents or your great grandparents or your country or
your society or the government and say I am who I am because I
am the byproduct of thousands of choices.
No, you are who you are. You are where you are because
God placed you there. You are exactly who you are.
You are exactly where you are because God placed you there. 5
God did not give us leftovers, He gave us his very best.
God did not. He does not give us his
leftovers. He gave us his very best One of
the strangest miracles by Jesus is his is him turning water into
wine. I've always been perplexed by
this miracle. It's unlike any other, right?
I mean, just it. The other miracles all kind of
go together for the most part, but this one is just kind of an
outlier to me. I'm like, what was the purpose
of this miracle? Why did Jesus do this?
I think there are several, but one of them is this God never
gives us leftovers. He gives us his very best.
Typically at a wedding in those days, the host will serve the
best of the wine first, right? When people are completely sober
and they, they drink and it's like, oh, this wine's good.
And then after people had a lot to drink, they'll serve the
cheaper wine last, right? Not only will it be cheaper
wine, they often will cut it with water.
But when Jesus turned the water into wine, he turned it into the
very best kind of wine, the guest said.
You have saved the best for last.
You see, so often we could be tempted to think that God is
serving us cheap wine, that we're getting God's leftovers.
But look at what God gave Adam out of the ground.
The Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to
the sight and good for food. Every tree was pleasant to the
sight. It was a delight to look at.
Every tree was good for food. It tasted good.
Church family, God does not serve us leftovers.
He gives us His very best. He's given you his very best. 6
God saw our need for access to water and dry places.
Why did God create rivers? When God created bodies of
water, He made oceans. He made seas, He made lakes, He
made ponds, He made lagoons, gulfs, rivers, streams, bays,
straits. If God made the oceans to speak
to his greatness, what do the rivers speak to?
Why did God spend 5 verses describing these four rivers?
Everything about that, Like what?
Why'd you spend 5 verses of the creation account to describe
these four rivers? I think it is this.
I think that God saw our need for access to water and dry
places. Today we can live almost
anywhere because of artificial irrigation.
But for thousands of years, all of life revolved around water.
Travel revolved around water, right?
If you want to travel to the desert, you, you, you follow the
even if it was a long way, you follow the river.
Villages revolved around water, commerce revolved around water,
all of life revolved around water.
It's as if God was using rivers to remind us.
Just as you cannot live in the desert apart from water, so you
cannot live apart from me. Just as they needed to stay
close to the river to live, so we need to stay close to God to
live. So often we venture off and
think, I'll be all right. I don't need that much water.
God created the very desert that he leads us into, but he also
leads us besides still waters. 7 work was not a result of the
fall. It was part of God's good and
perfect design work was not a result of the fall.
It was part of God's good and perfect design.
You ever play those games like word association?
Like if I say food draw, the first thing that comes to your
mind? All right?
If I were to say right now, food draw right, what what would you
draw? I I did this to myself.
I was a banana. I was like, I only eat bananas.
I wonder if we were to do that with heaven, what images would
we draw? Clouds, gold light, A hammock?
I wonder if it would cross any of our minds to draw a rake or a
shovel. When God made Adam, the Lord God
took the man, put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and
keep it. God was perfectly capable of
caring for this garden. He does not need Adam for it,
but he created Adam to care for it, which means work was not a
result of the fall. It was part of God's good and
perfect design. First family, the work that we
do now, it's not a necessary evil.
If you are thinking that heaven is a rescue from Amazon and
Google and Microsoft and Boeing, think again.
Work is part of God's good design.
When we get to heaven, we will primarily be doing two things,
worshipping and working. Work is part of God's design #8
God is not holding out on us. God is not holding out on us.
When my boys were really young, like, you know, two to five
years old or something, when they were really young, when
somebody would give us a really nice dessert like homemade
cookies, homemade pie, homemade cake or a fancy dessert that
they bought. I will hold out on them.
I didn't want to share with them.
I didn't. The reason is because they
didn't know the difference between good dessert and bad
dessert. Two young kids store bought
cookies taste exactly the same as homemade cookies.
They can't tell the difference. But as they got older, they
began to catch on to my ways. They knew Dad is holding out on
us. They would go to mom and be
like, why can't we have the Miss Priscilla's cookies?
And so, yes, I share with them now.
They're old enough to discern. I think sometimes we feel this
way towards God. We feel that God is holding out
on us. God has so much more that he
could share with us, but he's not.
He could make me taller, smarter, prettier, richer,
funnier. He could make me more handsome,
more athletic, more creative, more confident, more talented.
But it seems like God is holding out on me.
God said to Adam, You may surely eat of every tree of the garden
except one. Isn't it always the one?
Isn't it always the one thing that we don't have that causes
us to feel like God is holding out on us?
We don't see the other 99 trees. We only see the one that we
can't have. Brothers and sisters, God is not
holding out on us. He has shared all good things
with us #9 God clearly tells us in His Word what sin will cost
us. There's a phrase called hidden
cost. You may have heard that phrase
before. When you buy a vehicle, the
sticker says 25,000 or $24,999. But that doesn't include hidden
costs like fees, title, taxes, gas, tires, insurance,
maintenance, repairs. This vehicle is going to cost a
lot more than $24,999. When you start a small business,
the business loan is for $100,000.
But there's always added cost to this business such as legal
fees, taxes, software, operations, insurance, payroll,
utilities, inventory. Even with marriage or parenting,
so many people get married without considering the cost of
marriage, not the wedding. People think about the cost of
the wedding, but I'm saying if you consider the cost of
marriage, there is a cost to marriage.
So people have a child without considering the cost of a child,
and not just money, but the time and the energy of raising a
child. But there are no hidden costs
with God. God didn't say to Adam, don't
eat of this tree, OK, have a nice day.
God said, But if the tree of knowledge of good and evil, you
shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it, you shall
surely die. God always tells us up front,
this is what sin will cost you. If you go down this path of sin,
this is what it will cost you. I pray, church family, that
before you click on your phone or your computer, you consider
this is what it will cost you. Before you enter a relationship,
you consider this is what it will cost you.
Before you take a drink, another drink of alcohol, this is what
it will cost you. Before you buy another toy or
pillow or vacation that you don't need, this is what it will
cost you. Because God has told us what it
will cost. There are no hidden costs, He's
told us. #10 last point, God had a purpose for creating this
tree. God had a purpose for creating
this tree. If God didn't want Adam to eat
of this tree, why create it? Another question, if you didn't
want him to eat it, why create it?
Wouldn't that just solve the problem?
This is a really good question. It's a complex question and it
is beyond the scope of the sermon, but I came across 2
quotes that I want to share with you.
These are really good quotes. I'm going to share them with
you. Number 11 is by Dietrich
Bonhoeffer. Bonhoeffer rightly observed that
symbolically, the middle of Adam's world was not himself,
but life, the very presence of God.
The Tree of Knowledge as a prohibition signifies that man's
limitation as a creature is in the middle of his existence, not
on the edge. Here's another one.
The prohibition against eating the fruit of the Tree of
Knowledge gave Adam opportunity to worship God through loyal
devotion. Martin Luther likened the tree
to Adam's church, altar and pulpit.
Here he was to yield to God the obedience he owed, give
recognition to the word and will of God, give thanks to God, and
call upon God for aid against temptation.
In other words, this tree was to be a reminder to Adam that Adam
was not God. It was further a way for Adam to
worship God because every time he saw this tree, he would have
to make a choice and he could choose God or the tree.
And it was a way in which Adam could worship God by saying, I
choose you God, over this tree. Let's pray.