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East of Eden
March 25, 2020
Now we see that In the beginning God…created. In 6 days He created what we know to be the known universe. He created the sun, moon, and the stars, and everything in it, after which God created humanity. And when God was done with that we are told God said this is “very good!”
Now we know from the story that this was more than what we might think of as modern day garden or back yard. Adam and Eve were meant to be caretakers of this place God had created.
There were many things in this garden to look at and to eat, to discover and to cultivate. Things were different before sin entered into this world, very different. We know that for some reason the serpent, who is described as the craftiest creature in the Garden of Eden, the serpent could speak to Adam and Eve. Oh, and trees had supernatural powers in their fruit that would have an effect on those who ate it. At least two separate trees did. One was the tree of knowledge of both good and evil. The other tree was the tree of everlasting life.
When God had finished creating everything, He rested and instructed Adam and Eve not only to be caretakers of everything , but He wanted them to discover. Now I know that we have traditionally interpreted the word subdue in this passage and that sounds like a conquering word. but another definition, and I believe in this instance a better interpretation, is to discover. Adam and Eve were to discover how God did all of this. They were to discover what God designed and how all of this creation fits together.
God also gave them another command. They could eat of any tree in the garden, except for the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil. They had millions of things to do – and here’s an extra lesson – but they did the one thing they weren’t supposed to do. If we filled up our time with the things we need and should be doing – would there be time to do the things we ought not to do? My point is this – we could save much heartache and pain in this life if we would stick to all the things we need to be doing! Now back to our lesson today.
It’s interesting, that in light of our current world situation the question has come up, How does evil exist if God didn’t create it? I am working on that answer, I really don’t know yet. I am not sure that It’s a simple easy answer.
For instance some say , that evil is where God isn’t. And that may be true - but it’s not a complete truth about evil – I believe it’s a characteristic of or a description about evil, but not the creation of the existence of evil.
Some may say that God did create evil. God created Lucifer, who was once a beautiful angel who rebelled against God. Since God created Lucifer, and Lucifer through his rebellion is evil, God created evil.
But I can’t find a place in Scripture, where God caused Lucifer to fall, just as God did not cause Adam and Eve to fall. So, I don’t know much about the creation of evil. But I do know that evil, in some shape or form was in the Garden. And the serpent who we equate with evil convinced Adam and Eve to disobey or rebel against God, and we call that willful disobedience or sin.
When Adam and Eve brought sin into this world. they had to leave the Garden of Eden. God was concerned that if they were to eat from that other special tree, The Tree of Everlasting Life, they would be in this sinful state forever. And that would make it impossible for reconciliation and redemption.
Genesis 3:21-24 (NIV) The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.
So, Adam and Eve leave the Garden of Eden and they are now East of the Garden. The Bible is specific here to put them East. Later in Genesis when Cain and Abel, the two brothers of the first family, have a problem and Cain gets jealous and kills Abel. Cain is sent to the land of Nod, East of Eden.
If you continue to read in Genesis, it seems as though the writer of this book has some really bad feelings about what it means to be East of Eden. In fact throughout the entire Old Testament, humanity seems to get worse and worse the further East from the Garden they go.
The thing of it is, we are all still today, living East of the Garden. We know because to date I don’t believe anyone has found the cherubim with the flaming sword. I always thought that would be the next great discovery of the great Indiana Jones. Finding true west and the Garden of Eden.
But I don’t think that Spielberg ever read any of my letters, so I won’t hold my breath for a royalty check for that idea, LOL.
Like I said, Genesis isn’t the only place in the Bible where we find that good is in the west and evil or sin is in the east. And for those of us here in the United States in this century it’s probably a cultural thing. Because most of us don’t read our OT in Hebrew. Because if we did we would know the word Kedem is Hebrew for East. And we would draw the conclusion about a parallel with the Temple and sacrifices because the Temple was built according to Kedem.
Now the Temple had to face east. The altar of sacrifice was East, the Holy of Holies was West. Are you seeing the similarities here, everything in the Temple went from the East to the West, symbolizing a return to what is good - symbolizing a return to what is holy - symbolizing a return to our Creator - symbolizing a return to God and Eden.
Most importantly, if we understood the thoughts and ideas behind the Hebrew holy days, we would understand that on the holiest day of the year, Yom Kippur, when the sins of all of Israel are atoned for, the high priest would offer the sacrifice on the altar in the east then walk the length of the Temple to sprinkle the blood on the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies – west. Back and forth he would go all day long.
Now – I may not be able to definitively say who or what created evil, but when it comes to our predicament today, we live east of the Garden. In other words, we are not in a perfect place. But even when Eden was inhabited somehow evil was there. And even now – after Jesus has died and has resurrected – meaning the gift of salvation is finished or the solution to the reconciliation and redemption is complete – still something is not right, we are still East.
There is a solution. God has a solution and it’s very simple. His solution is you and me. We are here to combat evil, to turn the tides. Even in this time of great sickness God works through His people for those around His people.
No matter how bad this world gets, we are the agents of change that God has here. We are the hands and feet of Jesus, we are the CHURCH.