Wednesday after Invocavit
Posted on February 24, 2021 by under
Scripture: Genesis 2:8-17 (NKJV)
2:8 The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man whom He had formed. 9 And out of the ground the Lord God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
10 Now a river went out of Eden to water the garden, and from there it parted and became four riverheads. 11 The name of the first is Pishon; it is the one which skirts the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. 12 And the gold of that land is good. Bdellium and the onyx stone are there. 13 The name of the second river is Gihon; it is the one which goes around the whole land of Cush. 14 The name of the third river is Hiddekel; it is the one which goes toward the east of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates.
15 Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; 17 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.”
Devotion
Our first parents were given an earthly Paradise. There was no sin, no corruption. There would be no conflict, no scarcity, no pain. On the contrary, they would have God’s fellowship and every need supplied in abundance. They were given everything a human being could desire. Only one “good” thing was forbidden them: to eat from the one tree.
It was a real challenge the devil faced, to convince Eve that God was evil and that she was deprived. He had to trick her into not believing her own eyes and ears and everything she knew to be true. Still, he was tragically successful. He did not face such a challenge with Jesus. Forty days without food is a real hardship. Suffering, scarcity, and death had filled the world for some 4,000 years. It wasn’t so hard for the devil to paint a picture of a God who did not care, who was not trustworthy, or who did not deserve to be worshiped. But there Jesus stood, unmoved in His confidence in His Father’s goodness. He knew it was the devil who introduced evil into the world, not God. He knew it was mankind’s sin that brought God’s curse upon the world, not some sadistic design on God’s part.
See the goodness of God in Scripture! And see the marks of God’s goodness, His Son’s sacrifice, which earned your salvation, and Holy Baptism, where He makes you an heir of His heavenly Paradise.
Prayer: O Lord, mercifully hear our prayer and stretch forth the right hand of Thy majesty to defend us from them that rise up against us; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
