Satans Two Intentions In The Garden?

In this episode we look at the tree of life in Genesis. Most attention goes to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, but the tree of life was never restricted. Adam and Eve were free to eat from it at any time before the fall. After they took the forbidden fruit, everything changed. God drove them out and placed cherubim and a flaming sword to guard the way. We examine why that happened, the possible double intention behind the serpent’s actions, and the mercy shown in preventing a permanent fallen state. The same tree appears again at the end of Scripture, open and free.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:28

We cover the tree of knowledge, and tonight is going to be the tree of life. So let's set the table here. So the garden had two trees standing in the middle of it. These were two very special trees, unlike any other, and one of them carried a very clear command from God Himself. The other one did not. And God placed both the tree of life and the tree of knowledge and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the Garden of Eden. And God told the man that he could eat from every tree except for just one. Now, the tree of life was never placed under any restriction whatsoever. Okay. The man and the woman were free to take from it any time they wanted to before the other fruit was taken. Have you ever realized that? I didn't. And I'll say it again. The man and the woman were absolutely free to take from the tree of life at any time, the tree of knowledge, they did not have this freedom or this liberty to do. Um that detail is that detail almost always gets missed in the text and gets passed over. And most of the attention falls on the tree that was forbidden. So the command is given, the serpent speaks about that to the about it to them, and the woman and the man take it and eat it. And the tree of life is named only at the beginning, and then again at the very end of the chapter. Yet the second time it is mentioned, everything changes. After the fruit of knowledge has been that, after that fruit has been eaten, God speaks of the tree of life in a way that he has not spoken of it before. God says then that the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil, and that if he also reaches out and takes from the tree of life, he will live forever. The thought is left unfinished in the text itself. What follows there is God implementing a plan. God drives and forces the man and the woman out of the garden. He stations the cherubim at the east side and sets a flaming sword that turns in every direction to keep the way of the tree of life from ever being approached again. The tree that had been absolutely freely available is now completely out of bounds. This is not a small change in the story. It's absolutely huge. And from that moment, from that moment on, the whole human race lives on the outside of that guarded path. Watch. So God forms the man from the dust of the ground and breathes life, breathes into him the breath of life. And he places him in the garden to work it and to watch over it. And then God causes every tree that is pleasant to look at and good for food to grow from the ground. In the middle of the garden, he places the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They're both there, right? The command comes next. God tells the man that he may eat freely from every every single tree of the garden, but he must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And the reason is because God says on the day that He he eats from it, he will die. And the tree of life is included in this permission given for every tree. However, there's no separate warning that's attached to it. And later the woman is formed. The servant the serpent speaks to her to her only about the restricted tree. Nothing is said about the tree of life in that conversation. And when the woman so the serpent's talking to her, and when the woman sees that the forbidden tree is good for food, it's pleasing to the eyes and desirable for gaining wisdom, she takes the fruit and she eats it. And she also gives some of her fruit, some of the fruit to her husband, and he eats it with her. And their eyes are then opened. You know the story. They then realize that they're naked, they sow fig leaves together and hide among the trees because they are now ashamed. And they something they did not know. Um they didn't know what being ashamed was. And God walks in the garden in the cool of the day or in the evening, and he calls for the man, and the questions are asked, and the answers are then given. And so consequences are spoken over the serpent, over the woman, and over the man. And the ground itself is then placed under a curse. Pain and hard labor now enter the picture. And then the final movement of the chapter arrives. It's here now. God observes and he says that the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil, and the us being the divine counselor whom he's speaking to. God states that the concern that the man, there's a concern that the man might also take from the tree of life and live forever, but now live forever in the condition that he is now in, in a fallen state. Stay locked in here, please, because this is going to be huge later. So God He sends the man out of the garden to work the ground from which he was taken. And he drives him out, like makes him leave, drives him out and places cherubim on the east side of the garden, along with a flaming sword that turns in every direction to guard the way back to the tree of life. And the placement of the placement of the cherubim or throne guardians, that's what cherubim are. So they're they're on, but they're placed on the east side, and that is deliberate. The man is driven out in that direction, and the cherubim, which is plural here, not singular, or it would say cherub. The text indicates that there are multiple cherub here, hence the term cherubim, it's plural. And they are stationed there to block any return. No one's getting through those gates. Now, in the larger pattern of scripture, the direction of the east often marks the place of coming and the place of going, like in and out, right? Later on, when God gives when God gives instructions for the tabernacle and the temple, guess where the entrance is? It's set facing east. And that's the same direction that was closed at the at the garden. It now becomes the direction from which people would one day approach the place where God would dwell among them. The cherubim themselves are not temporary figures. They're this is now this is their first appearance in scripture. And then they return again and again in connection with the presence of God and and the the guarding of um of holy space, sacred space. And that's why that's why um that's why they're also called throne guardians. In the tabernacle, they are woven into the curtains and set over the mercy seat. In the temple, the same, that same pattern continues. They stand as guardians of the place where God meets with his people. And just as they stood as guardians of the tree of life, okay, the garden was the first sanctuary, the first place where God walked with the man and with the woman. And and with the man, the woman that he had made. And when that place was closed, the cherubim then remained at their post. They weren't going to move. And when God later made um excuse me, established the tabernacle in the temple, he placed the same guardians at at the heart of those structures to show that this that the same holy presence, the same holy presence was there. And that and also that that approach still required guardians because not just anyone could come into that space and and you can't just willy-nilly come in there anytime that they want. Um, the flaming sword in the garden that turns in every direction completes this barrier. And there is complete, there is no unguarded angle. There's no side path. There, the no there's no moment when the way stands open by accident here. The path back to the tree of life is fully closed. The text does not say the tree itself was destroyed or it that its fruit became harmful. The tree remains where it was. And what change what changes is access to it. The path that once led to it now is now watched and closed. And the text says that God drove the man out. And the language is not soft there, and that is purposeful. It is not a quiet dismissal or a simple instruction for Adam and Eve to leave. God forcibly expels the him and her from the garden. And that kind of action points to the to the need for force. If the man had been ready to walk away without resistance, the strong verb that was given there would not have been required. I mean, can you, I can't imagine. Can you can you imagine Adam and Eve, who had been so close and intimate with God for however for however long the time span was, are now forced to leave this beautiful place. Let that sink in. It's a place of cherished memories, a place where they knew of a time when when there was no wrong, there was no shame, because they didn't know what that even was. There was no categorical definitions for any of that. It was a place of perfect peace, um to now only now to be forced out into a cursed place where everything was inverted. Um perfect peace was no more, where like a close, intimate nearness to God was experienced, where there was now strife, there was arguing, there was hate, there was jealousy, there was toil and hardship to work the ground now just to be able to eat. Um even birthing a child was now excruciating where it wasn't before. And now this place, um, that this world, this world was filled with death. And we know what this world is like because we have been born into it. We we what we don't know, we don't know any different other than the promise given to us by God that one one day that we will not know these things anymore. But Adam and Eve, they knew what it once was and and now have to then now have to endure what it is now. The man um the man and the woman leave the garden carrying the knowledge that they took and and leaving behind the life that used to be free for them to have. They step into a world where death is certain, where growing your family, I mean, not to mention the growing a family and growing the earth and populating the earth is now physically painful and and where it wasn't before, and where the ground now even works against them, and and where the way back is kept by beings who will who will not fail to guard it. And this becomes the fixed condition of all of a human race. Every person, every person born after that moment enters a world that's already marked by the same separation. Death is no longer a a um possibility that that might be avoided. It it is the appointed end of every single life. And the body that was formed from dust will now return to dust. And the breath that God breathed into the man will leave, it will depart. And there is no longer an open path to the tree that could have sustained life without end. So the ground itself resists the one who must work it. And what once grew freely without toil now requires toil and work. Thorns and thistles, as it says, rise where food is sought, and pain enters childbirth. Relationships that were whole become strained, and um the knowledge of good and evil is now carried inside every human heart. This is not a temporary hardship that will pass in just a few generations. I mean, we we know that, we know that, but it is the settled state of the world outside the garden. No human effort, no long journey east or west can reopen the way that God has closed. And and just hang on, we're we're getting to the climax here. This is all gonna make sense. Now, from this point forward, um, the story of scripture is the story of people living east of the garden, outside the place of direct access to God, who are now um, who are now under the certainty of death and in need of a way back that they we cannot open by our or their own doing. Now remember earlier when I said to stay locked in? Now, here here it is. I want you to consider this possibility for a moment. The serpent's words in the garden, they never mention the tree of life. Weird, right? But they never he never mentions mentions it. Not once. His entire focus stays on the restricted tree, the the one that carried the command. Satan questions it, lies about the death that would come from it, and holds out the promise that they will become like God in knowing good and evil. And that is what the text records. Nothing more is is said there. However, right after they eat, God speaks of a second danger. To the He's speaking this to Divine Council. The man has he says, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. And now, lest he reach out and reach out his hand and also and take also of the tree of life and eat and live forever, the sentence cuts off. Now the expulsion, the kicking out of Adam and Eve follows at once here. Like the the word also is that word is very telling. So God sees this next imminent overreach as the real threat after the first one has already been taken. Think about it. Give them to seize the knowledge that made them like one of the divine counsel, and then lock that new fallen condition in place with life that would never end. The knowledge had already brought them into the same kind of knowing that Satan possessed. The tree of life would have made that state permanent. Think about it. Fall they're permanently fallen, permanently separated, permanently under the curse, yet with there's no limit of time, just like Satan. Like no death to bring the condition to an end, like no space left for the later work of the second Adam, Jesus, or the reopening of the way. The rebellion would have been secured for the whole human race. The text does not put those words in the serpent's mouth. Now we we cannot say it with certainty, but look at the facts. The text tells us that both trees were in the in the in the middle of the garden. So, like in Genesis 2, I believe it's verse 9, the tree of life was in the midst of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. So both trees are located in the midst or in the middle of the garden. And that's the only um that's the only spatial information given there. Eve also refers to the forbidden tree as the tree that is in the midst of the garden, and that's in Genesis 3. So the text places them in the same central area, with which to me strong it strongly suggests that they were they were very near each other, those two, the two trees, but it never says how close, whether it's side by side or a short distance apart, or even or simply both somewhere in the middle. But no exact distance or further detail is given. But the earth, but think about this the urgency of God's response, the the force of the driving out of Adam and Eve and the cherubim and the and the and the flaming sword that turns in every direction all show that the danger of the second step was real and it was immediate. So whether the serpent planned it, which I think he did from the start, or simply hoped for it once the first fruit was taken, either way, God did not allow it. God knew by by driving Adam and Eve out and guarding the path, he refused to let the fallen condition last without end. And so they had entered into a condition marked by death, by toil, by pain, and by separation from God. And if they had also eaten from that tree, from the tree of life, that cursed state would have become permanent for them. They would have gone on, they would have gone on without end under the weight of evil and wickedness that had entered the world through their choice with no release and no conclusion. Can you imagine that? But death would now come, okay, and with death, the fallen condition itself would reach its end in every life. Now, in preventing unending life under the curse, God showed mercy. But the tree of life does not vanish from the larger account here. It appears again at the end of the scriptures in the final chapters of Revelation, the tree stands once more beside the river of the water of life, uh, bearing fruit each month and leaves for the healing of the nations. So the curse is gone at that point. Um those who belong to God see his face. And so between the closed garden and the open city lies the long work of God to restore what was lost. And so the second Adam, who is Jesus, does what the first Adam did not did not do. Access to God is given again, not by human effort, but by the one who opens the way. Now, and death remains the curse that every person must endure in this present world. It is the full outworking of the separation that began when the path to the tree of life was closed. But for yet for those who stay faithfully loyal to God, death is also the point in which the fallen condition ends. And after death, the faithful are no longer under the effects of the fall at all at all whatsoever. And the way to the tree of life, once watched by cherubim enclosed by the flaming sword, stands open for them. And there is no more guard, uh, there is no more sword turning in every direction to guard the way. Um the access that was lost in the garden is given, the access that was to God was given again, and they enter the life that does not end. And the tree of life is the sign of life that comes with God alone. In in the garden it stood open and unrestricted. And after the knowledge of good and evil was taken, God closed the way so that the curse would not last forever. Now in Revelation, the same tree stands stands free in the picture that it gives. So and the curse is is also removed there. And what was what was closed in Genesis is opened once more from beginning to end. The tree declares the same truth. Like true life is found only with God, and he will not leave people locked forever in the state that that came through the fall. You are with a curse, and and that curse will one day end. And that will end for all of us, just like it did in Adam and Eve. Yeah, death. I mean, death, it's it is a horrible thing, and it, but we all must go through it, and that is the consequence of the fall. But it is it is also the beginning uh for those that belong to the Lord. So may the Lord bless you, may the Lord keep you, may the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you, may the Lord lift up his countenance to you and grant you peace. Good night.