Grace Thoughts
GraceLife Thoughts – Train to Reign (Part 4)
Genesis 1 and Revelation 22 tell us that God created humans to ‘rule and reign’ the earth.
So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. Then God blessed them, and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth. Genesis 1:27-28
And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding 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, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His servants shall serve Him. They shall see His face, and His name shall be on their foreheads. There shall be no night there: They need no lamp nor light of the sun, for the Lord God gives them light. And they shall reign forever and ever. Revelation 22:1-5
However, as we saw in the last part of our study, humans do not have ‘dominion’ (rule) over every living thing that moves on the earth. Humans are not eating from the ‘tree of life.’ The nations are not ‘healed.’ Our world is under a ‘curse.’ We do not ‘see the face’ of God. We do need the sun. Humans are not currently ‘reigning forever and ever.’ Why not? Good question.
The Garden
It’s important that we understand the purpose of the Garden of Eden. God created Adam in Eden, the dwelling place of God on the Earth He had created. God planted a ‘garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man whom He had formed’ (Genesis 2:8). God created many ‘creatures’ on the Earth, but none like human beings. He made them in His ‘image and likeness’ and told them to be ‘fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it.’
The fact that God placed Adam in the Garden ‘eastward in Eden’ demonstrated His desire to dwell with humans in a special relationship. This relationship was to be on earth. God had already created supernatural beings who dwelled with Him in Heaven. His relationship with angelic beings would be somewhat different than the relationship He would have with humans.
We need to closely look at what happened in the Garden to understand what we face today in our lives on earth. The great promise of the Garden is not being fulfilled, has not been fulfilled, and will not be fulfilled until the events of Revelation 22 when a ‘pure river of water of life, clear as crystal,’ will proceed from the throne of God and of the Lamb (Jesus Christ). In the middle of its street, and on either side of the river, will be ‘the tree of life;’ most likely the same Tree of Life we see in the original Garden of Eden. The tree will bear ‘twelve fruits,’ and the leaves of the tree will be for ‘the healing of the nations.’
Some people think of Revelation 22 as the Garden of Eden ‘restored.’ I think of it as the Garden of Eden ‘expanded.’ God will create ‘a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away’ (Revelation 21:1). The Apostle John, who received this vision from Christ, wrote that the ‘tabernacle of God’ will be with men, ‘and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God’ (Revelation 21:3).
This fits quite well with what the Apostle Paul wrote in 1 Thessalonians 4. Some Christians in ancient Thessalonica were concerned about believers who died before Jesus Christ returned from Heaven to ‘seize, catch up’ (rapture) His children. Paul comforted them with these words –
For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord. 1 Thessalonians 4:14-18
The key words I want you to notice are the last ones – “And thus we shall always be with the Lord.” God wants to be with us. He wants to ‘dwell’ with us. So why isn’t that happening now?
Evil
Remember the ‘tree of the knowledge of good and evil’ from Genesis 2? God told Adam that he could eat the fruit of any tree in the Garden of Eden ‘except’ for the fruit from the ‘tree of the knowledge of good and evil.’ Why? ‘… for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.’
Question: what’s evil? The Hebrew word is רַע (ra’). It means ‘adversity, malignant, bad, bringing misery, giving pain, wrong, injurious, wicked.’ Some might say it’s the opposite of ‘good,’ which is טוֹב (towb) in the Hebrew. It means ‘pleasant, agreeable, desirable, kind, beautiful, useful, suitable, honest, virtuous.’
It’s interesting to note that when God creates the ‘new heaven and new earth,’ that ‘there shall be more death, nor sorrow, nor crying, no more pain’ (Revelation 21:4). God added that nothing that ‘defiles, or causes an abomination or a lie’ would be allowed into the New Jerusalem – part of the new heaven and new earth (Revelation 21:7). Evil will be gone – only that which is good will remain.
Next Time
So, if God is going to rid the universe of evil one day why did He ever let evil exist in the first place? Why plant a ‘tree’ in the Garden of Eden that would introduce ‘evil’ to Adam? What was God up to in the Garden? We’ll dive deeper into that in the next part of our special series – Train to Reign.
“Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.”
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AdamBible StudyChristianityGarden of EdenGod the CreatorGood and EvilJesus Christ
Published by gracelifethoughts
Founder & Director of GraceLife Ministries View all posts by gracelifethoughts
