chapter. It is warm up here. I'm not even wearing a mask.
At least you can breathe without
a mask a little bit better. All right, the second chapter
of the book of Genesis. As you know, chapter one sets
forth the God making all things, creating everything out of nothing,
and that includes man making man out of the dust of the ground. We pick up our reading this morning,
chapter two, verse seven. The scripture says, and the Lord
God formed man of the dust. That is, God was, he was the
one who was the potter. He fashioned man. Actually, this
is the idea here of one who is a potter, and he fashioned man
as he would have him to be. God is the great potter. And
he made Adam as he would have him to be made. And even back
before creation, God, as the great potter, he fashioned in
his own purpose that which he would have all men to be. And
we can read, of course, in Romans chapter 9 of God's work as the
great potter. He made vessels of honor and
he made vessels of dishonor, which as the great potter, he
had the right to do. And if you were an amateur pottery
maker, you can make any sort of vessel that you wanted to
make. Well, God is not an amateur at this. He's the creator. And
he purposed to make man as he made him. And before that, back
in old eternity, God purposed that he would have vessels of
mercy. Vessels of mercy. That is vessels
to whom he would give grace and glory. These vessels were given
to the Lord Jesus. These vessels were fashioned
to magnify the grace of God. If you're a believer this morning,
the reason you believe, the reason you rest in the Lord Jesus is
because God, the great potter, ordained that you would be a
vessel of mercy. Isn't that wonderful? He could
have made you, he had the right to make you into anything he
would have you to be. But he and his great love and
mercy, he ordained that you would be a vessel of honor. You would honor his justice,
you would honor his law, you would honor his grace, you would
honor his mercy in your substitute, the Lord Jesus. He was your surety. Vessels of honor fitted unto
life. but then other vessels are vessels
of dishonor. Well, just as surely as God fashioned
the one, so he fashioned the other. And these he purposed
to raise up, to magnify his wrath and his justice as a God of absolute
holiness. You see, the distinction that
exists between all men, that is, those who are saved and those
who are lost, those who are vessels of honor and those who are vessels
of dishonor, those who are the elect and those who are the rest,
is a distinction God made. You can't attribute this to anything
else or to anyone else. Did not the great apostle ask
in 1 Corinthians chapter four, who maketh thee to be different
from another? Who made you different? Why are
you different? Why is it this morning you love
the Savior? You love the grace of God. You
love the God who is sovereign. You love the God who is holy.
You love the God who does His will in the armies of heaven
and among the inhabitants of the earth, knowing that nobody
can stay His hand or say unto Him, What doest Thou? What's
the reason that you love that God while other people despise
that God? Who hate that God of sovereignty? You start speaking of God's sovereignty
and immediately they become red faced and they become angry.
And they say, that's not fair. And yet to you, you say, this
is my God. This is the one I worship. Well,
again, who made you different? God did. God did. He fashioned you with his own
gracious, gracious, omnipotent hands to be a vessel of honor. Well, God the great, who is the
great potter, he formed man, he fashioned man. The scripture
says, go back to verse seven, of the dust of the ground. And
then he breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. And the scripture says, and man
became a living soul, a living soul. And this is a soul that
will never cease to exist. The body that, that keeps the soul, that the
body that houses the soul, and of course it's going to die.
And we know that. But the soul that is tapernacling
in the body, it will go on and on and on. It will never cease
to exist. Now look what else God did, verse
eight. And the Lord God, he planted
a garden eastward in Eden. Eden means delightful. Oh, it
was a paradise. It isn't a paradise anymore due
to sin entering in, but it was a beautiful, beautiful paradise. And there he put the man, the
man whom he had formed. You could have put him anywhere
he wanted to, but he put him in this garden. Delightful place. And out of the ground made the
Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and
good for food. Now, he isn't saying that right
then God made the trees, because if you read back in chapter one,
he made all trees on the third day. But as Moses is led of the
spirit of God to write this, he's just reminding us that all
of the trees in the garden, and as far as that goes across the
world, God made them. And especially there in the garden,
in the garden out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every
tree that is pleasant to the sight, beautiful trees and good for food. So pleasing
to the eye, pleasing to the taste. And then he has two specific
trees that are noted, only two. I don't have a bunch of trees,
ask some tree experts. A lot of trees out here, softwoods,
hardwoods, fruit trees, et cetera, et cetera. But especially God
wants us to know about two trees. First of all, he named the tree
of life, which is also in the midst of the garden. And here's
the second tree, the tree of knowledge. Knowledge of what? Good and evil. Now drop down, if you will, to
verse 16. And the Lord God, having made
all of these things and positioned them and having put Adam there
in the garden, well, verse 15, I'll read. And the Lord God took
the man, he put him in the garden of Eden. He put him there, wherever,
he could put him anywhere he wanted to put him, but he put
him in the garden to dress it and to keep it. Now verse 16,
and the Lord God commanded the man saying, of every tree of
the garden thou mayest freely eat. But, verse 17, but of the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it,
For in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die."
You'll notice that God did not say, if you eat of it. fruit of that particular tree,
you'll die. God just said, in the day that
thou eatest thereof, because you see this awful transgression
of Adam, it did not take God off guard. This did not shock
God. It did not surprise God. Man
has for Well, I guess ever since Adam
fell, pretty much. And after that, man has talked
about the origin of evil. And this is a mystery that's
too great for us. I'm really more interested in
how the evil can be gotten rid of. I can answer that one. That's a question I can handle. There is a remedy for evil and
the remedy for evil is the goodness of God that is manifested to
us through the Lord Jesus Christ. and his work of redemption. So
as to the remedy of evil, what to do about evil, we can better
handle that than we can the origin of evil. But I will just say
this, everything owes its origin ultimately to God. You've got
to conclude that. And I wouldn't, I'd never charge
God with with any kind of transgression or evil or sinfulness. We couldn't do that. The Bible
says he's not the author of evil. But God so arranged things that
evil, it came into the world. For if God had not willed its
entrance, it would not exist. You surely agree with me on that.
And it is in the removal of this terrible thing of sin that God
brings the greatest glory unto himself. And that is through
the substitutionary sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. And
so God put in the garden these two specific trees. First of
all, there's the tree of life. Now, next Lord's Day morning,
that will be my subject. So I'll just basically kind of
introduce it to you here today. Nobody knows what that tree of
life was. And it doesn't appear that Adam,
he wasn't commanded not to eat of the fruit of the tree of life.
My suspicion is that he, and then when God gave him Eve a
little later in this chapter, my suspicion is that they ate
of the tree of life quite often. You see, the tree of life is
a picture of our Lord Jesus himself. And I'll show you that next week,
and especially we'll go to the book of Revelation, chapter 22,
where there was in the paradise of God, in the midst of the paradise
of God, we read, John tells us, and this is, of course, in heaven's
everlasting glory. There is in the midst of the
paradise of God that which John says is the tree of life. whose fruits, whose 12 fruits
go out to feed the nations, that is to feed all of true Israel. Because the 12 nations, that
pictures Israel and Israel pictures the true church of God. It's
the tree of life. It's our Lord Jesus who is himself
the fruit. He's the one who feeds us and
we're his offspring. We're his fruit. And then the scripture says,
and the leaves are for the healing of the nations of the tree of
life. The leaves of the tree of life. What are they? That's
the doctrines of the gospel. That's how we're healed. Redemption. Reconciliation. Resurrection. Substitution. Satisfaction. In this tree of life, the leaves,
the leaves of this tree are for the healing of people from every
nation, kindred, tribe, and tongue. Christ is the tree of life. But it's this other tree that
I wanna talk to you about this morning. And that is, the scripture
calls it, the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Now God named this tree. In fact,
the very first time in the Bible evil is used, God uses the word. This is the tree of knowledge
of good and evil. There are not two more opposing
forces in the world than good and evil. They're poles apart. God is good. And we read in the scriptures
of the goodness of God. Now, Satan, this serpent, this
subtle one that we read about to begin with, he is pure evil. God is pure good. Satan, the
serpent, is pure evil. And there exists in this world,
in God's universe, ever since Lucifer fell, whenever that was. Ever since he fell, there has
been present in God's universe, which originally God pronounced
everything to be very, what do you say? Good, right? Very good. But ever since Lucifer
fell, there has been in God's universe good, and evil. And evil is never satisfied to
abide on its own. Evil, you see, delights to spread. It's like a cancer. Lucifer, he fell. And after his
transgression, which his transgression pride was found in his heart. And he sought the position of
the son of God. And immediately it seems that
that infection of evil, it spread to one third of the angels and
they became infected. I know we're in the middle of
this virus pandemic, but there's nothing more contagious or deadly
than sin. So from Lucifer, it's spread
to one third of the angels. Then Lucifer seeing the God's
crowning glory in creation, that is, man. He sought to infect
man. And indirectly, he was successful. Because the way to get at the
man was through the woman. Satan is always clever. He knew of Adam's vulnerability. And to you and me, and here's
a word of a very practical instruction to you and me, he knows where
we're vulnerable. He knows, believe me, he knows
your weakness. I don't know what your weakness
is. I've got an inclination of my own weakness, but everybody's
weaknesses are dissimilar. But I guarantee you Satan knows
your weakness. And he knew Adam's weakness.
I can't get to Adam, but I can get to his wife. And therefore the infection,
it spread. And first of all, it spread to
Eve. Lucifer, evil. One third of the
angels, evil. And now Eve, she is also a participant. in this rebellion against God,
in this uprising against God. And always remember this, here's
what sin is. It's an uprising against the
authority of God. That's what sin is. It's nothing
less than that. It is a direct attack upon the
sovereign dominion of God. That's what it is. And so Satan
goes after the woman and is successful. And she takes of the fruit of
the tree of good and evil and she eats of it. And as others
before me have said, nothing happened. Nothing happened. I remember Brother Mahan, of
course, I've listened to a bunch of his messages, but I heard
him say one time, he said, even the serpent took a bite of whatever
the fruit was, and the serpent said, you see, nothing happened
to me. And Brother Mahan said, that's
because he was dead already. And Eve, when she partook of
it, she was infected, but she didn't die because she was not
the representative. And I suspect that when Eve took
of whatever the fruit looked like, I suspect she said, this is beautiful. And she tasted it. And then she
turned to her husband and said, I ate of it, nothing. This is good. It's good, it's
good for food and it's beautiful. It's pleasing to the eye and
it's good to the palate. Honey, it didn't hurt me. And
then he ate of it. And then he was infected. But
wait, when he became infected, that's
when the virus got us. Yeah, right then. The Bible says,
wherefore as by one man, sin entered into the world and death
by sin. And so death passed upon all
men for that all have sinned in Adam. He was our federal head. He was our representative. That's
when we became infected. That's when we became sinners. Evil, evil. This is a tree of knowledge of
good and evil. Now, I think this tree of knowledge
of good and evil, it represents, first of all, the absolute sovereignty
of God. It stood as a symbol of the sovereignty
of God, of the absolute authority of God. Now, God put Adam in
the garden. That's what the scripture says.
God put him there. You till it, you keep it. You
preserve it. Whatever had to be done, just
pick the fruit and so forth and so on. Whatever was necessary
to be done, that's what Adam did. And God said later, he said,
name everything. Adam was a brilliant man. And
of every tree of the garden, thou mayest freely eat. Whatever's
here, just enjoy. But I'm putting one tree right
in the middle of the garden. I'm naming it the tree of knowledge
of good and evil. That, Adam, that is symbolic
of my absolute authority. And here's my law to you. You
can eat the fruit of every other tree in the garden, whatever
you want to eat. But don't you eat of that one. Why not? Because I told you not
to. That's the only reason necessary. Why not? Because God told him
not to. Because that symbolizes, you see, the dominion of God. God is the creator. God is the
sustainer. God is the governor. God is the
sovereign of all of the universe. And that tree of the knowledge
of good and evil was a token or a symbol of that dominion
of God. Don't eat of it. It's a very
simple command. And as you think of it, really
it isn't a large command. It's just one. It's just one. And in a way you think it's such
a small thing. Of every tree of the garden,
thou must freely eat for free. It's just one tree. Don't eat
of the fruit of that. For in the day ye eat thereof,
you'll surely die. God gave him a law, one law. Here's the attached commandment
to it. Don't eat of it. And here's the
attached penalty of it. You'll die. That's not complicated,
is it? That's pretty simple. I mean,
I don't have the intellect that Adam had. I don't have his kind
of IQ. But I can understand this. Here's
a law. Here's a penalty to be paid if
you break the law. I got it. You think Adam got
it? He surely saw that. He realized
it. But he defied God. He did it
anyway. Because in chapter three and
verse six, at the end of it, her husband was with her and
he did eat. Literally, he willed to eat. Where did sin first originate
in man? Was it actually in the eating?
It's in the willing to eat. This was his will to eat. For you see, not only is this
tree of the knowledge of good and evil symbolic of the absolute
sovereignty of God, secondly, it is symbolic of the responsibility
of man to do what God told us to do. And in this case, to not
to do what God told us not to do. Don't eat of it. It's symbolic
of our responsibility to God. And these two humongous truths
are set through all the scriptures, God's absolute sovereignty and
man's accountability or responsibility to obey God. And both of them
are true. Obey and live, disobey and die. Now, good and evil. Let me talk
about good and evil for a little bit. You know, when we think about
God, who is purely good, I think about him being the God of nature,
the God of providence, the God of man, the God of grace. And in each of those departments,
nature, providence, man, and grace, or salvation, we can prominently
see good and evil. Good and evil. In nature, we
see good and evil. We see light, and we tend to
think of light as good. We see darkness. We tend to think
of darkness as evil. We see summer, good. Things are growing. Winter, evil. Because the one sets forth life. The other sets forth death. One
is a season of fruitfulness. The other is a season of barrenness. We see good and evil in creation
or in nature. I don't need to really overwork
this point. You see fruit. You see flowers. You see roses. Good. and you see thorns, evil. In nature, and you know that,
just look through nature, you see good and evil. What about
providence? We know providence is God directing
all things to the end that he himself has appointed. We see
in divine providence, we see sickness, which we tend to think
of or look upon as evil. And we see health, which we tend
to look upon and consider as good. We see prosperity, which
we kind of think is good. And we see adversity or poverty,
not so good. And those of us who are the people
of God, we recognize that God works all things together for
good. Now here's one of the many differences
between God and men. You see, men, we take something
good, just wait, we'll make evil out of it. That's just us. God made man good. He fell into
sinfulness and now the good things that we touch, unless God is
merciful and unless God is gracious, out of that goodness will be
evil due to our hands. But here's one of the many, many
differences between us and God. God can take that which is evil
and he can bring good out of it. And is that not seen in the death
of the Lord Jesus? The evil of men at work, the
evil of Satan, the evil of Judas, the evil of Pontius Pilate, the
evil of Herod, the evil of the Sanhedrin, and all of the evil
of all of the elect of all of God's people of all of the ages,
you see evil at the cross of Calvary. But God takes that evil and he brings good out of it because he brings salvation out
of it. through his son. And it's like in nature, and
I'll just back up to nature, the good and evil, but you know
what God does? Ultimately, he brings forth good
out of all of it. I've said this before, I was
talking to a preacher in another state just this last week, and we were
talking about the pandemic And I said, listen, it's all good. It's all good. With God, all
things are good. And he works all things together
for the good of his people. Isn't that what it says in Romans
chapter eight and verse 28? And we know that all things work
together For good, that's the evil, that's the bad, that's
the sin, anything that's negative, all of those things are included
in that. All things work together for
good. Who can make all things work
together for good, even evil? God can, and God does. God does. Now, let me give you an illustration
of this. Go to Genesis chapter 50. Look at Genesis chapter 50. Even the evil of men, when men have a motivation of
evil, God brings good out of it. Revelation,
or excuse me, Genesis chapter 50. Genesis chapter 50, and you
know the story of Joseph's kindness to his brethren, and we won't
review the history of that, but he is second in charge to Pharaoh,
and he has all the foods that Egypt has saved up, He's dispersing
it to the hungry and that includes his own family. His brothers
had sold him into slavery and actually a couple of them wanted
to kill him. He wound up in prison. I mean,
his life is, he'd been put through the wringer, as we used to say.
Those of you who've never seen an old washing machine, you don't
know what the wringer is, but some of us know what, putting
him through the wringer, you know what that means. Pressed
him hard. So now Jacob has died. His brothers
are fearful that Joseph is now going to retaliate. But he says
in chapter 15, verse number 20, verse 19, Genesis 50, 19. And Joseph said unto them, fear
not, for am I in the place of God? Didn't God put me here? That's what he said. Brothers,
listen, God put me here. Verse number 20. But as for you,
you thought evil against me. That was your motivation. But
God meant it. unto good, and ever how God means
for something to turn out, that is the way it's going to turn
out. You meant it for evil, God meant
it for good. Isn't that wonderful? So you
see, God can even take, and we can't do, because we do the reverse,
we take good and we bring evil out of it. But God takes evil
and he brings good out of it, as is seen in divine providence. And then thirdly, in man. I said
in nature, providence, in man, we see good and evil. Go back
a few chapters to Genesis chapter six. Of course, God made man
upright. God made man good, but he sought
out many inventions is what the scripture says. God made him
good, but he made himself evil. He became evil in transgressing
God's law. Look here at Genesis chapter
six and verse five. And God saw that the wickedness
of man was great in the earth and that every imagination of
the thoughts of his heart was only evil. Evil a good bit of the time.
No. Continual. Steady flow. The heart is evil. It's wicked. And therefore everything
that comes out of the heart ultimately is evil because the well is contaminated,
right? The fountain is contaminated. We're evil within. Evil within. Another reference, chapter eight
in verse 21. Chapter eight in verse 21. God
made man good, but he's evil. This is when Noah came forth
from the ark. Verse 20. Genesis eight in verse
20, and Noah built in an ark unto the Lord. He took of every
clean beast and every clean fowl and offered burnt offerings on
the altar and the Lord smelled a sweet savor and the Lord said
in his heart, I will not again curse the ground anymore for
man's sake for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his
youth. Evil from his youth. We see goodness
and evil in man. And then fourthly, we see goodness
and evil in salvation. In salvation, we see sorrow and
joy. We see darkness and light. We see death and life. We see
conviction and we see great consolation. We see the hiding of the face
of God, but we also see the full manifestation of the grace of
God. In grace or in salvation, we
see unbelief, the evil of unbelief. And you remember, we read in
Hebrews chapter three, the writer says, beware lest there be found
in any of you an evil, evil heart. Of what? Unbelief. Unbelief,
we see that in ourselves. But we also see belief, which
is due to the goodness of God. We see the wrath of God in salvation. We see the love of God. You know,
actually, I thought about this quite a bit. We live in a world where there
is the necessity of the presence of evil as well as the presence
of goodness. For if there were no evil, now
stay with me. If there were no evil, then there
wouldn't be a fallen world. And if there weren't a fallen
world, there would be no need of salvation. And if there was no need of salvation,
then that which is God's greatest glory couldn't be set forth. There
has to be the presence of evil. Do you agree? There's got to
be the presence of evil. So if there were no evil, it
would not be a fallen world. And if there was nothing good,
and if everything was evil, then God would not be the governor
of all things, for God alone is good, and that which comes
forth from his hands must be good. It's the reason we read
in Genesis chapter one, the first five days, after each of the
days, it says, God looked and God said, it's good. And that's
the sixth day in which he made man, God said, it's very good. That's what God said. And then if evil prevailed to
overcome good, then God would be removed from his throne of
sovereignty. And Satan would be the ruling
power, that one who is pure evil. That wouldn't be good. So then
in order for God to be magnified in the gracious recovery of a
remnant of Adam's fallen race, there must be in his creation
There must be the existence of both good and evil with the ultimate
outcome. Remember, I've said this already. Only God can take evil and bring
good out of it. There must be in God's universe,
evil and good with the ultimate outcome being good. The salvation of God's people
and the glory of God's grace shining brilliantly through the
substitutionary sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. There was then this tree of knowledge
of good and evil. And let me give you this just
real quick. Go with me to the book of Deuteronomy chapter 21. Deuteronomy chapter 21, and I'll
try to wind this down. Deuteronomy chapter 21. I find it most interesting that
often in the word of God, the death of our Lord Jesus, and
he died upon the cross, is set to be his death on a tree, on
a tree. There's much similarity between
the tree of Calvary and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
Here in Deuteronomy chapter 21, 22 is the verse, 22 and 23. And if a man have committed a
sin worthy of death and he be to be put to death
and thou hang him on a tree, His body shall not remain all
night upon the tree, but thou shalt in any wise bury him that
day. For he that is hanged on a tree,
of course, is accursed of God. That thy land be not defiled,
which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance. Now
please go to the book of Galatians chapter three. Galatians chapter three. And I'll read verse 13. Galatians chapter three and verse
13, Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law. How do
you do that? By being made a curse for us.
For it is written, curse it is everyone that hangeth on a tree. And then he continues that the
blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus
Christ, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through
faith. There's a lot to be said between
these two trees, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,
and the tree of the cross of our Lord Jesus. But let me just
close with this. In all of what we call time, the greatest most stupendous,
most, I don't even know what word to
use here. Illustration, example of good and evil is when our
Lord Jesus, when he hanged on a tree. The Bible's very specific
in saying he was hung on a tree. They nailed Him, we call it a
cross, but the Bible also refers it to a tree. Because there you
see is good, and you see good and evil at work at the cross.
I've already talked about the evil of men who nailed Him there,
but look at the goodness, the goodness that's seen there, the
goodness of God in giving His Son. the goodness of God in establishing
a covenant that required the death of His Son for a chosen
people? And what could we say about the
goodness of the One who died for us? He knew no sin. There wasn't any evil in Him
at all. He was pure goodness and He's
dying for those of us who are nothing but evil. And how did
he satisfy God? He took upon Himself all of the
indebtedness, all of the evil was imputed to Him. Imagine that! and he himself remained good
because he said, I am the good shepherd, the good shepherd giveth
his life for the sheep. And all the while that this good
shepherd is laying his life down for the sheep, all of the evil
of his sheep had been made to meet on him as a great weight. Behold, the tree of knowledge
of good and evil. You won't know goodness and you
won't know evil. You won't learn it anywhere else
like you're learning at Calvary. There's a good God giving his
good son to die for evil people. Isn't that magnificent? And God takes the evil of men,
the evil of Satan, because Satan entered into Judas, and Satan
was sifting Peter like wheat to deny the Lord three times.
We see all of that evil, and we see God who is good fulfilling
His good covenant. in crucifying his good son who died in the stead of evil
people. And through his death, he put
our evil away. And God takes the coexistence
of goodness and evil at the cross of Calvary on that tree, and
God brings out of it that which is purely good, the salvation
of his chosen people. And the reason you live today
unto God, and the reason our sins are forgiven, and the reason
we're made the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus is because
of that good one who died in the stead of evil people. And
He put our evil away without being defiled with evil at all. And to indicate that He did the
job that God gave Him to do, God raised Him from the dead. Took Him to glory. Seated Him
at His own right hand. And now all the things that are
happening for God's people It's all good. That's what I told
that preacher. It's all good. We're evil. And there's evil that we do and
evil that happens to us, but our God ultimately brings good
even out of evil. Amazing, isn't it? Bow down and
worship such a God. Well, let me close in prayer.
Which one of you is playing? OK. And David, after I pray,
he's going to play a verse of a hymn. And as he does, I'll
make my way to the vestibule. And I can't shake hands together,
but I'll be glad to greet you in back of my mass. There'll
be a smiling face. And good to see all of you this
morning. And I hope that we can join back
together tonight to worship our God. Lord, we thank you for the
cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, that tree upon which our Savior
died, the tree that stands for substitution and satisfaction,
where the issue of our redemption and reconciliation was settled. We rejoice before you, Father,
and we bow to you and your amazing dominion and sovereignty. How glorious it is that you can
take even things that are evil and you bring good out of them. Bless all of us with the knowledge
of Christ the Savior. Let us be caught up in Him. And in his work of redemption,
may he occupy our minds and our hearts and our thoughts, our
motivations. May we live in this world in
a manner that's honoring to the Christ of the cross. Forgive
the evil that is in us. And thank you for making us good
in Christ Jesus. For indeed we're made the very
righteousness of God in him. Bless us for Jesus' sake as you
glorify your name. Amen.