"Finding Eden" (Genesis 2:8-17)

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Sovereign Grace Family Church Worship Service, June 28, 2020 Songs of Praise: Come Ye Sinners Here I am to Worship Though You Slay Me I'll Fly Away Step by Step Sermon: "Finding Eden" Genesis 2:8-17

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Stand with us.
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Peace be with you.
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We can work and sing.
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Jesus reigns.
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He stands to save you.
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For what did we allow to come? Peace be with you.
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We will pray.
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You may be seated.
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Brother Mike's going to come, and he's going to read to us the last chapter of the book of Ephesians.
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Brother Mike, make sure that mic's on.
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Okay.
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We're closing out the book.
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So we have, beginning in chapter 1, we have our redemption with lives in Christ and our place in Christ seated in the heavenly places.
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In chapter 2, we have being made alive in Christ, being alienated from God before Christ came, made us alive.
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We have Paul's stewardship of the gospel to the Gentiles in chapter 3.
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Chapter 4, we have the unity that we have in Christ.
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Chapter 5, we have the imitators of Christ, or in some translations it says imitators of God, and instructions to the family.
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And as we close out the book, chapter 6 has more instructions to the family.
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Children, obey your parents and the Lord for this is right.
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Honor your father and mother, which is the first commandment with a promise.
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That it may be well with you and that you may live long on the earth.
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Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.
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Slaves, be obedient to those who are your masters, according to the flesh.
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Do it with fear and trembling, with sincerity of heart, and as to Christ.
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Not by way of eye service to be a man pleaser, but as slaves of Christ.
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Doing the will of God from the heart.
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With good will, render service as to the Lord and not to men, knowing that whatever good thing each one does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether he be slave or free.
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Masters, do the same things to them, and give up threatening, knowing that both their master and yours is in heaven, and there is no partiality with him.
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And finally, be strong in the Lord, in the strength of his might.
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Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil.
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For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, rulers of darkness of this world, and against the spiritual forces in high places.
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Therefore, take up the full armor of God, so that you may be able to resist the devil in the evil day, and having firmly done everything, to stand firm.
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Stand firm, therefore, having girded your loins with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace.
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And in addition to all, take up that shield of faith, with which you will be able to extinguish the fallen arrows of the evil one.
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And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
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And with all prayer and petition, pray at all times in the Spirit.
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And with this in view, be on alert, with all perseverance and petition for all the saints, and pray on my behalf, that utterance may be given to me in opening my mouth, to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains, and in proclaiming it, I may speak boldly as I ought to speak.
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But that you also may know about my circumstances, and how I am doing, Tychicus, the beloved brother and faithful minister in the Lord, will make everything known to you.
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I have sent him to you for this very purpose, that you may know about us, and that he may comfort your hearts.
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Peace be to the brethren, and love with faith, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
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Grace be with all of those who love the Lord Jesus Christ, with an incorruptible love.
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Amen.
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Let's stand together, and we're going to sing, Here I Am to Worship.
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Amen, and you may be seated.
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I want to invite Brother Mike to come, and he's going to lead us in our time of devoted prayer.
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First of all, I'd like to thank Gary and Cindy and Rosanna for all their work yesterday, and orchestrating our little conference, appreciating their service, and it was very good.
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And I'm thankful for the time we got to spend together.
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It was edifying, I know, to me, to hear Andy and Keith preaching the same day.
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So I was very thankful, and thankful you guys were here.
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Let's take a moment of silence, and then we'll go to the Lord in prayer.
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Most Gracious Heavenly Father, thank You so much, Father, for sending Your Son into this world, being the light of the world, and that light shined in darkness, and He was sent unto His own, and His own received Him not.
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He was rejected.
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He was despised.
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He was a man of sorrows.
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He was beaten.
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He was bruised.
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He was crushed.
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He was murdered.
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He was nailed to a tree by wicked men.
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And Father God, You would not have it, and You raised Him up from the dead.
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And God, You said, to all who come unto Him, through faith, and faith alone, with the gift of repentance, that God, You would grant them life and life eternal.
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Father, thank You for Your Son.
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Thank You that He is the resurrected, risen Son of God.
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He is not a crucified Jew.
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He is now ascended on the right hand of You, and He is ever interceding for His saints.
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And that, Father, one day, He will split that eastern sky, and He will descend on a white charter.
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And Father, He will have a sword in His mouth, and He will have a robe drenched with the blood of His enemies, and on His leg will say, King of kings and Lord of lords.
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And Father, You will make all the wrongs right on that day.
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And Father, what a terrible and awesome day it will be.
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And Father, how we long to have Him return, to receive His bride unto Himself, and to take us to the place.
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Because, Father, He said, where I am going, I am preparing a place for You.
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And if I go, I will come and receive You unto Myself, that where I am, there You may be also.
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Even, Lord, now come quickly.
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Father God, thank You for this church.
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Thank You for the people that are here.
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Thank You for this time that You've ordained for us to be together in a time of corporate worship, through the singing and the giving and the preaching of the Word and prayer.
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And Father, for the taking of the ordinance.
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God, thank You that we can come together corporately, and in one mind and in one spirit and in one body, and worship You in spirit and in truth.
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Father God, I lift up those in this room that are struggling with illness.
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Father, I pray that You would strengthen their bodies.
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I pray that You would give them grace and give them mercy, and that You would comfort them in these difficult times.
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And Father, I pray that You would heal them if they so choose to glorify You.
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God, I pray for those who are going through a time of spiritual depression.
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Father, feeling distressed and downtrodden and perplexed.
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That God, that You would put Your hands around them and guard them and comfort them, Father, spiritually, and help them not to lean on their own understanding, but in all of their ways acknowledge You, and You will guide and direct their paths.
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Father God, I pray for those who are feeling strong in their faith.
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That, Father, they would not take that for granted.
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That, Father, You would continue to grow them in the grace and knowledge of Your Son, and helping them to strengthen their faith and to hold on to You.
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That, Father, that we would finish this race well, and we would be able to say all, as Paul said, that I have fought with good faith, I have finished a course, and I have kept the faith.
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And that we would receive the crown that is before us.
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Father God, I lift up Keith as he comes to open Your Word.
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I pray, God, You would strengthen him, that You would keep him from error, that, God, You would open his mouth with Your words, and that You would anoint his speech with the power of Your spirits, and that it leaves his mouth, Father God, it would go out and it would correct and equip and instruct and exhort and rebuke, and that, Father, You would grant repentance where it is necessary.
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And, Father, for the young person or the old person or the child, whoever it may be here today that does not know You, I pray that You would send forth Your Spirit to them, that, Father, You would either terrify them in Your wrath or melt their heart with Your loving kindness, that today would be the day of salvation, and they would see Jesus Christ as the Lamb of God to take away the sin, and that, Father, they would place faith in Him today.
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God, we love You.
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We thank You for all that You have done.
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Be with us through the rest of this service.
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In Christ's name, amen.
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I want to invite you to take out your Bibles and turn with me to Genesis chapter 2.
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We're going to continue our study of the book of Genesis, and today we're going to be looking at verses 8 through 17.
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That's going to be the focus of today's message, verses 8 through 17.
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And as you're turning there, I want to give a few words of preliminary introduction.
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In the middle of the 17th century, an epic poem was penned by the Puritan John Milton.
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In its final form, it consisted of 12 books and over 10,000 lines of verse.
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It is considered to be one of the greatest English poems of all time.
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The title of the book, the poem, was Paradise Lost.
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It's a poetic narrative, and it tells the story of the fall of man.
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It recounts the fall of Satan, the temptation of Adam and Eve, their expulsion from the garden.
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And this is what it says in its opening lines.
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Of man's first disobedience and the fruit of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste brought death into the world.
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And all our woe with loss of Eden till one greater man, Christ, restore us and regain the blissful seat.
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Milton's purpose, as he states in his introduction to Paradise Lost, was to justify the ways of man with God.
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To justify the ways of God to man.
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His desire was to help us to understand why God did what he did.
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Paradise Lost contains much of what we find in the biblical narrative.
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It talks about the garden, it talks about the serpent, it talks about Adam and Eve.
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But it also uses poetic license to construct many narratives that are not found in the Bible.
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There are scenes with the heavenly throne room and Satan being expelled and Satan climbing over the wall into the garden.
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There's all kinds of things in Paradise Lost that are not found in the Bible.
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Much like Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, it seeks to fill in the unseen details of the spiritual realm.
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And probably the most famous line in Paradise Lost was Satan when he said, Better to reign in hell than to serve in heaven.
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That line has become so commonplace that some people believe it's in the Bible.
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But it's not.
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Milton's work is an example of adding fictional elements to a true story.
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You've all seen that happen.
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You've all watched movies that say, based on a true story.
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And you know that when you see anything that's based on a true story, that there's going to be elements of it that are going to be fictional.
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There are going to be parts that no one could have known about.
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And so they have to fill those parts in.
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But the scene is based on an actual account.
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The film or the movie is based on an actual account.
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Well, that's what Paradise Lost is.
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Paradise Lost is a fictional account of an actual event.
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And that's important because a lot of people, when they read about the Garden of Eden, they think the whole story is fictional.
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Many people doubt the existence of Adam and Eve.
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And by extension, they doubt the existence of Eden.
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But as Christians, we have reason to believe that Eden was a real place.
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Even though Paradise Lost and many other accounts have sought to fictionalize elements of Eden, we must never allow that to make us think that the place itself is a fictional place.
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Eden was a real place at a real time in history.
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And though we cannot know everything about it, the Bible does provide us many insights into the reality of it.
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And that's what I want to talk about today.
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The sermon today is going to be a venture through the Garden of Eden.
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The title is Finding Eden.
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I want to examine the details that the text gives us.
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And I want us to understand that the Paradise of Eden is a prototype of the Paradise of Heaven.
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Most importantly, I want us to understand that as much as the original Paradise was real, the coming Paradise that we have to look forward to is just as real.
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So let's stand together and we're going to read verses 8 to 17.
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And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed.
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And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.
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The tree of life was in the midst of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
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A river flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and there it divided and became four rivers.
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The name of the first is the Pishon.
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It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Habbalah where there is gold.
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And the gold of that land is good.
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Delium and Onyx Stone are there.
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The name of the second river is the Gihon.
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It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Cush.
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The name of the third river is Tigris, which flows east of Assyria.
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And the fourth river is the Euphrates.
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The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.
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And the Lord God commanded the man saying, You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.
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Let us pray.
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Father in heaven, I thank you for your word.
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May you bless it now as I preach it and may you keep me from error.
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Open your hearts of your people and Lord God bless us all with the understanding of your truth by the power of your spirit in the name of your son.
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Amen.
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One of the commentaries that I am using for my study is written by James Montgomery Boyce.
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James Montgomery Boyce was a contemporary of R.C.
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Sproul.
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He was a pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, I believe, and he was a wonderful man of God.
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And he wrote two wonderful commentaries.
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He wrote one commentary on the book of Romans and one commentary on the book of Genesis, both of which I've used in teaching for years.
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And I want to read a short statement that he made in his commentary on these passages.
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This is his words.
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Occasionally in my preparation of studies like this, I turn to reference books in which the various literary use of a word, such as Eden, are recorded.
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On this occasion, I looked up Eden and Roget's International Thesaurus and was surprised to find it not under a section dealing with historical names and places, but under the section dealing with imagination.
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It was listed alongside terms such as utopia, paradise, heaven, Atlantis, happy valley, fairy land, cloud land, dream land, land of promise, and kingdom come.
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The quotations which in Roget accompany each word section contain such gems as imagination rules the world by Napoleon.
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The center of every man's existence is a dream, Chesterton, and all dreams are lies, a French proverb.
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Apparently for the compiler of this thesaurus, Eden was no more than a fairy land.
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You know, that's the way most people see the garden of Eden.
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It's like the city of Atlantis.
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You've all heard of the city of Atlantis, that great city that was supposed to have fallen into the sea, and according to DC Comics, created a whole race of people called merpeople, and Aquaman is the strongest of them.
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Okay, nobody cares.
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But the point is, you have these myths of ancient cities, myths of ancient places, and a lot of people, rather than putting Eden within the historical framework of a historical place in time, they put Eden into the same category as Atlantis, or another lost city.
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How many of you have ever read the book Animal Farm? Animal Farm is a tremendous work by George Orwell, certainly not a Christian book, but a good book nonetheless, and it is a fictional account of a group of animals who take over a farm and farm it themselves, and it was all about the Russian Revolution and the rise of the Soviet Union.
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That was the allegory.
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One of the characters in Animal Farm was a raven named Moses.
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Moses represented the clergy in Orwell's allegory.
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And Moses would fly above the animals and he would tell them about a magical place located in the sky.
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It was called Sugarcandy Mountain.
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And he would say, as long as you understand that your labor is not in vain, but one day you will perish and you will go to this place called Sugarcandy Mountain.
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And he promised that's where all the animals go when they die.
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And he said, I've seen it because I can fly above you all and I can see above you all and there is this place, this candy-coated paradise where you will all lay in luxury one day and eat of the sweet of the trees which is candy-coated all around.
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And it was clear in Orwell's writings that Sugarcandy Mountain was not to be seen as a literal place but rather it was meant to be a comfort for those who were facing the impending doom of death.
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It wasn't to be seen as real but rather in an allegorical way it was to be seen as comfort for the dying.
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And that's what Orwell was charging the clergy with.
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Orwell was saying that's all the clergy do is the clergy provide you with a hope for Sugarcandy Mountain something that doesn't really exist but something that we can all hope for when we face the inevitable reality of death.
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Well, it's unfortunate that so many people equate the paradise of God with fairy tales.
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You talk to the average person what do you think of heaven? It's a fairy tale.
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That's what Stephen Hawking said.
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Stephen Hawking said that heaven is a fairy tale for people who are afraid of the dark.
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They see it as folklore.
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It's pie in the sky.
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It's not real.
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It's make-believe.
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But when we come to Genesis 2 and we read Genesis 2 what we find is that the garden that is described here in this text is not a garden that is written as a mythological place but it's written as an actual place that existed at a certain place at a certain time and for a certain purpose.
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And what I want us to look at today are three features about the garden which we see in Genesis 2.
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Three features about the garden that indicate to us that this is a historic place.
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We're going to look at three things.
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We're going to look at the location of the garden.
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We're going to look at the description of the garden.
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And then we're going to look at the legislation of the garden.
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So that's the three-point outline today.
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The location of the garden, the description of the garden, and the legislation.
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And my point in all of this is to show you that all three of those things point to the fact that the garden was real.
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So let's look first at the location of the garden.
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Verse 8 says, And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden in the East.
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Notice, we often say Garden of Eden.
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And that's not wrong to say because that phrase is used in Chapter 2, verse 15, Chapter 3, verse 23, and Chapter 3, verse 24.
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So the Garden of Eden is not a wrong term but that's not the way it's introduced.
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It's introduced rather as a garden in Eden.
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Referring to Eden as a geographical location.
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Like if I said there's a garden in Callahan.
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Or if I said there's a garden at the beaches.
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Or if I said there's a garden in Ocean Way.
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You're speaking of a larger geographical location in which there is a garden.
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And so God has planted a garden in this place that's called Eden.
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And verse 8 tells us it's in the East of Eden.
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So not only is it in a place but it's in a specific place in the place.
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And so we're given a specific reference to where it is within that geographical location.
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Now some people will say that when it says in the East what it's referring to is that it's East of Israel.
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Because if you read through the Bible what you will find, and this is true, that in general when they talk about North, South, East, or West it's almost always in reference to Israel.
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In fact you know we still do that today.
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Why are we Westerners? Well think about where Israel sits geographically.
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Everything to the West we would say is Western.
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And then you have the Middle East.
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And then the Far East.
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In relation to what? In relation to Palestine or Israel.
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That piece of land.
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And so you have, that's the demarcation point.
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Even though the world is a globe our maps are still set apart fairly that way.
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We have the West, the Middle East, and the Far East.
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In relation to what? In relation to Israel.
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And so when we come here and it says it was a garden in the East that could be a reference to the fact that the garden was in the East of Israel.
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But it could also be a reference to the fact that it was a garden in the East of Eden.
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And it could also be a reference to the fact that it was a garden East of Israel.
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So we see a reference to the locations.
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We also see other locations mentioned.
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We see Assyria mentioned.
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We see Cush mentioned.
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We see Havilah which are mentioned.
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These again act as marking posts.
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We also see a reference to two rivers that we can name and understand where they are.
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There's four rivers mentioned but only two that we would reference as rivers that we would still know.
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And that's the rivers of the Tigris and the Euphrates.
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But where would this be? Where would this be today? Well if you go to Israel and you go to the East you come to a land that used to be known as Mesopotamia.
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Modern day Iraq.
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So we look at that as the possible location.
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As the possible, and I keep stressing possible location, based on the reference to the rivers, based on the reference to its relationship to Israel, and based on the fact of what is that area and how it's structured.
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And this is important.
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And why is this important? Why would I even stress this today? Because this is telling us something about the author's understanding of Eden.
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Who's the author? Who wrote Genesis? Moses.
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What is he doing in writing that it was here, it was east of Eden, it was here, it had these rivers, it was here in relation to Assyria and Cush and Havilah.
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What is the point that he's making? It's a real place y'all.
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That's the point.
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The simple matter is he's saying this place wasn't sitting on a cloud somewhere.
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This wasn't the city of Atlantis that fell off into the ocean somewhere.
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This was a real place and a real space and a real time.
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This is not a fairyland of make-believe.
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This is a region on the earth God named and set apart and put a garden in it.
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And the big question people ask is, well, where is it now? Where is Eden now? People have searched for centuries.
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You know, there's been expeditions going out into the lands, the areas, and trying to find this place called Eden, and it's never been found, but it won't ever be found.
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Do you know why? Because it was a place that existed in the Antediluvian period.
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Now that's a big fancy word, so let me help you understand it.
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If you don't know what it means, Antediluvian means it was a place that existed prior to the flood.
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Guess what happens when the world floods? Everything changes.
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When the world floods, everything changes, and therefore I do not think that anyone is going to go find the Garden of Eden.
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In fact, I would even go as far as to say even the Tigris and the Euphrates that we have today are probably not the same place that they were then because even a small flood can change the direction and course of a river.
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Imagine what a worldwide flood would do to the direction and course of a river.
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So my point is to simply say this.
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Even though we know, based on the writing of Moses, that it existed at a place and a point in time, we don't know exactly where it is because everything has changed, and we're not going to find it because everything before the flood was destroyed.
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We now live after the flood, and everything in the Antediluvian period, everything pre-flood is no more.
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But just because Eden is not on the world map today doesn't mean it was a fictional place.
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It was real.
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It took up a space and time in Earth's history.
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So that's the location of the Garden.
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Now let's look at the description of the Garden.
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The description of the Garden.
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The Garden is described as having three main components.
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If you look at your Bible, you'll see these three things.
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The first is the irrigation of the Garden.
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That's verses 10 to 14.
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Then the vegetation of the Garden is mentioned in verse 9.
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And then the beauty of the Garden is mentioned in verse 9, and then again in verses 11 and 12.
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Let's look at those three things.
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First, the irrigation of the Garden.
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It says, beginning in verse 10, a river flowed out of Eden to water the Garden, and there it divided and became four rivers.
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So you have one large spring, if you will, one large source of water, and that one large source of water then becomes four sources of individual rivers.
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It fed four rivers, and these rivers provided the water necessary to maintain the vegetation.
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You say, well, what's important about that? Well, the Garden functioned as a Garden functions in its standard normal methods.
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It needed water.
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Gardens still need water.
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It wasn't magically water.
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It wasn't magically irrigated.
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God said, okay, I'm going to plant a Garden.
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A Garden needs water, so I'm going to have the Garden have a source of water that waters the Garden.
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And again, you say, well, what's the point? Why are you stressing this? Because it points to the reality of it.
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It doesn't come to us as a myth.
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It doesn't tell us that cherubs came in with, and even if it did, it wouldn't be wrong, but it doesn't tell us that cherubs come in and sweat upon it and cause the dew to, no, it says that the rivers were made.
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Why? Because rivers are needed, and that's what Gardens need, and God made it that way because that's the way he intended.
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It's a real place with real irrigation.
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When you look at history, where are the cities and the towns are always built around a water source? Why? Because it's necessary.
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It's necessary for life.
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It's necessary for irrigation.
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It's necessary for all of those things.
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So God puts what is there because it's what is necessary.
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So we see irrigation, verses 10 to 14.
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There's some interesting things about those rivers, but the most important thing that we need to understand is while the Garden is special, it's not presented to us as magical.
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It's presented to us as what, and when I say this word, hear me now.
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When I say this word, don't rush to correct me because I'm going to correct myself.
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It's natural.
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What I mean by natural is it's working like a garden would work naturally because that's the way God designed it.
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Now, are there some supernatural elements? Yes, we're going to talk about the tree of knowledge of good and evil, the tree of life.
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Yes, there are some supernatural elements, but the Garden is a garden.
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It needed water, so God gave it water.
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It has vegetation.
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We see this in verse 9.
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Vegetation is said.
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It says that out of the ground, the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.
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It has the vegetation that's needed to eat.
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It's good for food.
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Why is this important? Because again, not only did it have the irrigation that was needed to produce the food, but the food was there to give food to man.
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It was natural.
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Again, when I use that word, please understand what I'm saying.
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This is the normal function that would still be today.
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We still have gardens today.
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Why? Because we've got to eat.
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God produces a garden.
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Why? Because man is going to eat and he's going to enjoy it.
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It's producing food for Adam to eat.
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It's not producing magic beans to put in the ground and make a beanstalk to go up and see God.
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It's producing food.
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It's producing fruit and vegetables.
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And at this time, man was a vegetarian.
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And I imagine it was okay with him.
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I don't know.
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It wouldn't be okay with me, but it was okay with him to be a vegetarian.
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Because everything was good.
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It was perfectly nourishing.
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And I think about this at this moment.
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This is Adam being given by God a perfect garden, a perfect place to eat from.
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It has water to water it.
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It has vegetation flowing out of it or forming out of it.
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And then it also says it has beauty.
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Verse 9 it says it was pleasant to the sight.
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Verses 11 and 12 says that it had gold and delian, and onyx stone.
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You know what? I'm going to tell something about myself.
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I don't understand the value of precious metals and jewels.
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Because you can't eat them.
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You can't bury them in the ground and grow stuff.
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I've always wondered why precious stones and precious metals have been the primary currency of human history.
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I mean, outside of food and agrarian societies, most people who accumulated wealth accumulated wealth by what? By the amount of gold or the amount of precious stones.
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Why so valuable? My wife and I kind of joke about that because I don't wear a wedding ring.
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I don't wear a wedding ring because I don't like anything on me.
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And she gets really upset.
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She goes, people are going to think you're not married.
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I tell everybody I'm married.
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I'll just tell them.
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But I don't wear a wedding ring because I don't like things touching my hand.
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It's just a weird thing for me.
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And I've tried all kinds.
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I've tried rubber ones, the soft ones, the metal.
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It just doesn't work for me.
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But I don't understand the value of precious metals.
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I don't understand the value of gemstones.
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But I do understand this.
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And maybe this will help some of you who maybe think like I do.
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Man needs the world to function.
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But man also craves form and beauty.
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Why do we spend so much time creating art? Because there's a craving within us for beauty.
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Who's the greatest artist? God.
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What is his world? It's a beautiful world.
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Even in the fallen state.
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You go up to Tennessee, man, when the leaves start to turn, and you go up into the mountains of the Smoky Mountains, and it's some of the most beautiful country in all the world.
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And it's just wonderful to look at.
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And you can sit on a rocking chair, and I've done it with Jennifer.
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We sit on a rocking chair and just look at the beauty of the mountains.
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And I go back to the garden, and I say, okay, why gold? Couldn't eat it.
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I don't think he was making rings and earrings at that point in time.
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Why gold? Why delium? Why onyx? Why? Because man needs form as well as function.
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Man needs beauty as well as he needs the industrial.
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He needs the things that work, but he also needs the things that are pretty and beautiful.
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And so we see here, God is giving man not only what he needs, but what will bring him joy and pleasure.
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There's beauty as well as function.
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So we see in the garden the coming together of form and function in one place for man and his enjoyment.
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That man would enjoy the food that he puts into his mouth, that he will enjoy the sight of what he sees around him.
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And this is, again, real.
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You can walk over and touch the gold.
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You can pick up the stones.
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It's real.
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Moses describes the garden as a place that's properly watered, properly planted, and properly adorned.
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That's the description we're given.
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And finally, we've seen the location of the garden, we've seen the description of the garden.
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Now we're going to look at the final thing, and that is the legislation of the garden.
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Within the garden's lush vegetation there existed two very specific trees.
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The Tree of Life, which we will learn more about after the fall, because they are kept from the Tree of Life.
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God bars Adam from the Tree of Life so that he cannot continue to live forever in his fallen state.
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He sets up a cherub there so that Adam can no longer go to the Tree of Life.
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We'll learn more about that in Chapter 3.
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But we also see the Tree of Knowledge.
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This tree is the only one in the garden which is forbidden.
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I call this tree the Legislative Branch.
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Oh, that's good.
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I thought of that, I wrote it down, highlighted it.
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I said, don't forget to say that.
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It's the Legislative Branch because it's the only law.
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It's THE law.
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God has given man one command.
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You might say, well, he was given the command to go and subdue and take ownership of these things.
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But there's one prohibition.
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Certainly God gave Adam things to do.
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But there's one thing that he must not do.
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He must not eat of this tree.
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One singular prohibition.
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And one consequence.
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If you eat of this tree, you will die.
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Dying, you shall die.
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The severest penalty is given for breaking this command.
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And these trees do represent what I would call the spiritual component of the garden.
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I've argued already that the garden is a real place and a real space and real time and real history.
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But that doesn't mean that it does not have a spiritual component.
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You're a real person and a real place and a real time and real history.
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But you have a spiritual component, right? And likewise, the garden was a real place and a real space at a real time and real history.
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But it had a spiritual component.
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And the spiritual component was the trees.
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The tree of knowledge and the tree of life.
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And some might say, well, this is where mythology is creeping in.
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But no, this is not mythology.
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Just because something resides above the natural does not make it mythical.
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Only the materialist would say that the only things that exist are natural things.
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As Christians, we are not materialists.
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We are supernaturalists.
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We believe that there are things that rise above the natural.
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And even though these trees have a supernatural function, they still point to the historicity of the garden.
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You say, how? How can a supernatural tree point to the historicity of the garden? And the reason, the answer to that is because these trees give the answer to man's perpetual predicament.
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What is man's biggest problem? Social injustice.
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What's man's biggest problem? Systemic racism.
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What's man's biggest problem? Misogyny.
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What's man's biggest problem? I could go on and on.
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You know what man's biggest problem is? He's a sinner.
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He lives in a group of other sinners and they all sin together.
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And whether you want to call that systemic or whether you want to call that inherent or unconscious bias, whatever you want to call it, it's sin.
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That's man's biggest problem.
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It's not a viral disease.
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It's a heart problem.
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Man's biggest problem is that he is a sinner.
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He loves sin.
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He craves sin.
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He wants sin.
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He lives in a state of total depravity.
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The Bible says there's none good, no not one.
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There's none who understands.
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There's none who seeks for God.
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All have turned aside.
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Together they have become worthless.
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No one does good, not even one.
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Their throat is an open grave.
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They use their tongues to deceive.
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The venom of asps is under their lips.
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Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.
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Their feet are swift to shed blood.
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In their paths are ruin and misery.
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And in the way of peace they have not known.
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There is no fear of God before their eyes.
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That's the problem with man.
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And this issue poses the most serious threat and that's death.
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The wages of sin is death.
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All men die because all men sin but sin did not rise out of the ether.
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Sin had an origin point.
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Sin began as the first breach of the first law by the first man.
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I'll say it again.
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Sin began as the first breach of the first law by the first man.
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The world around us is testimony to the existence of Eden because without Eden there would be no tree of knowledge.
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Without the tree of knowledge there would be no original command.
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Without the original command there would be no first transgression.
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Without the first transgression there would be no sin nature.