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Scripture Reading: Gen. 2
My intention in these chapters is not to teach us from Genesis 1 and 2. Instead, my intention is to use Genesis 1 and 2 as an illustration to instruct us in how to read the Bible properly. First, we need to get the facts from the record of the Bible. Today the Bible has been translated into more than one thousand languages and has become accessible for nearly everyone to read and receive its facts.
Furthermore, learning the Hebrew and Greek languages, the original languages with which the Bible was written, can help us to better understand the real meaning of the Bible. The translation of the Bible from the original languages is not an easy task. A popular Chinese translation translates the word spirit, the human spirit, as “spirit-soul” or “spirit-heart.” This means that the translators thought that man’s spirit, soul, and heart are the same thing. Such wrong translation leads people astray from the proper understanding of the Bible. This is why we must find out the real meaning of the facts according to Hebrew and Greek. Many Bible scholars and theological teachers understand the biblical languages, but they also make the mistake of saying that spirit and soul are synonyms. Paul, however, says in 1 Thessalonians 5:23 that God sanctifies us in our spirit and soul and body. The three nouns with two conjunctions strongly show that man is of three parts.
We have seen that we first need to get the facts from the Bible, but then we need to go on to receive revelation. Once we receive the revelation, we need to go further to see the vision. In these few chapters I have the burden to present illustrations of how to do this. Now let us consider the illustration from Genesis 2 of receiving revelation and vision through revelation.
Genesis 2 tells us that God ordained the seventh day to be the Sabbath as a repose (vv. 1-3). The Sabbath is a separating repose between God’s creation work of six days and the eighth day.
Genesis 2:7 shows that God created man with three parts—a body made with the dust, a spirit made with God’s breath of life for man to receive God, and a soul as the issue of the spirit meeting with the body.
God put man into a garden in front of the tree of life, and by the side of the tree of life there was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which was prohibited to be eaten by man (vv. 8-9, 15-17).
From the place where the tree of life was, a river flowed out into four heads, and at the flow there were gold, bdellium, and onyx stone (vv. 10-14).
God brought all the created things to man to see what man would call them, so Adam named all the living things. None of the living creatures created by God was qualified to be a mate to match man as his wife (vv. 18-20).
Jehovah caused man to sleep and took one of his ribs with which He built a wife to match man to be one body with man (vv. 21-25).
These are the facts of chapter 2, but what do they mean? Why was there a repose, a Sabbath? Why is man’s spirit not mentioned in the account of God’s creation before the Sabbath? Genesis 1 says that God created man in His own image and according to His own likeness, but it is not until Genesis 2, after the mentioning of the Sabbath, that man’s spirit is mentioned.
I was taught from my youth that the Sabbath was given to us by God so that we may remember that He is the Creator of the heavens and the earth. But we need to see the real spiritual significance of the Sabbath. The Sabbath divides God’s creation into two sections. The first section was without the life of God. The life of God is not mentioned in Genesis 1. We see man only with the image and likeness of God but not with the life of God.
The second section of the account of God’s creation in Genesis 2 is centered on the life of God. The most striking item in Genesis 2 is the tree of life. A number of years ago, there was a famous teacher of the Bible who said that the tree of life is over today. But the tree of life is not over, because it is mentioned in Revelation as a reward to the overcomers (2:7) and as the eternal life supply for God’s redeemed in the New Jerusalem (22:2). The Sabbath divides the first section of God’s creation without the life of God from the second section with the life of God. This is the spiritual significance of the Sabbath.
After God’s creating work of six days, He had a repose on the seventh day, the Sabbath. Then on the eighth day everything is centered on the life of God, because God put the man whom He had created in front of the tree of life. The eighth day is the day of the Lord’s resurrection. Our eighth day in the New Testament is from the day of the Lord’s resurrection until the New Jerusalem. We all need a repose, a Sabbath, like Paul had on the road to Damascus when the Lord stopped him and brought him into the eighth day of Christ’s resurrection.
God particularly made a spirit for man that man may receive Him as life and everything. Genesis 1 tells us that God created many things, but He did not give the details of His creation. But in chapter 2 He gave us a clear record with details. God created a body for man with the dust, and God breathed into him the breath of life. The Hebrew word for breath in Genesis 2:7 is the same word for spirit in Proverbs 20:27, which says that man’s spirit is the lamp of Jehovah. The soul is the issue of the spirit meeting with the body. God created man with a spirit so that man could receive Him as life and as everything.
The tree of life signifies God as life to man so that man could be completely like God in His appearance, life, and nature but not in His Godhead. The tree of life is a figure signifying God as life. In the Gospel of John the Lord said, “I am...the life” (14:6a), and He also said that He is the vine tree (15:1). He is the life and He is the tree, so He is the tree of life. Revelation 2:7 says, “To him who overcomes, to him I will give to eat of the tree of life.” Then at the end of the Bible, the tree of life grows in the flow out of God’s throne to supply the entire New Jerusalem. This is the clear revelation.
After God created man with a spirit, God put this man into the garden in front of the tree of life. This picture indicates that God wanted man to receive the tree of life.
The tree of the knowledge of good and evil signifies Satan as God’s enemy in God’s creation, implying that Satan is composed of knowledge and evil as well as good. This indicates that there is an opposer to God in the universe. God is to be life to man, but Satan is to be knowledge, evil, and good to man, which leads to death. God prohibited Adam from partaking of the tree of knowledge. If Adam had partaken of the tree of life, he would have received life, but instead he partook of the other tree and received death.
Satan tempted Eve with knowledge, causing her to doubt God’s word, by asking, “Did God really say...?” (Gen. 3:1). Eve was hooked because she answered him and was brought into the realm of the tree of knowledge. Such knowledge is a terrible thing. Many times the most learned ones are the hardest ones to convince about Christ. It is easier for a simple, uneducated person to get saved.
When the young people hear this word, they may wonder whether or not they should go to college. In 1977 I gave messages in the Life-study of Genesis in which I encouraged the young people to get the highest education. Many young people were helped by those messages, which were concerning Hiram, the skillful builder of the pillars in God’s temple. In those messages however, I pointed out that after we gain our education, it must be buried so that it can be useful in resurrection for God’s building (see Messages 85 and 86). The apostle Paul received the highest education, being brought up at the feet of a learned rabbi named Gamaliel (Acts 22:3). After he was saved by the Lord, Paul’s education and capacity came up in resurrection to be used by the Lord for the building up of His Body.
The river that flowed out from the place where the tree of life was, signifies that the Spirit of God flows out of God as the river of the water of life with four heads to reach the four directions of the earth.
The gold, bdellium, and onyx stone at the flow of the river are precious materials for God’s building—the Body of Christ consummating in the New Jerusalem (1 Cor. 3:9; Rev. 21:18-21). Bdellium is a pearl made not from the oyster but from the resin of a tree. First Corinthians 3 says that we are God’s building built with gold, silver, and precious stones; furthermore, we should not build God’s building with wood, grass, and stubble (vv. 9-12). At the end of the Bible in Revelation, there is a city built with three precious materials—gold, pearls, and precious stones. Gold is the base, pearls are the gates, and precious stones are the wall and foundations. This shows that through the flow of the Holy Spirit, we are transformed into precious materials for God’s building, that is, the New Jerusalem. This is a great revelation.
None of the living creatures created by God in the first section of His creation was qualified to be the wife of man, signifying that no living creature and also no man are qualified to match Christ as His counterpart. Adam was a type of Christ (Rom. 5:14). He was seeking a wife, just as Christ was seeking the church to be His wife, His counterpart. But nothing in the old creation can match Christ to be His counterpart. To match Christ we must have Christ’s life.
God caused man to sleep and took a rib out of him with which He built a wife for man, signifying that Christ died according to God’s will and that from His side flowed His blood for redemption and His Spirit of life for life dispensing, through which His Body is built up and becomes one with Him in His life, nature, and expression but not in His Godhead, as fully unveiled in the New Jerusalem. The King James Version says that God made the rib taken out of the side of Adam into a woman. The word made is a wrong translation. In Hebrew it says that God built a woman.
God caused Adam to sleep. This means that God decided by His will to let Christ die. Then when Christ died on the cross, His side was pierced. From Adam’s side a rib came out, whereas from the side of Christ, blood and water came out (John 19:34). Blood signifies redemption. Water signifies the dispensing of the Spirit. The rib, according to the New Testament, signifies Christ’s unbroken life. When He was on the cross, the soldiers came to break His legs, but when they saw that He had already died, they did not do it. John 19:36 says, “These things happened that the Scripture might be fulfilled: ‘No bone of His shall be broken.’” Jesus’ resurrection life is unbreakable. Eve is a prefigure of the New Jerusalem, which is built with the Lord’s resurrection life released out of Him.
