Part One: The Reaching Begins · Week 2 of 13
Week 2 · The Garden
This week God reaches by walking into the hiding place and asking a question he already knew the answer to.
Genesis 1-3, the return
Last week we walked through these three chapters quickly, to see the shape of the whole story. This week we slow down and stay.
Genesis 1 to 3 is where everything is set. A world made good, on purpose, by someone who kept stopping to look at it and say so. A man and a woman given a garden and one limit. And then a voice suggesting that the limit was not love but meanness, and the whole thing comes apart in four verses.
Here is what I want you to watch for this week. When it comes apart, God does not leave. He does not send. He comes. He walks in the garden in the cool of the day, and he calls out for a man who is crouched behind a tree, and what he says is a question.
He knew where Adam was. The question was not for information. It was the first move of a God who was already coming after him.
That is the pattern the rest of the Bible follows. Man hides. God comes looking. And every time he comes, it costs him something. This week it costs an animal. Later it will cost his Son.
Five days, about fifteen minutes each. Read, look, write what you see.
THE BOOKENDS
The two verses this whole story runs between.
Genesis 3:9 (KJV)
And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou?
AND
Revelation 22:17 (KJV)
And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.
The first thing God asks, and the last thing he offers. Everything between is him coming.
1In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
2And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
3And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
4And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
5And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
6And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
7And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.
8And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.
9And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
10And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good.
11And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.
12And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
13And the evening and the morning were the third day.
14And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
15And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.
16And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.
17And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,
18And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.
19And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
20And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.
21And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
22And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.
23And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.
24And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.
25And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good.
26And 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 fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
27So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
28And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
29And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.
30And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.
31And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.
Day 1 · COME · ~15 min
He kept saying it was good
Read: Genesis 1:1-31
Seven times in this chapter, God looks at what he has made and calls it good. Nothing here is an accident, and nothing here is grudging.
1. Verse 31. Copy what God says after he has made everything. What word does he add this time that he did not use before?
2. A world made by someone who keeps stopping to enjoy it. What does that tell you about him, before a single thing has gone wrong?
What did you see?
Go deeper: read this passage in the WSB Bible with commentary
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