“In a selfish act of laziness, God created Adam for slavery and shoved him into Eden’s trenches to work as a landscaper and even put him on a hyper-restrictive diet, laying down the law about what he could eat.”  Unfortunately, that is precisely the meaning that way too many people believe when they read Genesis 2:15 “The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.”  Of course, they wouldn’t come out and say it as bluntly as I just did, but their attitudes reveal that they believe it nonetheless.

That kind of statement is wrong, wrong, wrong. 

Shocking and wrong.  Did I say that? 

Yeah, it’s SO wrong.

Not selfish, not laziness, not slavery, not shoving, not trenches, not landscaping, and not restrictive.  Glad I got that off my chest.

Ok, Barb ol’pal, what do you think it means then? 

I’m glad you asked.  My meaning expansions are in the [parentheses]:  Genesis 2:15 “The LORD God [in a divine act of joy and generous delegation] took the man [His cherished and prized pinnacle of Creation] and put him in the Garden of Eden [God’s sanctuary and palace garden, a place of lush beauty, yielding fruit by command of God Himself] to work it [rule it, have responsibility for lovingly keeping it every bit the sanctuary it was from the start] and take care of it [by maintaining communion with God and keeping the order and beauty with which this sanctuary was created.  In effect, God was giving the man the highest honor possible: to maintain—by man’s God-given abilities and intellect—what God had established in creating man in God’s own Image and creating a sanctuary for joy, communion with God, and as worship of Him as our Creator.]”   

As we continue looking at Agricultural Imagery and Analogy in the Bible, the first occupation for man is a combination gardener and priest.  The image conveys everything from cultivation, nurturing, and stewardship of what God has given us… as an act of worship.

Food for thought:

• In general, is your unspoken expectation that God is out to bless you or mess with you?  In a situation where things could go wrong through no fault of your own, do you expect that they will or that God will preserve you from it? 
• When you think of Adam’s working in the Garden of Eden do you think of digging dirt and planting rows of corn or beans in the hot sun, or do you think of priestly duties? 
• How might changing your assumptions about work in the Garden change your attitudes about God and about the work He has you doing? 
• In Creation, God established order over chaos, light into darkness, form into the formless, and life into what He’d already created as a material world.  Even before the fall of man, God’s sanctuary needed to be maintained to keep chaos, darkness, and material forces from pressing in, disrupting the order.  Read Colossians 1:15-17 and Hebrews 1:3  Who really holds it all together?  How might Adam’s working in the Garden be both gardening and priestly as God’s Image-bearer?

Genesis 2:8 Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. 9 And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground– trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food.

We can all agree that the Bible is not a science textbook or a research biologist’s journal.  But when you consider the Pentateuch (the first 5 books of the Bible) was recorded thousands of years before the modern era—even more than a thousand years before Christ—it’s genuinely remarkable what is written. 

Man was formed out the dust of the earth as were the other land animals (Genesis 1:20-25).  Those happened on “Days” 5 and 6.  God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground as part of Third Day gardening.

Biodiversity, a crasis of the words biological and diversity, basically points to the variety of living organisms on Earth and their inherent and amazing variability.   

If you take the Bible as true, as I do, this diversity was designed from the start. 

All kinds of trees.  Pretty trees.  Trees for food.  Some are both. 

All display God’s wisdom, His appreciation for beauty, His preference of diversity over monotony, and His awesome creativity.

And yet, built into the DNA from the very beginning was future biodiversity.  Pretty trees could become varied and more beautiful, even without the help of geneticists and breeders.  Trees for food would develop greater efficiency and production because what was already built into the genetic code made it possible.  It is this pre-programming for functionality and future diversity in DNA that breeders use to feed the world.  God created for biodiversity and future productivity, giving us a clear picture of God’s existence, His wisdom, and His open invitation for mankind to rejoice in his Creator and to use the opportunity for wise stewardship.

Food for thought:

Consider the miracle of the genetic code and how DNA not only governs reproduction but also contributes to biodiversity.

When mankind decided to sin and fell from grace, what happened to the genetic code?  What does that mean for mankind?

Consider Adam and Eve.  One couple chose sin.  From one couple, many nations.  Many nations, One Redeemer, the Lamb (that is, Jesus Christ).   Revelation 5:9 And [the four living creatures and twenty-four elders] sang a new song: “You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, because you were slain, and with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people and nation. 10 You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth.” 

In what way do we see diversity of people (united by human DNA) affirmed in redemption as an expression of open invitation, even as the means of redemption remains only one Way?

The Garden of Eden—even the name suggests abundance, everything lush and beautiful.  The romantic view is that the Garden was a tropical paradise, replete with flowering plants and with jungle-like, untamed greenery both wild and wonderful.  Kind of like Costa Rica, only better. 

Sorry to pop your bubble, but Costa Rica and even Hawaii aren’t anywhere close to what the Garden of Eden was in Genesis.  Technically, it’s not even the Garden of  Eden, as if it was the sole garden of a proper noun place called Eden like Longwood Gardens of Kennett Square, Pennsylvania.  The very word Eden is in the semantic range of enrich or make abundant resulting in the Garden of Eden conveying meaning as Garden of Abundance. 

What was so abundant?  The streams arising from within the earth—Eden, the very source of water for sustaining life—made God’s Garden well-watered and the perfect place for perfect life to be perfectly introduced.

Genesis 2:4 This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created. When the LORD God made the earth and the heavens– 5 and no shrub of the field had yet appeared on the earth and no plant of the field had yet sprung up, for the LORD God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no man to work the ground, 6 but streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground”

God had not sent rain and even when no man was yet to work the ground, the water was so abundant in Eden, it could not be contained.  It didn’t pool deeply in the Garden, but was meant to water entire areas outside of the Garden (Genesis 2:10-14). 

This was not rain water—a gift of the sky.  It emerged up from Eden, from within God’s abundance.

I wonder if Jesus had this life-giving, life-sustaining, arising from God’s abundance idea in mind when Scripture records this imagery, John 7: 37 “On the last and greatest day of the Feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, ‘If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. 38 Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.’ 39 By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.”

Food for thought:

Read Jeremiah 2:12-13 about God’s people having rejected the spring of living water.  In what ways do we dig our own cisterns instead of trusting God in current culture?

About the day of reckoning, again we see living water.  Zechariah 14:8 “On that day living water will flow out from Jerusalem, half to the eastern sea and half to the western sea, in summer and in winter. 9 The LORD will be King over the whole earth. On that day there will be one LORD, and His Name the only name.”

In John 4:4-14, Jesus talks to a Samaritan woman about living water saying, John 4:10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” 11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his flocks and herds?” 13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”.

In what ways might these be connected as imagery, recalling Eden, God’s abundance—living water—giving and sustaining life?  In what ways is water necessary for life?

Genesis 1:9 And God said, “Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear.” And it was so. 10 God called the dry ground “land,” and the gathered waters he called “seas.” And God saw that it was good. 11 Then God said, “Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds.” And it was so. 12 The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. 13 And there was evening, and there was morning– the third day.

The Third Day is when gardening began.  And God proclaimed it was good. 

No flops in God’s garden. 

It was all perfect, as perfect should be.

Don’t you find it interesting that people always try to poke holes in the Bible, that it’s nothing but a bunch of fairy tales and myths?  And yet, here it is, as true today as it was then. 

Plants have seed that reproduce themselves.  Trees bear fruit and do so according to their kind.

Sure, there’s some genetic variability on this side of expulsion from Eden in which some offspring from seed produce genetic show-stoppers that today’s breeders work hard to attain, but in every bunch, there are some genetic flops, failing to grow or producing no fruit.  But the variability never results in apples producing sheep or alligators or even different kinds of trees.  Apples don’t become elms or maples or buckthorn.  Their seeds produce apples.

The words of Christ still ring true: Matthew 7: 15 “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. 16 By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 17 Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. 18 A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. 19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.”

Jesus, always one to have a good horticultural analogy in His arsenal, is talking about people, their hearts, and their fruit, but consider the consistency which He likens to plants.  For millennia no thornbush bears grapes.  Grapes bear grapes.  And it’s been that way since the Third Day.

Food for thought:

What kind of spiritual fruit do you bear?  How do you feel about others noticing the fruit you produce and whether it’s good or bad?  Does Jesus tell us to condemn them or just recognize them?

Another year gone by.  A 2018 ahead as a year of promise, a year of hope.  Why do I say that?  Well, I prefer optimism to pessimism and I think it’s more biblical.  God emphasizes not fearing the future.  He reminds us He’s still God.

God’s focus is always on hope, faith, trust, and giving us ample reasons to believe God has good in store for us.

A while back, I was trying to earn money for a mission trip to South Africa with a group of nurses and doctors ministering to those who were HIV-positive and dying from AIDS.  One of the jobs I held temporarily to earn my way was doing telemarketing for a well-known charity before the negativity and rejection became too much for me. 

I discovered something profound though: discouragement is spiritual. 

It gets in your flesh. You can’t wash it off at the end of a day.  Nothing other than prayer and time in God’s Word could extinguish it…but even then, it lingered as an echo, a shadow, a placeholder, even a hook like Velcro waiting for a weak moment for discouragement to return and resume discouraging.  Spiritual things are like that.

For this reason, optimism and trusting in God go hand-in-hand, offering a better future.  God never sends a spirit of discouragement, depression, purposelessness, or futility.

As we conclude 2017, Americans (and others globally) can acknowledge that far too many of us have spent the year being negative, pessimistic, depressed, stressed, and discouraged people. 

Looking for bad news in our brothers instead of looking for what is good.  Going on witch-hunts, as if we were hoping to discover the worst in our fellow Christians!  And it’s no one’s fault but our own for partnering with evil and reaping the personal consequences in our own attitudes.

We have Scripture’s clear admonition to agree with each other in the Lord because it’s a genuine key to joy (Philippians 4:1-9).

As we look ahead to 2018, let’s consider it a year of promise, a year of hope.  Let us no longer succumb to a lack of faith, uncharitable actions and words, grieving the Holy Spirit by listening to our adversary’s lies and joining that work of the devil.  Instead may we find ourselves submitting to God, acknowledging that God’s plan is to bring good, perhaps in ways we cannot even fathom.  Yes, even good out of what man intends as harm (Genesis 50:20).

My New Year’s wish for you is a 2018 as a year of promise, a year of hope.  May your 2018 include seeing God’s actions in surprising ways, God’s faithfulness to you in every circumstance, an eternal perspective that melts the stresses and waters your faith, and a year in which you experience more of Jesus, day by day and become like Him.

Closing the year with something good and ringing in this year of promise, year of hope, here is my prayer for you:

Lord God, how wonderful to call you “Lord!” How marvelous to acknowledge all your faithfulness to us during the past year and the many years prior!  How awesome are your deeds and amazing is your sovereignty! How beautiful is your mercy!  How desperately we need your grace and forgiveness!  Your wisdom is so far beyond our understanding, Lord. Teach us to fear you daily and to honor you as Lord throughout 2018.

We ask, Lord, that you would be glorified this coming year.  May our submission to you testify to your goodness and may we display that beautiful virtue of humility.  Remind us daily of your love.  Keep us in safety and health according to your will.  Give us hearts of gratitude for your provision and spirits of contentment no matter our circumstances.  May we have enthusiasm and zeal for what is good and honorable in your sight.  May we grow in love for one another and have grace to show our fellow man.  Let us hate only what is evil and love fully what is good.  May we bring joy to your heart in our daily actions and receive joy in return to bless our days.  Let this be a year of promise, Lord, of witnessing many more of your promises kept, and a year of hope as hope in you never disappoints.  Strengthen us for the days ahead so that we might bring glory to you as we bring your Gospel of peace to a world in need.  We ask for your blessings upon our families and friends.  Most of all, we ask for you to be with us.  Thank you, Jesus, for all these good gifts.  Amen.

Luke 2:20 “The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.”

What is the Christmas miracle the shepherds celebrated?  It’s not that virgins give birth or that women wrap their babies in cloths and put them in mangers.  Nothing is impossible for God. 

God could give us a million pregnant virgins and a million lowly babies without ever giving us … Himself.

* * *

Stop for a moment. Be Still and appreciate this miracle: The Word became flesh.  Jesus is “God with us”—Immanuel (Matthew 1:23). 

Jesus is God giving us of Himself…

… at Christmas in His birth

… continually giving from Himself and revealing the Father during 30 years of ministry on this earth

… giving Himself for us all the way to death on a Cross,

… and giving us shelter in Himself when we come to Him for forgiveness. 

Because there was no other way to reunite sinful man with a Holy God in mercy and forgiveness, the Christmas miracle is God gave us Himself.

* * *

Be Still, people.  The miracle that began at Christmas in Bethlehem makes the miracle in your heart even more profound.  Luke 2:11 “For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.”

Be Still, shepherds and all who listen.  My faithfulness lasts for generations.  My patience is longsuffering.

Be Still and Know that I AM God.  I have brought My salvation. I am returning to judge.  My judgments are always true and what I have promised I will always do.

Be Still and Know that I AM God.  Psalm 98:1 A psalm. Sing to the LORD a new song, for he has done marvelous things; his right hand and his holy arm have worked salvation for him. 2 The LORD has made his salvation known and revealed his righteousness to the nations. 3 He has remembered his love and his faithfulness to the house of Israel; all the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God. 4 Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth, burst into jubilant song with music; 5 make music to the LORD with the harp, with the harp and the sound of singing, 6 with trumpets and the blast of the ram’s horn– shout for joy before the LORD, the King. 7 Let the sea resound, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it. 8 Let the rivers clap their hands, let the mountains sing together for joy; 9 let them sing before the LORD, for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples with equity.

Reflect today on these thoughts: 

1. Jesus Christ is Immanuel, God with us, Lord from His birth. 
2. He ministered to us and brought His salvation because there was no other way.  
3. He revealed the Father’s love for us supremely on the Cross. 
4. He waits patiently for the full number of faithful to enter in to forgiveness. 
5. He will return as King of Kings and Lord of Lords and will judge the quick and the dead. 
6. All of which are certain because God ordained it. 
7. Will you open your heart to His forgiveness?  Still Christmas, Still time, Still waits with open arms to welcome you to His mercy.  Luke 2:11 “For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” 

Merry Christmas!

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This concludes our series Still Christmas, Advent 2017 Devotionals which began December 3, 2017 and are archived from that date.  I will be posting other devotional thoughts periodically and resume a regular posting for Lent 2018.  

In the rush of Christmas preparations, do you ever stop and Be Still in order to ponder the true meaning of Christmas?  There’s so much noise regarding Christmas that we can miss what should be truly treasured.  To ask ourselves, “What Child is this?”

In Luke 2:19, we read,

But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.”

Maybe having nursed her baby (with Jesus now soundly sleeping) Mary might have looked at her son and thought about his being God’s Son. 

What does it mean that she treasured these things up or that she pondered them?  

Maybe: “But he looks like any other baby.  It could seem like just a weird dream if it weren’t for all the angels and the shepherds who came and what they said.  What does it mean that He will save our people?  How will He do it?  What’s expected of me?  It’s a lot of pressure raising a baby who is the Son of God.  Hey Joseph, this is so strange, isn’t it?  What do you think of all this?  Does He kind of look like you?  Does He kind of look like me?” 

How can He possibly be God’s Son if the LORD is One as ‘The Shema’ has always taught us?”

If you think we have questions about the Incarnation we have only heard about, just imagine the questions in the heart of the woman who was holding Him.  The Word made flesh.  A wriggling little baby.  Fully God, but fully man.

 * * *

Be Still, Mary.  Just treasure the moment.  You’ve worked hard for this event and the shepherds are evidence that I see humility as a plus and low status in a way that people do not understand.

Be Still.  Jesus is sleeping.  You will know Him someday as the Great High Priest about whom the author of Hebrews writes, Hebrews 4:15 “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are– yet was without sin.” For now, you don’t need to do anything special, Mary.  Just Be Still.  Enjoy the moment and believe that what I have promised I will do.

Be Still and Know that I AM God.  I don’t see things the way people do, Mary.  It’s how I already know this lowly baby, wrapped in strips of cloth whom you’re holding, is Messianic royalty.  He has been born King of the Jews.  Matthew 2:1 “After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem 2 and asked, ‘Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.’”

Be Still and Know that I AM God.  Jesus will not return as a baby.  He will return as My appointed Judge.  He will return as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords.  Revelation 19:11-16

Questions for Reflection. 

1. When you think of Jesus, do you think of royalty?  Do you think of supremacy?  Do you think of the final Judgment? 
2. In what ways is it marvelous that all these aspects were hidden, wrapped up with a tiny baby in the arms of a teenage mother? 
3. On this Christmas Eve, is it any wonder Mary would treasure them up and ponder them?  Shouldn’t we?

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Still Christmas, Advent 2017 Devotionals began December 3, 2017 and are archived from that date.

Would you drop everything and leave it all behind to see what had been announced to you? 

The shepherds did. 

They even double-timed it to get there. 

Curiosity can be a great motivator. 

But angelic messengers were a definite plus.

“When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, ‘Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.’  So they hurried off and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby, who was lying in the manger.” (Luke 2:15-16) 

Just as the angels had told them…

Luke 2:17 “When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, 18 and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them.”

When the shepherds returned and spread the word, we read that all who heard it were amazed, not that they dropped everything and ran to have a look, too.  Stop and think about it: they had the opportunity to witness a moment in world history, in eternal history.  Yet they were only amazed.  Were people amazed at the news itself or that it was shepherds who had been tasked with sharing that good news?

Same good news of great joy for all people.  Different messengers.  Different levels of curiosity and response.  A once-in-a-lifetime event and who knows how many responded to the good news?

 * * *

Be Still, shepherds.  Yeah, it IS a really big deal.  Let your curiosity invite you to meet My Son.

Be Still.  The good news is good not because of the messengers or evangelists, but because of the Savior.

Be Still and Know that I AM God.  I AM not a baby in a manger.  Unlike a million babies who could be in mangers, I have always been God.  Even my Son Jesus, who experienced the Incarnation—being sent in human likeness (Philippians 2:7)–has been God and foreordained Savior since before the foundation of the world (1 Peter 1:20).  Without going all theological on you, know this: He was only revealed as Savior in the sign of the baby in a manger.  He and I have been One long before the Incarnation.

Be Still and Know that I AM God.  If curiosity won’t drive you to consider My Son, perhaps a warning like recorded for you in the Book of Hebrews 2:1 “We must pay more careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away. 2 For if the message spoken by angels was binding, and every violation and disobedience received its just punishment, 3 how shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation? This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard him. 4 God also testified to it by signs, wonders and various miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will. 5 It is not to angels that he has subjected the world to come, about which we are speaking. 6 But there is a place where someone has testified: ‘What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?’”

Questions for Reflection: 

1. Would we drop everything or find excuses why our work is too important to leave? 
2. Was the good news better news when it was announced by angels than when it was announced by shepherds or to you? 
3. Why is it important that we remember God didn’t become man, that only Jesus was Incarnated (but fully God and fully man)? 
4. What is it about mankind that makes us special to God’s heart, even more special than the angels He created (see Genesis 1:26-27)?

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Still Christmas, Advent 2017 Devotionals began December 3, 2017 and are archived from that date.