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God Creates Man (vs. 4-7)

4 These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens (Genesis 2:4).

Moses narrows the focus from the vastness of the created universe, zooming in to our little planet. Notice the reversal of “heavens and the earth” to “the earth and the heavens.” This an earthly story, concerned with earthy matters like dirt, plants, animals, work, and humans. You see while Genesis 1:1, makes it clear that this is God’s story, Genesis 2:4 reminds us that God’s story includes humans. And the God of this story is none other than the LORD God. Underline that in your bible. The reason Lord is in all caps in your bible is that this is God's covenant name, Yahweh. The God who made the universe is also the God of Abraham and Moses, who stops at nothing in the biblical story to be in relationship with his people. He is not just some aloof sovereign, this God longs to be with and even loves this creature man whom he has made. Hold on that, we’ll return to it a little later.

in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens 5 When no bush of the field was yet in the land and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up—for the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to work the ground, 6 and a mist was going up from the land and was watering the whole face of the ground— 7 then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.

Here we see the setting in which God will create humanity. This is before the garden, and it is a lifeless place, much like what we saw back in Genesis 1:2 no edibles were growing in the fields and no plants that could be cultivated for food like wheat or corn. And Moses tells us why. God had not yet caused it rain, and man was not present to work or cultivate the ground.

So God makes man, and he doesn't just make him the way you assemble a shelf from Ikea or your kid's bike at Christmas. No, he forms man like an artist or potter. Have you ever seen a potter painstakingly shape a lump of clay? With care and skill, God forms man from the dust, from the same world for which he was made. But this is also very personal language. God breathed into man’s nostrils his very life. Face to face, the creator fills man’s lungs with his own breath.

God Gives Man a Place and a Job (8-14)

8 And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed. 9 And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

10 A river flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and there it divided and became four rivers. 11 The name of the first is the Pishon. It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. 12 And the gold of that land is good; bdellium and onyx stone are there. 13 The name of the second river is the Gihon. It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Cush. 14 And the name of the third river is the Tigris, which flows east of Assyria. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.

In a place called Eden, God planted a garden. Moses tells us that this was a place filled with beauty and bounty, trees that were pleasing to the eyes and that produced fruit good for the belly. God watered this garden by a river that carried that life out into the world by 4 rivers. The garden was pristine and the world around it was filled with riches and wonders just waiting for humans to discover.

You see, I hesitate to call the garden of Eden a paradise. I think it was a paradise, but not in the sense that we often imagine it. When I think of a paradise I think of the Sandals beach resort commercials. At a Sandals resort, we all have abs, perfect tans, lounge all day on soft towels, and our drinks have tiny umbrellas. Sounds like paradise to me! Read verses 15-17.

15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, 17 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.”

Wait a minute, work and the possibility of death. . . that doesn't sound like perfect tans, tiny umbrella drinks. I think we have imagined wrongly. Yes, the garden was beautiful and bountiful, but it was also a place for work. God hadn’t just created an all-inclusive resort for Adam, he made for him a garden, and gardens are meant to be worked. What happens to gardens when they are cared for, do they produce more or less? And what happens to gardens if they are not kept or protected. The wild animals and the weeds overrun it. Adam's job is to care for and protect this garden so that all the life and beauty that God created it with would grow and expand even beyond the borders of Eden. Adam wasn’t a guest on vacation, he was a gardener in a garden. To put it another way, Adam was God’s first partner in the project of human history.

We saw this last week in Genesis 1 but didn't have time to explore it. Listen to Genesis 1:27-28: 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28 And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion. . .

Unlike animals and plants made according to their kinds, humans (male and female) were made according to God’s image. Now in our upcoming OneOff on September 9 we are going to take deep dive into the image of God. But for this morning, the connection I need to make for you is that part of bearing God’s image, is the idea of partnership. As an image-bearer Adam, and as we’ll see in a moment Eve were God’s partners. Not equal partners, God is the creator while humans bear HIS, but we are partners nonetheless.

As God’s partners, humans were to fill the earth with God’s goodness and beauty. They were to be fruitful and multiply, or have families and fill the earth with other image-bearers. They were to subdue the earth or harness its' hidden potential. The ground for Adam is filled with possibility. Plant a seed and food will grow. And finally, they were called to rule, to push the beauty and bounty of God’s character beyond the borders of Eden to the ends of the earth. This was Adam’ and as their representative, humanity’s job.

But remember those two trees back in Genesis 2, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. What are they about? As with every other aspect of the creation story, the emphasis is not so much on the creation but upon the creator who desires that his people have both life and true knowledge of good and evil. I think God is establishing the terms of his partnership with Adam. God put the tree of life in the garden because he is the source of life. Life, he intended his imager bearer to multiply over the face of the earth.

But God also placed the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the garden. As in any partnership, both parties bear responsibilities. God made the dirt, and Adam worked it. Adam planted the seed and God brought the rain. Adam, and soon Eve, were faced with a choice. Remember Genesis 1. 6 times God designates what he made as good and a 7th time he calls all of it very good. Only God establishes right and wrong. Would the first humans trust God and the way that he had defined good and evil, or would they reach out, take off the forbidden fruit and define good and evil for themselves? You’ll have to come back next week to find out, but if they do, God is clear what will happen. They will surely die.

[MOU1] God Creates A Companion for Man (vs 18-25)

18 Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” 19 Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. 20 The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him. 21 So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. 22 And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man.

We’ll pick up the rest of this section in just a moment

[1]As the creator and definer of all good things God decides here in Genesis 2 that Adam’s loneliness is not good, so he decides to make Adam a helper.

Indeed, God parades every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens before Adam, and as part of his duty as God's image-bearing partner, Adam exercises his authority and names the animals. But in naming them all, none was found suitable for him. The word helper is important here. It means one who is uniquely suited to help another. God is himself is said to be Israel’s helper throughout the Old Testament. He is the only one who can help them in the way in which they need help. So, we must reject any modern sense of inferiority surrounding the creation of woman as a helper. Yes, as Paul and the other New Testament writers explain, Adam is meant to lead: by being created first, his responsibility to name the animals, and even to name his wife “woman.” But make no mistake, the picture here is of man who cannot possibly fulfill his role as God's image-bearing partner without a helper.

So, God creates woman, not from the dust like Adam, but one of Adam's ribs, and like a father walking his daughter down the aisle, presents her to her husband. One commentator says it this way She was “not made out of his head to top him, not out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near his heart to be beloved.”[2] Men and women need each other if they are to successfully bear God’s image.

And Adam responds to God’s gift of a wife with song. . . with poetry. I never could stand those guys in college who carried a guitar around all the time and would just plop down in random places and start singing. But those dudes always seemed to have dates, and it turns out Adam is one of those dudes. So single guys, maybe you should learn to play guitar or write poetry.

23 Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” Don’t miss the fact that is the first time Adam speaks in the entire Genesis story, and he does so when he see’s his wife for the first time. We are the same he sang! We are one. Bone of his bones, flesh of his flesh. Together they could step into the great task of bearing God's image.

24 Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. 25 And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

Finally, Moses points us the theological point of this scene in verses 24-25 namely marriage. Adam and Eve are the first of what is to be foundational for human society in God’s world, the family. Men will leave behind their fathers and mothers to become one with their wives. And together they will fill the earth with God’s goodness! For a moment, everything is truly right with the world. Adam and his wife are perfect for one another, there is no confusion about right and wrong and they have nothing to hide. They are both naked and unashamed.

This morning there are so many points of application that we could draw out of Genesis two, and there is no way I am going to able to address them all or even fully explore the ones I am about to address. Instead, I am going to give them to you and trust that as God leads you will explore them in your cell groups and missional communities. Genesis 2 calls us to:

Genesis 2 call us to reject escapism:

Adam and ultimately Eve were created from the earth. . . for the earth. Friends, we were made for this place, and our bodies from this place—Adam from the dust and Eve from Adam. Yes, sin has broken everything, God put us here for a purpose and that purpose remains. Heaven is not our home: As much as a global pandemic and social unrest would cause us long to escape this place to heaven, that’s not God’s plan. As we’ll see in Revelation 21, heaven is coming to us.

· Therefore, God is very much concerned with the natural world and how we use and often exploit its resources, resources which he has called his image-bearers to steward.

· Likewise, our physical bodies matter, because we cannot fulfill our purpose without them. God is concerned about what you eat, that you exercise every once in a while, and that you care for yourself when you’re sick. Friends we must reject escapism and all of its implications. Heaven is not our home.

Second, Genesis 2 teaches us to: Value all human life:

God created us with care and wonder, in his image and we’re not to be tossed away. This winter when you step into the cold and see your breath for the first time, remember who gave it to you. You belong to him, and so does the panhandler who begs on Poinsett Hwy, the unborn child who our society deems unexpected and expendable, or the elderly COVID patient left to die in a nursing home. Let me clear your conscience this morning. You can an I believe should say full-throated that black lives matter and women matter and simultaneously reject the ungodly and unbiblical beliefs that the black lives matter and the me-too movements espouse. Those organizations don’t own the truth of human dignity. No my friends that belongs to God and he calls us to value all human life.

Third, Genesis 2 teaches us that Work is Good:

There is much we should say about this but we don’t have the time. Suffice it to say, God works and he created man to work. Certainly, work is made more difficult by sin as we will see next week, but we must be careful not to see work as a product of sin. Work is good. By working Adam and Eve bore God’s image grew the garden. So whether you wiping babies noses, repairing automobiles, or making decisions in an office when our work reflects God's we push his goodness into the world and thereby bearing his image. Work is Good.

Fourth, Genesis 2 teaches us to Look to Jesus:

We all know that this story goes terribly wrong in the next chapter, and I am saving much for Daniel next week. But as Adam and Eve fail as God's image-bearers and the subsequent effect of that fall is that the failure of every one of Adam's descendants. That you and I and every person ever born. We don't bear God's image and we don't represent his goodness with our lives. No humans have chosen to define good and evil on our own terms and rule God’s world for themselves instead of for God. But the God who made us to bear his image is Yahweh, the covenant God of Israel, and just as Adam and Eve were joined together in the garden as one flesh, God has joined himself to his people. He’s committed to us no matter how badly we mess it up.

What we need is a savior, someone who can bear God’s image on our behalf. In steps God’s Son,. Jesus. And the New Testament opens with him teaching his people how to be God's image-bearers, how to rule the world on God’s behalf based upon God's definition of right and wrong. So for example, Jesus teaches in Matthew 5 that God’s people rule with mercy, not cruelty, with humility, not pride. But then he demonstrates all of this for us with his life, most importantly on the cross. There he's hoisted high as the ultimate image bearer, as the King who in humility and mercy laid down his life for his sinful people. Jesus is as Paul said in Colossians 1:15: the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. My friends, sin has robbed us of our rightful place as God partners, but Jesus has come to restore us. If you will look to Jesus today and repent of all the ways you have redefined right and wrong, Jesus will forgive your sins and restore you to the rightful place. Let's pray.

[1] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. (2016). (Ge 2:4–3:1). Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles.

[2] Waltke, B. K., & Fredricks, C. J. (2001). Genesis: a commentary (p. 89). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.

[MOU1]