Please keep in mind verse 3 and Eve's declaration of the location of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. It was in the midst of the garden along with the Tree of Life.
The word midst is tavek (taw'-vek), 8432 in Strong's Concordance, from an unused root meaning to sever, a bisection, i.e. (by implication) the center - among(-st), X between, half, X (there-,where-), in(-to), middle, mid(-night), midst (among), X out (of), X through, X with(-in).
Right from the beginning God clearly gives men the way to go, but also the freedom to choose, because here in a nutshell is what this whole Bible and the history of mankind is all about: God gives us His eternal law of love, and then expects us to carefully consider what to do with it. His commandments are life, and they always will be for us to use to live as He lives. They are the way for us to carefully consider how to live within what God says is our right to choose as He commands in Deuteronomy 30. They are His gift to us so that we can choose the productive life He has set before us.
Taking of the fruit of that tree caused them to separate themselves from God as it says in,
The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was in the midst of the Garden.
God uses this to give us a clear warning right from the beginning what will always be Satan's modus operandi.
They had gained an insight into their circumstances that they did not have before but they could not consider it correctly. Rather than being drawn to God, it drove man from God.
Brethren, knowledge alone puffs up, but love of God edifies. The love of God in Jesus Christ teaches us how to carefully consider and use that knowledge to draw us closer to God and one another. But to this day we are sometimes more concerned with prideful pontificating according to what we think we know, rather than humbly considering God's eternal law of love within all our relationships.
Brethren, those things that Mr. Armstrong spent so much of his life to focus on in Genesis 1-3 are vital to our unity within the Body of Christ.
Let us continue the story very shortly after Adam and Eve broke the first covenant God made with men who were in the process of being created in His image.
First of all let us get back to the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil being in the midst or possibly the center of the Garden, and perhaps directly next to the Tree of Life.
Of course, here we see the Word of God, who, after the fact had to offer Himself up in sacrifice. But remember this is the God who walked with Adam and Eve before they sinned and they could freely be digesting His every word as He walked and shared with them all He had that would bring them life! But they needed to believe, tend, keep, and eat! They had an opportunity then to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Word of God without the impediment of sin.
Brethren this is not nearly the same situation that faced Adam and Eve before the fact, but it certainly was the same in that although they merely had the spirit of man in them they had the ability to connect with God's Spirit. They did not have God's Holy Spirit within them yet but they had direct, unfettered contact with God, to teach them His way of life and how to use His eternal law of love as it needed to be applied with careful consideration. If they kept their part of the covenant God made with them, it would continue.
Brethren, as John said, the earth itself stands as a major teaching device. So too did the Garden of Eden for Adam and Eve before sin entered the picture. So with this in mind, let us consider what those other trees in the garden of Eden could have and probably did represent for them to eat.
Adam and Eve did not have the Holy Spirit of God in them, but they did walk with the Word of God daily, and the Garden was a teaching tool! As the old saying goes, You are what you eat.
Brethren, this is exactly what God was teaching Adam and Eve face-to-face. If they would have continued to … . . .
In what way is man in God's image? Our first tendency is to think of man in terms of form and shape as being in God's image. I do not feel that this is wrong. But I also do not feel that it addresses the right issue.
I no longer picture it that way. Now I assume Adam is already alive and God is kneeling over him. Have you ever noticed that there is no indication anywhere in the Bible that God had to perform mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to cows, or goats, or sheep, or any other animal that He created? He created them and they started breathing. Why should man be any different?
He is different because he is in the likeness of God. God had to do something. He did something to that man that actually made man into the image of God - because while he was lying there on the ground breathing, he was still yet a creature. He had animal life. He had a brain. But he did not have the spirit in man.
I believe when God knelt down and breathed into that man it was the infusion of the spirit in man. That is what made man in the image of God! That is what gives man the power to have dominion. That is what gives man the intellect he needs in order to rule the things that God has created.
Man had creature life, but man became a living being with intelligence, one who has the power to govern his actions. Not by instinct, but by memory and by conceptualization; by being able to think spatially. A man can appreciate beauty, communicate verbally, or write. A human being has feelings that are so far - in the expression of their subtly and power - over an animal in terms of love or hate - if we look at those two as being extremes - and over all of the other degrees that fall in between as well.
We can create. We can destroy. The power is in a man to be able to do these things. It is in that spirit when combined with the brain, but it has to be developed.
I think that God is showing very clearly then that as we are, we are really nothing more than a pale representation of what we can be. Yet we are endowed with powers that lift us so far above the animals on earth that we can have dominion over them.
It is also the first indication, when combined with Genesis 2:7 and 15, that when God confers a responsibility, He also confers the powers to carry out that responsibility.
I have used the word power quite a bit. What does it mean? It means, the right, ability, or capacity to exercise control, dominion. That is what God gave to man when He breathed into him. He gave him power to exercise dominion over the earth.
You shall receive power. This occurred. It is recorded in Acts 2. But I want you to remember that power arrived like the sound of wind - a mighty rushing wind; air. I want you to get the connection between Genesis 2:7, when God breathed air into Adam. He was giving him a spirit. I am convinced of that. And when God gave His Holy Spirit, He duplicated it on a majestic scale, and it again came to mankind - this time God's Holy Spirit - like the sound of wind, air moving. Mankind then is given a power, this time the Holy Spirit.
Let us go back to Genesis 2. Even as Adam and Eve were a fundamental example of what causes separation, we find here that Adam is a pattern for something that is spiritual.
Adam was nothing but a lifeless body. He was dead until God breathed into him the breath of life. While he was without the breath of life he could produce nothing, nothing that could please God. It was only after he was given the spirit. That is what that verse says. Look it up in the Hebrew. It means puff of wind, angry or vital breath, divine inspiration, intellect, blast, breath, inspiration, soul, spirit. These are all translations of that word.
What we see here is a physical parallel of what happens spiritually. Adam was a lifeless body until God breathed into him the breath of life.
Here we see the physical parallel confirmed and then connected to another subject in which the principle applies. Without the spirit, without wind/breath, we are physically dead. In like manner, faith without works is dead. Genuine faith is alive and living and it will produce the right works. In like manner, works without the Holy Spirit are dead works. There is dead faith and dead works. In like manner, there is living faith and there are good works, but there are only good works where there is living faith. Living faith is the spirit that gives life to the works and makes them good in God's eyes.
Even as Adam was changed from dead to living by having breath given, we are changed from spiritually dead to spiritually alive by receiving the Spirit of God. Christ is that spirit. Christ in you, the hope of glory. It means here everything, all that Christ represents. He Himself was missing from the Old Covenant. Forgiveness through His blood was missing. The fullness of the gospel that would lead to living faith was missing. The Holy Spirit was not yet given so it was missing. The Old Covenant was very good, but by comparison to the New Covenant, it was like Adam, dead, until God breathed life into him.
