Enigma of evil and the Garden of Eden

Enigma of evil and the Garden of Eden

Enigma of the existence of evil and the Garden of Eden and God the Benevolent.

I will try in my own humble way to answer this most difficult question.

How can we ever reconcile the fact of evil, suffering and pain, existing side by side with a benevolent holy God of light?

Let us go back to the story of the Garden of Eden. God says to Adam in Gen,Chp 2 Verse 17 that he may eat of any tree except the tree of knowledge of "good and evil". Note the tree of knowledge of good and evil, so evil existed before Adam.

However, God being all-knowing knows before hand that Adam is going to fail the test so why did he give it in the first place? I hear a loud reply from the congregation of saints out there, “because he wanted us to have a free will and not be robots”. I don’t buy this, completely, as God could easily given Adam free rain and said to him “Adam your can do anything you want without any reservations”

Surely, the above would be free will without the necessity of any test.
Nevertheless, God in his infinite wisdom goes ahead and gives Adam (and Eve) a test he “knows they are going to fail, Why? Was this fair seeing the awful consequences for humanity down through the age? Yes absolutely, as I will describe later in this essay
Let us go back to the origin of evil, where did it come from.

Now this might be hard for baby to understand but it is absolutely true and right out of The Word of GOD.

Isaiah Capt. 45 Verse 7 I form the light and create darkness: I make peace and create “evil” I God do all these things. God made evertthing so he must have made evil but why?

Let us go back to Adam and the pampered environment of the Garden of Eden. If Adam and eve had remained and by obeying God ( as God knew the would not) they would have existed in forever a paradise setting of beauty warmth, comfort, never ever have to toil work just reach out and eat do any thing they want . This would be wonderful for say a hundred years or a thousand years, but having never ever experienced cold they could not appreciate warmth, never being hungry never appreciate food never being thirsty they would not appreciate the taste and satisfaction of sparking water They would have existed in a one-sided reality never knowing the opposite. Therefore, after countless years what is paradise to us would become a boring hell to them. Therefore, God simply had to banish them into the world. You see God had said to Adam he must not eat of the tree of knowlege of what? Good and Evil. So it is obvious that if Adam had not eaten of this tree he would never been able to know that Eden was a really Good place.

So God being fair and just gave them the test, which they failed and drove them out into the present reality world of thorns, cold, dark, pain, evil etc, etc. This reality is based on a duality we know evil so we know the beauty of goodness; we know truth so we can hate the lie, and we experience the light so that we know dark.

We yearn for paradise lost and when we finally reenter it, through the blood of our lord and savior Jesus Christ, we will be able to appreciate it as we have known and will always remember the opposite.

I do not for one moment believe the nonsense that there is an eternal battle between God and the Devil and that the Devil is almost Almighty Gods equal. The Devil can only do what God permits him to do as we read in the book of Job. 'This shouting at the enemy iiritates me', it is God who will deal with the Devil, not us.


ther is:

Good and evil
Light and dark
Truth and lie
Deception and honesty
Love and hate
Positive and negative
Faith and despair
Holiness and depravity
Warm and hot
Life and death

And so on and so on……………………

God bless

Alan
McDougall
 
Just my opinions brother.
It is not difficult to understand all was created by God . Man could and did choose. God was not surprised. What man gave up in the garden was his innocence- up till that time he lived his life obey and depending on God. Once he ate fron the tree of the knowledge of good and evil he made his own path based of his desires, goals and will. Anytime man has forsaken God's leadership and went his own way the result was always the same- death.God nis even now calling us back to this smae total depndance on Himself as we are to be led by the Spirit in all htings. Man could have had it made if he had simply chise the tree of life ( Jesus ).
Tests are not given and questions not asked for God to find something out but indeed for us to find out about ourselves.
The battle being fought now is in the minds and hearts of believers. God has no equal.
 
Just my opinions brother.
It is not difficult to understand all was created by God . Man could and did choose. God was not surprised. What man gave up in the garden was his innocence- up till that time he lived his life obey and depending on God. Once he ate fron the tree of the knowledge of good and evil he made his own path based of his desires, goals and will. Anytime man has forsaken God's leadership and went his own way the result was always the same- death.God nis even now calling us back to this smae total depndance on Himself as we are to be led by the Spirit in all htings. Man could have had it made if he had simply chise the tree of life ( Jesus ).
Tests are not given and questions not asked for God to find something out but indeed for us to find out about ourselves.
The battle being fought now is in the minds and hearts of believers. God has no equal.

You are very wise. Where did you get this learning? He is calling us back to the garden, I have been feeling this for some time, calling us to be totally dependent on him and obey his instructions. I had a dream last night, my son was doing something that I had specifically told him not to and was putting himself in danger. I was angry and thought, why doesn't he listen and obey, it's for his own safety and well-being? God told me in the dream, you do the same thing when you don't obey me.
 
I just gave a sermon on the Garden of Eden and this very story. It was the first of my "Road to Christmas" series. I talked about the Garden, and how, in the very first few chapters of the Bible, it became necessary for God to send His Son, Jesus, to be our salvation. The Christmas story was written starting with Genesis chapter 2. Why? Because in the beginning God gave us paradise on Earth. This paradise was the Garden. Man had all he could ever want. In this paradise was a tree, and, at the time there was only one commandment. "Do not eat of this tree". You say, why is there good and evil if we are created by a loving, Holy God? Because evil isn't something that exists. Evil is simply, a lack of God. Evil "exists" not as a trait in itself, but of a lack of a trait, a lack of good and a lack of God. I will disagree and say the tree in the Garden is a representation of God's love for us...He loves us so much He gave us the right to choose the path of Good with God, or the other path, without Him. I do not believe it was a test, I believe it was a decision for mankind to make. This brings us back to something very, very sad. In the beginning there was only one law. When mankind knew no suffering and was fully provided for, it still could not follow but one simple law. But in that garden God foretold the coming of our wonderful savior, Jesus Christ. When God shed the blood of animals to give skin coverings to Adam and Eve, he foretold the shedding of the blood of Christ to cover our sins and bring us salvation. Praise God, that from the very beginning He loved us enough to let us choose. Praise God that from the very beginning He foretold His promise to this world, and Praise God, he has fulfilled His promise in Jesus Christ. Amen and Merry Christmas. Praise to the KING!
 
Don it is you who is wise as you are hearing the call of God and taking it to heart.

Amen t that LivingWaters, God had a plan before we even stumbled ( in fact He stil does everyday!)
Rev 13:8 And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
 
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