You know what? I think these are some really good questions that Job is asking the Almighty. "Why would you want to spend the time and the energy on man? Man that is, you know, "man". Not just thinking about him/them/us but making him/them/us better than could be without you. You give them your gifts and favor to improve thier situation, forever. I think you even love them the way that you are always thinking about them and how you can impart to them some divine part of yourself."
In fact I think that man was created for Greatness in God. Man was the only part of God's Genesis creation that was made with a purpose mentioned. Everything that the Lord made was good! But when he made the man and woman and He surveyed everything that He had created it was Very Good. I take that to mean that once man and woman were added to the entirety of creation it was complete. It was finished by the addition of these two living souls.
This man and woman were created to dress and to keep the garden. They had jobs to do that were important to God. I don't know what you think the Garden of Eden was like. Was it like a vegetable garden with rows of neatly aligned plants and trees? Was it like an old English rose garden with a hedge maze? Was it a rock garden like a Zen practitioner keeps, with tiny stones raked to reflect tranquility and order? I dont know either. We do know that it had trees and that some of the trees at least bore fruit.
I have in my minds eye the garden being more like a secret garden than a massive plantation. I see it as being more an intimate place of meeting and communing than an agricultural industry. I have been in gardens, usually at special hotels or tourist locations, that are like a place within a place. You enter the garden through the gate and you leave behind everything else. There is something, for me anyway, about these places that quiets me on the inside.
My idea of Eden is smaller than you might believe. I don't mean small because of mans inability to maintain a larger area, but because in a small garden it would be easy to find each other. The man and the woman would just be a word away from each other. Not a shout or a scream but even a whisper of their names and their heads would turn from the work they were about to take the time to be with the One who made and gave them the garden to work in.
The job of Dressing the Garden, for me, takes on a very personal importance when it's a smaller place; a personal place. The flowers should be trimmed just so and the trees and their limbs providing shade but not obstruction. Adam did this for Eve's enjoyment of the Garden, and Eve did this to bless Adam's time in the Garden and they both did this to Serve the One! They wanted the garden to be a welcoming place and they wanted it to reflect their appreciation for it and for its Creator. Dressing or working in this place was not a job, it was a ministry of service to each other and to God.
The job of Keeping the Garden, for me is also very personal. Keeping the garden meant to defend and protect the garden. To keep IN the things that blessed the Garden and its visitors and to keep OUT the things that were a threat to the blessing of the garden. This is an important idea because something that should not have been allowed to remain in the garden got in and was able to take up residence. I'm speculating a bit here but I would guess that the enemy really took up a "sleeper cell" role in the garden. See him off to the side; no noise, no threats, just hanging day after day and then a conversation and the rest is, as they say, history.
This isn't about the deception and the disobedience that cost the man and woman their intimate garden of communion. It is about God's intention for us. He has made available for us exceeding great and precious promises so that we could be become partakers of His divine nature. Think of that for a second. We have been given promises that will make us direct partners with God in his character. Partakers of His divine nature. This one idea should occupy our thoughts and prayers for a good long while. We ask God for so many things in prayer; some noble, some foolish, some well intentioned, but erroneously sought. This one verse in 2 Peter 1:4 informs us that we have been given promises that make up all of the differences in our lives to enable us to share in God's own nature. What better thing could I ask Him for than what he has already promised me?
I know Him and sometimes I know so little of Him. What does He want for me, for you? That you would prosper and be in health even as your soul prospers. I have to believe that if God wants me to prosper then the only thing that can keep me from prospering is, well, me. Why would God think about man in the manner that he does? Because he Loves us and he desires us to know Him as we were meant to in the Garden. Intimately, not hurried or lusting for more than what he was gladly providing. Closely, so that His whispering of our names would turn our heads to Him and move our steps in his direction. How heartbreaking it must have been and is today, to know that God came walking into the cool of the garden and called His Beloved's by name and they did not answer, but rather hid. This was not how it was designed.
The veil that was torn from top to bottom when the Master cried out that it was finished brought back into our lineage the entirety of His best for his Beloved. How much more could he love us? When we were unlovable and were in fact enemies of God, he laid down his life and gave mankind an alibi by saying that the murderers didn't know what they were doing. But He did. He knew that at the end of that terrible trial there was a Joy waiting for Him and for us that resulted from a completely restored relationship.
We were without Christ and were aliens from Israel and strangers from the covenants and promises, having no hope and without God in the world. But now we are made close, very close to Him buy the very blood he shed and that we were guilty off shedding. But He loved us and gave himself for us.
OK, I don't think I can fully convey the awesome place that we have in God because of His love for us and because of His plans and intentions for our lives. We are no mistakes. We are created with purpose, and with divine purpose. If we can accept the fact that it is not about us and how much or how long or how little we do, but it is because His Grace allows it, enables it, empowers it. His Grace doesn't just open the doors to us, it blows them off the hinges. In Him!! In Him we are no longer strangers but we are partakers of His divine nature. Accept the idea that He knows what he is doing. Accept that he has the ability to restore anything he chooses. Accept the notion that He had you in mind before time, before the cross, and before you read this! Accept the promises provided by His sacrifice and His Awesome Grace!
God Bless you and take what He is giving!
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