Gen 2:4–15 — The Garden of the Lord

The title of the sermon today is “The Garden of the Lord.” And I take that from our text in verse eight. It says, the Lord God planted a garden in Eden. In the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed.

I think when we think about the Garden of Eden, we think of it as a paradise for man himself. We think of it as a place of paradise, and we think of our own longings for paradise. We think of our own longings for those moments when we too have experienced maybe a little foretaste of paradise. Maybe you have been on a vacation somewhere in the more temperate zones, let us say a Hawaii or somewhere closer to the equator, and you have experienced for a brief moment that feeling of paradise, just everything about it, the air, the feel of the breeze, the sun, the beautiful vegetation. And it is so easy to think of the Garden of Eden in that way, to think of it purely as a paradise for man.

But the truth is, the text tells us very clearly that God planted the garden. God planted the garden for himself. It is God’s garden. In fact, later on in the Bible, there are two places where it is called the garden of the Lord. That is where I got the title from. The first one is in Genesis 13, verse 10, and the other one is in Isaiah 51, verse three, which I put in the silent meditation here at the beginning. Where it says that God is going to comfort Zion. This is talking about the restoration of Israel after the exile. And he says he is going to make her wilderness like Eden. And her desert like the garden of the Lord.

So the Bible clearly views the garden of Eden not merely as a place of paradise for man to enjoy the delights of paradise, but primarily as the garden of the Lord. It is God’s garden. The Lord planted that garden. And then, notice the correct order here, then he took the man and he placed him in it. He placed the man in the garden. And he placed the man in the garden in a subordinate role as what? As like a gardener. It says there later on, so verse eight says he placed the man, put the man there. But then in verse 15, it repeats that same thought and it says, the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and to keep it.

If you just think in terms of human experience, the gardener of a wonderful estate that is manicured with beautiful gardens and paradise-like features. The gardener who is there is not the center of the stage. The gardener is simply there to keep the place in order for the owner, for the owner of that mansion.

And so it is here with this Garden of Eden. This garden is the garden of the Lord. It is God’s garden. It is God’s presence who is there in the garden. And man is merely the steward. He is merely the gardener who is there to take care of it and to commune with God.

Now, one of the things that we have seen in our study of these opening chapters of the Bible, which are absolutely foundational, Genesis 1, 2, and 3, is foundational for the entire biblical worldview. The entire biblical worldview is here. If you did not have the rest of the Bible, if all you had was Genesis 1 to 3, you would have enough. You would have the whole doctrine of the Bible, the whole worldview of the Bible, which is that God is the creator of all things.

This world is God’s world. He created it to be a theater for His own glory. The earth is the Lord’s, as we sang in Psalm 24, and the fullness thereof, that is all the things that inhabit that world, all the creatures, all the plants and the animals and man himself who lives within that world. The world is God’s world.

But man sinned, man fell, man disobeyed God and plunged this world into a place of curse and of death. But the plan of salvation is that God is still going to achieve his purposes for creation in spite of man’s sin. And so the promise of the gospel in Genesis 3:15 is that he will send the offspring of the woman to be a second Adam. Who will do what the first Adam failed to do, and he will win the right for his people to eat again of the tree of life and to dwell again in the presence of God in the garden.

Although not simply a return to the garden, but rather not only just a return, but also experiencing the fullness of the eschatological blessing that God had intended for man from the beginning. And that is what the Tree of Life symbolizes. Adam had not yet eaten of the Tree of Life as he was created. He was still mortal in a sense. He was not mortal in the sense that we are, which is we are under the curse of death. He had not sinned, so he was not mortal in the sense of being destined to die. But he was not immortal either. He had not yet eaten of the Tree of Life. And so the whole story of the Bible is that Christ, as the second Adam, wins the right for us to eat of the tree of life, which is Christ himself, and to obtain eternal life, to obtain immortality, and to dwell with God in the new creation forever and ever. This is the foundational narrative of scripture. All of scripture is about creation, fall, and new creation. That is what God is doing in Christ.

Now, as we have seen in this opening section of Genesis, especially back in Chapter 1, we have seen that the entire world, the entire cosmos, which has two parts to it, it has the invisible part that is called Heaven, and it has the visible part that is called Earth. And we mentioned that the Earth does not refer simply to the planet Earth, it refers to the entire visible realm. And then within that visible realm, it is subdivided into another heaven and earth, the visible heavens, that is the sky, and the visible earth where man dwells. We saw, though, that the creation narrative is telling us that the entire cosmos is a temple for God to dwell in. Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool, as we read later on in Isaiah 66, verse one. What we are looking at now, though, in our text today, is that although the whole creation, the entire cosmos, both the visible and the invisible realm, is the temple where God dwells, the sanctuary, the holy place that God fills with his glory, it is a theater of his glory, yet there is also a more holy place within that cosmos, and that more holy place is the Garden of Eden.

This is very similar to in the experience of Israel. Remember that when Moses is writing these opening chapters of Genesis, he is writing to the people of Israel. Either at Mount Sinai or soon after, after they have come out of, left Mount Sinai and they are wandering in the wilderness. But in that period of time, when they are experiencing God, God and His work of forming them into a holy nation and establishing them as a holy people, eventually they will come into the land. And in the land, they will also build a temple. Now before they get there, they build a temporary temple called the Tabernacle, which is more like a mobile temple that can easily be built and taken down. And then the Levites will carry all the different parts of the lumber and the different parts of the ark and so on. And they will carry them throughout the wilderness and then they will set it up again. This tent that they set up. It is a mobile temporary version of what will become the temple later on under Solomon.

My point is that Israel also understands this idea of the big cosmic temple and the smaller more holy place because their experience would be what? The land, the holy land that they are going into, is like the cosmos. It is like the whole world. But then within that land, the land itself is holy. But there is also a particular point within that land in Jerusalem, Mount Zion, that is the focal point. It is the center point of that cosmic temple. And that place is even more holy. The whole land is holy. The Canaanites cannot dwell there. Those who are breaking God’s covenant, who worship idols, they have to be removed from the land. The land itself is entirely holy.

But even though the land itself is holy, there is also a special place in the center of that land, in Jerusalem, that is going to be especially holy. And on the top of that mountain, Mount Zion, there is going to be a temple. And then we see the same idea even there. If you go up to that mountain, you see the same idea of these concentric circles of increasing holiness. You see it right there in the temple too, because you have the temple courtyard, which is like the land. And then you have the temple itself. And then in the temple itself you have the outer sanctuary called the Holy Place. And then you have the inner sanctuary, the Most Holy Place. And so there is these three different layers of increasing intensification of holiness.

And that is what? That is symbolizing the intensification of the presence of God. The closer you get to God Himself, you end up there in the Holy of Holies and you see the Ark of the Covenant with the cherubim. And God Himself is there in the midst of the Holy of Holies. And only the high priests can go in there. The average Jewish person cannot go in there. Even the ordinary priests cannot go in there. Only the high priests can go in there once a year on the Day of Atonement. It is the most holy place.

And so we see this idea then of a big giant holy place, which is the whole cosmos. But then we see the Earth itself as being set apart as a specially holy place. And then within that we have the Garden of Eden. The Garden is the most holy place. And God has placed man there in the garden, just like the great high priest of the old covenant, to minister before God, to work it and to keep it.

That is very significant language there in verse 15. The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden to work it and to keep it. Those two verbs, to work it and to keep it, are significant. They are kingly and priestly terms. To work it is a kingly work. It is an office of kingship and exercising dominion and cultivating. But then to keep it is a priestly term. It is the same word that is used later on in reference to the Levites. Remember I mentioned the Levites are the ones that have, their job is to set up and take down the tabernacle whenever the people of God move throughout the wilderness. And we are told in Numbers chapter one, at the very end in verse 53, that the Levites are supposed to camp around the tabernacle, and there to keep guard over it, to make sure that it is protected from anything that is not supposed to be there, any foreigner, any unclean person who would try to enter into that holy presence of God.

And that word that is used in Numbers 153, to keep guard over the tabernacle, it is the same word that is used here in Genesis 2 verse 15. When it says to keep it, to keep it is to guard it, to exercise a priestly office like the Levites did of protecting the holy presence of God. Nothing unclean can enter there. Nothing that is contrary to the holiness of God can enter there. Even a circumcised Jew who was part of the people of God, who is part of the holy nation, if he touches a dead body or eats an unclean animal, he has to be separated from the camp. He has to be outside the camp and then get purified and then come back. There has to be this sense of holiness and purity in the presence of God.

Eden as the Temple of God

And so the key point then is that when we are told in Genesis, that Adam is the gardener of this garden, and his job is to be this king who is also a priest, who cultivates the garden, who manages the garden, who subdues the earth, but who also is exercising this priestly function of guarding the holiness of the garden, that tells us that this garden is special. This garden is not just simply going to Hawaii and enjoying a paradise, idyllic place where it is just a wonderful place for man to be happy and restful and enjoy. No, this Garden of Eden that God made is a holy place. It is the garden of the Lord. He planted it, He made it for His glory, for His presence to be there. It is a temple. Again, understanding that the entire cosmos, heaven and earth is the temple, but there is also a focal point, an even more intensified place within that earth, and that is the garden itself.

All the features of our text that tell us that this garden is God’s place of dwelling with his people. We have that language there, the priestly verb that is used. Adam is put in the garden to keep it and to guard it like the Levites did with the tabernacle.

We also have later on in Genesis 3, another key text. In Genesis 3, now this is after Adam and Eve have sinned, they have broken the covenant. They ate of the forbidden tree, the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Their eyes were open. They are naked. They tried to sew fig leaves to hide themselves in the presence of God. And then we are told in verse 8, And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden, the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden. And the Hebrew words that are used there, the sound of the Lord, that is the voice of the Lord. That is the presence of God. Remember in Psalm 29, the voice of the Lord is mighty. The voice of the Lord is powerful. This is the booming thunder of God’s presence. And walking in the garden, that language of walking, when the sound of the Lord God is walking in the garden, that is the same language that is used later on. When God says to Israel that I will be in your midst, I am going to have this special holy temple and I am going to walk in your midst. I am going to walk among you and dwell with you and commune with you.

The language of the voice of the Lord and the walking of God in the presence of the garden reinforces this idea that this garden is not just a paradise for man, it is the garden of God. It is the presence of God. It is a holy sanctuary that is set aside for God himself.

Notice as well that in the very center of the garden are two trees, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And those two trees together are very significant. We are going to look at this next week when we talk about the covenant of works that God made with Adam in the garden. But those two trees symbolize what? They symbolize the presence of God and they symbolize that man himself would be able to participate in God’s own immortal life if he passed the test, if he obeyed God. Then he will be able to eat of the tree of life. As it says later on in Genesis chapter 3, again after the fall, in Genesis 3 verse 22, Then the Lord God said, Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat and live forever, Therefore, the Lord God sent him out of the garden.

But notice that phrase there, to eat of the tree of life and live forever. That is immortal life. Adam, as he was created, did not have immortality. Immortality is a confirmed life, a life that can never be taken away. It is eternal life with God. It is the life of God himself dwelling in man. So Adam had this tree there as a reminder to him that if he passed the test, one day he would be able to eat of that tree and he would enjoy eternal life. Now it is not as though the tree itself would grant him eternal life, but it would rather function like a sign or a seal to confirm. The advancement to immortal life if he passed the test.

But again, the point here is, we are going to look more at this whole topic of the covenant itself and the covenant of works next week, but the point is that the tree of life in the middle of the garden, at the very center of the garden, tells us something about this garden. Again, it is not just a paradise of idyllic scenery and beautiful ocean breezes and happiness and seeing the animals frolic. It is more than that. It is God himself. The tree of life is the life of God himself that man would be able to participate in one day.

The River of Life

And there is also this river that flows out from the midst of the garden. Verse 10, a river flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and there it divided and became four rivers, and it spread throughout the whole earth. The significance of the river is that the river of Eden is showing us that God himself is the source of life. The river is what nourishes the tree of life. The tree of life has its roots and it is getting the water from the river. And then the tree of life is producing life And the fruit of that tree symbolizes the life of God himself. The river of God is the river of God’s own life. Later on in scripture we see that the river is the spirit of God. The spirit of God himself.

Notice as well that there is a reference here to Eden and the tree of life and the river that begins there. It is all in the very center of the world. It is in the center of the sacred geography of the pristine world before the fall. Eden is the cosmic center and God Himself is there. God Himself, His own life is there. He is the source of life.

Later on in the book of Revelation, when John sees a picture of the renewed creation, after Christ has accomplished all of his work, it says, then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb. As telling us that the source of the river is God himself and the Spirit of God flowing from God’s own life and giving life to the world.

Later on in the Bible as well, there is a passage in Ezekiel showing the river flowing from the temple. This is the eschatological temple. Ezekiel’s looking ahead to the glory of the days of the Messiah, and it is going to be fulfilled in the new creation. And he sees this picture, this is all symbolic pictures, but he sees a river coming out of the temple itself, a river flowing from the temple, and then giving life wherever it goes. It even goes down to the Dead Sea, which is an area of That part of the world that is known to be particularly dead. It is called the Dead Sea because there is nothing living in it. There is no fish there. There is no plants growing around the banks. It is a dead river. But when this river, when this eschatological river flows from the temple, it brings life. And suddenly the Dead Sea becomes alive. And the fish flourish and the trees around the water, they grow, of course, anticipating the final restoration in heaven in the new creation.

Eden as the Mountain of God

Now there is another key thing here as well. Not only do we have all these features that I am trying to point out to you that show us that this is a temple, that the garden is a sacred place where God dwells, not only do we have the idea that God made it, not only do we have the idea that man is just the gardener, and so therefore it is not really about him, it is about God, not only do we have that reference there to the fact that he is like a priest who is to guard it and protect this holy place, But we also have another interesting feature of our text, which is that there is implicitly in our text this idea that Eden is like a mountain.

And you might say, I do not see that in the text here. Where does it mention anything about a mountain? Well, there is a couple of clues in our text that will help us to see that. The first clue is the fact that this river, it begins in the Garden of Eden and then it flows out and it divides into four rivers and those four rivers then flow down the mountain and they cover the entirety of the world. Why are there four rivers? Well, the number four in scripture is very symbolic. Remember the language of the four corners of the earth? Or the four winds. Jesus says he is going to gather his elect from the four corners of the earth. So the number four symbolizes the entire world. Another way of thinking about it is the four parts of the compass. North, south, east, and west. The four corners of the earth. And so the fact that this one river, which begins in Eden in the center of the world, then divides into four rivers, and these four rivers encompass the entirety of the four corners of the earth, that shows us then that this must be the highest point on earth. If the four rivers are able to naturally flow down from this point and cover the entirety of the globe, then this shows us that Eden is actually a mountain. It is Mount Eden.

Another thing that supports that is the fact that later on in the Bible, In Ezekiel 28, it mentions this. In Ezekiel 28, verses 13-14, the context of Ezekiel 28 is the prophecy against Tyre, who was a king, who was opposed to God’s people. But his animosity to the people of God is a picture of Satan’s animosity to God Himself. And so the prophecy of judgment against the king of Tyre, it becomes also a prophetic judgment against Satan. And so in Ezekiel 28 verses 13 and 14, God says, you, Satan, were in Eden, the garden of God. This is before he fell, before Satan became Satan. Before he became this devil who is opposed to God, he was a glorious cherub. He was a glorious angel in the presence of God. It says, you were an anointed guardian cherub. You were on the holy mountain of God. So the Bible describes Eden as the holy mountain of God, and that fits in with what we saw in our text, that the river that flows out of Eden divides into four subordinate rivers, and they cover the entire earth. The river flows out of Eden to the rest of the world, implying that Eden is the highest point.

Eden is a sacred mountain, crowned at the top with a paradise temple. It is a paradise temple that is the place where God meets with his people. A mountain is a significant thing, theologically, because a mountain goes up high, it reaches up into the tops of the sky. It reaches up into heaven. And so it is the meeting place between heaven and earth. It is the meeting place between God and his people.

Even the pagans had this idea. The gods on Mount Olympus. The Babylonians had a similar idea that there was a pantheon of gods upon the top of a sacred mountain. Because the mountain reaches up into the sky, and the sky itself is like a picture of heaven. In fact, it is even called heaven. Remember back in Genesis 1, when God created the heavens, which is the invisible realm of God and his angels, he also then created a visible heaven, which is called by the same name. So the earthly heaven, the sky that we can see, the visible heaven, is simply a replica on an earthly, creaturely scale of the heaven of heavens, which is the heaven where God dwells.

And so a mountain, which reaches up into heaven, is the meeting place between heaven and earth. And so it is not surprising that Mount Eden has at the very top of it a sacred temple, which is the garden itself, and that there is the tree of life, and there flows the river of the water of life, in order to bring life to the entire world.

Later on in Israel’s experience, remember they also had kind of a replica of this whole idea, where the land itself is like the whole cosmos, and then within that land there is a special center point, which was the temple, symbolized by the same symbolism as the Garden of Eden. If you read in 1 Kings 6, and verses 18 and 29 and 32, and other passages as well, when Solomon was building the earthly temple, he decorated the walls of the temple with engravings of garden-like imagery. The palm trees and the flowers, even cherubim, were engraved and covered with gold in the walls of the temple.

The temple that Solomon built is full of Eden symbolism, reminding us that the Garden of Eden is the special place where God dwells with his people. The garden was not just a paradise of delight for man. It was a holy place where God dwells with his people.

Life in the Presence of God

And here is the great thing about it. So at first, I am emphasizing this idea that it is not just a paradise for man. It is not just for man to enjoy this pleasant place of rest and vacation. But it is really for God and it is a holy place. But here is the blessedness of this truth is that it does become a place of blessedness and paradise for man. That is the whole point of this river. The river of the water of life shows us that God’s presence, although it is terrifying in its holiness, And although it is really focused on God’s glory and not man’s enjoyment, yet that very presence of God is life-giving. The presence of God is the source of life.

We will see later on, actually next week, when we look at this statement there where God says to Adam, in the day that you eat of the tree, you will surely die. We will see this very concept that the presence of God is life. Because Adam did not die on the day that he ate. We read later on in Genesis 5, he lived for hundreds and hundreds of years. So what does it mean that he died? Well, it means that he was expelled from the presence of God. So just as being expelled from the presence of God is death, so also being in the presence of God is life. That is the true source of life, is the very presence of God.

How often do we forget that? How often do we think we pursue our own life, we pursue our own paradise apart from God? And the Bible says the only way to have true paradise, to have true life and enjoyment and happiness is to pursue God himself.

Remember in Jeremiah chapter two, verse 13, where God, speaking through the prophet Jeremiah, is condemning the people for their apostasy, for their idolatry. And how does he describe it? He says, my people have committed two evils. This is a famous verse, you have probably all heard of this. They have forsaken me. The fountain of living waters, and they have hewn out cisterns for themselves.” That is, a cistern is like a holding tank for water built into the ground. They have hewn out cisterns for themselves, but they are broken cisterns that can hold no water. He is saying, because they are going to these other gods to worship these other gods, they are making false places, false ways of securing living water, of securing life, of securing happiness, of securing joy for themselves. Thinking that if they worship these other gods, they will get the things that they want. And God is saying to them, Those are broken cisterns, they do not hold water. For a moment it may seem to satisfy a little bit, but ultimately sin does not satisfy and it does not bring happiness. It does not have the ability to truly satisfy your soul.

But if they had turned to me, they would have found that I am the true fountain of living waters. And Jesus said the same thing to the woman of Samaria in John 4. When he sat down by the well and he asked her to bring up some water for him. And he said to her, if you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to you, give me a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water, not this earthly water that cannot satisfy.

And later on in John 7, Jesus on the last day of the feast, the great day, he stood up and he cried out, if anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. And he is referring there to that Ezekiel 47 passage where the rivers of living water flowed out of the temple and brought life to all of the dead sea and all of creation. And it says in the commentary that he was referring to the spirit that he was going to give to his people after his death and resurrection.

Let us turn away from all the broken cisterns of this life where we seek happiness, enjoyment, and life apart from God. Only true happiness, only true life comes from God himself. That is what our Garden of Eden story and the fact that this river is flowing out from the midst of the garden is telling us that the presence of God, even though it is holy, even though it is a little bit frightening, even though it, It makes us feel so small and insignificant because it is so focused on God and how God made this whole world for His glory and not for our happiness. Even though paradoxically it seems to be a crushing thing to focus too much on the holiness of God’s own presence. It is a fearful thing, especially for those of us who are sinners. And that is all of us. And we turn away from it. It is hard for us. So it is hard for us even to pray sometimes because we feel so distant from God and we are so caught up with the things of this world.

But the truth is, is that there in the blazing light of the glory of God’s holy presence, The blazing presence of God which is full of light and glory and holiness and it is fearful, that is the place of true life. True life only comes from God himself, the spirit of God flowing within us. And as Jesus said, now after the fall, the only way that we can achieve that, the only way we can have that water of life is through the work of Christ. Jesus Christ had to go to the cross. He had to pass through that sword of the flaming cherubim that blocked the way to the tree of life. And he was slain for us. And he rose again from the dead. And he is ascended to the right hand of God. And he is now pouring out the Spirit upon his church.

Let us seek Him. Let us trust in Him. Let us not hew out for ourselves broken cisterns that can hold no water. Let us look to Christ and Christ alone. He is the tree of life. He is the source of the Spirit and the water of life that transforms us, that satisfies our thirst, and that enables us to live for Him out of gratitude and joy.