Genesis 2

The finished creation (vs. 1-3)--The chapter opens with God having finished the creation and hallowing the seventh day. As mentioned in chapter 1, the Jews were required to honor that day, but Christians are not. Sunday, the first day of the week, is the day of worship in this dispensation of time (Acts 20:7; I Cor. 16:1-2).

Man, his home, and his responsibilities, and his wife (vs. 4-25)--In chapter one (the creation of the heavens and earth, and the vegetable and animal/human population of the latter) to the specific—the creation of man. Part of man’s responsibility was to dress and keep the Garden of Eden, so plant life is mentioned again. And then, later on the animals are brought to Adam to see if he could find a suitable helper. He wasn’t able to, so God created woman. So the most important aspects of the early life Adam are revealed.

Verse 8 says God “planted”—a nice term—a garden “eastward” in Eden; “eastward” from where Moses wrote, I suppose. Four rivers are mentioned as flowing through the garden. Only two still exist, at least by their names in chapter 2, the Euphrates and the Tigris (or, "Hiddekel," depending upon which version you are using). Thus, the Garden of Eden was obviously somewhere in that vicinity of the world, and just as obviously doesn’t exist any more.  Baghdad isn't it.

God actually gave Adam two commands—one, to “dress and keep” the garden (v. 15), and the second, not to eat of the tree of life in the midst of the garden (v. 17). Eat of that tree and you die—a concept Adam could not possibly have understood. He found out. I’ve always suspected that if Adam had been lazy and not “dressed and kept” the garden, he would have been sinning and lost paradise through that means. It’s moot, of course. But it is noteworthy that, even in the perfect state before sin, God expected man to work.

Adam named all the animals God brought to him and, as noted, couldn’t find one appropriate, so God caused a deep sleep to come upon him, took a rib, and formed woman (vs. 21-22). The old fable that man has one less rib than woman because God took one from Adam to create Eve is just that—a fable. I actually believed it when I was a kid. Marriage and the family are instituted here—one man, one woman, Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve, and not Adam and Eve and Julie and Betty and Susie. Mankind got away from chapter 2’s pristine plan, of course, and very soon as we shall see. God tolerated it for awhile (Acts 17:30), but “from the beginning it was not so” Jesus tells us in Matthew 19:8, and He intends for us to get back to that pattern. There’s no excuse any more because we have the completed word of God to explain what He wants in marriage.

Incidentally, while homosexuality has been practiced in nearly every culture in history, I’ve never heard of one, besides modern America, who let them marry. Such cultures may have existed somewhere, but I’m unaware of it. And I know everything…

One final thought about creation, and this is something those who are still confused by evolutionary dogma need to consider. The very idea of “creation” implies the appearance of age. In other words, how old was Adam 15 minutes after God created him? Well, he was 15 minutes old, wasn’t he. How old did he look? Probably in his 20s or 30s. Obviously, he had speech and reproductive capabilities. And this principle—appearance of age—would be true of all initially formed substances. Mountains would seem to be much older than they are; what would have indeed taken millions/billions of years to form naturally, God fashioned instantaneously, but again, with a natural, aged appearance. The mountain ranges of the world—the highest ones—were actually probably uplifted during the flood (more on that later), but the physical matter they were constructed from existed from the beginning.

And one final, final thought that just occurred to me. Darwinism, of course, teaches that the universe is billions of years old (something like 20 billion) and that the earth is only about 4 or 5 billion years old; that’s the last I read, those numbers may have changed yesterday, that’s about how often evolutionists revise their theory. Man, though, is just a few million years old; in other words, he hasn’t been here since the formation of the earth. In fact, if you do the math, man is a Johnny-come-lately to this planet; a billion is a thousand millions, so the earth has been here a few thousand times longer than man. If that makes any sense. But the Bible teaches, and not just in Genesis 1 and 2, that man has been here since the beginning (thus the “days” of Genesis one are not “eons” of time). In Romans 1:20, Paul wrote, “For the invisible things of him [God] since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made.”

How could “the invisible things” of God be “clearly seen” “since the creation of the world” if there were no humans around from that time to see them?