One aspect regarding the creation of man is related to the center of the gospel, which is the Kingdom of God.

In Genesis 1:26-27, God revealed His purpose for creating man.

Genesis 1:26

²⁶ Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

From the very beginning, God gave man the right to govern the entire earth. God wanted man to have dominion over the earth on God’s behalf. For him to exercise God’s authority, what kind of man must he be? He must be created in God’s image, and according to God’s likeness, that is, like God. So if you saw this man, you saw God. He was God’s representative. 

In Genesis 1, God presented a man in His divine likeness.

Genesis 1:27

²⁷ So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

But man, in the strength of his own natural life, could not possibly bear such a lofty responsibility. To exercise divine authority and be a divine representative, he must have divine life.

In Genesis 2, God presented the tree of life, and God intended for man to eat of the tree of life.

Genesis 2:9

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.

God is the first and only speaker in creation. According to Genesis 1:3, 6, 9, 11, 14, 20, 24, 26, 28, 29; 2:18   “God said”. 

After man’s creation, God spoke to Adam.

Genesis 2:15-17

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.”

In Genesis 3, however, we find a second speaker in the garden, disguised as a serpent.

Genesis 3:1-4

Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden’?” ² And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; ³ but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.'” ⁴ Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. “

After his rebellion, Satan was cast down to the earth as indicated in the previous blog, and here the Bible reveals his location.

“Satan, God’s avowed enemy, is there. This apostate spirit is the fourth person in the Garden of Eden. And what is his mission?

He is there with the definite, deliberate, diabolical purpose of tempting Adam and Eve to do just what he himself had done through an act of self-will to step outside the circle of God’s will, to dethrone God by enthroning self. He is there to gain recruits for his rebel ranks; to win subjects for his Kingdom of darkness and death.

Let us ask and answer two questions:

What was Satan’s aim in tempting Adam and Eve?
What was Satan’s method of approach to them?

Satan’s aim, let us remember, was to exalt himself to God’s place of sovereignty and authority and to secure for himself the worship from God’s created beings which belonged to God alone. So he was in Eden to draw Adam and Eve away from God, to persuade them into disobedience and disloyalty, which would automatically cast them out of God’s Kingdom into his own. To accomplish this he did not need to incite them to gross sin or vice; one act of disobedience would carry out his purpose. He needed only to destroy confidence in God and to lead them to disbelieve and disobey Him.

Satan’s method of approach was very cunning and subtle. It was not the method of open warfare against God but that of undermining faith in God by malicious propaganda. Satan did not come out into the open and contest God’s sovereignty over his created beings but he sought to discredit God in their sight by creating within them discontent with their circumstances and by holding before them a false Utopia, thus hoping to instigate a revolt against God.

His method has not changed from that day to this. He is attempting the same thing and using the same method now that he did 4,000 years ago. The seed germ of discontent and disorder sown in the garden of Eden has borne fruit and is reaping a terrible harvest in all parts of the world today. Churches and chapels are being demolished; Bibles are being torn to pieces; anti-Christian demonstrations are being staged; threats are being made of dethroning God in his own universe. Back of all this subtle, efficient, destructive propaganda is the mastermind of the first spiritual Bolshevik who began his world revolution in the garden of Eden.” “Life on the Highest Plane” by Ruth Paxson

Jesus Christ, open our eyes to see that your enemy desires that we are rebellious as he is, Lord, help us cooperate with You to establish your Kingdom on the earth!

In Him,

Marion