A Human in the Garden

We discuss the formation of man in Genesis 2. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:07

Well, welcome back to the Bible and Me podcast. My name is Devin Birdsong. I have Brother Brad and Brother Brett Cottrell here. We're in the middle of the Genesis study. We are in chapter two, verse four, and I'm going to start by reading verse four through six. These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth, when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, every plant of the field before it was in the earth, every herb of the field before it grew, for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground. So the prevailing thought of biblical studies has been that Genesis chapter two, verse four starts a zoom in on one particular day, which is day six. And I don't think that's exactly what's going on here. So we're going to talk about that, but I want us to just look at maybe some things that might have stood out while I was reading that may be different from what we knew previously. One of the main differences I see in the beginning is the use of the Lord God. It's the first time Lord appears before God. So that in itself is a big change because the word Lord there is the Hebrew word Yahweh, and it means the self-existent one, the all-powerful, all-knowing one. So before this time in the creation narrative, Genesis 1, 1 through 2, verse number 3, it's just the supreme power at work. Now there is a all-knowing, an all-powerful and self-existent element to this God who's been at work in the creation account. So it's it's a revelation of the personal side of God, which is what they what the Hebrew readers or first receivers of this text knew about God. He was a relational God. And so now here in verse number four, it's like you're you're gonna catch the relational side of God in what is being described. Anything else in that, in those verses that kind of just jump out at you?

SPEAKER_02 2:34

I just I see in verse five, one thing that stuck out to me was just the fact of God's creation carrying on without man. Mm-hmm. And I guess it was back before when it was just the supreme power of God, the word of God spoke the plants and things into existence, and they they grew and lived without man taking care of them.

SPEAKER_03 2:55

So that could be a call back to um day three. Is that right? Yes, vegetation came in day three, I believe. Okay. So we have a description in some ways of day three, which further goes to the idea of this is not a zoom in on one particular day. Right. Because what's being described here is uh some things that went on in day three. But notice this, you said there was the absence of man here, but there's also the absence of plant. Every plant of the field, it's actually before it was in the earth, and every uh herb of the field before it grew. So what that's a weird way of communicating that, right? Yes, like why would you describe that? But he's describing the larger realm of the dry land, the big boundary. It wasn't completely inhabited yet. Anything else that stands out as like an odd way of talking? And I want to kind of hone in on that idea because sometimes as Bible readers, we might just pass over something that's said in an odd way or described in an odd way. And the Torah, which is the first five books of the Bible, does this all the time. It creates tension over a text, and that is like an invitation to talk about why it would be said that way. And you don't actually find out sometimes why something is said that way until it's repeated later in a in a passage. What about the first line? These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created. Generations are described later on in the biblical account as like human generations, right? And you're talking about skies and dry land as as if there's There's been skies and dry lands before. Yeah. Why would why would they use that to be why would the writer use that or God use that to convey the message of these are the generations of the heaven and the earth? I just wanted to highlight that to create some kind of tension. It's it's like this is the history of how it came into be.

SPEAKER_02 5:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 5:12

But I thought we just read that in chapter one in the beginning part of chapter number two.

SPEAKER_02 5:17

Right.

SPEAKER_03 5:18

Why would you describe the heavens or the skies in the dry land as being talked about like it's almost almost like you would talk about humanity?

SPEAKER_02 5:29

So is this talking about the birth, the birth of the world, the birth of creation?

SPEAKER_03 5:35

Yes, it is talking about the birth, the historical uh aspect, but it's also if you talk about the birth of a human and you're talking about the generations of that human, it's speaking of a relational aspect between the previous generation, right?

SPEAKER_01 5:51

Correct.

SPEAKER_03 5:51

So if heavens and earth have a partnership to bring about life with not just humans, but plants and humanity here, there's something going on between heaven and earth, which we know in the uh in chapter number one, God's ideal was that heaven and earth come together to create the heavenly realm and the earthly realm. We talked about that at length, how there's there's a real relationship going on between heavenly rulers and earthly rulers, the sky uh rulers and the earth rulers are gonna have some kind of connection, but it's it's more than that. The heavens and the earth itself, or the the sky and the dry land itself, is going to come together, and something's gonna come out of this. It's it's gonna be amazing. So, this is describing um the realm, the greater realm of the earth, as being um almost like that wild and waste territory that was talked about in Genesis chapter number one and verse number two. The earth was without form and void. There's still this emptiness. There's a there's a lot of work to come by in order for the the full realm of the dry land to completely uh be inhabited. There's the absence of plants, the absence of humanity, but there's room for God's divine purpose to be brought about on the dry land, and it's gonna happen almost in concert. Um it's gonna be partly what goes on in the heavens and partly what goes on on the dry land itself. Verse number six says, but there went up a mist from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground. So things are getting ready. What's going on here? There's not a man, there's not a plant yet, but in order for the dry land to produce those or dry land to uh be able to house those, there has to be the gift of water. So there's a mist that went up from the very middle, the very center. And this uh also is kind of a call back to Genesis chapter number one and verse number two. It's God's giving this gift of usable water, and this is how it's used on the dry land. It comes up from the midst of the earth, from the very center point, the middle. When we read the Bible, we kind of read these as kind of Passover verses, like, you know, not a lot going on here, but there's real reasons to create this tension of why you would talk about heavens or the skies and the dry land as having generations or there being some kind of a relational aspect between the two of those, because the heaven and the earth from then on are going to become partners in sustaining life and God's goodness.

SPEAKER_02 8:55

I'll be honest, that's a really hard thing to wrap my mind around. It's a beautiful thing to think about as we're sitting here talking about it, but to just imagine sitting down and just reading for the sake of reading and catching that is really hard.

SPEAKER_03 9:09

Yeah, it's very difficult. It's it's experiencing this passage in a completely different way. Yeah. But I think there's a huge importance to that because later on, think about the implications of one of these elements being rebellious. What about if the if the earth decides not to take in the water? Or what if the if the heavens decides not to give the water? This is going to be the life-sustaining force that moves throughout the rest of human history, and it's going to be a partnership. And who keeps us all going? It's God, it's the Lord God. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:46

I think that just that foundation there sets the tone of looking at God for how He and for how and who He really is, and the power that He has. The fact that all these intricate parts of the world and the earth and creation that we just chalk it up to it it just happens. That's all controlled by God. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:07

I think I referenced it in an earlier episode about the human body being so intricate and the deep seeing that um how it all works together. And I've never really seen the creation of the physical world as that intricate, and just that that does just show I looked looked in the notes of my Bible, it talks about in verse six, talks about like canals and and things to water irrigation. Yeah. Talking in this verse, and it's that's so intricate that God created that to come out of the out of the earth. That's what would be needed. And just seeing that here, you you see the intricacy of his design. Yes. Um it is amazing. No man could could come up with that.

SPEAKER_03 10:50

Right. Let's move forward to this idea. So in verse number six, there went up this mist or this water source that comes out of the ground and waters the whole face of the ground. How would the entire face of the ground get watered with this mist? It's not describing multiple springs of water. So if the entire face of the ground gets the water source, what's being said there? How does water get spread to the entire face of the ground from one particular water source or all of the dry land? How is that possible? It's only possible if the water source were at an elevated level, right? In order for all of the dry land to get the benefit, then the water source has to be at an elevated level. Flow down all of it. I mentioned that because there's things in this text that are explicitly said, and then things that are implicitly said. You only get that if you meditate on the on the verse and put your mind there, what's being described.

SPEAKER_00 11:54

Right.

SPEAKER_03 11:54

That's going to become very important when it when you find out what happens next. So let's read to what happens next. And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul. And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there he put the man whom he had formed. So now we find God forming something. It's the very same word that's used, it's used 62 times in the Old Testament. And one of the greatest ways to do biblical studies concerning word studies is to see where it's used elsewhere in the Old Testament and see how other writers used it, and that offers some commentary back on what's going on here, what's being said here. This particular word only being used 62 times in the Old Testament, it's relatively easy to figure out what is being talked about here. So the word for formed means uh fashioned. It's the very same word that Jeremiah chapter 18 uh talks about when Jeremiah's told to go down to the potter's house and watch the potter work with clay, which clay is water and dust together, or water and earth together. So you're supposed to think when you read further on into the Old Testament, you're supposed to think about God actually getting his hands in the dirt and forming man. Here again, it's the Lord God, He's the relational God, He's the all-knowing, all-powerful, self-existent one. Nobody gives him the power that he has, it's just within him to impart to other things in the creation. And he steps down and gets his hands in the dirt.

SPEAKER_01 13:46

I've always just seen in that if I was going to go form something in the dust of the ground, I would go use my finger and draw an outline. And that's how I think I've always just seen God doing that. Me too. He drew an outline of man and then he breathed life into the nostrils, and poof, there's the man. But with what you just said, reading into that, no, there's a lot more hands-on in that forming like you would clay. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 14:16

So if the uh later texts in the Bible are supposed to inform what's going on here and paint the picture of what's going on here, and maybe this is what you're getting to. It's not an outline that he's drawing with the human laying down, right? God's forming the man standing up. Up.

SPEAKER_01 14:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 14:37

And in order for him to breathe into the man's nostrils the breath of life, this man was face to face with God. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:45

On the same level.

SPEAKER_01 14:47

I've I've always seen man laying on his back.

SPEAKER_02 14:50

I I've no I've just seen the outline of a body, you know, you've seen that crime scene. I that's just what I've imagined. Yeah. Just a rough sketch of you know the limbs, and then I don't know, God blows towards it, and then yeah, I I it's just nothing that I've ever really thought of. Yeah. But to think of that to form from start at the feet and form up, it makes a lot of sense, and it's amazing.

SPEAKER_03 15:14

To think that Adam or the the human became face to face with God and God blows his own breath into him.

SPEAKER_02 15:23

And to think about that when it comes to pottery, and I I forget what grade we did, we did a little bit of pottery in art class, and you you know, you just have a blob of of clay on the wheel, and then you form it up. Yeah, you go up, you don't trace it out. You put pressure, apply pressure, and if you're making a vase and you as you hold the pressure along with water, yeah, yeah. Constantly are getting your hands wet and spraying the clay with water, and you form it up. The mist, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:55

It's amazing. It is, it is. Yeah, here again, it's awesome that you can spend, you know, several minutes time thinking about these verses.

SPEAKER_02 16:04

But then that puts a lot, and I know it's just a a song that we sing, but and I can't remember the title of it now, but the the phrase is coming to my mind, the potter knows the clay. Yes. You put that into this context, and now thinking of God taking his hands and forming clay and then forming man. Yes. And every, you know, if you think of of just drawing an outline in the ground, everything inside that line, you never touched.

SPEAKER_03 16:31

No, right.

SPEAKER_02 16:32

But then if you take the hands and as you form it, you know what's inside every single part of that. And as you form the leg and the torso and the arms and the the head, I mean, God's hands was all over his creation, yes, and knows every intricate part inside that because his hands touched it.

SPEAKER_03 16:51

Yes. So let's back up to what was going on in the creation narrative of chapter one. Remember, we talked about how many things God was just ordering, some things he was bringing into existence by his word, some things he was ordering, but when it came to the creation of man, he stepped closer.

SPEAKER_01 17:10

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 17:11

What's going on on the dry land, he steps closer and he wants to get his hands involved in what's going on on the dry land. It's amazing. It is. Here's the other thing that's amazing to me. Think about the order in which uh the creation narrative works. There's all these realms formed and then they're inhabited. Look what's said right here. There goes up a mist from the earth, verse number six, and watered the whole face of the ground, and the Lord God formed the man. In order for the man to be formed, there had to be this water and dirt together, which which produced the clay.

SPEAKER_01 17:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 17:47

So all of that is already available for God to work with. Here's a couple thoughts. So we talked about this partnership between heaven and earth. If they come together, which I know it had not rained yet, and I don't want to emphasize that, rain had not fallen on the on the earth yet. But later on, the partnership between heaven and earth is rain falls down to to carry on the work of God's creation, of what it takes to sustain this life. The word for earth is uh Adama. The Hebrew word for dust is Adama, or the earth or the dry ground is Adama. So he pulls Adam, the human, out of, he pulls a dirt creature out of the dirt. Uh, what about those two things working in the idea of God saying, Let us make man in our image? We talked about that little song that he sang in uh chapter one, verse number twenty-seven. So God created man in his own image. The image of God created he him, male and female created he them. God says, Let us make man in our image. Could he have been talking? This is just a meditation, could he have been talking as well to the dry land? Let's let's form a partnership. Heaven and earth comes together, and God is the self-existent, heavenly one. Heaven and earth comes together to create this human. And I know there's nothing that's standing against God's purpose in the creation account, but is he giving an invitation to the dry land itself? Join me.

SPEAKER_02 19:33

Yes, because what makes me think that is now realizing the relationship God wants with his creation. Right? So that's the dry land is his creation. Yeah. And so he's asking it to join, have a relationship with him in forming man.

SPEAKER_03 19:49

Yes, and and the ultimate design for mankind is to carry out or to mirror what's happening then happening in the heavenly place through the rest of the dry land. I know that's not what man chooses to do, right? He chose to go against God's purpose, but it's a uh really beautiful thing.

SPEAKER_01 20:08

Man will tend that land once he creates the garden. And so why why not include the the land in your creation?

SPEAKER_03 20:17

In your desire to say let us. What all is God talking to when he says let us? Everything up until that point is working in concert to bring about humanity, sustain humanity, and God's inviting everything that's happened up until this point to join in let us make man. That's just thought. Something else that happens here, verse number eight, and the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden. That's the first time Eden is brought up. First time a direction's brought up, eastward in Eden, and there he put the man whom he had formed. Look at verse number 15. And the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. So these two boundaries are mentioned in verse number eight and verse number fifteen. Eden is mentioned for the first time. So we get the first mention of a division on the dry land. So you got the dry land, and then inside the dry land is Eden. It's a boundary line inside the dry land, which to the Hebrews receiving this text for the first time, they would know that on the very outer lines of this dry land is that unusable water. But then inside it there's a space called Eden, and then there's a space inside of Eden that is called the garden. So it's a three tiered description. You got dry land, you got a boundary inside the dry land, and then you got a boundary inside that boundary. The second boundary is Eden, third boundary is this garden. So God plants this garden eastward in Eden, and there he put the man whom he had formed. So he placed him there. Verse number 15, the English translation says he put him in the garden. The Hebrew word for put in verse number eight and put in verse number 15 is two different Hebrew words. Same English translation, but it's two different Hebrew words. In verse number 15, God is saying he noached him. That's the Hebrew word. It's the very same word for Noah's name. It means rest. So in verse number 15, whatever this little boundary inside of Eden is, or this little territory inside of Eden is, it's a resting spot for man. But there's things that are going on in it. It's he's given purpose inside that rest. Remember us talking about the day of rest where it's it's a it's something for man to pause and do every week. This is saying that God rests man there. So you're supposed to think that whatever's going on in verse number 15 inside this garden is not just a place for man to work, but it's also a place for man and God to meet together and God to rest him. Something that I feel like is lost on a lot of uh a lot of Bible readers is this boundary, this three-tiered boundary. Dry land, Eden, and then the garden at the center. Yeah, I wouldn't see that. And we also, there's a whole lot told about the dry land here in verse number five. It's the empty place. There's not a lot going on out here. There's no plants, no trees, no humanity. Yeah. So God starts in this Eden boundary, but right in the center. This is the place where God and man can meet together. This is the place where God places him, he puts him there. It's it's our meeting place. This is our special place where we can come together. And it's also a place that is completely filled with abundant trees.

SPEAKER_02 24:16

Which to the initial reader, they would see this as this is a symbol of their tabernacle, or this is what their tabernacle is. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 24:24

Okay, expound on that thought.

SPEAKER_02 24:26

That the place their uh not tabernacle, um, what would have been called when they were still before the tabernacle was built in the tent. Yeah. So that was the place in the middle of their camp where before the temple was built. Before the temple, I'm sorry, yes. It is the tabernacle. Before the temple, yes.

SPEAKER_03 24:44

So the way the tabernacle is designed is there's this outer boundary where it's open to the sky. Yes. There's this big altar outside there, and then a wash station where the priests wash themselves. Man could bring their sacrifices to that outer altar. Yes. And then from then on, it's the priest's job to go in and represent men by proxy. Right. They would go into the inner part of the tabernacle, but inside that inner part of the tabernacle that Israel couldn't go into, there was also a little cubicle where once a year the high priest got to go in and have direct communion with God, and God in his visible presence would come down and rest over the uh Ark of the Covenant. So it's exactly what you're supposed to think about. Yeah. Uh, what about some other things later on in the biblical storyline that has this three-tiered system? We get into Genesis chapters six and seven and eight, where Noah is told to build this little cubicle. But if you read the directions, it's pretty vague. It's not explicit directions. It's told about a three-story system where there's all kinds of fruit abundance and animals and men and women, human couples, and they're there in this place, protected from the wild and the waste and all the chaos.

SPEAKER_01 26:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:16

There's a real reason why there's uh uh vague uh descriptions going on in in places like uh, you know, talking about the Ark. We have the Ark Encounter in Kentucky that you and I have actually visited uh a couple years back, Brother Brad. And for them to be able to recreate that off of what the instructions are in Genesis, they had to use a lot of creative liberty because there's not a lot being said there. I hate to mess up people's Bible stories, but what I want to uh highlight is the things that are mentioned are mentioned for a reason. You're supposed to think about going up to meet God. There's uh it it becomes more intense, the presence of God, the the place where man meets with God is a is a very special place, and it's right here in Genesis chapter number two.

SPEAKER_02 27:07

Narrows down too, don't it? The place where you meet God, it puts it on a personal level. Yes, it just it gets smaller and smaller to where it's just ultimately it's just you and God.

SPEAKER_03 27:18

Yeah. So we've talked about so far this realm that's uninhabited yet. There's no plants, it's just dry and dusty, but then somewhere right at the center, there's a mist that comes out of that, out of the middle of the ground. Um, it would create this idea, possibly of an elevated place, and it's it's spreading toward the whole surface of the ground, but then right there is where God chooses to make man. And then he also plants a garden right there at the center and forms man out of that clay. We also talked about how personal God got with man. He's standing face to face with man and breathing into man, yes, his own breath. And then God plants a garden and and puts the man there. This is where this is where me and you are going to meet.

SPEAKER_02 28:12

I think that part of him breathing into the nostrils is such a beautiful picture of what's even happened before of here you have first he makes the land, and then what can the first thing is uninhabitable, and then he gives the life into into that. So here the the clay is still uninhabitable. I mean, it's just it's just a form, but it's still building on that same pattern of here's this creation, and then I put life into it. Yeah. And so seeing that here right now, I just see a statue of a man right formed out of clay, of just dead, just clay. Yeah. And then when God breathes the life into it, then it becomes it's an inhabitable creation.

SPEAKER_01 28:54

Yeah. I think I've always read and assumed that when God created man that he was already in the garden. Yeah. I yeah. But clearly it he was not. Yeah. And so it it kind of shows God has a better plan than just I mean, just what you said, Brad, you know, to make it inhabitable. He created man. It was still in the uh, was it not still in the I guess in the desert, if you will.

SPEAKER_03 29:18

In the dry land.

SPEAKER_01 29:19

In the dry land. I mean, that's where he created him. Then he creates the garden and then then he puts him there. Yeah. I just assumed he was created in the in the beautiful garden already.

SPEAKER_03 29:29

So that's a perfect way to land the plane. All these assumptions that we have when we come to these texts, and we say, Well, I know how to retell that story. It's so important to pay attention to the small things, the order, what's being said here. Just like we found out in Genesis chapter number one, there's a real beauty to the order. Here again, we find out how ordered God is. He's an amazing designer, amazing creator.

SPEAKER_01 29:57

When you first hear about Adam and Eve, you see a picture of a garden tree, there's a snake out of the tree, and there's an apple. That's that's your first, uh, it's my first recollection of of seeing. So I just assume well they just come from the garden. Yeah, it's great. Thoughts as we close?

SPEAKER_02 30:15

I have been guilty in hearing, I've not heard very many conversations like this in the past, but if you hear someone really get into things, I've often thought they're just trying to put things. I think you even maybe mentioned this before on on this uh podcast, putting things where it's really not. Yeah. Trying to overanalyze things. But the more we go through and we we talk about some of these details, the details you've brought up today of God forming man, I mean, it's such a beautiful picture. It is, and it just it's a it's a deeper understanding of God.

SPEAKER_03 30:51

Yeah, I don't want to say what God's not God's word is not saying. I don't want to do that. And so far, we haven't had to get anybody else's ideas, it's the way the literature is laid out. That's what I really want to highlight on this study is the way the literature is laid out speaks a message like a meta message that has something awesome to say. And I want to help other people not discount the arrangement of scripture. It's like this is amazing.

SPEAKER_02 31:23

But the reason this makes sense and the the way we're talking about it is because of the knowledge of the first readers. If it wasn't for that, it still wouldn't make sense to us.

SPEAKER_03 31:34

Completely. And we want to think that we're so far advanced past them. Right.

SPEAKER_02 31:38

You know, you have to you have to put yourself in their mindset to truly understand it and apply it.

SPEAKER_03 31:45

Yeah, God help us.

SPEAKER_02 31:46

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 31:47

Yeah, well, it's been a great, great study, and we're gonna start the next study in verse number nine. We'll go back to eight and nine and uh move on from there.

SPEAKER_00 31:59

And gives me a purpose for my life. Jesus is my judgment. He's the reason that I'm still living. When I die, it's gonna be my reason when I die.