Fruits of a Garden

I was so careful when my children were young. It was easier then. As they grew older, however, as I entered the workforce and they entered a more adult world ... as they were more 'peer' in concept, I realize now the 'carefulness' of the earlier days wasn't there anymore.

"Do not be conformed to the pattern of this world!"

I wish it hung as a banner in front of my eyes (my children's eyes, all our eyes) ... all the time. One I had to intentionally gaze through, peer around, consciously turn my back on if I wanted to walk a way other than God's way.

However, that's the subtlety of sin. It parks itself right in front of our face .... saying, "I'm alright. I'm light. Look how far from darkness I am." Yet all the while its light is merely a cloak covering the depth of darkness permeating its soul ... waiting to devour mine.

God wanted us to realize something when He shares with us His conversation with Cain (and Cain's response) in Genesis 4. Sin is not an inanimate, lifeless object. It lives ... it desires ... it has a game plan ... it’s on the prowl. And its target is you ... is me ... is all those I love.

It doesn't take the headlines or the local news channel to alert even the least discerning that still ... the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. (Genesis 6:5)

How comfortable have you been standing at the checkout counter at any grocery store lately? How many commercials on TV can you sit through, without cringing in embarrassment? If you live with a forest of billboards, how often have you felt the need to avert your own eyes … or desperately wish those of your young sons and even daughters were blindfolded?

Maybe it's because I'm a tad older, though I’m not that old. I remember when certain content simply wasn't appropriate in mixed company, even in commercials. Where certain poses and body language still brought blushes to faces that might happen to ‘take it in’, even men’s countenances. Where parents felt a need to avert the heads of their children when someone clothed in specific apparel came into their line of vision. Now, flesh rules the day, as that wily serpent takes us back to the garden before ‘eyes were opened’ … knowing fully well how very opened they, indeed, are … having successfully erased every aspect of our shame - so hooked on pleasure have we become.

Today you’re apt to find the person on the pew right next to you, or maybe even yourself, clothed in fashion that can only turn heads … worse yet, turn hearts. How well I remember my own sons saying, “You’re not letting her out of the house in that, are you!” referring to their eleven year old sister. They wanted her covered. And I think it was their reactions that most captured my attention to just how differently a man’s mind ‘sees.’ Sin’s success at inoculation permeates the church today, not just the world.

Today a 'no holds barred' philosophy seems to be behind what should be even the safest content .... turning it into a 'who can push the envelope the furthest' contest. It grieves me ... I can't imagine what it does to God's heart of holiness.

What makes for top box office ratings these days? or even the content of the supposedly 'family' appropriate TV programs? Think about the DVDs or videos lining your shelves.

If Romans 1:28-32 doesn't describe, in varying shades of grey (not that before God there is any such thing) what those shelves hold (even children's material) then you have accomplished the unaccomplishable:

And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting: being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, callousness; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness; they are whispers, backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful; who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them.

If they're on my shelf (which, grievously, they are) I've shown my approval of them. If my attendance at their offering filled their coffers (which it has), I've shown my approval. If my bookcase reveals a sharing in their feast, a supping at their table ... then I needn't wonder if I've conformed to the pattern of this world. It's there for all to see. And evil needn’t look beyond me to find a tool of conformity to work its work in the heart of those I love best.

What does Paul tell the Ephesians?

This I say, therefore, and testify in the LORD, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart; who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness. But you have not so learned Christ, if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness. (4:17-24)

I'm not writing this to you as much as I'm writing this to myself! Oh, how much I’m writing it to myself.

We can't live in two gardens. We can't live with one foot in Eden and one foot in Gethsemane. A divided mind, a divided heart, can't live ... it dies. And it pulls those watching into the pit with it.

We can't have two masters. Either the flesh (Eden) rules us, our choices, our shades of grey. Or the Spirit of God, where the sod of our Gethsemane knows well the indentation of our own bended knee and taste of our own obedience’s bloodied drops of sweat.

No wonder David cried out: Create in me a clean heart; and renew a right spirit in me. We’re desperate for it.

How far we have fallen from the light, even those of us knowing ourselves children of God, purchased by the shedding of His own blood ... because our own hand keeps reaching out with Eve’s.

It’s so easy not to look beyond her … not to look beyond the serpent … but our own senses enjoy being titillated just as much as hers. We’ve not just bought the whispering lie, we live it out, daily. We stand in Cain’s field because it’s ours … bloodied knife in our own hand … righteousness, slain at our own feet, and our dirt trying to cover the evidence of it. How do I know?

Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy – meditate on these things. (Philippians 4)

…Abstain from every form of evil … (1 Thess. 5:22) Another translation puts it …avoid even the appearance of evil…

God doesn’t allow man any shades of grey … period!

But the Eve-ishness of our hearts won’t truly receive that message. When Eve saw it was pleasing to the eye more accurately translates satisfying to the desires of the heart. Is it any wonder that God looks at our own righteousness and sees it as ‘filthy rags?’

Man hasn’t changed, because flesh hasn’t change. The LORD looks and still sees ‘that the wickedness of man is great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart is only evil continually.’

It's impossible to shield our children from the vileness of life. And there's something terrifying in that reality. I’d like to look at their own stumbling, their own conformity to the world and point my finger … anywhere, but where bitter truth lies. The same truth that the first parents had to live with as their own world grew darker and darker and darker, until even the earth itself was filled with evil’s violence. It lies with me … with my own Eve-ishness … my own conformity to the result of my slaying of righteousness, over and over, on the field of want … desire … which lines my own shelves, colors my own conversation, molds my own choices.

Paul pens my heart eloquently when he writes … For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good. But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God – that through Jesus Christ our Lord!

Righteousness will ever be an internal work … ever a work outside my own doing. Righteousness will never cease to always be a work of grace, acted out on my behalf, imparted through mercy alone to this fallen, evil-seeded clay called me. Righteousness’ fruit, that daily putting off of the old and putting on of the new through the working of the Spirit of God within me, must make up my moment-by-moment portion of obedience … my Gethsemane living.

There’s something about Gethsemane … it doesn’t allow for even the merest speck of self to set foot upon its sod, let alone dwell there.

Why has the world grown so increasingly dark in our day? Because we, the children of light, have taken up companionship with the serpent. And the heartbreaking truth remains, we’re comfortable there, for the most part. We’ve accepted his definitions of ‘goodness’ … we’ve allowed the planting of his description of ‘fair … pleasing’ to take residence within us. It’s not that darkness’ seed has vanquished the light. Never! But Light will not reside with it … and making our choice, God allows us to reap its fruit … though it breaks His heart.

We must choose! That’s what love is, a choice. Choosing to walk as children of light through the power of the Holy Spirit within us … turning our back to every ‘pleasurable’ seed of darkness. Daily! In every single area of life … not from external legalism … but from an internal love that allows us to choose no other. As more and more of God’s children, beginning with me, make that the genuine desire (‘stretch out after’ in the Hebrew) of their living, cutting to the quick our conformity to the world, darkness will diminish as God’s light burns brighter and brighter upon the earth.

May love such as this truly capture our hearts. As we stand in Cain’s field, aware the blood dripping from our own knife, may the blade fall from our grip. May our stained hands, instead, stretch out after Grace’s covering, grasping it so tightly about ourselves that even a shadow of darkness has no chance of slithering through. May our love choose, not conformity to darkness, but the transforming light of conformity to the mind of Christ, who lived Gethsemane with every step, with every breath … that I, in Him, may choose the same.





© 10 January 2006
DeAnna L. Brooks

Gifted Clay

Male and female created he [God=Elohim] them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created.

Gen 5:2

When God took that clay from earth’s sod and fashioned mankind in His own image, God designated both man’s position and individuality … his honor, authority, and character … setting it apart as unique among His creations. We miss that in the English; yet the concept is captured in Hebrew: called their name Adam.

God didn’t name the animals … Adam did, as each was brought to him by God.
God did name, however, the clay into which He imparted the His own breath of life. He name him ‘Adam.’ (mankind). Fascinating. One part of that ‘image of God’ quality, then, can be see in Adam as he, in turn, gives names to other creations of God.

God ‘calls me by name’ – not simply by the name mankind; but by my own name noting that uniqueness of character, of nature, of giftedness which He Himself imparts to me. My ‘name is also carved into the palm of His hand. I’m not simply a number, another clump of dust into which the breath of life is imparted.

Throughout the OT the ‘naming’ of a child carries great significance. Once, again, it appears an example man of ‘acting in the image’ of God.

Scripture opens with God giving man a name, and in closes with the same : To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it. (Rev. 2:17)


* * * * * * *

Adam … begot [bear, bring forth] a son in his own likeness, after his image Gen 5:3

Immediately this puts me in mind of the first time Genesis records ‘image’:

… So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created them …

Strong’s Hebrew dictionary sheds some unexpected light on what God did when He first reached down into that clay and created.

“Image” is from an unused root meaning to shade; a phantom, that is, (figuratively) illusion, resemblance; hence a representative figure, especially an idol: - image, vain shew.

That’s what the serpent in Eden knew; what the breathing clay had not yet figured out. Man wasn’t a ‘piece’ of God; he wasn’t the essence of God’s divinity … merely a shadow, a shade, resembling only in part the real thing.

No wonder God moved the apostle John’s pen to write so specifically.

For God so loved the world He gave His only begotten Son …

Not made, nor fashioned as God fashioned man. Jesus was Divine … was one and the same in essence and nature and glory .... and He remains so.

Mankind, this clay tent fashioned in the image of God, has never been nor ever will be more than a shadow of He Who was, and Is and Is to Come.

In steps the miracle of Grace, Love’s desire for relationship, the immutable plan birthed before the foundations of the world.

Ephesians 2:5-10 tells the eternal tale … a tale of new creation.

But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;) And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

One day, those created in Christ Jesus, will be brought, again, before the Tree of Life, where we will be invited to eat. Never as God, or becoming God … but standing in the Righteous of the Lamb, God will choose to see us pure and spotless … children of the Living God.

Those today, those throughout history, seeking godhood (newage theology is rife with it) still sit before a garden tree immersed in a serpent’s lie.

All man can ever bear are those in his own likeness … mired in sin … chained and enslaved to self … desperately needing a Savior.

That’s the hope begun in Genesis 5. That lineage that would bring man first to a manger; then lead him to follow bloody footsteps up a savage hill, to stand before a bitter tree, where Redemption Wine at last spilled. Before an empty tomb man would learn ‘freedom’s dance’ as hands raise heavenward to embrace the Son.

LET THERE BE ..... HOPE!

In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. (John 1:4-5)

What a perfect banner to be flying over these opening chapters of Genesis, where in the very beginning God spoke four words, Let there be light! Promptly filling all creation with evidence of His presence. And still, darkness attempted from the beginning to ‘overtake’ light. And the world grew darker, and darker … but always there, casting out darkness’s challenge light blazed … for any heart looking.

Lest those reading the account of man begin to despair, Genesis 5 opens with a fresh reminder of clay’s beginning. God made man in His own image … and God blessed them. Awesome. Knowing what the morning held … fully aware they would taste bitter fruit while still in Eden … just as fully aware that self would turn on righteousness in a field tended by clay burgeoning with self gone awry … still God blessed them.

And He didn’t lift His blessing, even in light of their choosing another way. When God’s curse fell, it fell upon their way, their choice … not upon His beloved. It fell upon evil, upon unrighteousness seen in the guise of a serpent, a serpent which would know God’s curse, but not upon the clay housing the soul of those bearing His image, bearing His love … into eternity.

Something about that really moves me as two world orders find delineation at the end of Genesis and throughout Genesis 5.

Genesis 5 stands a genealogy of mercy, of hope, of grace:

Hebrew ..... English
Adam ..... Man
Seth ..... Appointed
Enosh ..... Mortal
Kenan ..... Sorrow;
Mahalalel ..... The Blessed God
Jared ..... Shall come down
Enoch ..... Teaching
Methuselah ..... His death shall bring
Lamech ..... The Despairing
Noah ..... Rest, or comfort.


That's rather remarkable:
Man (is) appointed mortal sorrow; (but) the Blessed God shall come down teaching (that) His death shall bring (the) despairing rest.

Reading God's message to us, His beloved, something becomes crystal clear. God wasn't winging it as He went along. He wasn't trying to play 'catch up' with man's actions, ever trying to pull the fat out of the fire. God's grace had already turned every page, and fully poured His grace upon each one.

Darkness might attempt, over and over, to snuff out the light ... but light, it ever scatters the darkness ... and darkness is unable to stand in His presence at all.

No wonder every knee shall bow before Him, and every tongue confess His Lordship.

Field of Sorrows

I stumbled this morning upon an unanticipated field, in an unexpected place. It took my soul unaware … painting a picture my eyes had n’er before beheld, filling my heart with immeasurable sorrow.

It’s a field of another I’d been visiting these past few days, the field of Cain, maybe better understood, I think, as the field of self.

It’s a field I hadn’t been all too comfortable in, hitting a little too close to home as I had to ask myself how often had I, in bringing offerings to God, been little different from Cain. How often had I brought self, fully inflated, before the Lord, rather than a vessel emptied of self … rather than a heart more attuned to Abel’s?

By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. (Hebrews 11:4 – ESV)

But any allusion of comfort shattered this morning when the eyes of my heart alighted upon that field … as One stood before me holding out a cup and a piece of bread, broken.

And Cain saith unto Abel his brother, `Let us go into the field;' and it cometh to pass in their being in the field, that Cain riseth up against Abel his brother, and slayeth him. (Genesis 4:8 – YLT)

Suddenly I understood that field as my field, where self and righteousness cannot abide together. A field where I, in my own sin, rose up against God’s righteousness … and slew Him. A field purchased by love, purchased by blood, that I might truly die to self and live to God.

I stood in that field this morning, Communion Sunday, in a fresh and new way. I don’t want to be like Cain, clinging so fast, so tightly, to self that I will choose to flee the presence of Almighty God.

In Hebrew Cain’s response to God’s truth can also be rendered: My evil is greater than I can bear. And, indeed, it is … so Grace chose to bear that burden, and I stand awash in it this morning because the Righteousness of God shed His own blood on my behalf.

I don’t know that I will ever sit in a Communion service quite the same again, picturing the bludgeoning that took place in that field of sorrow, I bludgeoning my own hand is guilty of, a field known in the beginning … yet a shadow of another field of sorrow that would cover my sin for all eternity.

Maybe it was said best in a song familiar to each of us.


O Sacred Head, Now Wounded

O Sacred head now wounded
With grief and shame weighed down
Now scornfully surrounded
With thorns Thy only crown
How art Thou pale with anguish
With sore abuse and scorn
How does that visage languish
Which once was bright as morn

What Thou my Lord hast suffered
Was all for sinner's gain
Mine mine was the transgression
But Thine the deadly pain
Lo here I fall my Savior
Tis I deserve Thy place
Look on me with Thy favor
Assist me with Thy grace

What language shall I borrow
To thank Thee dearest Friend
For this Thy dying sorrow
Thy pity without end
O make me Thine forever
And should I fainting be
Lord let me never never
Outlive my love to Thee





© 8 January 2006
DeAnna L. Brooks

Two Brothers

Why is Abel mentioned first in Genesis 4:2, to be followed then by Cain? What is the hidden treasure? I’m not certain, but I’m immediately but in mind of anther set of brothers soon to follow: Jacob and Essau. Though Essau was ‘the oldest’ by minutes, most often his name is preceded by Jacob’s. Born of the same seed, their natures differed. Essau sold his birthright for a pot of stew. Not just his temporal inheritance, but the spiritual birthright, as well. Genesis 25 tells us that Esau despised his birthright.

Are we already seeing this played out here, right beyond Eden’s gates? Hebrews 11:4 may shed some light, keeping the truth in mind that while man looks on the outward appearance, God looks on the heart.

… by faith Abel offered unto God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous …

There was something very different about these two presentations to God. Only here in Genesis 4 is the word translated ‘offering.’ Every other time it’s used in Genesis it takes on the connotation of ‘gift’ or ‘present.’ But here, in Genesis 4, something was at work.

It puts me in mind of God’s heart revealed in Romans 12:1-2.

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God to present our bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

Two brothers, residents of the same physical world, but hearts in two different realms, came before Jehovah, the Self-existent One, offering Him the gift of self. Abel’s offering representing a faith sacrifice … a humble acceptance and recognition of his need for God’s covering of grace and forgiveness. A placing of himself into God’s hands.

… apart from shedding of blood there is no remission … (Heb. 9:22)

Cain’s ‘offering’ of self feels different, somehow. It carries pride’s voice. Look what my hands have wrought. I give You the best of what I can do. Accept now what I did by myself. I hear no humility, no confession of need; but rather the voice of self-sufficiency.

I don’t sense this family was a stranger to God’s voice, nor a stranger to a system of offerings already ordained. Cain’s own words when God confronts him after Abel’s murder signify he was accustomed to God’s presence.

From Your face shall I be hid (absent).

God never indicated any such thing. Nor did God banish Cain. God simply told him that the fruits of the earth would no longer yield themselves readily and richly to his hands. Cain would need to gathering where he found it.

Genesis 4:16 reveals the truest picture of Cain’s heart in the matter of spiritual things:

And Cain went out from the presence of the LORD.

So different from his parents.

Therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground
from whence he was taken. So he drove out the man … (Genesis 3:23-24)

Cain chose to leave the place of God’s presence, the place and attitude of worship.
He chose to severe himself from not only his family, but from any all ‘fear of God.”

Two world orders, firmly established, right outside the gates of Eden ... how God must have grieved.

So much more to say ... but time escapes me.





[birthright = a favored covenant-relationship with Yaweh; function as priest of family]

The Day of Knowing

Genesis 3:5 … God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good from evil …

Satan, by his very nature, is a deceiver. Jesus calls him the Father of lies. Realizing that, I’ve turned to take a closer look at the serpent’s first words to Eve. What might they reveal about Satan? What corrupted picture of God might he have been imparting to Eve?

A single word was the first lie. The inclusion of not into the exceedingly abundant provision and permission God had given Eve. It brings to mind the saying, “Give them and inch, they’ll take a mile.”

God withheld from His beloved nothing, save one thing. To not eat of the single thing that would endanger, would bring harm, in a world that otherwise held no limitations.

Scantly clad in orphan attire, holding out a now empty porridge bowl having known only meager portions, Oliver’s voice suddenly bursts upon the page: More please!

But Eve was no orphan … nor were her provisions meager. They were abundant beyond measure, beyond what she could have consumed in a lifetime.

I fear desire already lived and breathed within this feminine clay … desire for the forbidden, because it was forbidden.

The fertile heart soil lay ready, waiting … and the serpent, reading the signs well, dropped the seed. Growth was instantaneous.

Eve grabbed the bait, added her own lie nor shall you touch it, and glossed over the consequences. God had left no question to the cost of disobedience: you shall surely die. He couldn’t have stated it more clearly. But Eve displayed a heart already questioning God, already displaying a deafness to His Word: lest you die.

God’s pronouncement declares certain death; Eve’s rendition held only the possibility of death.

I’ve never appreciated ‘dumb blonde’ jokes, but I must admit at this moment a deep desire to chalk up Eve’s subtle word shadings to a ‘blondeness’ in her thinking. But God personally built Eve in His image, and I just can’t make ‘blondeness’ fit that scenario.

She chose. Deliberately. Intentionally. Selecting the lens through which she would look and listen. It hurts, because I want to make excuses for her, excuses for me. When I read the passage quickly, I can; but not when I look into a heart so clearly revealed there.

Not until Eve had revealed her heart did the serpent strike the deathblow, permission already granted him through her own lies.

And that’s where I began, looking at those words, wondering the picture of God they painted. Was it a picture the serpent believed? Knowing from where he came that seems unfathomable. A portrait Eve wanted to claim, because it would make godhood attainable for her? Regardless, they both wanted the same thing … to attain godhood. It’s a portrayal that certainly twists and perverts the very nature of God.

… in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good from evil …

Could Eve, or anyone for that matter, truly believe that God’s essence is knowing good from evil? Not righteousness. Not holiness. Not love. Not light. Not all the things that God reveals Himself to be … none of which are attainable by man.

Knowing, through discernment and personal experience and involvement in, does not make for godhood. It’s contrary, in one respect. God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone.

Eve had to have known that. Adam, who was there through it all, certainly did, a witness to God’s creative nature. But even if, for a fleeting moment Eve bought the lie, choice still followed. Choice revealing a darkness of heart already looking for another god.

The serpent had indeed found fertile soil, innocence already gone. It wasn’t the ‘sight’ of the eye the serpent appealed to, but the ‘sight’ of the soul, the perception, that seat of understanding we’re all tempted daily to lean upon.

Lean not on your own understanding, but in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths.

Where that dark seed first knew life within the Potter’s clay remains a mystery. But on the day of knowing, that mystery no longer mattered. It’s fruit no longer hidden, Grace’s covering, also, came visibly into play.

Eve displayed more than her own nature that day, a nature I share with her. With a single bite, she also put on display the nature of God. Mercy and Righteousness lay in full view … before Eve … before Adam … before a serpent … before this heart of clay who speaks the words of one after God’s own heart – Create in me a clean heart, O LORD, and renew a right spirit in me.








© 5 December 2005
DeAnna L. Brooks

Desire's Need

Ezekiel 28:12-17 sheds additional insight upon the eternal battle raging between the Serpent and the Light!

You were the seal of perfection, Full of wisdom and perfect beauty.

You were in Eden, the garden of God;

Every precious stone was your covering:

The sardius, topaz, and diamond, Beryl, onyx, and jasper, Sapphire, turquoise, and emerald with gold.

The workmanship of your timbrels and pipes Was prepared for you on the day you were created.

You were the anointed cherub who covers; I established you;

You wee on the holy mountain of God;

You walked back and forth in the midst of fiery stones.

You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created, Till iniquity was found in you....

You became filled with violence within, And you sinned;

Therefore I cast you as a profane thing Out of the mountain of God;

And I destroyed you, O covering cherub, From the midst of the fiery stones.

Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty,

You corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor...

Wow! A covering cherub ... disguising himself later as an angel of light ... whose very first words to man necessitated a Divine covering ... that no fig leaves, no false light, could imitate. It took a bloodied covering, flowing scarlet to return Light to that which had chosen darkness.

* * * * * * *

What did Eve desire? What drove her to place her will, her understanding, above God’s? Was it not the seedbed of pride? A desire to know as God knew.

There is a way that seems right to a man; but the end of it is death.

Upon the eating, Eve gained what she desired … gained more than she bargained for. Suddenly she knew what God had always known, and it drove her to disguise herself, to hide the now awful truth from the very One who walked with her in the cool of the evening.

Every fiber of Eve’s being, of Adam’s being, vibrated the truth that apart from God only darkness exists … apart from Him all is vanity. And they had not yet come to understand LOVE.

So rather than running to it, they hid themselves in feeble makeshift garments that on another occasion would weave a garment of laughter, but on this day could only bring tears.

Then LOVE steps in, and they begin to understand.

I can’t help but speculate that what they had so taken for granted, up until now, suddenly took wing … no longer remaining earthbound. Grace covered every interaction, every conversation between their hearts and God’s, with mercy. In the midst of their pain, of their sorrow, they discovered unfathomable joy and a loving gratitude toward their Creator they’d not tasted of before. Sweet juice of the Vine replaced the bitterness of a forbidden bite … and they knew that they knew that they knew that surely joy indeed comes in the morning.

Your Eyes Will Be Opened

The serpent spoke tremendous truth with the words, “...your eyes will be opened.” Possible more truth than he imagined. Up until that moment it seems outward appearances were the garb in vogue. Appearances that were stripped away while forbidden juice still lay upon the tongue, tasting sweet. Bitterness came on a swallow, swallowing up falsehood. Suddenly everything was laid bare. And looking at one another, their nakedness revealed, nothing preventing them from seeing the darkness within their own hearts, what did they do. They immediately went to covering the transparency causing so much pain, so much shame, so much disillusionment.

Truth reveals all darkness, necessitates transparency, for nothing can be hidden from the Eyes that know all … and yet still choose to love.

But transparency wasn’t safe in Eden, not any longer, so man attempted to cover truth revealed in a bite, longing self to remain disguised, beautified.

… and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings (3:7)

Once again I’d missed what God wants me to see, to understand. Covering in Hebrew is a word more accurately translated armor.

New meaning now breathes in God’s counsel, Put on the whole armor of God. The girdle. The breast-plate. The helmet.

Adam and Eve weren’t simply attempting to clothe their physical flesh. They were desiring to protect themselves. To arm themselves against a frightening truth they saw, in themselves, in one another.

It would be fascinating to explore this, but words quickly come to mind that seem so appropriate here.

Love covers a multitude of sins.

And that is exactly what LOVE did. He provided the perfect covering for man’s sins … Himself … worn here first in its shadow, until that day assigned before the foundation of the earth when it would be worn in its fullness.

And when that first drop of blood spilled onto Eden’s sod, it reveal to hiding hearts that the battle was not against each other, but against a deceiver whose own desire was to claim them for his own.

Finally, my brethren, be strong in the LORD and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done so, to stand. (Ephesians 6:10-13)

A Serpent Slithers

Rationalization screams through Eden as the serpent, at last, makes his own voice heard. I can’t help but picture him slyly watching, listening in to grace-filled conversations as man and his Creator walk together in the cool of the night. Watching. Waiting. Though Eternal eyes fully took in his presence, clay eyes remained blinded to the danger.

Would that I could hear their conversation, for somehow I fully image warning wrapped within the Divine words, just as they imbued the words Jesus spoke to those walking with Him.

But ears didn’t hear, didn’t comprehend, so the watcher continued his pursuit. Plotting. Revenge, the darkness of its cloak, clutched tightly around his heart. His first words to the Almighty’s beloved say it all.

“Has God indeed said, ‘ You shall not eat of every tree of the garden?.”

Can’t you hear his voice, dripping with honey, with malicious cunning dressed in the guise of innocent wonderment? Isn’t that always where a good lie starts, infiltrating cunningly, smoothly, deceptively clothed in innocent’s raiment.

Discernment fled, or lay buried beneath desire.

No voice could be heard within this clay trumpeting truth, bearing the armor to extinguish the fiery darts. Clay ears remained deafened, not listening:

Cursed be the deceiver ...

So he feared Me
And was reverent before My name.
The law of truth was in his mouth,
And injustice was not found on his lips.
He walked with Me in peace and equity,
And turned many away from iniquity.

Adam remained silent … and darkness fell … ‘til the Second Adam restored light. Can you hear the whisper?

“They shall be Mine,” says the LORD of hosts,
“On the day that I make them My jewels.
And I will spare them
As a man spares his own son who serves him.”
Then you shall discern
Between the righteous and the wicked,
Between one who serves God
And one who does not serve Him. (Malachi)

But at this moment, discernment had fled, and its absence laid bare a heart needing covering … a heart awash in desire … a heart hungering for self rather than Light!

How unlike the One Who knew to feast only on Heaven’s fare.

Now when the tempter came to Him (Jesus), he said, “if You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”
But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”

Eden was not deficient of God’s Word. It permeated the air, it entered with every breath drawn in and should have exhaled on every word spoken. But when most needed, it wasn’t God’s word breathing out of Edenic clay ... but a dark seed, twisting, turning, polluting the Divine Voice ‘til it served self, planting doubt, granting disobedience permission to serve another master.

And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God said, ‘You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.”

And with its utterance, death gasped its first breath while a serpent slithered in glee ... slithering still.

A Bigger Picture

Genesis 2:6-7
“… but a mist went up from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground. And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.”

I missed the sequence until now, the fine-tuning from the bigger picture to the more and more specific picture, from the intent of blessing to the twisting of the same until blessing was diminished.

God, in His first creative act outside the heavenly sphere that was His home, created earth … that realm which would be the abode of our temporal being. His first separation was to set aside the waters from the ground. Spilling upward out of that ground a life-giving mist blessing the face of the ground. When next God looked to the ground it would be to gather its parts, the dust of the ground, and from it lovingly fashion man … that being that was to be a reflection of His own image. But God would ‘zoom in’ closer still, gathering from the rib of that dust-based man, and build (re-form) a woman perfectly designed for him, to pour blessing of heart and soul and flesh upon man. Their union producing the blessing of life.

I guess what really captured my attention came when I began looking closer still at ‘ground,’ quickly discovering the slide back into dust, away from blessing. The ground was the substance (for want of a better term) from which God chose to create life: every tree, every beast of the field, every bird of the air, man himself.

When God confronts Adam for eating the fruit Eve gave him, God pronounced a curse upon the ground. Interestingly, not because Eve ate, but because Adam, apparently with awareness of his actions, followed after ‘another god’ in his heart.

Not only would the ground experience the curse, mankind would continue to eat of that curse, becoming a slave to the very things from which God had intended the outpouring of blessing, the very substance from which man himself was created. In essence, becoming a slave to self.

Maybe I’m off base, but the delineation seems so clear. And, therefore, it makes all the more sense that when Cain later offered the fruits of the ground, they could be only one thing … unacceptable to God. It may seem harsh, but I think there is much hidden here. They were the direct fruits of that which was cursed because of Adam choosing ‘another god’.

I still hear the apostle John: God is light; in Him is no darkness at all.

Where is Eve in all this, you ask? It is after she ate of that which was forbidden that Adam named her “Life-Giver.” God had left them hope. Eve, she who was re-built (built anew) would house the seed of life … the seed of Promise … the seed of hope … the very seed of Heaven. He Who would know no earthly father … He whose only Father was Light, and Truth, and Life Himself.

Yes, Eve took the serpent’s bait. But she still rested under the ‘covering’ of her husband. Eve would suffer her own consequences, without doubt; yet her consequences appear to fall on none other than herself. Adam’s consequences, however, would ripple into every aspect of every living thing yet to come.

In the midst of all playing out here in Eden lies a deceiver … a deceiver whose own heart possibly seeded the very ground from which God created man. It had been Satan’s domain; and he had left his mark. Thankfully, life did not come from the ground. The ground was simply the temporal tent that housed God’s breath … the only life there ever really was or will be.

Food for thought!

Forbidden

So many beginnings take root here in the first three chapters of Genesis. I find myself going back to the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. The recognition that evil already existed. And it did. Satan had already established himself on the earth, scattering his own seed about.

God so desired to guard his beloved’s heart from knowledge (experience of) of that evil. But one must note that the tree was more than knowledge of evil, it was also knowledge of good. To participate in one is to see into the other. Talk about a paradox.

When Eve ate of that forbidden tree, she was choosing to participate, share in, spread iniquity. James delineates so beautifully that digression, that fall into death. Desire was never forbidden, only tasting the fruit of its vine when the desire diverged from God’s way, God’s directives.

Evil is first mention in Genesis 2, contained in the fruit of a tree. Had Eve any inkling of what would manifest as the worst contagion earth has ever known? Or did fulfilling her desire take precedence over any and all inklings she might have had.

We will never know, but when next evil is mentioned, it is outside of the Eden, and God lays bare the chilling consequences of that ‘foothold’ gained in a garden called Delight:

Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually (6:5)

Then the LORD said in His heart, "I will never again curse the ground for man’s sake, although the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth;" (8:21)

Nothing had changed. Everything had changed. Yet still, God allowed Adam to name his wife LIFE ... and this, after her choosing a way other than God’s … Grace! Grace! Grace!

Desire for Eve

Eve didn't need to go looking for Adam. Contextually, he appears to have been right there, with her .... yet he never engaged in conversation with the serpent.

Puts my mind to wondering again if the key isn't discovered in James: But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full grown, brings forth death.

Was the dialogue between Eve and the serpent an internal dialogue? Not audible to other ears? Did he notice her lingering gaze upon the tree and take advantage of a hidden thought he recognized there? I would be inclined that direction, personally. Because Adam apparently was there with her. For whatever reason, she did not turn to him for guidance, for counsel, for confirmation and direction. She simply acted, on her own, where her own desire took her.

Yet I can't help but ask if Adam did likewise, only his desire wasn't for the fruit ... possibly even being unaware of the temptation churning around in his beloved's head prior to her extending the already bitten fruit to his own mouth. I propose that Adam ate of it because it matched his own desire, a desire for her .... a desire that over-rode his desire for God. He ate because he chose her ... he'd rather join her than loose her, even if it meant turning his back on God.

That union between a man and a woman is a powerful force ... a melding of souls that carries with it such incredible responsibility ... blended into the joy and ecstasy of oneness. One more reminder that our actions are never solitary or isolated ... they always have an effect on others.

Maybe the biggest question here is why didn't Eve turn to Adam for direction and counsel ... even in this matter she may have considered so insignificant? Why don't we?

The more I delve into these opening chapters of Genesis, the more convinced I am that God's intent was never for independency, but always a cooperative dependence that finds its framework, its focus, on Almighty God and an unswerving understanding of His ways.

The Question of Eve

When God created man (Adam) [and all the other animals for that matter] He created as a potter creates ... molding, squeezing, fashioning this image of Himself from the dust of the earth. The Hebrew uses all the imagery of a potter working with clay.

But God’s creation portrays something very different in the Hebrew when it comes to Eve. The concept here is that of building, constructing, rebuilding. It’s interesting to bounce these observations around. God didn’t choose the flesh of Adam to build Eve ... God chose Adam’s rib ... his bone. Again the question, why?

I’ve no answers, only supposition. What significance is there to bone? And why a rib bone? My mind takes me along many paths when I ask this question, but one readily comes to mind. Jesus is the chief cornerstone of the God’s church ... a sure foundation. Bones make up the foundation, the structure, the framework of the body. Eve was built from the foundation already made when God made Adam.

As for the rib, not only does it guard the heart, it also protects the lungs of man, that chamber housing the very breath of God, making him a living being. Therefore, Eve was built to also hold the breath of God.

All this is just my mind wandering through all the countless possibilities. And here’s yet another thought.

Scripture tells us that the life is in the blood. Bones are a vital part of that process within man ... they hold and protect the marrow ... the blood manufacturing department of man ... the creator and sustainer of life, so to speak. I find it interesting that Eve, when she finally receives her name, is named “Life-Giver.”

I have no answers, merely observations that generate more questions, but I know God does nothing randomly. He always works from a perfect design ... a design conceived and put in operation to direct our eyes to Him. And so, we keep looking for those messages, digger deeper and deeper into His Word, seeking to discover the fullness of Truth.

BREATH OF LIFE

And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground,

and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life,

and man became a living being ...

Genesis 2:7

What is life? It is a breath. A Divine breath, kept not to itself, but passed into lifelessness, and upon its wings living begins.

Paul tells us in Colossians that Jesus holds all things together. That includes maintaining the very breath of God within me, giving me life, moment by moment … heartbeat by heartbeat.

Can I capture that picture … even for a instant? God breathing into me. Talk about life-giving CPR. There is nothing like it.

Notice, God didn’t simply blow onto the man fashioned by His own hand, onto his outward form. No. He breathed into a space specially designed to hold that essence of Himself. Tented in clay though it may have been, it still was an inward work, even from the very beginning.

God formed man, like a potter forms a vessel, by squeezed His creation into His desired shape. I love this concept. God could have chosen simply to speak man into existence, as He did the rest of creation. But God’s desire for relationship becomes visible even here. That desire to touch, to be part of, to invest Himself into the product of His love. Not a single hint at indifference can be seen in man’s creation; rather it reveals an ongoing effort, denoting a plan, a desired destination for Himself and His creation.

Beauty resides in the continuing truth that nothing has changed. He who is the same yesterday, today and forever, doesn’t simply speak things into my life. He continues to invest Himself into my life … touching … molding … pruning … holding … encouraging … breathing His life into me daily … whatever it takes to maintain relationship. His mercies and compassion towards me, towards His creation, are still new every morning.

MERCY MISTS

MERCY MISTS

… a mist went up from the earth …

It’s been a long time. But these words, and an awe-filled conversation with my daughter, bring back to this heart a remembrance. A remembrance of God’s provision showing itself on the very first pages of history.

My children were raised in the arid lands of southern California, where, more often than not, rain remains a stranger. Although man has come in and attempted to create an Eden, left on its own the land is desert. Not always displayed in sand and cacti. But rain deprived, the floodgates of heaven locked tight overhead.

The first time I saw it I knew fear. In the early morning hours, my car overflowing with four small children, I turned a corner only to discover ourselves surrounded by smoke. It billowed thickly all around us, rising up from the earth. Heart pounding, I searched for flames. It took several heartbeats to accept their absence. Several more heartbeats to accept the smoke’s source.

Now, twenty years later, the same unbelievable awe traveled across phone lines to stir a forgotten memory. My daughter’s return home from college for Christmas had hit a snag, delaying her arrival. Car trouble. So instead of visiting face to face, I now held a phone to my ear a day later hearing she was on her way, at last, heading towards the center of town to catch the highway home. Before she could hang up her cell phone I heard her gasp, a sharp edge entering her voice.

“Mom, there’s thick smoke just ahead. All over. It’s surrounding everything.”

“Can you see any flames? Where are they coming from?“I can’t see any flames yet, but it looks like a war zone … like the entire downtown is on fire!”

“Do you hear any sirens?”

“Not yet … but the smoke’s so thick.”

“Maybe you had better turn around.”

“I can’t believe it!” Her voice, incredulous, starts my own heart to pounding.

“It’s not smoke, Mom! No need to worry. There’s no fire. This is just … just awesome! I can hardly believe what I’m seeing!”

“What is it?”

“Everywhere I look enormous curtains of mist … rising up out of the ground. I wish I had my camera, Mom! It’s simply incredible.”

… but a mist went up from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground …

Most days I fail to lay hold of the eternal eyesight I daily long for … eyesight that will enable me to gain a picture of God … of His mercy … of His grace. But every once in a while He allows me a peek that is inescapable. That picture gains its focus in the words preceding. Before … before any plant … before any herb … and there was no man … but …

Maybe the profoundness of God’s provision strikes me here because of the oft times aridness of my own journey … those seasons when the heavens seem shut up, locked against my need, my want. I’ve forgotten that God’s provision was set in motion way before my need knew life. He surrounds me … all the time. Wherever I place my foot, He is already there, and His sufficiency waters the whole face of my ground.

I’ve seen it. It steals my breath. It leaves me mesmerized … gaping in wonder.

I need that reminder this morning. Surrounded by the needs of my children. Surrounded by my own needs. From where I stand, each and every one as varied as the day is long, each seemingly insurmountable … it’s easy to forget the awesomeness of God’s sufficiency.

It is my history with Him. It is your history. For His story, interwoven into the fabric of our being, is the story of God’s perpetual provision for our every need. A provision set in motion before we even know our need. And it’s a provision not lacking in any measure … a provision rising like a mist from the ground watering the whole face of the earth.

LIGHT & DARKNESS

It’s interesting … light … darkness … from the very beginning existed conflict between the two. One sided, without a doubt. Darkness doing all the battling. Light’s very presence vanquishes battle, for Light can’t be fought against. Light’s mere presence casts out darkness … darkness in the universe … darkness in the soul, in the heart of man. Light can’t be vanquished, can’t be subdued, can’t be contained. It remains a ‘revealer.’ A revealer of intents. A revealer of the human condition. A revealer of all that is not light. While darkness attempts to disguise, light lays bare. Light is Truth. Darkness? Every lie conceived while attempting to disguise itself as ‘light.’

Is it any wonder that Satan couldn’t remain in the Kingdom where Light reigned? Thus, the utter irony. Refusing to dwell in Light, to abide with Light, to be consumed by Light, Satan disguises himself as the angel of light.

John the apostle reveals that God is Light, and that in God there is no darkness at all. Darkness, therefore, in all its varying degrees, is the antithesis of God.



Almighty God, strewn throughout this clay, seeds of darkness reside ... each one, at emnity with You. May Your Word be a cleansing spotlight within my life, revealing each speck that hides a pure reflection of You. Cleanse me, that Your light may shine brightly, within and without my life. Amen!

BEGINNINGS

JOHN 1:1-5 & GENESIS 1

In the beginning … once upon a time … in a time long, long ago … regardless of the tale needing told, before it all, stood God ‘living’ in relationship. How do I know? It lies evident in the Word. Love expressed. John tells me, “ In the beginning was the Word.”

Love existed to pour itself out upon the beloved. Love can’t live in solitude, in isolation. Love necessitates one to give love to … to communicate that love … and Jesus was that expression of Love, to the universe, to man.

From the very beginning of beginnings a Word spoke. Colossians 1:6 reveals Jesus created all things and holds all things together. (Ephesians 3:9 … God Who created all things in Jesus Christ). Speaking to His disciples, Jesus explains that the words He speaks are His Fathers words, the words He first hears His Father speaking, He in turn then speaks them, to me. Relationship … that weaving together in order to bless and be blessed … lay at the heart of all things from the very beginning. The expression of that love found voice, and thereby life, and that life brought light that couldn’t be overcome by darkness, no matter how dark the darkness, or how great its effort to snuff out and deny the light.

What does that reveal to me? Many thing, but the most important for me at this moment is really quite basic and utterly simple. The emptiness I so often feel is a relationship issue. Put more accurately, my sense of emptiness reflects a lack of relationship in my life. Or should I say in the shell of this mortal frame. For the truth is there is no life apart from relationship. Existence, maybe; but not life. And God intends me to have life, and to have it abundantly.

I’m not simply referring to lack of human relationship. My relationship with God right now is weak and wavering. Not on His part; but on mine. God created me for relationship with Him … first and foremost. Until that relationship is in order, is it any wonder that I would struggle to develop or maintain relationships with others. Deep emptiness, a bottomless void is all that can exist apart from relationship. But the Spirit of God hovers over the emptiness of my life, waiting to speak light into it … waiting to pour all of Himself into me … waiting for me to tire of the darkness of self absorption and simply allow Him to be my all and all.