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 … . . .
I know that I have used these scriptures so many times in recent sermons. But we have to get it through our heads that God is absolutely sovereign over His creation, and this is not the start of Plan B! I believe that Herbert Armstrong spent so much time here in the last few years of his life because this is where God purposely moved His work to create men in His own image of unbending loyalty forever. Men began the process to learn the way of peace with the way of war. War is the fruit of choices apart from loyally staying in line with the will of the Father.
There are two vital multi-millennial long lessons that God very purposely began here. 1) The pain of living apart from the perfection of God's law, and 2) Understand down to the very fiber of our being that when He is finished it is only going to be by His grace alone that we are going to be part of the Family. Although we must do our part in the work it takes to learn to live as He lives. He owes us nothing and we owe Him everything!
Brethren, right from the beginning God purposely gives us the clear opportunity to see that without the work They alone can do, we have no life beyond the brevity of human existence, no better than an animal!
The key vital element in the transference is this element of closeness. This does not stand alone. It must be combined with other factors, but without it there would be little or no hope of having God's Holy Spirit. God reveals this vital principle. It is so vital, He reveals it before the third chapter of Genesis is over.
The word Eden in Hebrew means delight or enjoyment - a garden of delight, a garden of enjoyment. When the Septuagint Version came on the scene, they used the Greek word Parkland, which is equivalent to the English Parkland for Eden. From that came the word Paradise. In many places in the Bible, in the Old Testament really, Eden is used as a symbol of great fertility. It was a place for things to grow. The environment there was beautiful for producing things. In this case it was not merely vegetation, but a relationship through fellowship that God had in mind - God, and Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve represent all of mankind. Eden spiritually indicates a rich and fertile place of unbroken fellowship.
Now the words, dominion and subdue, might inject to us a sense of foreboding because those words have a tendency, among us English-speaking people, to think of negative uses of power. That is, abuses.
This has to be put together with dominion and subdue so that we understand that God is showing that His intent in giving mankind governing powers is only good and positive. Mankind is to use his governing powers to maintain. That is what the word keep means. To preserve from decay is another application of that same word.
To tend means to edify, to cultivate. It means to promote growth toward the perfection of beauty. So God's conferring governmental power and authority, and all the gifts that were necessary, were intended by God to be used in a positive way, not in any negative sense at all. The power was intended to be used in a positive way - for the good of creation, which God had just reformed and shaped.
