Turning the page…
Turning the page…
Glory · In the Beginning
The tree looks like a trap until you see what it was for. God filled the garden with food and beauty, fenced off one tree, said plainly which one it was and what it would cost, and let the man and woman choose Him freely. A love that cannot say no is not love, so the tree was the one place where trusting God could be chosen rather than assumed. The serpent's whole strategy was to make that boundary look like stinginess, and every temptation since has run the same play.
https://glorystudy.com/questions/why-did-god-place-the-tree-in-the-garden · Scripture quoted from the World English Bible
Genesis 2:8-17
As you read: How much God gives before He withholds anything, and how plainly He names both the gift and the warning.
8Yahweh God planted a garden eastward, in Eden, and there he put the man whom he had formed.
9Out of the ground Yahweh God made every tree to grow that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food, including the tree of life in the middle of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
10A river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from there it was parted, and became the source of four rivers.
11The name of the first is Pishon: it flows through the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold;
12and the gold of that land is good. Bdellium and onyx stone are also there.
13The name of the second river is Gihon. It is the same river that flows through the whole land of Cush.
14The name of the third river is Hiddekel. This is the one which flows in front of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates.
15Yahweh God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate and keep it.
16Yahweh God commanded the man, saying, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden;
17but you shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; for in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die.”
Genesis 3:1-7
As you read: The serpent's question about God's word, the woman's answer with an addition of her own, and the promise that they would be like God.
1Now the serpent was more subtle than any animal of the field which Yahweh God had made. He said to the woman, “Has God really said, ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden?’”
2The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees of the garden,
3but not the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden. God has said, ‘You shall not eat of it, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’”
4The serpent said to the woman, “You won’t surely die,
5for God knows that in the day you eat it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
6When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took some of its fruit, and ate; and she gave some to her husband with her, and he ate it, too.
7Their eyes were opened, and they both knew that they were naked. They sewed fig leaves together, and made coverings for themselves.
Deuteronomy 30:15-20
As you read: God's own framing of covenant as a choice, and the appeal that follows it: choose life.
15Behold, I have set before you this day life and prosperity, and death and evil.
16For I command you this day to love Yahweh your God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments, his statutes, and his ordinances, that you may live and multiply, and that Yahweh your God may bless you in the land where you go in to possess it.
17But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away, and worship other gods, and serve them;
18I denounce to you this day, that you will surely perish. You will not prolong your days in the land where you pass over the Jordan to go in to possess it.
19I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Therefore choose life, that you may live, you and your descendants;
20to love Yahweh your God, to obey his voice, and to cling to him; for he is your life, and the length of your days; that you may dwell in the land which Yahweh swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.
God made every tree of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil stands in that list alongside the tree of life. It was pleasant to look at and good for food. Nothing in the tree itself was cursed; what made it deadly was that God had said, “you shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.” A good gift becomes a snare only when it is taken against the Giver's word.
“Out of the ground Yahweh God made every tree to grow that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food, including the tree of life in the middle of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.”Genesis 2:9
“but you shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; for in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die.””Genesis 2:17
Before there is a single prohibition there is a feast: “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden.” God is not a miser guarding a hoard. He gives a whole world and withholds one thing, then tells the man exactly which thing and exactly why. The boundary is the exception that gives the abundance its shape, not the point of the garden.
“Yahweh God commanded the man, saying, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden;”Genesis 2:16
“but you shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; for in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die.””Genesis 2:17
Obedience that can never be refused is not obedience; it is gravity. Moses later set the same choice before Israel: “I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Therefore choose life.” His reason for choosing is relational: “to love Yahweh your God, to obey his voice, and to cling to him; for he is your life.” Jesus says the same about His own commandments: “If you love me, keep my commandments.” The tree was God's way of making fellowship voluntary, so that love could be love.
“I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Therefore choose life, that you may live, you and your descendants;”Deuteronomy 30:19
“to love Yahweh your God, to obey his voice, and to cling to him; for he is your life, and the length of your days; that you may dwell in the land which Yahweh swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.”Deuteronomy 30:20
“If you love me, keep my commandments.”John 14:15
“For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. His commandments are not grievous.”1 John 5:3
Notice where the temptation starts: not with a piece of fruit but with a question about God's character, “Has God really said, ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden?’” That is a lie about a lavish God, and it worked. Then came the promise, “you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” James insists the trap was never God's: He “can't be tempted by evil, and he himself tempts no one,” while each of us “is tempted, when he is drawn away by his own lust, and enticed.” The tree tested trust; the serpent turned it into a question about whether God could be trusted at all.
“Now the serpent was more subtle than any animal of the field which Yahweh God had made. He said to the woman, “Has God really said, ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden?’””Genesis 3:1
“for God knows that in the day you eat it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.””Genesis 3:5
“Let no man say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God,” for God can’t be tempted by evil, and he himself tempts no one.”James 1:13
“But each one is tempted, when he is drawn away by his own lust, and enticed.”James 1:14
After the fall God barred the way to the tree of life, “lest he reach out his hand, and also take of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever.” Death entered, but endless life in a ruined state did not. That exile is where mercy begins, and Scripture keeps using tree language until it reaches the cross, where Christ “bore our sins in his body on the tree,” and “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree.” The story ends where Eden began, with “the tree of life” and leaves “for the healing of the nations.”
“Yahweh God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand, and also take of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever...””Genesis 3:22
“So he drove out the man; and he placed cherubim at the east of the garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life.”Genesis 3:24
“who his own self bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live to righteousness; by whose stripes you were healed.”1 Peter 2:24
“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us. For it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree,””Galatians 3:13
“in the middle of its street. On this side of the river and on that was the tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruits, yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.”Revelation 22:2