#2 The Meaning of Man

Within the last several weeks a rather frightening case was reported in the newspaper. Its implications are almost incredible. The suit involved an elderly gentleman who was apparently a bit senile, and who was also on dialysis. The family determined that the old gentleman had passed the time of productivity and, if he had the mental ability to reason it out properly, would have wished to terminate his meager existence. Had the nurses, who had grown to love this man, not protested, this man might be dead today.

We live in a frightening age. We now have awesome technological and biological powers in our hands, but no solid ethical or moral basis for the determination of how these powers are to be used. Not only have we made it convenient and inexpensive to kill children while still in the womb, there is actually serious discussion of issuing a life certificate which would pronounce an infant legally alive, just as one is now legally certified to be dead. This certificate would not be issued until after the birth of a child, when a complete battery of tests could be administered. Any ‘inferior’ or potentially non‑productive infant would simply be rejected and not pronounced ‘alive’ and thus terminated. I am told that in some places of the world suicide is not considered a crime and counsel is now given to those who wish to pursue it—but not to convince them of the error of their ways!

In a day when the power of life and death seems to be more in the hands of men than ever before, we find our society in a moral vacuum in which these life and death decisions are to be made. The age‑old philosophical questions about the meaning of life are no longer simply academic and intellectual—they are intensely practical and must be answered.

In the light of such issues, never have these verses in Genesis 1 and 2 been of more importance than they are today. In them we find the meaning of man. I have therefore entitled this message, The Meaning of Man: His Duty and His Delight. To rightly understand this passage is to grasp eternal principles which should determine many of our ethical and moral decisions. Beyond this, we are reminded anew of what it is that really makes our lives worthwhile.

While we have already dealt with the six days of creation in a very general way, it is important for us to understand the relationship between the first three chapters of Genesis. Chapter one outlines creation chronologically. (Actually verses 1‑3 of chapter two should be included here also.)

God created the heavens and the earth, and all life in six days, while He rested on the seventh day. Man is pictured as the crown of God’s creation. In order to maintain a chronological format, only a very general description of man’s creation is given in verses 26‑31.

Chapter two returns to this matter of the creation of man with a much more detailed account. Far from contradicting chapter one, as some scholars have suggested, it greatly compliments it. While it is stated that God created man, both male and female (1:26‑27), it is described more fully in chapter 2. In chapter one man is given every plant to eat (1:29‑30), in chapter two man is placed in a lovely garden (2:8‑17). In the first chapter man is told to rule over all God’s creatures (1:26, 28), in the second man is given the task of naming God’s creatures (2:19‑20). Contradictions between these two chapters must be contrived, for it is clear that the writer of the first chapter intended to fill out the details in the second.

Furthermore, chapter two serves as an introduction and preparation for the account of the fall in chapter three. Chapter two gives us the setting for the fall of man which is described in chapter three. We are introduced to the garden (2:8‑9), the two trees, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (2:9). The woman who was to be deceived is introduced in chapter two as well. Without chapter two the first chapter would be far too brief and the third would come upon us unprepared.

If chapter one is laid out in chronological fashion—that is in a sequence of seven days, chapter two is not chronological, but logical. Of course the events of chapter two fit into chapter one’s order, but the chapter is laid out differently. If chapter one is creation as seen through a wide angle lens, chapter two is viewed through a telephoto lens. In chapter one man is found at the top of a pyramid, as the crown of God’s creative activity. In chapter two man is at the center of the circle of God’s activity and interest.

This is the subject of this great passage of Scripture, the passage that covers God’s climactic act of creation: “The Creation of Man, Male and Female.”

2. God and God alone created man, both male and female: created them with the highest dignity and honor, in His very own image (v.27).

Man’s Dignity (1:26‑31)

Since chapter two builds upon the bare details of 1:26‑31, let us begin by considering these verses more carefully. Man, as we have said before, is the crown of God’s creative program. This is evident in several particulars.

First, man is the last of God’s creatures. The whole account builds up to man’s creation. Second, man alone is created in the image of God. While there is considerable discussion as to what this means, several things are implied in the text itself. Man is created in the image and likeness of God in his sexuality.

And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them (Genesis 1:27).

This is not to say that God is male or female, but that God is both unity and diversity. Man and woman in marriage become one and yet they are distinct. Unity in diversity as reflected in man’s relationship with his wife reflects one facet of God’s personhood.

Also, man somehow is like God in that which distinguished him from the animal world. Man, as distinct from animals, is made in the image and likeness of God. What distinguishes man from animal must therefore be a part of His reflection of God. Man’s ability to reason, to communicate, and to make moral decisions must be a part of this distinction.

Further, man reflects God in the fact that he rules over creation. God is the Sovereign Ruler of the universe. He has delegated a small portion of His authority to man in the rule of creation. In this sense, too, man reflects God.

Notice as well that it is man and woman who rule: “… and let them rule … ” (Genesis 1:26, cf. verse 28).

Them refers to man and his wife, not just the males He has made. While Adam has the function of headship (as evidenced by his priority in creation,[1] his being the source of his wife,[2] and his naming of Eve[3]), Eve’s task was to be a helper to her husband. In this sense both are to rule over God’s creation.

One more point should be made here. There seems to be little doubt that in the provision God has made for man’s food, only vegetarian foods are included at this time:

Then God said, ‘Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the surface of all the earth, and every tree which has fruit yielding seed; it shall be food for you; and to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the sky and to every thing that moves on the earth which has life; I have given every green plant for food; and it was so’ (Genesis 1:29‑30).

It was not until after the fall, and perhaps after the flood, that meat was given as food for man (cf. Genesis 9:3‑4). Shedding of blood would have significance only after the fall, as a picture of coming redemption through the blood of Christ. In the Millennium we are told,

The wolf and the lamb shall graze together, and the lion shall eat straw like the ox; and dust shall be the serpent’s food. They shall do no evil or harm in all My holy mountain, says the Lord (Isaiah 65:25).

Man’s dignity and worth are not imputed by man, but they are intrinsic to man as one who has been created in the image of God. Man’s worth is directly related to his origin. No wonder we are hearing such frightening ethical and moral positions proposed today.

Any view of man’s origin which does not view man as the product of divine design and purpose, cannot attribute to man the worth which God has given him. To put it another way, our evaluation of man is directly proportionate to our estimation of God.

I will venture to say that we who name the name of Christ are going to have to stand up and be counted in the days to come. Abortion, euthanasia, and bioethics, to name just a few, are going to demand ethical and moral standards. The bedrock principle upon which such decisions must be made, in my estimation, is the fact that all men are created in God’s image.

In this light, I can now see why our Lord could sum up the whole of the Old Testament in two commands,

And He said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and foremost commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself’ (Matthew 22:37‑40).

The attitude of the future seems to be to love only those ‘neighbors’ who are the contributors to society, only those who may be considered assets. How different is the value system of our Lord, who said,

Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me (Matthew 25:40).

In my estimation, here is where we Christians are going to be put to the test. Some are strongly suggesting that those who our Lord called ‘the least’ are precisely those who should be eliminated from society. May God help us to see that man’s dignity is that which is divinely determined.

(1:26) Man— Creation— Earth— Trinity: God’s Word created man. Man exists because God spoke man into existence. God used the power of His Word to create man. God simply spoke and man came into being. God spoke and the laws that caused man to form went into operation. God spoke, and the basic elements—the atoms, molecules, protons, neutrons, electrons, genes, DNA, and whatever basic element is ever discovered that makes up human life—came into being. God spoke, and the power of His Word formed and created man.

1. God held a very special conference, a divine counsel, to create man. Note what God said, “Let us make man...in our image...after our likeness.” This is plural. God is speaking to Christ, His Son, and to the Holy Spirit. How do we know this?

First, because Jesus Christ revealed the Trinity to us (John 14:16-17, 26). God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit do exist. All three exist in perfect unity. They are all of one mind and purpose. Therefore, they are bound to discuss and decide things together just as any unified family does.

Second, because Scripture reveals that all three Persons of the Godhead were involved in creation (Genesis 1:1; Genesis 1:2; John 1:3; Col. 1:16; Hebrews 1:1-2). The Godhead would have certainly discussed the plans and work of creation while they were creating the earth. It is illogical to think they would not discuss their work.

Third, because God uses the plural here in Genesis. God says, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” God is not telling angels nor any other heavenly creature that they are to work together in creating man. God, not heavenly beings, is creating man. Man is the creation of God and of God alone. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit—the complete Godhead, all that God is—created His crown and glory: man.

Fourth, because God made man in His own image. God did not make man in the image of angels nor of any other heavenly being. This is not the stress of this creative act. The stress is this: God was making man in His own image and in His image alone. “Let us make man” is referring to God the Father talking with God the Son and with God the Holy Spirit. Man bears the very image of God Himself. Man was created...

The point is this: God held a very special conference, a divine counsel, to create man. The Holy Spirit, who inspires Scripture, is using the plural “let us” to tell us this. This is not to say that the full doctrine of the Trinity is taught here. Such is foolishness. God would never be known as a Trinitarian Being if we read only the Genesis account of creation and ignored the New Testament. But when we read and notice the plural, the seed of the Trinity is planted in our minds. And we know what is meant because of the revelation of Jesus Christ and of the Scripture as a whole. We know that the Holy Spirit has inspired Scripture, that He has deliberately led the writer of Genesis to use the plural.

Why? To show the great dignity and honor of man. Man was given the glorious privilege of being created by all the Godhead. God held a great counsel to plan man’s creation. Man’s creation was to be so special, so climactic—the very crown and glory of creation—that God called a very special conference to discuss the matter, a divine counsel that involved...

2. God created man to be a very special creature: man was created in God’s very own image, after God’s very own likeness (see pt.1 above for discussion).

God created man for a very special purpose: to have dominion over all the earth. God planned and created man with a very special honor and responsibility: to look after all that He had created.

(1:27) Man— Creation: God and God alone created man, both male and female, created them with the highest dignity and honor, in His image. Why is God’s creation of man being repeated? Why is Scripture again declaring that God made man in His own image? Note exactly what the verse says:

“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them” (Genesis 1:27).

1. There is a need to stress that God and God alone created man. Human life did not just happen to come into being. The basic substance of human life did not come out of nothing—not the cells of man, nor the DNA, atoms, or molecules of man. Whatever the basic element of human life is—whatever man may yet discover to be the basic substance of life, whatever the raw matter and energy of life is—that basic substance did not just begin to form and mold life.

Human life was created by God and by God alone. Whatever the basic substances are that make up human life, whatever raw forces and laws cause human life, they were all created and put into operation by God. God and God alone, by the power of His omnipotent Word, created human life. God and God alone commanded human life to come into existence.

2. There is a need to stress the great dignity and honor of man. Man was created in the very image and likeness of God. Man is the crown and summit of God’s creation. Man is the creature to whom God has given His Spirit—His very own immortal breath, His life that lives forever. Therefore, man lives forever just like God. Man never ceases to exist.

Why has God given man an image, a likeness, of Himself? So that man will walk by faith and freely choose to love and worship God. God has given man enough of Himself to cause man to hunger and seek after God. Man has just enough of God’s image to drive him to seek after immortality and live forever.

3. There is a need to stress that God made both male and female, both man and woman, in His own image. Woman was created by God as much as man was; she was made in the image of God as much as man was. Woman was given as much dignity and honor as man was. Woman is as much the crown and summit of God’s creation as man is.

Each one is as important to God as the other, to His plan and purpose for the world. Very simply stated, both male and female were created by and for God; therefore each one is created to God. Each one, both male and female, is to live to God’s glory, serving and worshiping God as the Creator, the Lord and Sovereign of all life.

(1:28) Man, Purpose— Marriage— Earth— Creation— Animals— Science: God blessed man and woman. This is a picture of a meeting that God held with man and woman soon after both had been created. Imagine how Adam (the first man) felt right after he had been created, when all of a sudden he was standing upon earth, experiencing the very first moments of life. He was aware of himself and of all his surroundings, the beauty and fruitfulness of the earth, but everything was strange, a complete puzzle. Who was he? Where was he? What was he to do? All these questions needed to be answered and answered soon after he was created. The same was bound to be true with Eve (the first woman) as well.

This is the picture of what was happening in Genesis 1:28-30. God was meeting face to face with man and woman, blessing them and explaining who they were and why they were created and placed upon earth. Note that God blessed man and woman. What was the blessing? God blessed man and woman with...

· the privilege of being created in the image of God, of being the crown and summit of His creation.

· the privilege of living upon earth with all its provisions for food and beauty.

· the privilege of being male and female, of having the companionship of one another.

· the privilege of work, of finding satisfaction and fulfillment in subduing the earth—through research, discovery, development, and growth.

Note: the blessings and privileges are given to every man and woman. But every person has to claim the privileges, diligently work at using them more and more for the benefit of oneself and of society—all in obedience to God.

Note that God’s blessing was personal: “And God blessed them and said to them” (Genesis 1:28). God spoke to man and woman personally, face to face.

(1:28) Man, Purpose— Marriage— Earth— Creation— Animals— Science: God gave man and woman three great assignments or purposes.

1. First, man and woman were to reproduce and fill the earth. This was to be a most wonderful assignment. Man and woman were to establish the closest bond imaginable—a relationship of love, care, trust, and loyalty with each other. They were to walk, work, and worship hand in hand as they journeyed through life together. The relationship they built was to serve as the basis for all other relationships upon earth and within the societies and nations of earth. All groups upon earth—whether societies or nations—were to walk together in love, care, trust, and loyalty.

Note: God had created many animals, but He created only one man and one woman. Why? There were at least four reasons.

· To establish the family: to institute the rule and principle of one man and one woman for each other. There was to be no separation or divorce—no split families, no children without a father or mother—when God first created man and woman.

· To build a much stronger love, trust, and loyalty within man and woman. Love, trust, and loyalty are weakened and destroyed when intimate relationships are carried on with other persons. When love, trust, and loyalty are weakened within the strongest bond known to man, that of the family, they are weakened in all the other relationships of life: at work, at play, with one’s country.

· To teach man that all people are of one blood, from one source. Therefore, all people—all races and nations—are to live in peace and unity, working together to subdue the earth. There was to be no prejudice, discrimination, violence, greed, selfishness, or war upon earth—not originally, not when God first created man.

· To teach that man is as important as woman and woman is as important as man, that all succeeding generations of men and women are to be as highly esteemed as the first man and woman were. There is to be no abuse and no enslavement of women or men in God’s creation. Both are involved in the mission of God for the earth.

3. Third, man and woman were to have dominion over all the animals. Dominion means to rule over, to master, to control, to manage, to look after and care for. Originally, when God first created the animals and man, there was apparently no savagery among animals. Neither man nor animal ate other animals (Genesis 1:30, cp. Genesis 9:3). Man and animal lived side by side in peace and apparently with some affection for each other—at least among the higher order of animals. But man was the ruler, the dominating force, the leader among all the creatures of the earth.

(1:29-30) Food— Vegetation— Plant Life— Creation: God provided the vegetation of the earth to feed man and animal. Remember: God is meeting with man, sharing who man is and why he has been created and placed upon earth.

1. Man and animal were to be vegetarians in the original creation of the perfect earth. There was no such thing as eating flesh. Eating flesh came only after the fall (Genesis 9:3).

2. Man and animal were given an abundance of food: vegetables, berries, and fruit. They were given every plant that bore seed and every tree that bore fruit.

3. All the land of the earth was fruitful. There was vegetation and plant life everywhere, and there was more than enough. Note the words, “upon the face of all the earth” (Genesis 1:29). Apparently, there were no barren nor desolate lands upon earth.

4. Since the fall of man into sin, the earth and its fruitfulness have been affected. Man has abused and continues to abuse the earth and its plant life or vegetation, even to the point of threatening the survival of future generations. Man is rapidly destroying the earth’s plant life by housing and commercial developments and by pollution. Man is polluting and bulldozing the lands of the earth so rapidly that the earth’s resources are tragically being depleted.

(1:31) Man— Creation: God saw that His creation was “good”—everything created during the six days of creation, including man, fulfilled its function. This verse refers to all of God’s creation. It refers to man, yes, but God is also looking back over everything He has created. Note two facts.

1. Man was able to fulfill his purpose and function upon earth. Man was created in the image of God: he had the very breath—the immortal life—of God. Therefore, man was...

· able to serve God by subduing, developing, and managing the earth (Genesis 1:28).

· able to be fed and sustained by the resources of the earth (Genesis 1:29-30).

God looked at everything He had made, and “behold, it was very good” (Genesis 1:31). The word “behold” calls attention to how good—how perfect—God’s creation was. God was extremely pleased with His creation. Everything was very good, perfect in every detail. Everything was exactly as God had planned it: everything was perfect in sustaining man upon the earth, perfect in providing a home for man as he went about fulfilling his God-given purpose upon the earth.

If you could have been present to witness any event in Bible history, which event would you choose?

I once asked that question of several well-known Christian leaders, and the answers were varied: the crucifixion of Christ, the resurrection of Christ, the Flood, Israel crossing the Red Sea, and even David slaying Goliath. But one of them said, “I would like to have been present when God finished His creation. It must have been an awesome sight!”

Some scientists claim that if we could travel out into space fast enough and far enough, we could “catch up” with the light beams from the past and watch history unfold before our eyes. Perhaps the Lord will let us do that when we get to heaven. I hope so, because I would like to see the extraordinary events Moses described in Genesis 1 and 2.

Genesis 2 introduces us to a series of “firsts” that are important to us if we want to build our lives according to the basics God has put into His universe.

God had a great plan to remedy the situation, a plan that was going to create the earth in stages, in what is known as The Seven Days of Creation. We have already looked at the first six days.

· Now, for a crucial question: why would God choose to create the world in stages, in seven days, instead of just creating everything all at once? The seventh day of creation tells us.

Therefore God launched time, He began time, right along with His creative acts. All earthly activity was to be measured by days and weeks, and man was to take one of the seven days, the seventh day, to rest and worship. This is the reason God did not create the world in one moment of time; this is one of the reasons why God created the earth in stages, in seven days.

Now we come to the final day of creation: “The Seventh Day: Creation of a Day for Rest or Worship.”

(2:1) Creation— Heavens— Earth: God finished the creation of the heavens and the earth. The Hebrew reads, “And finished were the heavens and the earth.” The word finished is stressed: creation is completed; God has now completed His plan of creation. The word finished means both completed and perfected. Creation was now completed and the product was perfected.

The universe had begun as an idea in God’s mind. God had set out to bring His idea of the world into being. He had created it step by step.

· God’s plan of creation was now finished, completed, and perfected. This is strongly emphasized in this verse. Note the phrase “all the hosts of them.” This is a military picture. The idea is that “all the hosts” of creation were now finished and perfected:

All the hosts of creation had now been commanded and ordered, arranged and organized, marshalled and placed where they belonged. The innumerable hosts of creation had been finished, completed, and perfected just as God willed.

(2:2) Sabbath— Sunday— Creation: God rested on the seventh day from all His work. The word “Sabbath” isn’t found in this paragraph, but Moses is writing about the Sabbath, the seventh day of the week. The phrase “seventh day” is mentioned three times in verses 2-3. “Sabbath” comes from a Hebrew word shabbat that means “to cease working, to rest” and is related to the Hebrew word for “seven.”^3-1

1. Note the word “ended.” In the Hebrew it means to declare an end to; to declare finished (H.C. Leupold, Genesis, Vol.1, p.102). The idea is that God declared His work of creation to be finished.

2.Note the word “rested” (shabhath). It means to stop or cease from working. The idea is not that God rested from all work after creation. God does not need rest like man needs rest: He was not tired, burdened, pressured, or exhausted from His work in creation. Genesis 2:2 clearly tells us what God rested from or stopped doing: “He rested...from all His work which He had made [or created].” The word “work” (melakhah) means a special work, a very special job or task. The special work or task undertaken by God was creation; therefore, the work that God rested from was the work of creation.

This first Sabbath didn’t take place because God was tired from all His creative work, because God doesn’t get weary (Isa. 40:28). God set apart the seventh day because His work of creation was finished and He was pleased and satisfied with what He had created. “And God saw everything that He had made, and, behold, it was very good” (Gen. 1:31).

· First, there’s no mention of “evening and morning,” suggesting that God’s Sabbath rest would have no end. Unfortunately, man’s sin interrupted God’s rest; and God had to search for Adam and Eve and deal with them (3:8-9, and see John 5:9, 17).

· Second, there’s no record that He blessed any of the other six days, but God did bless the seventh day (Gen. 2:3). In blessing it, He made it a blessing.

· Third, after blessing the seventh day, God sanctified it (v. 3), which means He set it apart for His own special purposes.^3-2

Jehovah is the God of time as well as the Lord of eternity. It was He who created time and established the rotation of the planets and their orbits around the sun. It was He who marked out the seven-day week and set aside one day for Himself. Every living thing that God has created lives a day at a time except humans made in God’s image! People rush around in the frantic “rat race” of life, always planning to rest but never seeming to fulfill their plan.

It has been said that most people in our world are being “crucified between two thieves”: the regrets of yesterday and the worries about tomorrow. That’s why they can’t enjoy today. Relying on modern means of transportation and communication, we try to live two or three days at a time, only to run headlong against the creation cycle of the universe; and the results are painful and often disastrous.

A famous Chinese scholar came to America to lecture and during the course of his tour was met at a busy metropolitan railway station by his university host. “If we run quickly, we can catch the next train and save ourselves three minutes,” said the host. The scholar quietly asked, “And what significant thing shall we do with the three minutes that we save by running?” A good question that could not be answered.

Henry David Thoreau wrote in Walden over a century ago, “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” I wonder what he’d say if he saw the frantic people running up and down escalators in our airline terminals!

God had done many wonderful things during the six days of Creation, but the climax of the creation week was God’s “rest” after His work. As we shall see, God has sanctified work as well as rest, but it’s rest that seems to be the greatest need in people’s hearts today. Augustine was correct when he wrote, “Thou hast made us for Thyself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee.”

The point is this: God did not rest or cease from working. He only rested and ceased from the work that He had been doing that week. His work for that week—the work of creation—was completed. The rest of God was not...

The rest of God was a sense of quiet peace and accomplishment over the creative work He had just completed. The picture is descriptive: God took a day, the seventh day, to stand back and enjoy His creative work. No doubt all the heavenly host joined in His celebration and declaration that the work of creation, the six great days of creation, was now completed. The seventh day of God’s rest—the rest of God—is an inner sense of...

God was very pleased with His work. Standing there on the seventh day, He felt that He had done a very good job. God had a deep sense of peace, satisfaction, and accomplishment. He was at rest with what He had done.

The great tragedy is this: few people have this rest of God, the rest of fulfillment, satisfaction, and purpose in life. Too few work diligently upon the job. Too few do all they can to meet the needs of people and of society. Most just routinely do their work, use as little energy and effort as possible, and selfishly do as little work as possible.

(2:3) Sabbath— Sunday: God blessed the seventh day and set it apart as holy. Note how clearly—beyond any question—God sets the seventh day apart. “And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it [made it holy, set it apart]: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made” (Genesis 2:3).

There can be no question about what God is doing with the seventh day. He is setting the day apart from all the other days of the week.

1. God blessed the seventh day. Note: it is the day itself that is blessed. No other day was blessed, just the seventh day. The seventh day alone was honored with God’s blessing.

2. God sanctified the seventh day. The word “sanctified” means to set apart and make holy. God actually consecrated the day and declared it holy. This is very significant: it means that the seventh day was being set apart as a permanent day. The seventh day was to have a permanence that the other six days did not have. Any kind of work could be done on the other six days, but not on the seventh day. The work done on the seventh day was to be the same week by week. It was to be a day set apart for a very special purpose. It was to be a day different from the other six days, a day that was to never pass away, a day that was to be given over to the work of holiness.

Note a clear fact: the seventh day is consecrated and declared holy by God. The very fact that God Himself does this means that the day is consecrated and holy. No matter how much man abuses the day of rest and worship, it is still consecrated and holy to God and His true followers.

What an indictment against man! How desperately we need to quit abusing the day of rest and worship. Many rest, but few give the day over to holiness.

3. God rested and worshipped on the seventh day. No doubt, all the heavenly host rejoiced with God as He celebrated His glorious work of creation. The heavenly host—all the angels, seraphim, and cherubim of God—were bound to be praising and blessing God for His marvelous work. God is...

God is worthy of all glory and majesty, all dominion and power, all praise and thanksgiving, all worship and honor. The first seventh day, the great day of God’s rest, must have been one of the most glorious days of worship ever experienced in all eternity.

4. God set the day apart as a day of celebration and commemoration. God sanctified and made the day holy, set it apart as a very special day and as a permanent day. Now note: the day was not set apart for God; it was set apart for man. God does not need a permanent day of rest. To say or think so would be foolish. The day of rest and holiness is set apart for man. Man needs the day for two very specific purposes.

a. Man needs a day when he can rest, both physically and spiritually. Man needs a day when he can experience a quiet peace and sense of accomplishment over his work of the past week.

b. Man needs a day for worship and blessing, for praise and thanksgiving. Man needs a day that is set apart for him to concentrate upon God. Man’s attention span is short and the focus of his emotions does not last very long. Therefore, man needs one day out of every seven when he can focus his attention and emotions upon God, one day when he can concentrate upon God without major distractions. Man needs one day a week to worship God, to worship...

There is a difference between the Sabbath as observed by the Jews and others and Sunday as observed by Christian believers. The Sabbath is the last day of the week. It was a day when Jesus the Messiah was in the tomb, a day of great sadness for the true Christian believer. However, Sunday is the first day of the week. It is a day of great joy, for it was the day of Jesus’ resurrection, the day that He triumphed over death. It is called the Lord’s Day and is celebrated as a day of rest and joy, a glorious day for searching the soul and meditating upon God. It is the day of worship and of Christian fellowship celebrated by believers worldwide (Acts 20:7; 1 Cor. 16:2).

· God’s people are to remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy (Exodus 20:8; Exodus 31:14; Exodus 34:21).

· God’s people are promised a special blessing for keeping the Sabbath day holy (Isaiah 56:2; Isaiah 58:13-14).

· Polluting the Sabbath will bring the judgment of God upon a people (Ezekiel 20:13; Ezekiel 22:8, 15; cp. Numbers 15:32-35; Jeremiah 17:27; Ezekiel 20:13; Ezekiel 22:8, 15).

· Buying and selling are not to take place on the Sabbath (Neh. 10:31; Neh. 13:15).

· Helping the needy is lawful on the Sabbath (Matthew 12:12; cp. John 7:23; John 9:14).

· Early believers worshipped on the day that Christ arose from the dead, that is, on Sunday, the first day of the week (Acts 20:7; 1 Cor. 16:2).

There’s no mention of the Sabbath in Scripture until Exodus 16:23 when God gave the regulations to Israel about gathering the daily manna. From the way this commandment is worded, it suggests that the Jews already knew the importance of the Sabbath and were observing it as a day of rest. In giving the Sabbath to Israel, the Lord related this special day to other events in sacred history.

To begin with, when God gave Israel the Law at Mount Sinai, the Sabbath was connected with Creation (20:8-11). God was the generous Giver of all that they needed, and they must acknowledge Him by worshiping the Creator and not the creation. They were not to imitate the pagan nations around them (Rom. 1:18ff). Moses even mentioned the weekly rest needed by servants and farm animals (Ex. 23:12), so keeping the Sabbath was a humanitarian act as well as a religious duty. The Lord commanded His people to observe every seventh year as a Sabbatical Year and every fiftieth year as a Year of Jubilee. This would permit the land to enjoy its Sabbaths and be renewed (Lev. 25).

The Sabbath was not only connected with Creation, but at the close of the giving of the Law, it was vested with special significance as a sign between Israel and Jehovah (Ex. 31:12-17; Neh. 9:13-15). “Surely My Sabbaths you shall keep, for it is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the Lord who sanctifies you” (Ex. 31:13, nkjv). There’s no evidence that God ever required any other nation to observe the Sabbath, because the Jews alone were the chosen people of God.

There’s a third connection between the Sabbath and the Jews. When Moses rehearsed the Law for the new generation about to enter Canaan, he connected the Sabbath Day with their deliverance from Egypt (Deut. 5:12-15). The weekly Sabbath and the annual Passover feast would both remind Israel of God’s mercy and power in freeing the nation from bondage. Furthermore, this weekly day of rest would also be a foretaste of the rest they would enjoy in the Promised Land (Deut. 3:20; 12:10; 25:19; Josh. 22:4). God had brought them out of Egypt that He might bring them into the Promised Land to claim their inheritance (Deut. 4:37-38). In the Book of Hebrews, this concept of a “promised rest” is applied to believers today.

The nation of Israel eventually declined spiritually and didn’t observe God’s laws, including the Sabbath law; and they were ultimately punished for their disobedience (2 Chron. 36:14-21; Ezek. 20:1ff; Isa. 58:13-14; Jer. 17:19-27). The Northern Kingdom of Israel was swallowed up by Assyria, and the Southern Kingdom of Judah was taken into captivity by Babylon.

By the time of the ministry of Jesus, the scribes and Pharisees had added their traditions to God’s Word and turned the Law in general and the Sabbath in particular into religious bondage. The few prohibitions found in Moses (Ex. 16:29; 35:2-3; Num. 15:32-36) were expanded into numerous regulations. Jesus, however, rejected their traditions and even performed miracles on the Sabbath! He said, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27).

Hebrews 4 brings together God’s creation rest (v. 4) and Israel’s Canaan rest (v. 8) to teach us about the spiritual rest that believers have in Christ (vv. 9-11). When you trust Jesus Christ through baptism for remission of sins, you enter the “new creation” (2 Cor. 5:17) and into His spiritual rest (Matt. 11:28-30). You also enter into the spiritual inheritance He gives all who trust Him (Acts 20:32; Eph. 1:18; Col. 1:12). Believers are not under bondage to keep the Law (Gal. 5:1) because the Holy Spirit fulfills the righteousness of the Law in us as we yield to Him (Rom. 8:1-3).

The first Christian believers met daily for worship and fellowship (Acts 2:46), but they also gathered together on the first day of the week, the day of Christ’s resurrection from the dead (John 20:19, 26; Acts 20:7; 1 Cor. 16:2). The first day was known as “the Lord’s day” (Rev. 1:10); and to make the Lord’s Day into a “Christian Sabbath” is to confuse what these two days stand for in God’s plan of salvation.

The seventh day of the week, the Jewish Sabbath, symbolizes the old creation and the covenant of law: first you work, then you rest. The first day of the week, the Lord’s day, symbolizes the New Creation and the Covenant of Grace: first you believe in Christ and find rest, and then you work (Eph. 2:8-10). In the New Creation, God’s Spirit enables us to make the entire week an experience of worship, praise, and service to the glory of God.

The Jewish Sabbath law was fulfilled by Christ on the cross and is no longer binding on God’s people (Gal. 4:1-11; Col. 2:16-17). However, some believers may choose to honor the Sabbath Day “as unto the Lord,” and Christians are not to judge or condemn one another in this matter. When good and godly people disagree on matters of conscience, they must practice love and mutual acceptance and grant one another liberty (Rom. 14:1–15:7). “Therefore let no one judge you in food or in drink [the dietary laws], or regarding a festival or a new moon [the Jewish feasts] or Sabbaths” (Col. 2:16, nkjv).

The Meaning of Creation for the Israelites of Old

Before we approach the question of what the creation should mean to us, we must deal with its meaning for those who first read these inspired words from the pen of Moses. The initial purpose of this account was for the Israelites of Moses’ day. What should they have learned? How should they have responded?

(1) The creation account of Genesis was a corrective to the corrupted cosmogonies of their day. We have already said that Egypt, for example, believed in a multiplicity of nature‑deities. We need to recognize that Israel, due to her close and prolonged contact with the Egyptians, was not unaffected by their religious views.

“Now, therefore, fear the Lord and serve Him in sincerity and truth, and put away the gods which your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord” (Joshua 24:14).

It was not enough to regard Yahweh merely as a god, one among many. Neither should He be conceived of as just the God of Israel. Yahweh is God alone. There is no other god. He is the Creator of heaven and earth. He is not merely superior to the gods of the surrounding nations; He alone is God.

The tendency to begin to confuse God with His creation was a part of the thinking of the ancient world. He must be regarded as the God of creation, not just God in creation. Every attempt to visualize or humanize God in the form of any created thing was a tendency to equate God with His creation. So it was, I believe, with Aaron’s golden calf.

(2) The creation account describes the character and attributes of God. Negatively, Genesis one corrects many popular misconceptions concerning God. Positively, it portrays His character and attributes.

· God is sovereign and all‑powerful. Distinct from the cosmogonies of other ancient peoples, there is no creation struggle described in Genesis one. God does not overcome opposing forces to create the earth and man. God creates with a mere command, “Let there be … ” There is order and progress. God does not experiment, but rather skillfully fashions the creation of His omniscient design.

· God is no mere force, but a Person. While we must be awed by the transcendence of God, we should also be His immanence. He is no distant cosmic force, but a personal ever‑present God. This is reflected in the fact that He creates man in His image (1:26‑28). Man is a reflection of God. Our personhood is a mere shadow of God’s. In chapter two God provided Adam with a meaningful task and with a counterpart as a helper. In the third chapter we learn that God communed with man in the garden daily (cf. 3:8).

· God is eternal. While other creations are vague or erroneous concerning the origin of their gods, the God of Genesis is eternal. The creation account describes His activity at the beginning of time (from a human standpoint).

· God is good. The creation did not take place in a moral vacuum. Morality was woven into the fabric of creation. Repeatedly, the expression is found “it was good.” Good implies not only usefulness and completion, but moral value. Those who hold to atheistic views of the origin of the earth see no value system other than what is held by the majority of people. God’s goodness is reflected in His creation, which, in its original state, was good. Even today, the graciousness and goodness of God is evident (cf. Matt 5:45; Acts 17:22‑31).

The Meaning of Creation for All Men

The theme of God as Creator is prominent throughout Scripture. It is significant that the last words of the Bible are remarkably similar to the first.

And he showed me a river of the water of life, clear as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb, in the middle of its street. And on either side of the river was the tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. And there shall no longer be any curse; and the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His bond‑servants shall serve Him; and they shall see His face, and His name shall be on their foreheads. And there shall no longer be any night; and they shall not have need of the light of a lamp nor the light of the sun, because the Lord God shall illumine them; and they shall reign forever and ever (Revelation 22:1‑5).

The truth that God is the Creator of heaven and earth is not merely something to believe, but something to which we must respond. Let me mention just a few implications and applications of the teaching of Genesis 1.

(1) Men should submit to the God of creation in fear and obedience. The heavens proclaim the glory of God:

The heavens are telling of the glory of God; and their expanse is declaring the work of His hands. Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night reveals knowledge (Psalm 19:1‑2).

For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God, or give thanks; but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened (Romans 1:20‑21).

By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and by the breath of His mouth all their host. He gathers the waters of the sea together as a heap; He lays up the deeps in storehouses. Let all the earth fear the Lord; Let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him. For He spoke, and it was done; He commanded, and it stood fast (Psalm 33:6‑9).

The greatness of God is evident in the work of His hands—the creation which is all about us. Men should fear and reverence Him for Who He is.

Bless the Lord, O my soul! O Lord my God, Thou art very great; Thou art clothed with splendor and majesty, covering Thyself with light as with a cloak, stretching out heaven like a tent curtain. He lays the beams of His upper chambers in the waters; He makes the clouds His chariot; He walks upon the wings of the wind; He makes the winds His messengers, flaming fire His ministers. He established the earth upon its foundations, so that it will not totter forever and ever. Thou didst cover it with the deep as with a garment; the waters were standing above the mountains. At Thy rebuke they fled; at the sound of Thy thunder they hurried away. The mountains rose; the valleys sank down to the place which Thou didst establish for them. Thou didst set a boundary that they may not pass over; that they may not return to cover the earth ( Psalm 104:1‑9).

Then after his return from the defeat of Chedorlaomer and the kings who were with him, the king of Sodom went out to meet him at the valley of Shaveh (that is, the King’s Valley). And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; now he was a priest of God Most High. And he blessed him and said, “Blessed be Abram of God Most High, possessor of heaven and earth; and blessed be God Most High, Who has delivered your enemies into your hand.” And he gave him a tenth of all. And the king of Sodom said to Abram, “Give the people to me and take the goods for yourself.” And Abram said to the king of Sodom, “I have sworn to the Lord God Most High, possessor of heaven and earth that I will not take a thread or a sandal thong or anything that is yours, lest you should say, ‘I have made Abram rich.’ I will take nothing except what the young men have eaten, and the share of the men who went with me, Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre; let them take their share (Genesis 14:17‑24).

Abram offered tithes to Melchizedek on the basis of his profession that Abram’s God was “God Most High, possessor of heaven and earth” (verse 19,20). And yet while Abram gave a tithe to Melchizedek, he refused to benefit in any monetary way from the pagan king of Sodom, for he wanted this man to know that “God Most High, possessor of heaven and earth” was the One Who made him prosper.

We sing, “He owns the cattle on a thousand hills … I know that He will care for me.” That is good theology. The God Who is our Creator, is also our Sustainer. You see God did not wind up the universe and then leave it to itself, as some seem to say. God maintains a continual care over His creation.

He causes the grass to grow for the cattle, and vegetation for the labor of man, so that he may bring forth food from the earth, and wine which makes man’s heart glad, so that he may make his face glisten with oil, and food which sustains man’s heart. The trees of the Lord drink their fill. The cedars of Lebanon which He planted, where the birds build their nests, and the stork, whose home is the fir trees. The high mountains are for the wild goats; the cliffs are a refuge for the rock badgers. He made the moon for the seasons, the sun knows the place of its setting. Thou dost appoint darkness and it becomes night, in which all the beasts of the forest prowl about. The young lions roar after their prey, and seek their food from God. When the sun rises they withdraw, and lie down in their dens, man goes forth to his work and to his labor until evening (Psalm 104:14‑23).

The New Testament goes an additional step by informing us that the Son of God was the Creator, and continues to serve as the Sustainer of the creation, holding all things together:

For in Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together (Colossians 1:16‑17).

(3) Men should be humbled by the wisdom of God as evidenced in creation. Job had endured much affliction. But finally, enough was enough. He began to question the wisdom of God in his adversity. To his questioning God responded,

Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind and said, ‘Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Now gird up your loins like a man, and I will ask you, and you instruct Me! Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth! Tell Me, if you have understanding, who set its measurements, since you know? Or who stretched the line on it? On what were its bases sunk? Or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy? (Job 38:1‑7).

Job was challenged to fathom the wisdom of God in creation. He could not explain or comprehend it, let alone challenge it. How, then, could Job possibly question the wisdom of God’s working in his life. True, he could not see the purpose in it all, but his perspective was not God’s. Let any who would question God’s dealing in our lives contemplate God’s infinite wisdom as seen in creation, and then be silent and wait upon Him to do what is right.

If man should choose to ponder any question, let him attempt to fathom why an infinite God would so concern Himself with mere man:

When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon and the Stars, which Thou hast ordained; what is man, that Thou dost take thought of him? and the son of man, that Thou dost care for him? Yet Thou hast made him a little lower than God, and dost crown him with glory and majesty! (Psalm 8:3‑5).

(4) Man should find comfort in times of distress and difficulty, knowing that His creator is able and willing to deliver him.

Therefore, let those also who suffer according to the will of God entrust their souls to a faithful Creator in doing what is right (I Peter 4:19).

Why do you say, O Jacob, and assert, O Israel, “My way is hidden from the Lord, and the justice due me escapes the notice of my God”? Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Everlasting God, the Lord, the creator of the ends of the earth does not become weary or tired. His understanding is inscrutable. He gives strength to the weary, and to him who lacks might He increases power. Though youths grow weary and tired, and vigorous young men stumble badly, yet those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength; they will mount up with wings like eagles, They will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary (Isaiah 40:27‑31).

Thus says God the Lord, Who created the heavens and stretched them out, Who spread out the earth and its offspring, Who gives breath to the people on it, and spirit to those who walk in it, ‘I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness, I will also hold you by the hand and watch over you, and I will appoint you as a covenant to the people, as a light to the nations’ (Isaiah 42:5‑6).

I am the Lord, and there is no other; besides me there is no God. I will gird you, though you have not known Me; that men may know from the rising to the setting of the sun that there is no one besides Me. I am the Lord, and there is no other. The One forming light and creating darkness, causing well‑being and creating calamity; I am the Lord who does all these (Isaiah 45:5‑7).

(5) Man should respond to the God of creation with the praise that is due Him:

Let the glory of the Lord endure forever; let the Lord be glad in His works; He looks at the earth, and it trembles; He touches the mountains, and they smoke. I will sing to the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God while I have my being. Let my meditation be pleasing to Him; as for me, I shall be glad in the Lord. Let sinners be consumed from the earth, and let the wicked be no more. Bless the Lord, O my soul. Praise the Lord! (Psalm 104:31‑35).

Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord from the heavens; Praise Him in the heights! Praise Him, all His angels; Praise Him, all His hosts! Praise Him, sun and moon; Praise Him, all stars of light! Praise Him, highest heavens, and the waters that are above the heavens! Let them praise the name of the Lord, for He commanded and they were created. He has also established them forever and ever; He has made a decree which will not pass away (Psalm 148:1-6).

Come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord our Maker (Psalm 95:6).

O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Thy name in all the earth, Who hast displayed Thy splendor above the heavens! (Psalm 8:1).

The teaching of Genesis one is a great and mighty truth. It is one that demands more than assent; it necessitates action. And yet, great as it is, it has been paled by the coming of Jesus Christ. Just as God proclaimed, let there be light, so God has once and for all spoken in these last days (Heb 1:1‑2) in His Son, Who is the light:

For God, who said, “Light shall shine out of darkness” is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ (II Corinthians 4:6).

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him; and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness; and the darkness did not comprehend it (John 1:1‑5).

There was the true light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man. He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God (John 1:9‑13).

While God revealed Himself faintly in creation, He has disclosed Himself fully in His Son:

No man has seen God at any time; the only begotten God, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him (John 1:18).

We cannot avoid the biblical revelation that the God Who created heaven and earth, the God Who redeemed the Israelites from Egypt, is the God‑man of Galilee, Jesus Christ. Just as He fashioned the first creation (Col 1:16), so He has now come to accomplish a new creation, through His work on the cross of Calvary:

Therefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come (II Corinthians 5:17).

Beyond this there will soon come a day when the heavens and the earth will be purged of the effects of sin and there will be a new heaven and a new earth:

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up. Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, on account of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat! But according to His promise we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells (II Peter 3:10‑13).

Are you ready for that day, my friend? Have you become a new creation in Christ? Genesis one reveals how God has taken chaos and fashioned it into cosmos—order and beauty. If you have never come to Christ, I can say with total confidence that your life is formless and empty; it is chaotic and lifeless. The same One Who turned chaos into cosmos can make your life anew.

Man’s Duty (2:4‑17)

While Genesis 1 describes a progression from chaos to cosmos, or disorder to order, chapter two follows a different pattern. Perhaps the literary thread which runs throughout the passage is that of God’s creative activity in supplying those things which are deficient.

Verse 4 serves as an introduction to the remaining verses.[4] Verse 5 informs us of the deficiencies which are supplied in verses 6‑17: No shrub, no plant, no rain, and no man. These are satisfied by the mist (verse 6) and the rivers (verses 10‑14), the man (verse 7), and the garden (verses 8‑9).

The deficiency of verses 18‑25 is, simply stated, “no helper suitable for Adam” (cf. verses 18,20). This helper is provided in a beautiful way in the last part of chapter 2.

Again, let me emphasize that Moses goes not intend to give us a chronological order of events here, but a logical one.[5] His purpose is to more particularly describe the creation of man, his wife, and the setting into which they are put. These become key factors in the fall which occurs in chapter 3.

Man has always wondered about prehistoric times. What was the earth like in the earliest days? What existed and what did not exist? How did vegetation and life upon earth get their start? What is the origin of plants and of life? These four verses give a picture of prehistoric earth. They are actually a brief review of the account of creation covered in Genesis 1. These four verses lay the groundwork for explaining what has happened to the earth and the heavens, to man and his world, since God created the universe. This is “The First Picture of the Earth Before Man: Prehistoric Times.”

(2:4) Creation— Universe: the LORD God created the heavens and the earth. This is the account of the heavens and of the earth “when they were created.” The Hebrew word “account” (toledoth) means generations, story, history, account. This is the true account of how the earth and heavens came into being. This is the true account—a brief review—of the origin of prehistoric earth. This is a brief review of Genesis 1. Note the words “when they were created.” The stress is that they were created: the universe did not just come into being by itself. The heavens and the earth did not just happen...

· by something—some force or matter, some gas or energy—appearing out of nothing.

For something to appear out of nothing is against all the laws of nature and science.

What is the truth about the origin of the universe, of the heavens and the earth? The truth is that the LORD God Himself created the universe, both the earth and the heavens. And in this declaration there is a stunning truth: the stunning truth is that God truly exists. Man’s denial and rejection of the truth cannot do away with God. God is—God exists—and God Himself created both the earth and the heavens.

Genesis 2:4 is the first of eleven “generation” statements that mark the progress of the story Moses wrote in the Book of Genesis. (See chapter 1, section 2.)

Adam the worker. Looking back to the third day (1:9-13), Moses told how God had brought forth vegetation and provided a “mist” to water the plants. You won’t encounter rain in Genesis until the time of the Flood. It’s interesting that God needed someone to till the earth and help produce the food needed. Humans are stewards of God’s creation blessings and should use His gifts as He commands. God and man work together, for God put Adam into the garden to do His work in tilling the soil and caring for it (v. 15).

A retired man living in a city got tired of seeing an ugly vacant lot as he took his daily walk, so he asked the owner for permission to plant a garden there. It took days to haul away the accumulated rubbish and even more time to prepare the soil, but the man worked hard. The next year, the lot was aglow with life and beauty, and everyone took notice.

“God has certainly given you a beautiful piece of property,” said a visitor as he admired the flowers and the landscaping.

“Yes, He has,” the busy gardener replied, “but you should have seen this property when God had it all by Himself!”

The reply was a wise one and not at all irreverent. The same God who ordains the end—a beautiful garden—also ordains the means to the end—someone to do the work. After all, “faith without works is dead” (James 2:26); and no amount of prayer or Bible study can take the place of a gardener plowing the soil, sowing the seed, watering plants, and pulling weeds. “For we are laborers together with God” (1 Cor. 3:9).

Work isn’t a curse; it’s an opportunity to use our abilities and opportunities in cooperating with God and being faithful stewards of His creation. After man sinned, work became toil (Gen. 3:17-19); but that wasn’t God’s original intention. We all have different abilities and opportunities, and we must discover what God wants us to do with our lives in this world, for the good of others and the glory of God. Someday, we want to be able to stand before God and say with Jesus, “I have glorified You on the earth. I have finished the work which You have given Me to do” (John 17:4, nkjv).

Adam the tenant. God planted His garden “eastward in Eden” (Gen. 2:8). “Eden” means either “delight” or “place of much water” and suggests that this garden was a paradise from the hand of God. Bible history begins with a beautiful garden in which man sinned, but the story ends with a glorious “garden city” (Rev. 21–22) in which there will be no sin. What brought about the change? A third garden, Gethsemane, where Jesus surrendered to the Father’s will and then went forth to die on a cross for the sins of the world.

We have no information about the Pishon River or the Gihon River; and though the Tigris (Hiddekel) and Euphrates are familiar to us, we still don’t have enough data to determine the exact location of the Garden of Eden. The location of the land of Havilah is also uncertain; some place it in Armenia, others in Mesopotamia. The King James Version has identified the land of Cush as Ethiopia, but this interpretation isn’t generally accepted today. Fortunately, it isn’t necessary to master ancient geography in order to understand the spiritual lessons of these early chapters in Genesis.

In this beautiful Garden, God provided both bounty and beauty; Adam and Eve had food to eat and God’s lovely handiwork to enjoy. As yet, sin hadn’t entered the Garden; so their happiness wasn’t marred.

(2:4) God, Names of— Jehovah— Yahweh— Creation: the LORD God Himself made the universe. Note the name used for God in these verses: the LORD God (Jehovah Elohim). The name for God changes or rather is enlarged here in Genesis 2. God (Elohim) is combined with LORD (Jehovah or Yahweh). In Genesis 1, where the creative power and might of God needed to be stressed, just the general name for God, Elohim, was used. Elohim is the name that stresses His power and might as the Creator and Sovereign Majesty of the universe. Now, in recording the early history of man upon earth, Jehovah or Yahweh is combined with the creative name of God: it was the LORD God—Jehovah (Yahweh) Elohim—who created the universe. Why the combined names? Why combine Jehovah or Yahweh with Elohim? Why is it now necessary to say that it was the LORD God who stands behind creation? Because Jehovah is the personal name of God, the revealing and redemptive name of God. God is about ready...

This passage is laying the foundation for what is to follow: the early history of man upon earth. The early history explains the relationship between God and man:

It is time for God to be revealed as Jehovah, as the Lord God of the universe. The universe was created by a personal God, a God who created the world so that He might establish a personal relationship with His creation, in particular with man. Simply stated, the Lord God—Jehovah Elohim—is the name that describes what God is about to do upon earth: establish a personal relationship with man and redeem man from his terrible plunge into sin and death.

1) God is the LORD God—Jehovah Elohim—the personal God: the only living and true God, the only God who can establish a personal relationship with man. His very purpose for creating the earth was to establish a personal relationship with us—with every one of us. This is the declaration of Scripture from beginning to end.

2) God is the LORD God—Jehovah Elohim—the revealing God: the only living and true God, the only God who can reveal Himself and the truth about man and the world. The Lord God alone can reveal where man has come from, why man is here, and where man is going. The Lord God alone can tell man why there is evil, suffering, and death upon earth. He alone can reveal how man can be delivered from evil and death.

a) The LORD God has revealed the truth through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

3) God is the LORD God—Jehovah Elohim—the redemptive God: the only living and true God, the only God who can truly redeem and save man from sin, death, and hell.

(2:5-6) Creation: the LORD God created the heavens and the earth in stages (Genesis 2:5-6). Note that the heavens and the earth were created:

God created the earth stage by stage. He had the power to take an unshaped and unformed earth and shape and form it. He had the power to take a lifeless and unpopulated earth and create life and populate it. Thereby God is the Sovereign Lord of the universe. As Sovereign Lord, God reveals two wonderful things to us.

1) God has the power to take a person and make a new creation out of him. And God has the power to take that new person, that new creation, and move him along stage by stage until he reaches the climactic moment of redemption at the return of the Lord Jesus Christ.

2) God has the power to quicken dead, lifeless matter and give it life. Therefore, God has the power to quicken the dead spirit of man. He has the power to “quicken the dead, and call those things which be not as though they were” (Romans 4:17).

While as yet no rain had ever fallen, God provided the water which was needed for plant life. “But a mist used to rise from the earth and water the whole surface of the ground” (Genesis 2:6).

There is some discussion over this word ‘mist’ (‘ed). It could mean a mist or a fog, as some contend.[6] The Septuagint used the Greek word pe„ge„, which means ‘spring.’ Some have understood the Hebrew word as being derived from a Sumerian word, referring to subterranean waters.[7] It may be that springs flowed out of the ground and that vegetation was perhaps watered by irrigation or channels. This could even explain, in part, the work of Adam in keeping the garden.

The water being supplied, God created the garden, which was to be the place of man’s abode, and the object of his attention. It was well‑supplied with many trees which provided both beauty and food. And out of the ground the Lord God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing to the sight and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2:9).

Specifically, two trees are mentioned, the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. This latter tree was the only thing forbidden man.

And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, ‘From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you shall surely die’ (Genesis 2:16‑17).

It is interesting that seemingly Adam, alone, is told by God that the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil must not be eaten. One can only conjecture as to how effectively God’s command to Adam was communicated to Eve. Could this explain Eve’s inaccurate appraisal in 3:2‑3?

Into this paradise,[8] man was placed. While he was surely to enjoy this wonderland, he was also to cultivate it. Look again at verse 5:

Now no shrub of the field was yet in the earth, and no plant of the field had yet sprouted, for the Lord God had not sent rain upon the earth; and there was no man to cultivate the ground (Genesis 2:5).

When placed in the garden, Adam was to work there: “Then the Lord God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it” (Genesis 2:15).

Adam’s creation is described more fully in 2:7 than in chapter one. He was formed[9] from the dust of the ground. While this is a humbling fact, it is also obvious that man’s origin is not from the animal world, nor is man created in the same way as the animals. In part, Adam’s dignity stems from the fact that his life breath is the inspiration of God (verse 7).

Here was no mythical garden. Every part of the description of this paradise inclines us to understand that it was a real garden in a particular geographical location. Specific points of reference are given. Four rivers are named, two of which are known to us today. We should not be surprised, especially after the cataclysmic event of the flood, that changes may have occurred, which would make it impossible to locate this spot precisely.

I find it most interesting that the Paradise of Eden was a place somewhat different from what we envision today. First of all, it was a place of activity (the word ‘work’ might be too strong because the curse of the ground later made ‘work’ really ‘work’ as we would think in our words today).

Men today dream of paradise as a hammock suspended between two coconut trees on some desert island, where work is never again to be contemplated. Furthermore, heaven is thought of as the end of all prohibitions. Heaven is frequently confused with hedonism. It is very self‑centered and pleasure‑oriented. While Adam’s state was one of beauty and bliss, it cannot be thought of as unrestricted pleasure. The forbidden fruit is a part of Paradise, too. Heaven is not the experiencing of every desire, but the satisfaction of beneficial and wholesome desires.

Servanthood is not a new concept in the New Testament. Meaningful service provides fulfillment and purpose for life. God described Israel as a cultivated garden, a vineyard (Isaiah 5:1‑2ff.). Jesus spoke of Himself as the Vine and we as the branches. The Father tenderly cared for His vineyard (John 15:1ff.). Paul described the ministry as the work of a farmer (II Timothy 2:6).

While the church of the New Testament may be better described as a flock, nevertheless the image of the garden is not inappropriate. There is a work to be done for the child of God. And that work is no drudgery, no duty to begrudgingly carry out. It is a source of joy and fulfillment. Many today have no real sense of meaning and purpose because they are not doing the work that God has designed for them to carry out.

(2:7) this is the summit of God’s creation, the phenomenal creation of man. God took two things and made man: the dust of the ground and His own breath of life. He formed Adam out of the dust of the ground, and He breathed His own breath into the nostrils of Adam. Thus the believer knows a wonderful truth: he has been made by God Himself, by the Sovereign Lord and Majesty of the universe. As the Psalmist says, “I am fearfully and wonderfully made” (Psalm 139:14). When we study and meditate upon the teachings of Scripture, we are able to say with Elihu, “There is a spirit in man...the spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life.... I also am formed out of the clay” (Job 32:8; Job 33:4, 6).

(2:7) Man— Creation: the LORD God formed man. This is exactly what Scripture says: “And the Lord God formed man.”

1. God and God alone formed man. Man was not formed by impersonal forces nor did he just appear out of nothing. Neither did man evolve from other creatures that had come out of nothing. Impersonal forces did not form man: not cells, not DNA, not atoms, not molecules, not hydrogen, not protons, not neutrons, not electrons. Whatever is discovered to be the basic substance and energy of human life, that substance did not form man. But note: all these substances are a part of man; they are what constitute and make up the body and physical life of man. However the basic substances are not what formed man. The energy and power that formed man is the Supreme Intelligence of the universe, the LORD God of the universe. The LORD God formed man. The LORD God created the substances and then He took the substances and used them to create man. Man was created and formed by God and by God alone.

2. God “formed” (yatsar) man. The word “formed” means to mold, to shape, to form. It is the picture of a potter who has an image in his mind that he wants to create. Therefore, he takes some clay and molds and forms the clay into the image of his mind. Note: the potter has the idea of what he wants to create, and he has both the intelligence and power to form his creation. So it was with God. God is the Master Craftsman who had the idea of man within His mind. God also had both the intelligence and power to create man, both the omniscience (all knowledge) and omnipotence (all power) to do what He wanted. God wanted to create man; therefore, God formed man. God molded and shaped man just like a potter who forms the creation of his mind. Man is the creation of God, of God’s mind, of God’s intelligence and power, of God’s omniscience and omnipotence.

This gives great dignity and honor to man. Man is the product of God’s mind, of His thought and heart. Man’s creation—man’s very body, mind, and spirit—came from the heart of God, from the intelligence and power of God Himself. We are the creation of God’s very own heart, His very own mind and power. We have been created with all the dignity and honor possible—created by the very intelligence and power of God Himself. We are the creation of the Sovereign Lord and Majesty of the universe.

3. It was the LORD God—Jehovah Elohim—who formed man. This is the personal name of God, the name that stresses...

When this name—the LORD God—is used, God’s personal relationship with man is being stressed. God’s creation of man was very, very special. It was a matter that had the personal attention and care of God. God Himself was personally involved in the creation of man, involved in a far different way than when He created the rest of the world. In creating man, God was creating the creature...

Therefore a very special relationship, a personal relationship, was bound to be established by the LORD God between Himself and man, between Himself and the creature He was putting in charge of His world. God stood before man as God, as the great Creator and Sustainer of life. But God also stood before man as LORD, as the Supreme Master of man’s life, as the Supreme Lord and Master...

This is why the name LORD God is used in the creation of man. The LORD God was establishing a personal relationship with the creature He was now creating: man was to be very, very special to God. There was to be a personal relationship, a close bond, between God and man forever. God—the LORD God—was to stand before man as man’s Lord. Man was to be the subject of God forever and ever.

(2:7) Man— Creation: man was formed from the dust of the ground. The material used to form the body of man was lowly stuff—stuff that is both humble and base, of little worth and value. What was it? Dust, the dirt of the ground. Isaiah and Job say “clay” (Isaiah 64:8; Job 33:6). Martin Luther translates the Hebrew “lump of earth” (H.C. Leupold. Genesis, Vol.1, p.115). The idea of Scripture seems to be that a mixture of water and dirt was used to form the body of man. Imagine! Our bodies are made of the same substance—of the same chemical elements—as the earth itself. Physically, we are nothing more than lowly and base dirt, nothing more than the grains of dirt and dust that lie upon the ground. No better description of the lowliness of man’s creation has ever been written than the statements made by Matthew Henry:

Þ “The matter was despicable. He [man] was made of the dust of the ground, a very unlikely thing to make a man of.”

Þ “He [man] was made of the dust, the small dust, such as is upon the surface of the earth.”

Þ “He [man] was not made of gold-dust, powder of pearl, or diamond dust, but common dust, dust of the ground.”

Þ “He [Adam] is said to be of the earth...dusty, 1 Cor. 15:47. And we also are of the earth, for we are his offspring, and of the same mould.”

Þ There is such an affinity between the earth and our earthly bodies that “our mother’s womb, out of which we were born, is called the earth.”

Þ Our bodies are called houses of clay and our foundations are said to be in the earth.

Þ “Our fabric [flesh, body] is earthly, and the fashioning of it like that of an earthen vessel.”

Þ “Our fathers are in the earth, and our own final tendency [destiny] is to it; and what have we then to be proud of.” (Matthew Henry’s Commentary, Vol.1, p.14.)

Indeed! What do we have to be proud of? Nothing. Absolutely nothing, for we are made of nothing more than a handful of dust. From dust we have come, and to dust we shall return. Before we know it, our bodies will be nothing more than a small cup of dust lying someplace within the ground of the earth.

The point of Scripture is this: we come from the humblest of beginnings. Our origin is that of dust, lowly dirt and dust. Our bodies are fragile and frail. They are as nothing; therefore, we must depend upon God to look after us, and we must seek the glory and dignity that God alone can give. No matter how much glory and dignity we achieve upon earth, we shall soon be nothing more than a handful of dust. Our origin and beginning upon earth was humble. Therefore, we must walk humbly before God, depending upon God to make us eternal and glorious beings—beings who shall arise out of the dirt of the earth and live forever. We must depend upon God to give us a body that will never age or pass away, a body that will never die, but that will live forever.

Every person is made of the same substance, of the dust of the ground. No person has any more value or worth than any other person—not on the basis of the stuff from which he is made. All come from dust and all shall return to dust. This is significant: it means...

There is no place for pride, prejudice, discrimination, jealousy, enslavement, partiality, or favoritism among people. There is no place for any mistreatment of any person upon earth.

(2:7) Man— Creation: God breathed His own breath of life into man. Man is not just dust, not just physical substance. Man is far more than just a physical body. Man is a spirit. God has given man His very own breath.

· the body of the first man, Adam, was lying upon the ground before God. It had just been formed by God from the dust of the earth. Adam was lifeless—just a human body lying there upon the ground—never having breathed. Then all of a sudden—in descriptive terms—God leaned over and breathed His own breath into Adam’s nostrils. Adam received the breath of God, and when he did, the result was astounding: he arose from the ground and became a living soul.

Now, what is the breath of God? What is there about God’s breath that caused God to breathe His own breath into man?

1. The breath of God is the Spirit of God. This is seen in the Hebrew word for spirit, ruach. The word ruach means wind, breath, air, spirit. When God breathed into the nostrils of Adam, He was not just breathing air into Adam’s lungs so that Adam could live. If this was all God was doing—giving life to Adam—He did not have to breathe His own breath into Adam. God could have simply spoken the word and caused Adam to become a living soul just like He did when He created the animals. What God was doing was symbolizing and picturing for all generations to come this one fact: God has given man His Spirit, the very Spirit of God Himself. God has actually breathed into man His very own Spirit. This means a most wonderful thing: God has connected Himself to man in the most intimate way possible. God has put within man His very own Spirit. Man is related to God, bound to God, connected to God. Both God and man have the same breath, the very same Spirit. Man has within his body the very breath and Spirit of God Himself.

2. The breath of God is the life of God. When God breathed into man, God gave His very own life to man. What is the life of God? It is life that lives on and on, the life of eternity, the power to live eternally. God’s breath is not temporal; God’s breath lives forever. God’s breath never ceases to exist. Therefore, man was to breathe and live forever; man was to live eternally with God. Man was given the very breath of God Himself, the power of immortality, the power to live forever.

But note this about the Spirit of life—the Spirit of God—that has been given to man: man was created a spiritual being, but his spirit has been marred by his fall into sin.

God made no other creature like He made man. God gave no other creature His breath, neither His Spirit nor His life of immortality. This makes man’s creation distinctive, of the highest order and being, of the highest honor and glory, of the highest worth and value.

There is a sense in which man is a paradox. He was created with all the dignity and honor possible—created by the hand of God and given the very breath of God. Yet, he was also created out of the most base and lowly stuff of all: dirt. In one sense man has every reason to glory; in another sense he has every reason to be humble. What is to be man’s attitude? Man is to glory: there is nothing wrong with glorying. Man is to be humble: there is nothing wrong with being humble. It is the reason or object for glorying and for being humble that makes man right or wrong.

Þ Man is to worship and glory in God—that God gave him life and the dignity and honor (privilege) of life.

Þ Man is to walk humbly before God and before men, for God has made all men from the same material, from the dust of the earth itself. (Jeremiah 9:24; cp. 1 Cor. 1:31; 2 Cor. 10:17; Romans 11:36; Gal. 1:5; 2 Tim. 4:18; Hebrews 13:21; 1 Peter 5:11).

The duty of man is this: to present his body to God as “a living sacrifice” and as “the temple of the Holy Spirit” (Romans 12:1; 1 Cor. 6:19).

There is one thing man needs to know: he has been created in the image, in the very likeness, of God. He is an immortal creature: he shall exist forever and ever. Man must, therefore, make sure—absolutely sure—that he is going to live with God. The one thing he must not do is live apart from God. Man must not miss out on the glorious privilege of living forever with God.

(2:7) Creation: man became a living soul. Remember: “soul” (nephesh) means an animated, breathing, conscious, and living being. It does not mean the spirit of man. God had just breathed His Spirit and life into man. Once God did this, man became a living soul—an animated, breathing, conscious, and living creature. He was a living soul just like all the other creatures of earth. However, there was one distinctive difference between the animals and man: man was given the very breath of God Himself, the very Spirit and life of God.

Note: man did not become a living soul until God breathed His Spirit and life into man. This is significant, very significant:

Þ It means that man is the only living spirit upon earth. Man is both a spiritual and soulish or animate being.

Þ Animals live, but they are only animate or soulish creatures. They are not spiritual creatures; they do not have the breath or spirit of God within them; they do not worship God.

Þ Man lives, but he is both an animate and a spiritual creature. Man is both soul and spirit. Man is an animal, a soulish creature, but he is also a spiritual creature, a creature who worships God. Man is made both of earth and heaven.

This is the distinctiveness of man. Man is the summit of God’s creation: the creature who possesses both soul and spirit. He is the creature who has been given the very breath of God, the very spirit and life of God Himself.

Why has God given His own breath to man, given man His own Spirit and life? So that man can freely choose to love and worship God. God has given man (despite man’s fall) enough of Himself to make man hunger and seek after God. Man has a sense, a consciousness, that he has lost God’s Spirit and lost the power to live eternally with God; he has just enough awareness of God to seek after immortality with God, to seek after God and the privilege of living forever with God.

God breathed His Spirit into man. How often and how intensely that spirit within man should breathe after God.

“Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled” (Matthew 5:6).

(2:8-14) Introduction— Eden, Garden of: picture the scene: man had just been created. The LORD God Himself had just formed man from the dust of the ground, and had breathed the very breath of God into the nostrils of man (Genesis 2:7). Man stood there upon earth for the very first time in human history, stood there in the midst of all the lush green of the forest and the radiant reds, oranges, yellows, blues, purples, whites and all the other colors of the flowers and bushes that displayed their wild beauty. God now had...

· the perfection—the perfect man and the perfect universe—which He had planned and purposed.

But something else was needed. Man needed a residence, a home, a place to live. This passage of Scripture describes the place where man had his beginnings upon earth, the place where man was to live. It covers the features which God designed for man’s residence or home. The place is called The Garden of Eden, the most beautiful and bountiful paradise man could ever imagine. Eden was man’s paradise, his utopia.

Note that God’s glorious goodness is seen in His design of the Garden. The features of the Garden clearly show that God cares deeply for man—for man’s welfare, provision, security, joy, and happiness. The Garden shows that God designed the ideal place for man’s residence or home. This passage covers “The First Garden and Its Purpose: Eden, Man’s Ideal Place or Home.”

3. Eden met man’s need for beauty and food and for spiritual surroundings (v.9).

5. Eden met man’s need to exercise his free will—his ability to choose: the tree of knowing good and evil (v.9).

(2:8) Garden of Eden: the Garden of Eden was a real place, a real Garden planted by God Himself. However, the reality of the Garden has been denied by some persons.

Þ Secular man considers the Garden of Eden to be a fictitious story, just a fairy tale or fable. He thinks the Garden is just the Biblical author’s imagination of how man first began his life upon earth. Secular man says that the Biblical author simply pictures man beginning his life in a perfect environment and later failing and beginning to corrupt the earth.

Þ Religious man often looks upon the Garden of Eden as a symbol or type of the ideal environment or ideal earth. He thinks that the Garden is the dream of the ideal earth and environment toward which man should work. Religious man often says that the task of man is to strive to make the earth a Garden of Eden, the utopian paradise for which man dreams.

But note: this is not what this passage says, nowhere close to what it says. This passage clearly teaches that the Garden of Eden was a real, historical place—a real, historical Garden created by God Himself. How can we say this so confidently, so positively?

1. The specific direction of the Garden is given: the Garden was planted in the East, in the land of Eden. When Moses wrote this, he was leading Israel in the wilderness wanderings throughout the great Arabian desert. East of the Arabian desert would point toward the Arab nations of the Middle East, specifically toward the great fertile plains of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.

Note: the direction being pointed to is not a fictitious or symbolic land. It is a specific direction and a well known land.

2. The general location of the Garden is given (Genesis 2:10-14). Real lands are mentioned: Havilah, Ethiopia, and Assyria. Real rivers are also given: Pison, Gihon, Hiddekel or the Tigris, and the Euphrates. Apparently, the Garden was someplace close to where the Tigris and Euphrates join. This would place the Garden in what is known today as southern Iraq.

The point to note is this: the Garden of Eden—man’s paradise—lay toward the East and was located around four rivers that flowed through lands or countries well known to the people of that day. There is nothing fictitious or imaginary about the direction or location of the Garden of Eden. It was a real, historical place, a real, historical Garden.

3. Note a third fact as well. The very context of this section of Scripture points toward the Garden being historical. What is being discussed in this section of Genesis is creation, the beginnings of the universe and of man upon earth. If the earth and the universe are real and man is real—if the account of creation is accurate—then the Garden of Eden, man’s paradise upon earth, must be a real, historical place. Part of man’s beginnings upon earth is bound to include a discussion of his first environment and home. This is only logical; this is only to be expected.

Why is it important to stress that the Garden of Eden was a real, historical place?

1) If the Garden was a fictitious place, then it means that the fall of man is a fable. Why? Because the fall of man took place in the Garden of Eden. Therefore, if the Garden is unreal, then it means there is no such thing as sin, as man being lost in sin and separated from God. If the Garden of Eden never existed—not really—then man falling into sin never took place.

2) If the Garden is just a symbol or type of paradise—of the ideal environment or ideal earth—then redemption through Christ is not necessary. Man does not need God nor Christ to save him and his world. Man is perfectly capable of creating the perfect environment himself. All man has to do is work and work for the ideal earth, and eventually he will bring paradise and utopia to earth—all by his own energy, efforts, works, and goodness.

(2:8) Man, Needs; Responsibility— Home— Environment— Garden of Eden: the Garden of Eden met man’s need for a home, his need for a very special place to live. Man needs a place that he can call home, a place...

· where he can experience the closest and most intimate love, caring, sharing, communication, and relationships.

· where he can be employed and fulfill his duties and responsibilities and make his contribution to society.

· where he can settle down at night and relax, rest, sleep, and revive his strength for the next day’s duties.

God knew man’s need, that man needed a place where he could be centrally located, a place that he could call home. Therefore, God met man’s need: God created the Garden of Eden, the most beautiful paradise imaginable; then He took man and put him into the Garden.

1. The word “garden” (gan) means a place that is enclosed, protected, and sheltered. It even has the idea of being covered, of being perfectly protected (Heb., ganan) (Pulpit Commentary, Vol.1, p.43). The word “Eden” (edhen) means a place of delight, of pleasure, of bliss. Eden means a paradise.

The point is this: the Garden of Eden was different from the rest of the earth. The earth was perfect with a perfect and unthreatening environment, and it overflowed with an abundance of beauty and fruit. But the idea of Scripture is that the Garden of Eden far exceeded the earth in beauty and provision. The Garden gave man a place—some land, some acreage—where he could live and establish a home and community; a place that was enclosed, protected, and sheltered from the elements of nature and of the weather; a place that provided the covering—the perfect home and provision—that man needed. The Garden of Eden was a paradise for man.

2. God took man and put man into the Garden. As stated above, the Garden differed from the rest of the earth. From the beginning, man knew the difference between the Garden and the rest of the land outside. Man knew that God had blessed and cared for him in a most excellent way: God had given him a place that far exceeded the rest of the earth. As Matthew Henry points out: God did not put man in a palace made of silver and gold, nor in a house made of ivory, but in the most beautiful and artful place of all: nature—a Garden furnished and adorned by God Himself (Matthew Henry’s Commentary, Vol.1, p.15).

Man often blames his shortcomings and failures upon his environment. But note how man began his life upon earth: in a perfect environment, in a paradise upon earth. God was as good to man as He could be: He gave man a perfect nature and a perfect environment so that man could have an abundance of life, a life that far exceeded anything for which man could ask. But as we shall see in Genesis 3, man still fell into sin. He still came short and failed. Man cannot—not the first man, nor any other man—use his environment as an excuse to sin, fail, or come short. Environment, of course, has an influence upon every one of us; but a person is basically responsible for his own behavior and actions. Adam—the first man upon earth, the father of us all—clearly illustrates this. We would all fail and come short even if we had a perfect environment and world. Our problem with failure and sin is not a bad environment; our problem is the heart: the desire and craving to do what we want and to have what we want no matter what effect our behavior has upon the earth and others. We are without excuse.

The environment of Eden shows what God’s will is for the environment of the earth. God wants us to protect and look after the environment, not to destroy it. But think about what we do: all the pollution, garbage, junk, and nuclear waste; all the devastating effects pollution has upon the rivers, lakes, seas, sky, air, and lands of the earth. And why? Because of the selfishness (personal and economic selfishness), extravagance, and sin of the human heart.

(2:9) Man, Needs of: the Garden of Eden met man’s need for beauty and food and for spiritual surroundings. God caused “every tree” (kol ets)—all kinds of trees—to grow within the Garden. The idea is an enormous number and all manner of trees “pleasant to the sight and good for food.” The Garden was apparently a huge forest of trees, shrubs, and vegetation. It was furnished both to provide for Adam’s need and pleasure.

The beauty and provision of the Garden met to some degree the three basic needs of man.

1. The Garden provided beauty, discovery, and encounter for man. Every tree, bush, shrub, flower, and plant imaginable was there: each with its own height and width, leaf and bark, color and fragrance. The Garden’s beauty and immense size gave man the very provision he needed to meet his mental, emotional, and aesthetic needs.

2. The Garden provided food and shelter for man. Every species of vegetation, fruit, berry, and nut was there—everything to satisfy the taste and nourishment of man.

3. The Garden provided spiritual surroundings, a spiritual environment. The Garden’s beauty and provision was bound to give man a sense of awe and worship—to stir praise and thanksgiving from man. No surroundings and no environment can fully meet man’s need for worship. Only God can fully meet man’s spiritual need. But the Garden was so beautiful and so conducive to worship that it was bound to pull and stir man to worship God.

People seek to get what they want from their surroundings and environment. But the earth and the things of the earth cannot meet man’s basic need. As important as the earth and the physical are, man’s basic need is much deeper than what appears on the surface—much deeper than the physical and material. Man is spirit; consequently, his basic need is spiritual.

God makes an unusual promise to man. God will see to it that any person has sufficient food, shelter and clothing. But, there is a condition. The person has to “seek...first the kingdom of God and His righteousness” (Matthew 6:33; cp. Matthew 6:24-34).

(2:9) Man, Needs— Eternal Life— Tree of Life: the Garden of Eden met man’s need to live forever. How? God planted a fruit tree within the Garden and gave it the power of everlasting life. What is this tree? Here are all the Scripture verses that refer to it:

“And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the Garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil” (Genesis 2:9).

“And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever” (Genesis 3:22).

Þ The tree is named “the tree of life.” It sat in the middle of the Garden of Eden (Genesis 2:9).

Þ If Adam, the first man upon earth, had eaten of the tree, he would have lived forever. Apparently, he had never eaten of the tree when he was in the Garden (Genesis 3:22).

Now, what is the tree of life? On the basis of the facts revealed in Scripture, the tree is a real tree that bears life-giving fruit, fruit that gives a person everlasting life, that keeps a person from ever dying. But note this: the tree of life exists only in a perfect world, only where perfection exists...

When God planted the tree of life in the Garden of Eden, the tree was to keep Adam from dying. Adam was to eat of its fruit and live forever. But, as shall be seen, Adam never ate of the tree of life. He chose to eat the fruit of the forbidden tree. The result was catastrophic: man was expelled from the Garden and not allowed to eat the fruit of the tree of life.

The point to see in the present passage is this: God planted the tree of life right in the midst of the Garden, in the most prominent and conspicuous spot where it would always be easily seen. It was planted right where Adam would always be reminded that he had to eat of the tree in order to live forever. God gave man every opportunity imaginable...

God loves man—all of us. He showed Adam His love by providing the tree of life—the very possibility of living forever. God shows us His love by providing eternal life through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

(2:9) Man, Needs— Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil: the Garden of Eden met man’s need to exercise his free will, his ability to choose. God planted a second fruit tree in the Garden.

3. It was the only tree from which Adam and Eve were instructed not to eat. God used the tree for man to exercise his freedom of choice, his spiritual drive and ability.

Þ Man was to choose God by obeying Him (see note—^§Genesis 2:16; cp. Genesis 2:16-17; Genesis 3:2-3).

Þ If man chose to disobey God by eating of the tree’s fruit, man would know evil—what it is to be disobedient. He would experience evil personally and die, that is, be separated from God spiritually, physically, and eternally.

4. It was one of the two trees chosen to exercise man’s choice between life and death (separation from God). Adam, the first man—the forefather of the human race—did just what we do: he chose to go his own way, to do his own thing—to disobey God. He rejected the tree of life and ate of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

Several things need to be said at this point about both the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Are the trees figurative or literal? To hold that they are literal is neither naive nor magical.

1. Something—some object, some act—had to be chosen for man to exercise his ability or choice for God and for life with Him. Note this: man was within nature, within the most beautiful Garden of the world. The Garden had the most excellent trees of the world, and the trees bore the most luscious fruit in the world. One of man’s basic needs and drives was to satisfy his hunger with the luscious fruit so richly provided. What better way for man to exercise his ability or choice for God than through the flesh, than to have a commandment involving the fruit needed to meet his physical need for food?

In fact, forbidding fruit within such an environment as the Garden of Eden would be the very thing for God to do—the natural, expected thing.

2. No tree, within itself, has the power to give life or death. No tree or fruit has such inherent power. Any fruit that has such power would have such power only because God gave it life-producing qualities, chemicals, or juices. We all know this.

Scripture says this is exactly what God did: God gave life producing qualities to the tree of life and death producing, corruptible qualities to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Note three significant points about this fact:

Þ First, this is exactly what Scripture says. It is the literal statement of the account of Genesis.

Þ Second, God is God—Elohim, Almighty God, the God of all might and power. God can decree such power to any food He wishes.

Þ Third, as stated in point one, any person is hard pressed to choose a better method for man to exercise his choice for God and eternity, hard pressed to choose a better method when man is within a garden such as the Garden of Eden.

3. Now having said the above, there is one other possibility about the life and death qualities of the trees. It is possible that the trees and their fruit were the objects (vehicle, method, manner) chosen for man to exercise his spiritual choice to live with God or apart from God. It is possible that God’s Word decreed life or death for man—based upon man’s choice. It is possible that the trees possessed no qualities or chemicals or juices to give life or death, that they were only the objects used for man to exercise his freedom to choose to obey God. God, His Word, decreed that to eat of the tree of life gave life; to eat of the other tree brought death. The trees were only the things used to bring about what God had already said. The power of life and death rested in what God had decreed and man chose to do, not in the trees themselves.

(2:10-14) Man, Needs— Garden of Eden: the Garden of Eden met man’s need for water and irrigation. God caused a river to flow through Eden, apparently a great river. It was large enough to irrigate the whole Garden and to break out into four major rivers. The purpose for listing the four rivers and several of the surrounding lands was...

· to show the truth of how God created man and placed man in the Garden and the truth of what happened to man.

Now, where was the Garden of Eden located? Note that two of the rivers are known today, the Tigris and the Euphrates, but two are not known. Most likely, the catastrophic flood in Noah’s day rearranged the earth’s geography and eliminated the two unknown rivers. But note this as well: the flood was so catastrophic that it most likely rearranged the beds and channels of the Tigris and Euphrates. To think otherwise would be unrealistic, for the devastation and rearrangement of the geography of the earth’s surface by torrential rains and severe floods are too well known today. Therefore, it is impossible to say just where the Garden of Eden was located. The closest that we can say with accuracy is that it was someplace in the lands that surround the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, lands that actually cover several nations of the world such as Armenia, Turkey, Syria, Iraq, and Iran. H.C. Leupold thinks that it may have been in the Armenian highlands (Genesis, Vol.1, p.126); others think that it may have been in southern Iraq (cp. NIV, Genesis 2:8).

Now, back to the major thrust of this point: God caused a great river to flow through Eden, a river that separated into four other rivers as it flowed out of Eden. This shows the glorious goodness and care of God. God made every provision for man, even to seeing that man had water to drink and an irrigation system to water the growth of the Garden.

1) God will provide all the necessities of life for man if man will first seek Him and His righteousness.

“But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:33).

2) God has provided a living water that gives man eternal life, a living water that is found in His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

“But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life” (John 4:14).

“And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst” (John 6:35).

DEEPER STUDY -- (2:10) Adam vs. Christ— Gethsemane vs. The Garden of Eden— The Cross vs. the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil: there is a strong contrast between the first Adam in his Garden of Eden and the second Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ, in His Garden of Gethsemane. (The idea for the contrast was stirred by James Montgomery Boice. Genesis, An Expositional Commentary, Vol.1. Grand Rapids, MI: The Zondervan Corporation, 1938, p.104f.) Remember that our Lord was facing the critical decision of the cross in the Garden of Gethsemane.

There is also a strong contrast between the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the tree of the cross. (The idea for this contrast was stirred by Arthur Pink. Gleanings in Genesis. Chicago, IL: Moody Press, 1922, p.27f.)

(2:15-17) Introduction— Man, Purpose— Creation, Purpose: above all other verses in the creation account, these verses show why God created man. Very simply stated, God wants to live with a being who chooses—freely chooses—to live with Him. God wants to live with a being who has the ability to choose to live with Him and who will choose to live with Him. God wants to live with a being who has freedom of choice, a being...

God does not want to coerce man; God does not want man to be a robot that has been run off an assembly line and programmed to serve and worship God. God wants man to have freedom of choice, the ability to choose to live either with God or apart from God.

Þ Man is seen to be highly intelligent and physically strong. He is made responsible for thinking, planning, and cultivating the Garden (Genesis 2:15).

Þ Man is seen to have the ability to communicate with others. God is seen talking and sharing with him (Genesis 2:16-17).

Þ Man is seen to have the ability to will and to choose. He possesses freedom of will (Genesis 2:16-17).

Þ Man is seen to have needs and drives that have to be met both by his environment and by God. His environment has to provide work, food, and beauty for him. God has to provide instructions, directions, love, worship, fellowship, and purpose, meaning, and significance for him (Genesis 2:15-17).

Þ Man is seen to be a spiritual being who requires spiritual direction and godly fellowship for his life (Genesis 2:15-17).

Þ Man is seen to be a being who is very capable of responding to others, of loving and of expressing appreciation to others. God is here interacting with him (Genesis 2:15-17).

Þ Man is seen to have been a being of perfection and of immortality, a being who was morally perfect, physically perfect, and spiritually perfect. Man was originally a being who was not corrupted and did not die and had never been separated from God.

Þ Man is seen to be a being who has desires and urges that push him toward that which appeals to the flesh and which looks attractive and beneficial. The trees in the Garden and the prohibition governing the tree of the knowledge of good and evil show this (Genesis 2:16-17).

Þ Man is seen to be a being of curiosity—a being who has the drive to know more and more, even if the knowledge leads to evil (cp. the development of war weapons) (Genesis 2:17).

Much is revealed about the nature of man in these three brief verses, and much more could be added to the list above. But enough has been given to make the point: God has created man with freedom of choice. God wants to live with persons who choose to live with Him. God does not want persons with Him who do not want to be with Him. God wants to share His grace and goodness with those who want to experience His grace and goodness. This is the discussion of this informative passage of Scripture. These verses cover “The First Charge or Covenant: Man’s Purpose Upon Earth.”

(2:15) Man, Purpose— Creation, Purpose: Man’s purpose is to receive the goodness and grace of God. Why did God create man? Why does man exist? What is the purpose of life? As stated, man’s purpose is to receive the goodness and grace of God. God wants to share the riches of His goodness and grace with man—the overflowing riches of His goodness and grace. This is clearly seen in what God did for the first man, Adam.

God made a paradise—the Garden of Eden—for man. The Garden was the most perfect paradise imaginable. Remember: the earth was perfect, but God wanted a place that would be very, very special for man—a place of unmatched splendor, beauty, provision, fellowship, and perfection. The Garden of Eden far exceeded the outside world. Adam could compare the two, for he had lived in the outside world for some time. Just how long is unknown, but he had been there and walked about (Genesis 2:8, 15).

But note what happened (Genesis 2:15): God took Adam and placed him in the Garden of Eden. He had been outside the Garden, but God wanted him within its boundaries. God wanted Adam to know and experience paradise, the great gift of God, the glorious goodness and grace of God.

The point is this: God created the most glorious home imaginable for man, paradise itself, the Garden of Eden. Man already had a perfect earth, but a perfect earth could not hold nor adequately show the infinite goodness and grace of God. Therefore, God created paradise itself—a place where man could behold all the splendor, beauty, provision, fellowship, and perfection of God’s goodness and grace.

God’s purpose for man has not been defeated despite the sin of Adam. God will not allow His purpose to be defeated, not ever—not by anything nor by anyone. Everything that was lost by Adam’s sin has been regained by Christ. How? By Christ’s death. Remember: God’s purpose for creating man is to show man the riches of His goodness and grace. No greater love could ever be shown than for God to give His Son to die for the sins of man. This is exactly what happened in the death of Christ. The summit of goodness and grace is seen in this: God gave His Son to bear the condemnation, punishment, and judgment for man’s sin. When a man believes that Christ died for him, God takes that man’s belief and counts it as the death of Christ. God counts the man as having died with Christ. The man’s punishment has therefore been paid: he has died with Christ. Consequently, he is freed from sin: he stands perfect and acceptable to God. By Christ—by faith in Christ—man is freed from sin; man is able to be restored to perfection and righteousness.

But how about paradise? How can a perfect earth and a perfect paradise be restored? By the promise and power of God. God has promised to recreate a new heavens and a new earth, to create a paradise throughout the whole universe for man. The day is coming when God will show the riches of His goodness and grace beyond anything we can ask or think. When? In the glorious day of redemption and of eternity.

Note that God put Adam in the Garden. The greatest thing in all the world is to be called and placed by God. No matter where it is, the place God chooses for us is the best place to be.

(2:15) Man, Purpose— Labor— Work— Employment: man’s purpose is to serve God by working and taking care of the Garden—the paradise in which he lives. God had given Adam the Garden—the most perfect, beautiful, and bountiful paradise imaginable—and God expected Adam to work and keep up the Garden.

1. Man was to look after the Garden. He was to “dress” (abhadh) it. The word means to work, till, cultivate, dress, and serve the Garden. Man was also to “keep” (shamar) the Garden. This word means to watch over, to guard, to keep, to look after, to take care of. The point is this: man was made responsible—personally responsible—for the Garden of Eden. The Garden was paradise: it was the most perfect, beautiful, and bountiful place imaginable, but it had to be looked after and cared for. This duty was placed upon man. Man was...

Simply stated, man was to keep paradise as paradise. God had created the Garden, the most perfect, beautiful, and bountiful paradise imaginable; it was up to man to keep the Garden perfect, beautiful, and bountiful.

2. Man was created to be a responsible person and an active, working person. Man was not made to be irresponsible nor to be inactive, idle, slothful, complacent, or lazy. He was made to work and to work hard.

3. Man was created to have a strong sense of purpose and of self-worth. Man is a mental and emotional creature. Man needs strong purpose in life, to feel that he is worthwhile, that what he does matters and is significant and counts for something. Man also needs strong self-image, to feel that he is somebody, a person who matters to other people. Both purpose and self-image come—to a great degree—from the work that a man does. If a man’s work is significant, then he has a reason for getting up in the morning and living, and he feels worthwhile and has a strong purpose and self-image. This is the way God made man. This is the reason God charged man to work and to look after the Garden and the world. Man needs to think, plan, discover, work, and do something profitable. From such mammoth responsibility, man’s sense of purpose and self-worth are somewhat met.

Paradise has been lost and the earth has been corrupted. Adam’s sin and fall destroyed both. But Jesus Christ has promised to restore both. He has promised...

· to create the most perfect, beautiful, and bountiful paradise imaginable—a city that will glisten with all the jewels and glory of God Himself—a city that will be the summit of perfection and provision—a city that will be the very city of God and Christ—a city that will serve as the capital of the universe, and be named the City of God, the Holy City, the New Jerusalem.

The point is this: every person should make sure he is acceptable to God, that he is to be a citizen of the new heavens and earth, of the coming paradise of God.

Paradise has been lost, and the earth has been corrupted, but the earth has not been destroyed. We still have our minds and bodies and we still have the earth upon which to live. Therefore, the charge of God still stands: man’s purpose upon earth is still the same. We are to look after and take care of the earth. We are to cultivate it and keep it, watching ever so closely over its welfare. The earth—its soil, air, water, and growth—is to be preserved and protected, both for succeeding generations and for God.

(2:16-17) Man, Purpose: man’s purpose is to choose to live with God—to love, worship, and fellowship with Him. Why did God create man? Why did God put man upon earth and not immediately into heaven? These two verses show us: God wants a being who chooses—freely chooses—to live with Him. God wants a creature with freedom of choice, a creature who wills to live with Him—who wills to love, worship, and fellowship with Him supremely.

1. There was the great incentive for man to choose life with God. Man was given every tree in the Garden except one. Man had everything:

Man had the attraction, the appeal, the pull of all this. Man had the attraction and the right to all the fruit in the Garden. There was only one fruit he could not touch—only one fruit among all the fruit. There was no excuse for man ever choosing any fruit—or anything—over God. Man had the greatest incentive in all the world for choosing God. By choosing God, man had everything: every tree—all of the abundance and benefits of paradise itself.

2. There was the great choice—the great test—that had to be made. It involved one simple prohibition. How was God going to arrange for man to exercise his freedom of choice, his will? How was God going to test man’s choice—his love and loyalty—for God? Man had to be tested to show that he loved God above all else, that he wanted to live with God. The test was essential; otherwise, man would be nothing more than a robot.

a. There had to be something for man to choose other than God. If a man was to make a choice for God, the opportunity to turn away from God had to be present. Something—some object, some act—had to be chosen for man to exercise his ability or choice for God and for life with Him. Note this: man was within nature, within the most beautiful Garden of the world. The Garden had the most excellent trees of the world, and the trees bore the most luscious fruit in the world. One of man’s basic needs and drives was to satisfy his hunger with the luscious fruit so richly provided. What better way for man to exercise his ability or choice for God than through the flesh, than to have a commandment involving the fruit needed to meet his physical need for food?

In fact, forbidding fruit within such an environment as the Garden of Eden would be the very thing for God to do—the natural, expected thing.

b. God gave man a choice, a very simple and easy choice. God set only one restriction, and that one restriction was only upon one tree. Adam could eat from every tree in the Garden except one, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Note: the command in the Hebrew is in the strongest language possible: you must not, absolutely must not, eat of the tree.

c. God gave man this choice for a very specific reason: man is a spiritual being. Man was created with a need for God. Every thinking and honest person knows this, knows it down deep within his heart. But man not only needs God, man has the ability to live with God. Man can have his need met; man can seek after and come to know God. It is a matter of choice: man has to choose to live with God. The decision is up to man.

This is the reason God gave Adam this command. Adam needed God’s Word—needed God to speak with him—needed God to fellowship and interact with him. Man needed God’s Word, needed God to tell him in simple terms what to do and what not to do. It is in seeking after and in obeying God that man interacts and fellowships with God. This is clearly seen in Adam.

God simply said, “You may eat from every tree in the garden, but you may not eat from this one tree” (Genesis 2:16-17). God spoke, set the course for man’s life. Adam was to simply do what God said. Adam was to choose the life God had laid out for him.

Adam had to choose; he had to make a decision. The tree was there. If he left the forbidden fruit alone, he would be obeying God and choosing to live with God. If he ate the fruit, he would be disobeying God and choosing to walk his own way in life.

The same is true with us. We have to choose; we have to make a decision. Jesus Christ, God’s Son, has come to earth. He is there. If we ignore, neglect, deny, or rebel against Him, we disobey God and choose to live without God. If we receive Jesus Christ as our Savior, we obey God and choose to live with God.

Man does not live by bread alone, but by every Word that comes out of the mouth of God. Life—true fellowship, worship, and service—with God is found by living in the Word of God and letting the Word live itself out in us.

3. There was the result of disobedience: death. The Hebrew literally says, “Dying, you shall die.” If man disobeys God—fails to choose life with God—he dies. Death is sure, absolute, certain. It cannot be stopped.

In the Bible death means separation—separation from God. If a man chooses to live without God, then he will not live with God. He will die—be separated, cut off from God. This is exactly what Adam chose. He turned away from God—away from God’s Word—and turned to his own will and way in life. He did his own thing. As a result, he died.

A covenant is a binding arrangement between two or more parties that governs their relationship.^3-3 The word command is introduced at this point because it’s God who makes the terms of the agreement. God is the Creator and man is the creature, a “royal tenant” in God’s wonderful world, so God has the right to tell the man what he can and cannot do. God didn’t ask for Adam’s advice; He simply gave him His commandment.

God had given great honor and privilege to Adam in making him His vice-regent on the earth (1:28), but with privilege always comes responsibility. The same divine Word that brought the universe into being also expresses God’s love and will to Adam and Eve and their descendants (Ps. 33:11). Obedience to this Word would keep them in the sphere of God’s fellowship and approval. All God’s commands are good commands and bring good things to those who obey them (Ps. 119:39; Prov. 6:20-23). “And His commands are not burdensome” (1 John 5:3).

God placed two special trees in the middle of the Garden: the Tree of Life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen. 2:9, 17; 3:3, 22, 24). Eating from the tree of life would confer immortality (v. 22). Eating from the second tree would confer an experiential knowledge of good and evil, but it would also bring death (2:17).^3-4 Since they had never experienced evil, Adam and Eve were like innocent children (Deut. 1:39; Isa. 7:15-16). When they disobeyed God, they became like Him in being able to discriminate between good and evil; but they became unlike Him in that they lost their sinlessness and eventually died.

But why did God have to test Adam and Eve? There may be many answers to that question, but one thing is sure: God wanted humans to love and obey Him freely and willingly and not because they were programmed like robots who had to obey. In one sense, God “took a risk” when He made Adam and Eve in His own image and gave them the privilege of choice; but this is the way He ordained for them to learn about freedom and obedience. It’s one of the basic truths of life that obedience brings blessing and disobedience brings judgment.

The first marriage (Gen. 2:19-25)-- Man’s Delight (2:18‑25)

At the close of the sixth day of Creation, God had surveyed everything He had made and pronounced it “very good” (1:31). But now God says that there’s something in His wonderful world that is not good: the man is alone. In fact, in the Hebrew text, the phrase “not good” is at the beginning of the Lord’s statement in 2:18.

One deficiency remains. There is now adequate water, the beautiful and bountiful provision of the garden, and a man to cultivate it. But there is not yet a companion suitable for man. This need is met in verses 18‑25.

What was “not good” about man’s solitude? After all, Adam could fellowship with God, enjoy the beauty of the Garden and eat of its fruits, accomplish his daily work, and even play with the animals. What more could he want? God knew what Adam needed: “a helper suitable for him” (v. 18, niv). There was no such helper among the animals, so God made the first woman and presented her to the man as his wife, companion, and helper. She was God’s special love gift to Adam (3:12).

The garden, with its pleasures and provisions for food and meaningful activity was not sufficient unless these delights could he shared. God would provide Adam with that which he needed most.

Then the Lord God said, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him’ (Genesis 2:18).

Adam’s mate was to be a very special creation, a ‘helper, suitable for him’ (verse 18). She was to be a ‘helper,’ not a slave, and not an inferior. The Hebrew word ezer is most interesting. It was a word that Moses obviously liked, for in Exodus 18:4 we are told that this was the name he gave to one of his sons.

And the other was named Eliezer (El=God), for he said, ‘The God of my father was my help (ezer), and delivered me from the sword of Pharaoh’ (Exodus 18:4).

The other three times ezer is found used by Moses in Deuteronomy (33:7,26,29), it refers to God as man’s helper. So also in the Psalms (20:2; 33:20; 70:5; 89:19; 115:9; 121:1,2; 124:8; 146:5).

The point of the word as it is most often employed in the Old Testament is that the help given implies no inferiority whatsoever. In a way consistent with its usage, God is helping man through women. What a beautiful thought. How far above some conceptions this is.

Then also, she is a helper who ‘corresponds to’ Adam. One translation reads, “… I will make a helper like him.”[10]

This is precisely opposite the point. Yet this is often what we consider the perfect wife—one who is just like us. Incompatibility is by divine design in many instances. As Dwight Hervey Small has correctly observed, Incompatibility is one of the purposes of marriages! God has appointed conflict and burdens for lessons in spiritual growth. These are to be subservient to high and holy purposes.[11]

Just as Eve was fashioned so as to correspond to Adam in a physical way, so she complimented him socially, intellectually, spiritually and emotionally.

As a result, when I counsel those who plan to marry, I do not seek to discover as many points of similarity as possible. Instead, I am concerned that each partner has an accurate view of what the other is really like, and that they are committed to the fact that God has joined them permanently. A recognition that God has made man and woman differently by design, and a determination to attain unity in this diversity is essential to a healthy marriage.

Before creating this counterpart, God first whet his appetite. The creatures which God had formed are now brought to Adam to name. This naming reflected Adam’s rule over the creatures, as God intended (cf. 1:28). It probably involved a careful study on Adam’s part to note the unique characteristics of each creature.[12]

This naming process may have taken some time. In the process, Adam would observe that no mere creature could ever fill the void in his life. Further, I would use a little sanctified imagination to conjecture that Adam observed each creature with its mate, a wonderfully designed counterpart. Adam must have realized that he, alone, was without a mate.

At this moment of intense need and desire, God put Adam in a deep sleep,[13] and from his rib and attached flesh[14] fashioned the woman.[15] He then presented the woman to the man.

And the man said, ‘This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man (Genesis 1:23).

I like the way the RSV renders Adam’s initial response, “at last … ”[16]

In this expression there is a mixture of relief, ecstasy, and delighted surprise. “This (for Adam has not yet named her) is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh” (verse 23a). The name of Adam’s mate is woman. The English translation nicely picks up the play on similar sounds. In Hebrews, man would be pronounced ’ish; woman would be ’ishshah. While the sounds are similar, the roots of the two words are different. Appropriately ’ish may come from a parallel Arabic root, conveying the idea of ‘exercising power,’ while the term ’ishshah may be derived from an Arabic parallel, meaning ‘to be soft’.[17]

For this cause a man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh (Genesis 2:24).

From the account it is imperative that a man leave his mother and father and cleave to his wife. What is the relationship between this command to leave and cleave and the creation of women? Verse 24 begins, “For this cause … ” What cause is this? We can understand the reason only when we explain the command. Man is to leave his parents, not in the sense of avoiding his responsibility to them (e.g. Mark 7:10‑13; Ephesians 6:2,3), but in the sense of being dependent upon them. He must cease to live under their headship and begin to function alone as the head of a new home.[18]

The woman is not commanded similarly because she simply transfers from one head to another. While she once was subject to her father, now she is joined to her husband. The man, however, has the more difficult transition. He, as a child, was dependent upon and submissive to his mother and father.

When a man marries he must go through the more radical transition from a dependent, submissive son to an independent (from a parents) leader, who functions as the head of the home.

As many have observed, the husband‑wife relationship is permanent while the parent‑child relationship is temporary. Even if the parents are unwilling to terminate the dependent relationship of son to parents, the son is responsible to do so. To fail to do so is to refuse the kind of bond necessary with his wife.

The woman was by no means a “lesser creature.” The same God who made Adam also made Eve and created her in His own image (1:27). Both Adam and Eve exercised dominion over Creation (v. 29). Adam was made from the dust, but Eve was made from Adam’s side, bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh (2:23).

The plain fact is that Adam needed Eve. Not a single animal God had created could do for Adam what Eve could do. She was a helper “meet [suitable] for him.” When God paraded the animals before Adam for him to name them, they doubtless came before him in pairs, each with its mate; and perhaps Adam wondered, “Why don’t I have a mate?”

Though Eve was made to be a “suitable [face-to-face] helper” for Adam, she wasn’t made to be a slave. The noted Bible commentator Matthew Henry wrote: “She was not made out of his head to rule over him, nor out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near his heart to be beloved.” Paul wrote that “the woman is the glory of man” (1 Cor. 11:7, niv); for if man is the head (1 Cor. 11:1-16; Eph. 5:22-33), then woman is the crown that honors the head.

Now, perhaps, we are in a position to see the relationship of this command to the creation account. What is the reason for its mention here in Genesis? First of all, there are no parents to whom Adam or Eve have been born. Eve’s origin is directly from her husband, Adam. The union or bond between Adam and his wife is the union of coming from one flesh (Adam’s) and of becoming one flesh (in physical union). This bond is greater than that between parent and child. A woman is, of course, the product of her parents, as the man is of his. But the original union involved no parents, and the wife was a part of the flesh of her husband. This first marriage, then, is evidence of the primacy of the husband‑wife relationship over that of the parent‑child relationship.

The last verse is not incidental. It tells us a great deal that we need to know. “And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed” (Genesis 2:25).

We learn, for example, that a sexual side of this relationship was a part of the paradise experience. Sex did not originate with or after the fall. Procreation and physical intimacy were intended from the beginning (cf. 1:28). Also we see that sex could be enjoyed to its fullest in the divine plan. Disobedience to God did not heighten sexual pleasure; it diminished it. Today the world wishes to believe that they have invented sex and that God only seeks to prevent it. But sex, apart from God, is not what it could or should be.

Ignorance, if you will forgive me for saying so, is bliss. In our generation we are cool, if you prefer, sophisticated, only if we know (by experience) all there is to know about sex. “How naive are those who have never had sex before marriage,” we are led to believe. There are many things it is better not to know. Sex was never enjoyed so much as it was in sweet ignorance.

Later revelation does add much light to this text. Our Lord, significantly, quotes from chapter one and chapter two as though from one account (Matthew 19:4,5), a fatal blow to the source document critics.

The divine origin of marriage means it is no mere social invention (or convention), but a divine institution for man. Because God joins a man and woman in marriage, it is a permanent union: “What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate” (Matthew 19:6).

The fact that Adam preceded his wife in creation and that Eve was brought forth from Adam also establishes the reasons why the husband is to exercise headship over his wife in marriage (cf. I Corinthians 11:8-9; I Timothy 2:13). The role of women in the church is not just Paul’s idea, restricted to the time and culture of the Corinthian Christians. The biblical role of women is established on the biblical account of creation (cf. also I Corinthians 14:34).

God’s pattern for marriage wasn’t devised by Adam; as the traditional marriage ceremony states it, “Marriage was born in the loving heart of God for the blessing and benefit of mankind.” No matter what the courts may decree, or society may permit, when it comes to marriage, God had the first word and He will have the last word (Heb. 13:4; Rev. 22:15). Perhaps the Lord looks down on many unbiblical marriages today and says, “From the beginning it was not so” (Matt. 19:8). His original plan was that one man and one woman be one flesh for one lifetime.

God had at least four purposes in mind when He performed the first marriage in the Garden of Eden. First, He wanted suitable companionship for Adam, so He gave him a wife. He gave Adam a person and not an animal, someone who was his equal and therefore could understand him and help him. Martin Luther called marriage “a school for character,” and it is. As two people live together in holy matrimony, the experience either brings out the best in them or the worst in them. It’s an opportunity to exercise faith, hope, and love and to mature in sacrifice and service to one another for God’s glory.

Second, marriage provides the God-given right to enjoy sex and have children. The Lord commanded them to “be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth” (Gen. 1:28). This doesn’t imply that sexual love is only for procreation, because many people marry who are beyond the time of bearing children; but the bearing of children is an important part of the marriage union (1 Tim. 5:14).^3-6

A third purpose for marriage is to encourage self-control (1 Cor. 7:1-7). “It is better to marry than to burn with passion” (v. 9, nkjv). A marriage that’s built only on sexual passion isn’t likely to be strong or mature. Sexual love ought to be enriching and not just exciting, and marriage partners need to respect one another and not just use one another. Throughout Scripture, sexual union outside of marriage is condemned and shown to be destructive, and so are the perversions of the sexual union (Rom. 1:24-27). No matter what the judges or the marriage counselors say, “God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral” (Heb. 13:4, niv).

Finally, marriage is an illustration of the loving and intimate relationship between Christ and His church (Eph. 5:22-33). Paul called this “a great mystery,” that is, a profound spiritual truth that was once hidden but is now revealed by the Spirit. Jesus Christ is the Last Adam (1 Cor. 15:45) and therefore a type of the first Adam.

Adam was put to sleep and his side opened that he might have a wife, but Jesus died on a cross and His blood shed that He might have a bride, the church (John 19:33-37). Christ loves the church, cares for it, and seeks to cleanse it and make it more beautiful for His glory. One day Christ will claim His bride and present her in purity and glory in heaven (Jude 24; Rev. 19:1-9).

When Adam saw his bride, he burst into joyful praise (Gen. 2:23), as though he were saying, “At last I have a suitable companion!” (The niv sets this apart as a poem.) Her identity as “woman” would remind everybody that she was taken out of “man,” and the term “man” would always be a part of “woman.”^3-7 She was made from him and for him, and he needed her; therefore, they will always belong to each other and lovingly serve each other.

Adam didn’t speak the words recorded in verses 24-25. They are God’s reflection on the event and His enunciation of the principle of marital unity declared by Adam. Woman is one with man both in origin (she came from man) and in marriage. In the sexual union and in their children, the man and woman are “one flesh.” Marriage is a civil relationship, regulated by law, and should be a spiritual relationship and a heart relationship, governed by the Word of God and motivated by love.

But marriage is basically a physical relationship. The man and the woman are not primarily “one spirit” or “one heart,” as essential as those things are, but “one flesh.” Hence, the importance of “leaving” the former family and “cleaving” to one’s mate (Eph. 5:30-31), the forming of a new relationship that must be nurtured and protected.

The phrase “one flesh” implies that anything that breaks the physical bond in marriage can also break the marriage itself. One such thing is death; for when one mate dies, the other mate is free to remarry because the marriage bond has been broken (Rom. 7:1-3; 1 Cor. 7:8-9; 1 Tim. 5:14).

We live in a world created by God, we are creatures made in the image of God, and we enjoy multiplied blessings from the hand of God. How tragic that so many people leave God out of their lives and become confused wanderers in a unfriendly world, when they could be children of God in their Father’s world.

Conclusion

Having considered the passage in terms of its parts, let us focus our attention on this passage as a whole. No passage in all of the Bible so concisely defines the things which really count in life. Life’s meaning can only be grasped in relationship to the God Who has created man in His image and likeness. While this image has been distorted due to the fall, those who are in Christ are being renewed in Christ’s image:

… and that you be renewed in the Spirit of your mind, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth (Ephesians 4:23,24).

… and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him (Colossians 3:10).

Furthermore, man’s meaning in life is not only found in the dignity which God has given him as being created in His image, but in the work which He gives him to do. Men often view work as a curse. While work has been affected by the fall (Genesis 3:17‑19), it was given before the fall and is a means of blessing and fulfillment if it is done as unto the Lord (cf. Colossians 3:22‑24).

Last, the institution of marriage is given by God to deeply enrich our lives. The work we are to do is much richer and fuller when we share it with God’s counterpart for us. Here, then, is the real essence of life—a recognition of our divinely ordained dignity, our duty, and our delight. Our worth, our work, our wife are all a source of great blessing if they are ‘in the Lord.’

[1] I Timothy 2:13.

[2] I Corinthians 11:8,12.

[3] Genesis 2:23.

[4] “Now it is a well‑known fact that the book of Genesis is by its own author divided into ten sections, to each of which he gives the title ‘story’ (toledo‚th); cf. 5:1; 6:9; 10:1; 11:10, 27; 25:12, 19; 36:1, (9); 37:2. This circumstance alone, plus the use of the round number ten, would definitely point to the fact that here the expression, ‘these are the toledo‚th’ must also be a heading. In all other instances of its use in other books the same fact is observable; cf. Num. 3:1; Ruth 4:18; I Chron. 1:29; it is as always a heading.” H. C. Leupold, Exposition of Genesis (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1942), I, p. 110.

[5] “Verse 4b takes us back into the time of the work of creation, more particularly to the time before the work of the third day began, and draws our attention to certain details, which, being details, could hardly have been inserted in chapter one: the fact that certain forms of plant life, namely the kinds that require the attentive care of man in greater measure, had not sprung up. Apparently, the whole work of the third day is in the mind of the writer.” Ibid., p.112.

“I have been very insistent that the first chapter is to be understood chronologically. What is seen by the order of development, the progression of thought. It is seen also by the chronological emphasis‑‑day one, day two, and so on. You do not find that in the second chapter of Genesis.

There, instead of giving a chronological order of statement, the Lord is stating matters step by step to prepare for the account of the temptation.” E. J. Young, In The Beginning, (Carlisle, Pennsylvania, The Banner of Truth Trust, 1976), p. 70.

[6] Such appears to be the view of Leupold, I, pp. 113‑114.

[7] “What are we to understand by the ‘ed? Not a mist! The word is apparently related to a Sumerian word. It seems to refer to subterranean waters, and what we have here is either a breaking forth of water in some way from under the ground, or possibly a river overflowing its banks. I do not think we can be dogmatic here.” Young, pp. 67‑68. Cf. also Derek Kidner, Genesis (Chicago: InterVarsity Press, 1967), pp. 59‑60.

[8] “The word ‘Eden’ in Hebrew may mean a delight or a pleasure. I am not sure that that is what it means here. There is a Sumerian word that means a steppe, or a plain, a wide plain, and in the eastern part of this plain God planted a garden. Without being dogmatic I give my opinion that that is what ‘Eden’ means. So the garden is planted.” Young, p. 71.

[9] “The verb employed here accords more with the “Yahweh” character of God; yatsar means to ‘mold’ or ‘form.’ It is the word that specifically describes the activity of the potter (Jer. l8:2ff). The idea to be emphasized is that with the particular care and personal attention that a potter gives to his task. God gives tokens of His interest in man, His creature, by molding him as He does.” Leupold, p. 115.

[10] Cf. Leupold, p. 129.

[11] Dwight Hervey Small, Design For Christian Marriage (Old Tappan, New Jersey: Fleming H. Revell, 1971), p. 58. Elsewhere Small remarks, “As Elton Trueblood has suggested, a successful marriage is not one in which two people, beautifully matched, find each other and get along happily ever after because of this initial matching. It is, instead, a system by means of which persons who are sinful and contentious are so caught up by a dream and a purpose bigger than themselves that they work through the years, in spite of repeated disappointment, to make the dream come true.” p. 28.

[12] “For the expression to give names, in the Hebrew usage of the word ‘name,’ involves giving a designation expressive of the nature or character of the one named. This was not a crude fable, where, according to a Hebrew notion, the accidental ejaculations at the sight of new and strange creatures were retained as names for the future.” Leupold, p. 131.

[13] “Tardemah is indeed a ‘deep sleep,’ not a state of ecstasy, as the Greek translators render; nor a ‘hypnotic trance’ (Skinner), for traces of hypnosis are not to be found in the Scriptures. A ‘trance’ might be permissible. The root, however, is that of the verb used in reference to Jonah when he sleeps soundly during the storm.” Ibid, p. 134.

[14] “The word tsela translated ‘rib,’ definitely bears this meaning, (contra v. Hofman), although it is not necessary to think only of the bare bone; for, without a doubt, bone and flesh will have been used for her of whom the man afterward says ‘bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh,’” (v. 23). Ibid.

[15] “The activity of God in fashioning the rib taken from man is described as a building (wayyi ‘bhen). Rather than being an indication of the work of a different author, the verb grows out of the situation as being the most appropriate. It would not have been seemly to use yatsar ‘to mold,’ a verb applicable in the case of clay, not of flesh. ‘Build’ applies to the fashioning of a structure of some importance; it involves constructive effort.” Ibid, p. 135.

[16] Or, as Leupold suggests, “Now at length” (p. 136).

[17] Leupold, pp. 136‑137.

[18] Caution must be exercised, I believe, in the application of Bill Gothard’s principle ‘chain of counsel.’ While the wise will seek counsel and some of that may well come from parents, undue dependence is a real danger. The problem is not so much with the principle, but with its application.