Let's open your copies of God's Word to Genesis 2. Genesis 2. We'll begin our reading in v. 4 and we'll go down through v. 17. Sounds like that child is concurring with my statement. Genesis 2. We'll begin our reading in v. 4 and through v. 17. People of God, this is the Word of the Lord. And so then we were called and commanded to hear the word of the Lord. These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created, and the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens. When no bush of the field was yet in the land, and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the land, and there was no man to work the ground, And a mist was going up from the land and was watering the whole face of the ground. Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. And man became a living creature. And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east. And there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. A river flowed out of Eden to water the garden. And there it divided and became four rivers. The name of the first is the Pishon. It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. And the gold of that land is good. Delium and onyx stone are there. The name of the second river is the Gihom. It is the one that flowed around the whole land of Cush. The name of the third river is the Tigris, which flows east of Assyria. And the fourth river is the Euphrates. The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man saying, you may surely eat of every tree of the garden. But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die." Thus far the reading of God's holy word this morning. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of the Lord is forever. As we begin our text this morning in verse 4, I wonder how many of you in your reading through the book of Genesis, assuming that you have read through the book of Genesis, which might be a generous assumption. But assuming that you have, how many of you have looked at that phrase, these are the generations, and found it to be oddly familiar for a reason that you can't quite explain? The reason why that might be in your mind is because that phrase, these are the generations, is a recurrent theme through the book of Genesis. It's the reason why it's called the book of Genesis. Ten times throughout this book, we run into that phrase, these are the generations followed by, in this case, the heavens and the earth, but as you move through, these are the generations of Adam, these are the generations of Noah, and so on and so forth. And by now you should know that anytime the scriptures repeat themselves, it's for a reason and for a purpose. We've seen that quite a number of times just in Genesis chapter one itself, haven't we? That as Scripture repeats itself, it does so for emphasis, to clue us in that we're supposed to turn our attention here. And that's no less the case when it comes to this phrase, that these are the generations. And that phrase, what it does for us is it alerts us to the idea that there is now going to be a shift in attention, a shift in focus, a shift in the stage in the narrative of Genesis itself. and of the program that the book is advancing. In particular, with this declaration of these are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created, we are going to now move from that broad conception of God as the powerful, majestic creator of the universe and narrow into God as the relational creator of man. for his purpose, for fellowship, and for enjoyment. And just the fact that we are told that in verse 4 lets us know that that's happening. But at the same time, we have something within that phrase that points us to the idea that we're supposed to begin to focus on God and His relational capacity, in particular, His relation to mankind is a special element of His creation because we're introduced to God as the Lord God. In chapter 1, He's God over and over again. But the Lord God introduces to us another name for God. His covenantal name. The name that indicates the relationship that He enters into with the unique part of His creation. that He enters into with man. And so as God speaks to His people, He always speaks to His people as the Lord or the Lord God indicating that closeness, that personal relationship that He is going to have with His people. And in our text, it indicates the closeness, the purpose, the relationship in which God created man to Himself. And throughout this narrative here of the creation of man and God's relation to the creation of man, we are intended to learn something about the nature and character of God himself, and therefore, the nature and character of our relationship to him. And unsurprisingly, if you have your bulletin, if you looked at the outline in there, you should know where I'm going, that we're going to look now at the creation of man and see that our God, as much as He is that God of power and authority and wisdom and goodness and many other things in chapter 1, He's also a God of tender, loving, relational care. We'll do that this morning through the three elements listed for you in those outlines. First, we'll look at our narrative and see God's tender formation of man. Secondly, we'll look at God's gracious provision for man. And then finally, God's special purpose for man. So let's turn then to that first element, God's tender formation of man and our text, particularly in verse 5, which tells us, and verse 6, which tells us what the condition of the earth is at this particular time as our shift Narrows in on mankind in the creation it tells us in verse 5 and 6 that that there's no bush in the field that there's no small plant that God had not yet were caused it to rain upon the earth and we're given a reason for that and the reason why these things had not yet occurred why the why the earth is not coming and producing this abundant vegetation that you would expect it to produce is because God had not yet created man and placed him there to care for the burgeoning life-producing creation and the earth and the land. And what we're supposed to have as we come to verse 4, and we come to verse 5, and we come to verse 6, is this sense of anticipation. Kind of like when we come to Genesis 1, verse 2, and we get the idea that the earth is without form and void, but the Spirit is hovering over the waters. And it's supposed to fill us with that anticipation of what's going to come next. Here it's though the earth is sitting in anticipation of something that is to come. anticipating the coming of that one element of God's creation, that special creature who will fulfill God's unique and special purpose for that creature, namely relationship, service, and stewardship of this new creation. And that sets the stage for us, that sets the context then for what follows. That we are waiting for something to happen and we're waiting, namely, for God to create mankind. And it is in his creation of mankind and his forming of mankind, the very process itself that brings out this picture of God as a tender, loving, and caring God. As we turn to verse 7, and in this simple phrase, then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground. As we look at that, that seems pretty nondescript. It doesn't seem to be all that flowery and certainly not all that superficially remarkable, right? Simple statement. God takes man, forms him out of the dust of the ground. But if we understand that that idea of formed there, that what that word carries across for us is a sense of deliberate intentionality and of tender care. It's the idea that God in a way that He has not done with every other element of His creation thus far. Because you think of chapter 1 and how does it present God's creation? All of these things come into being by the decree of God. There's no special tender care and intention that goes into the forming of those things painted in the same terms that we find here, is there? There's the general decree of the Word of God that causes all those things to come into being, but with mankind, it's different. It's not just the bare, mere Word of God that brings Him to existence. It is His tender, intentional, deliberate formation of man. Let me get this turned down a little bit. It's a little loud. There we go. Thank you. If you think about it this way, when I was getting my undergrad degree, I had a friend who in the same university was an art major. And in particular, he was focused on pottery and on clay, of making things out of clay. And we worked together in that university doing the after hours work program to go towards paying the cost of the university. And I'd be able to see him in those times in the evening where he would take his his bucket of water and he would take his lump of clay and he would sit down by that pottery wheel and he would begin to form whatever it was he was going to create. And it was always so fascinating to watch him because he poured over that clay and he was deliberate and intentional and tender so that he could produce exactly what he's trying to produce. And it was quite clearly for him a labor of love as he formed whatever vessel it was he was trying to form. That's precisely the picture that we're supposed to get here. And that's the root of the idea as we move through Scripture and we see God referred to as the potter. as the one who takes those vessels and he forms them into what he wants them to be as that labor of love with that close personal relationship between the potter and the clay that he forms. God forms man out of the dust of the ground with all that tender love and care of the artist forming his special creation. But it doesn't end there either. Because the verse goes on to tell us in verse 7, "...and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living creature." And once again, if we were able to find a way to carry the Hebrew thought in a really appropriate way in the English language, it sometimes is so hard to do. It's almost the idea that Jesus kisses the man. He kisses life into this man. It's the idea of a gentle breathing out of life into this newly formed creation. That same tenderness now has added to it an intimacy so that we have this picture of God tenderly creating this man in an intimate way that is unique to the relationship between God and this element of his creation. God is a God of tender, loving care. who forms the man from the dust of the ground in a way that's never spoken of of any other living element of His creation breathes into man the breath of life. Man has the very breath of God within him as his principle of life because of the God who is a God of tender, loving care. But our text doesn't end there. Our text doesn't just merely end with the description of God and His tender formation of man that alerts us to the tenderness of God, but it moves on beyond that. How many of you have come to this description of the garden and you sort of just gloss through it because it's really not all that interesting to study geography, right? It really doesn't matter. Okay, there's a garden in Eden. It's got trees in it. That's great. There's waters. And we've got the name of the rivers that are providing the water. And there are some cool, valuable stones there. Let's get to the good parts, right? I'm not really worried about the geography lesson, but the very geography and formation of this garden itself and the description that's given to us continues to enforce and to enhance that idea of God and his tender care for his newly formed creation. Because think of the picture that's given to us. God plants a garden in Eden in the east. And there He put the man whom He had formed. God creates a garden for man. He creates a habitat especially for man, which is the first element of that tender care revealed there, a special place just for Him. But that land isn't just any sort of land. It's a beautiful land. It's a wonderful land. It's a marvelous garden. It tells us that in that garden, the Lord God causes to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. It's a lush and it's a vibrant land. It's filled for those trees that are pleasant to the eyes. The beauty of God's creation and not only that, the desirability of the fruit that it produces. He's given mankind the ability to enjoy the delights of this creation. He's not left it bare. It's lush and it's vibrant. And it's well-watered. Verse 10 tells us that a river flows out of Eden to water the garden, that it divides into those four rivers. And most of the time, we use that to try to figure out where the Garden of Eden may happen to have been, right? That's not the point. Think about the context in which this is written. Think about who the original audience of Genesis is. It's a generation and generations of people living in a land that has a very distinct lack of water, doesn't it? Think of that generation that wanders for 40 years in the wilderness and in the desert, and that it causes the need for a miracle from God to bring forth water out of that rock. They know how valuable water is. Perhaps in a way that we don't, we can merely turn on the tap and there is life-giving water, right? Not so for them. Perhaps if you're in California or in Texas or Arizona or Australia, places where water is necessarily scarce and they go through those prolonged seasons of drought, they have a real appreciation for the idea of how wonderful it would be to have abundant, life-giving water, wouldn't they? That's the idea here. God creates this garden and gives to men every pleasant tree that can provide them with desirable fruit to eat. And he gives them a land in which that life-giving principle of water is in abundance. And not only that, it's a rich and it's a prosperous land as well. Good gold is found there, delium and onyx, these precious things. In other words, this whole picture creates for us just the wonderful, marvelous land, this wonderful, marvelous garden that God has given to this newly tenderly formed creature. And we begin to understand the point, don't we? And to sort of cap it all off is the delightful little piece of trivia to know that Eden means pleasure and delight. God has literally created in the land of pleasure and delight a garden of pleasure and delight for his creation. God shows His tender, loving care in the way in which He forms man, but He shows that tender, loving care in the way in which He provides for him as well. Thirdly this morning, God shows that same tender, loving care through the special purpose for which He creates man. God creates man, he forms him, he places him in the garden, and then he gives him purpose. In verse 15, the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and keep it. He is to serve the Lord by working and keeping the land. That is, he's given stewardship over this pleasant land given to him by God, man uniquely created for this particular purpose. And once again, do we normally think of the idea of purpose in terms of tender, loving care? Perhaps not. We might take the idea of purpose for granted. But have you ever had a sense of purposelessness? Have you ever had a sense at any point in time in your life where you don't know why you're here? You don't know what you're supposed to do. You're not even sure who you are yet. And you have that distinct lack of purpose. And isn't that an incredibly unsettling position to reside in? Oh, it certainly is. Why? Because a lack of purpose is contrary for the very inherent nature of what it means to be a human. God has created us with purpose. with something to do, with a role to fill, with a function to undertake. And that is the greatest purpose of all to uniquely be able to serve the tender, loving God who created Him in the first place. Parents, you know the idea with your children. That you want to give them a sense of purpose, a sense of belonging to the family, a sense of contribution. Because that's really what purpose is, isn't it? It's an idea of contribution. That somehow you are giving something to something, right? Or to someone. That you contribute. And parents, we give our children the opportunity to contribute to that family, to the family, to enhance their sense of belonging to it, right? We give them tasks, we give them chores, we give them a voice, whatever it may happen to be, in order that they might have that sense of purpose and belonging and contribution. That's exactly what God has done here in His tender, loving care of a father. Provided the opportunity for His creation to have purpose. To have a contribution. To do His very will. Man has service to his God as the heart of who he is. Inherent to who he is. And wrapped up in that is the idea of obedience, of relational obedience. And that's something to understand. Because we get in the Bible the picture of the idea that nature itself obeys, right? When we get into Matthew, we'll have that picture of God commanding the wind and the waves to be still, right? And they obey His command, is the language that's given to us. But those are inanimate objects, aren't they? Wind and waves don't have consciousness, right? They obey, but not because there's any thought to that. But we, we're created to obey in a relational way, in a conscientious way. In other words, our obedience is another component of that idea of the special nature of our creation that we can obey because obedience provides us with an opportunity. And that is an opportunity to respond to this tender, loving care of God through our own trusting, loving obedience to Him in response to what He's done for us. So often this idea of that tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the command put before man is this idea of some sort of test, and perhaps we could conceive it this way, but we really need to understand for what it is, and that is an opportunity for Adam and for Eve and for mankind to show their love and trust in this God, to reciprocate back to Him the same love that He has demonstrated to them. So they might love him and in loving him, obey him in a way that no other element of creation possibly can. So that even obedience. rather than being some sort of onerous burden that we have to kick against, should have been for them and should be for us the expression of our grateful, loving, thankful response to the God who has provided such tender, loving care for us. The funny thing about God's creating us to serve and to obey is that obedience is always couched in the terms of His abundance. The command itself is always such a small thing when compared to the abundance that's provided with it. Look at the command that He gives to Adam. He says, you may eat of every tree in this garden. Of all of this abundance, you may freely partake. And so this abundance in place before man, and then comes the small command, but of this one tree, you may not eat. Abundance in obedience. And the restriction is so small. Brothers and sisters, saints, people of God, the heart of obedience is love itself. Grounded in the love that's been demonstrated to us through the tender care of a loving Father. And obedience to Him is something that He has every right to command because He's given us life. And He's given us purpose. He's done all that He has. So then, as part of our service to Him, obedience ought to be rendered. So what then do we do with all of this knowledge of who God is? That He is a tender and loving God. The first thing, of course, to consider is the Gospel. Because God's intimate, tender care is something on this side of the fall you can't know and have no right to outside of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Because man's relationship, and we'll see it in just a few short verses, man's relationship with God is going to fundamentally change. It's going to go from this picture of peace and relationship of pleasant service and obedience in fellowship with God to one of enmity and hostility. No longer will peace demonstrate and be the principal disposition of man towards God, but rather hostility and enmity. And something must overcome that enmity. Something must make us stop being rebels against this God. And that something, that someone is Jesus Christ. If you don't know Christ, then far from knowing Him as a God of tender care, you will know Him only as your enemy. To know Him as this God, you must place your faith in Christ, the one, as Paul tells us in Ephesians, has destroyed that enmity for all those who place their faith in His name and reconciles them to God, that they might know His wonderful, tender, loving care. If you are here and you don't know God in Christ, then the call to you is to place your faith, your trust, your belief in Jesus Christ in order that you might know this God as He's presented to you today. And for those of you who have placed your faith in Christ and now are living that sanctified life, there are a number of things that we need to take out from this original creation of man. And the first one is the recognition of the principal purpose of man. We were created for relationship and for service. And service to God is at the heart, or should be, at everything of everything we do, of who we are, of what we do, of who we are recreated to be in Christ Jesus. Ephesians 2.10 says that we are the workmanship of God created in Christ Jesus for good works. Brothers and sisters, you need to wrap your minds around this here and now. If you are here and you profess faith in Jesus Christ, your principal identity is a servant of God and everything else. Falls underneath that. And so we examine ourselves on that daily basis. Am I actually serving God? Or am I living in the pursuit of my own pleasure, my own desire, my own understanding of what life ought to be and how it ought to be lived? Because here's the thing that we like to take away from what we've just seen, is that God is a God who likes us to have delight and pleasure, right? And we're more than happy to live out that element and thus seek delight and pleasure. But forget about the other part. Because that delight and pleasure comes in the context of service. You want to know real delight and real pleasure. It begins in your service to the God who created you to enjoy those things through that service. serve your God, that you might know his good, tender, loving care and the delight that comes from it. And entailed within that is obedience. Because obedience goes hand in hand with service. As I've already said, obedience provides the opportunity to respond to God's tender, loving care with a trusting, loving obedience. That's the principal part that really reveals where our hearts are, where our affections are, where we identify, right? In the age in which identification is such a foremost thing. Where we identify comes and is clarified right at the point of obedience. Because we don't like the idea of obeying, do we? We like the idea of obeying the things that are easy to obey. As you get older and you get wiser in your childhood, and you hit the tender age of 10, and your dad tells you not to stick your hand in the running blender, I guarantee that you are going to enjoy that level of obedience. Right? But how dedicated you are to your service, How how fully you embrace that principle of obedience is precisely when obedience means you have to do something you don't want to do, or you're not supposed to do something you want to do, right? Telling the kid that he's not allowed to have the cookie before dinner because you'll spoil his appetite. That's a less easy command to obey for that child, isn't it? Because he wants the cookie. He wants it. And the principal thing that he has to consider is whether or not his want is more important than his parents' command. And his devotion to his parents is measured by where the importance lies. And that same reality exists in our relationship with Jesus Christ and with God through him. The importance and the desire and the love that we have for God finds its expression in obedience. That's not to say that in Christ we have to render a perfect obedience because He's done that for us, right? But it most certainly tells us those areas in which we're lacking in love and where we need to continue to grow and to press towards that greater love demonstrated in that trusting obedience. But we actually have to desire and move towards it. Brothers and sisters, obedience is part of that service. Particularly at the hard points when obedience means something we desire is something we must forfeit. And finally this morning, let me leave you with some encouragement. And that is namely that the same loving and tender care that God demonstrates toward Adam in the garden is the same loving, tender care He demonstrates towards His people now. If you read the book of Ephesians, you can't help but walk away from it and have a real sense that it looks a lot like Genesis. Because that picture of God forming this new creation and then placing Him in this position of rich abundance and in that giving Him a purpose looks a lot like what Paul says in Ephesians 1 and 2 when he talks about being that creation, that workmanship of God. where his special attention is focused in order that, as Paul says, that all the abundance of the riches of his grace might be poured out and lavished upon us. Created by God, formed by him, given abundance and service to him. And not only that, we see that same tender, loving care in our recreation, so also the giving of the principle of new life. I'd encourage you at some point in time to go to Ezekiel 37. We won't do it for time's sake. And read verses 1-14. It's the valley of dry bones. And the Lord tells Ezekiel to prophesy to the breath And to say to the breath, come and give life to these dry bones. And that's an illustration of what God is going to do. That He is going to breathe His very breath into spiritually dead Israel and bring them back to life. In John 20 verse 22, We find Jesus Christ visiting His disciples after He's risen from the dead, and He breathes on them and says, receive the Holy Spirit. In that new creation in Jesus Christ, God breathes His very breath into us in order that we might come to that newness of life and service. And He promises us His care and His provision in Matthew 6, 25-34 when we're told that we're not supposed to be like the pagans are, like the heathens are. Why is that? Because their lives are dedicated to what they may eat and what they may wear and what they may drink, and they're anxious about making sure they have all of these things and they're consumed with them. But we don't have to be. Why? Because our good God provides us with everything that we need that we might be freed up then to do what? To pursue His Kingdom and His righteousness. God provides His tender care and provision to His people in order that they might pursue their purpose. And then closing this morning, Because we all know that the life that we live now is difficult. And if this is all that there is, it seems like the promises are pretty hollow, doesn't it? But then we return to Revelation 22 which happens to be the last chapter in this entire book, right? And listen to the imagery in these five verses. Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city. Also on either side of the river, the tree of life with its 12 kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and His servants will worship Him. They will see His face and His name will be on their foreheads. The night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light. And they will reign forever and ever." Sounds a lot like Genesis 2, doesn't it? The idea being that the promise is held out to the people of God. That as we struggle now, There is coming that time when those struggles will cease and we are going to find ourselves in a garden of sorts that is much better than even that first garden was. We will live in the very presence of God himself and know his tender loving care as it was intended to be in the beginning and as he will bring it to be in the ending. In other words, we, we live to serve and obey now, and we know his tender care and his provision for us now, but there is coming a time when that is all we will know. And the hurt and the pain and the grief and the sorrow and the difficulty of living this side of the fall will be no more. And what we see in our text is what our reality will be. That's where our minds are to be directed. When we grow weary, when we falter and when we faint, is knowing that it will not always be this way, but something else is coming, something better and something greater. Because our God is a God of tender, loving care. Let's pray together this morning. Our Heavenly Father, we come before you and we confess our humility and our thankfulness. Father, you created man to serve you with a special purpose. You gave him everything that he could ever desire and everything that he could ever want and need. Father, he certainly didn't deserve that. Neither do we. On this side of the fall, when we have become rebels and certainly, and certainly not deserving of your tender, loving care, yet in your son, you have shown it to us. The very fact that we have salvation is a demonstration of that love. You've said so much in your word that because you loved us while we were yet sinners, while we were yet hostile to you, because you loved us, you redeemed us. You sent your son and we learn to love because we were first loved. We thank you for that, Father. And we pray, then, that you might give to us the strength to do what you've called us to do, to serve you, to serve you in trusting, loving obedience, resting in your tender care. Grant that to us, we pray, in Jesus' name. Amen.