Living the Good Life

In your notes, in the bulletin, it says that the title of the sermon is God's first maladdiction, but that's not really what we're going to talk about this morning. We're not going to get there until next week when God says, for the first time in the whole creation account, it is not good. We'll see what is not good next week, but today we want to look at what is good. What is the good life? All of us want the good life. People seek the good life in various ways. This means, but today we want to look at God's original creation of man, and we want to see what the good life really is. This is a wonderful chapter. Chapter 2 and 3 are unique in the book of Genesis in several ways. One way is that the name of God that is used there is used only there in Genesis 2 and 3, in their particular combination.

In Genesis 2 and 3, he is called Lord God. He is called Elohim Yahweh, Yahweh Elohim. The reason for that is that his name God or Elohim is the name of God, title of God, that emphasizes his sovereign control over creation, that he is a sovereign God who has all power and all authority, and he accomplishes his purposes. But the name Yahweh is God's name or Jehovah, the Germanic way of saying it, is God's way of describing himself as a covenant-keeping God that his love endures forever. You see, he's the kind of God that when you enter into covenant with him, when he brings you into covenant relationship with him, he will never, ever leave you nor forsake you. That's his promise. The teaching of the Bible is far greater than simply eternal security.

It's not just once saved, always saved, it is that God is a persevering God, and that when you enter into relationship with him, when he brings you into covenant relationship with him, he will never leave you nor forsake you. And this chapter, he begins, the writer begins to call him Yahweh Elohim, Lord God. Not only is he creator, not only has he created, as he's described it in chapter 1, but now we look and see his particular relationship with man. Really the high point of this chapter is the creation of the woman and the institution of marriage. But we're going to look at the first part of the chapter, verses 4 through 17, that leads up to that. And we want to see how God, what God thinks, the good life really is.

What is the good life anyway? What does it mean to live the good life? In Genesis chapter 2, beginning in verse 4, notice the heading of this whole section begins in verse 4. This is the account, or if you have a King James Version, it reads, these are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created in the day that God, the Lord God, made earth and heaven. Now let me just make one little comment. As you read through the book of Genesis, you're going to run onto this phrase. The trouble is in the translations, they sometimes translate in various ways. But this expression, these are the generations of, whether it's these are the generations of Abraham, or these are the generations of Noah, whatever.

Ten times that expression is used, and it always begins a section that describes that person and his descendants. Here it is the generations of the heavens and the earth. That is, God has created the heavens and the earth, and now he begins to describe man and mankind upon the earth. And notice what he says about them. Notice in verse 5, now no shrub of the field was yet in the earth, no plan of the field yet sprouted, but the Lord God had not sent rain upon the earth, and there was no man to cultivate the ground. But a mist used to rise from the earth and water the whole surface of the ground. Then the Lord God formed a man of the dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being.

The Lord God planted a garden toward the east in Eden, and there he placed the man whom he had formed. Out of the ground the Lord God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing to the site and good for food. The tree of life also in the midst of the garden, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Now a river flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and from there it divided and became four rivers. The name of the first is Peshon. It flows around the whole land of Havala where there is gold. The gold of that land is good. The gallium and the onyx stone are there. The name of the second river is Gihon. It flows around the whole land of Kush. The name of the third river is Tigris. It flows east of Assyria, and the fourth river is the river Euphrates.

Then the Lord God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it. The Lord God commanded the man saying, from any tree of the garden, you may eat freely. From the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat. For in the day that you eat from it, you will surely die. Here we have the account of the creation of man, and the first chapter we're told is took place on the sixth day. As you compare these two accounts, they're in the 19th century critical scholars, especially in Germany, came up with an ingenious way of tearing and ripping this passage apart and saying that chapter 2 is written by a completely different writer. As the account seems so different, there are things in it, and the details are different.

For example, in the sixth day, on the sixth day in chapter 1, God first creates the animals and then he creates man. In the second chapter, when he gives the details of the sixth day, he says, God created the man, and then he created the animals, and then he created the woman. Now, there's a good reason for that. There's a reason that God first brings all the animals before Adam, before he creates the woman, but we will see that next week when we see why it is not good for a man to be alone. I'll give you all a week to think about that, especially you men that are alone, like Ryan. Think why it is not good for a man to be alone. I want to notice four things in this passage that we're going to see.

The fifth is what we're going to look at next week, and that is, what is the good life? How has God described by his creation what the good life really is? First of all, the good life is living as God's personal creation. It's living as the handiwork of God. It's living as one that has the fingerprints of God all over him. In verses 4 through 6, he begins the description of the creation of man by describing the condition of the land itself. Now, there's a lot of things going on here. We remember the historical context in which this book was written and given to the people of Israel that they are about to go into the land, the harrets, which is the same word as the word for earth. God has given them a land, a promised land, and he's about to bring them into the land.

So there's many things going on here as he describes the creation of God and how God prepared the land for the man. In verses 4 through 6, he describes the condition of the land before the creation of man. Before man was created, and he focuses in, interestingly, the things that he describes are those parts of the land that would be directly affected by the fall. When we get to chapter 3, we'll see that the very things that he mentions here before the creation of man are the things that are affected by the fall of man. But then notice in verse 7, man is a special creation. Notice what it says, then the Lord God formed man of dust from the ground and breathes into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living being, a living soul.

Now notice that even though man is a special creation of God, he made in God image as we are told in chapter 1 after his likeness, that mankind is an image bearer of God, yet man is also a creature like other creatures in a real sense. He is made from the dust of the ground, the dust of the ground. The ground is his cradle and it's his grave and his home. Man lives upon the earth. Out of the earth he was created and back to the earth he will go at death when the curse comes. But what sets man apart from the animals? What is it that sets man apart? We are told in the first chapter it was because God created him in his own image. He has the fingerprints of God, God's personal touch in creating him is unique.

The account of God's creation, man is different than the account of his creation of all the other living beings on the face of the earth. Notice it says that he formed the man. The Hebrew word here Yatsar to form or to shape is the word that's used of a potter in forming a piece of pottery from clay. And that's the picture here. The picture is of a potter shaping his clay. In other words, the work of art, that man is a work of art in the hands of God that reveals and reflects who God really is. The beautiful passage in Psalm 139 when it describes the forming of a baby and a mother's womb. I think we have six or seven ladies in this church in whose womb a little child is being formed. In Psalm 139, David says it's God weaving a life together.

What a picture. That every day that's going on inside of the womb. The God is overseeing this glorious process that he has created. A life is being formed. God is shaping. In Ephesians 2.10 when it talks about you and me who have come to faith in Jesus Christ, it's this for you or his workmanship created in Christ Jesus. And the word that he uses there for workmanship is the Greek word Poi Ema. We get a word poem from it, the work of art. See, God looks at mankind and he sees man in a unique and wonderful way. All of his creation reflects his glory. But mankind is the special work of his hand. We're his handiwork. We were created. God reaches down, scoops up the dirt, and then notice what it says.

It says, he breathed into his nostrils. He breathed into his nostrils. The word to breathe here means to blow with force. He blows on the man. He blows his breath into his nostrils and he comes alive. See, man is in just a God-shaped piece of dirt. He's not just a piece of clay that God shapes into his own physical image, but he has within him the gift of life that was given to him by God himself. God breathes into his nostrils the breath of life. This is a biblical view of man. That man is not simply an interesting collection of chemicals and electrical impulses, but he is a container of the life of God. The word to breathe into or to blow suggests a good puff of wind like when you're blowing on a fire to revive it.

In other words, it was an exertion of God's power. The closest parallel we have to this is in Ezekiel chapter 37, the valley of the dry bones. God takes his Ezekiel out to this valley and it's full of dry bones. It's a picture of the people of God. The spirit of God has abandoned them because of their sin and idolatry and they're all dried up. They're just bones that are all disconnected. You remember the story, the bones are brought back together. God is going to give Ezekiel an incredible picture of the resurrection of God's people. The life that's going to be put into them and the last step after it brings the bones together and the flesh and the sin you and all that is there. And then it's in the spirit of God blows upon them.

The breath of God enters them and they're made alive. What a picture that is of salvation, isn't it? You only know that after you come to faith in Christ and then you look back at your life without Christ and you realize you were dead. You were lifeless spiritually. On that moment of time, the spirit of God breathed upon you and you became alive. The beautiful picture, very subtle picture, in fact, very controversial about interpretation in John chapter 20. Jesus is in the upper room with his disciples, I'm sorry, after this was actually after the resurrection. And it's before the day of Pentecost, before the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. And yet Jesus, as he speaks to his disciples there in the room, these intimate friends of his, it says he breathed on them and said, received the Holy Spirit.

What a beautiful picture that is, a picture of God's involvement in your life that is a creature is one made in the image of God, your great, great, great, great grandfather, Adam, and God formed him from the dust, he breathed into his nostrils, the breath of God, and he became a living soul, a living being. The results of this inbreeding, he became this living soul. Now, by the way, let me make something clear that in the account, the animals are described in exactly the same way as far as being living beings, living souls, but what's unique about man is, is God's involvement, that God breathes into him, is breath, and he receives a breath of God directly from God himself. You see, you have God's fingerprints all over you, and the good life is the life that's lived out of this knowledge and understanding that I belong to God.

I think there's no more important truth that you can learn living a Christian life than knowing you are a son or a daughter of God. You come to understand it through the work of the Spirit of regeneration, the baptizing work of the Spirit that you become a son of God or a daughter of God, and he is your father. He doesn't give you a spirit of slavery again, I wish you cringed in fear, but he's given you a spirit of adoption by which you cry out, Abba, Father, dear Father. Isn't it great in those moments when you have no one to turn to, and you're facing things that you know you don't have the resources to overcome? And in the quietness of your heart, you can say, Abba, Father. You ever lay on your bed at night in the dark of night when nobody is awake, but you and your heart is just churning, and you simply say, Abba, Father, dear Father.

See, that's what Jesus did in the Garden of Destiny. When he flung himself headlong as he is wrestling with this thing of becoming sin on our behalf, and it says he cried out, Abba, Father. There's any way that this cup can pass from me, but not my will. Your will be done, Abba, Father. You can say that because you know you have the fingerprints of God all over you. You were his personal creation in Christ Jesus. Man alone in this account is created in the image of God, and that's what's so tragic about his death. Is it when man dies, when God warns him in chapter 2, verse 17, that in the day that you eat of the fruit of this tree, you will die. The reason that is so tragic is man possesses Adam possesses the life of the breath of God in his being.

The second thing that God supplies for the good life is that the good life is living in God's personal presence. Notice this account. This is kind of puzzling when you read this because you're almost like on a side here. Why does he give us all this geography? Why is he telling us about these rivers and this land and all these things? Why does he do this? It begins in verse 8, the Lord God planted a garden toward the east in Eden. Eden was an area. Eden means delight. It was an area to the east, and we understand from the description that everything is described for us in relationship to Israel, to that land. So he says to the east, there was this land of Eden, and in Eden God planted a garden, and there he placed the man whom he had formed.

Out of the ground, the Lord God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing to sight and good for food. But the tree of life also is in the midst of the garden, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And he goes on. He talks about a river that is in the land of Eden and feeds into this garden and waters everything. And then out of it, it flows and it divides into four rivers. And he describes these different land areas where these rivers go. He describes all the richness of those lands, the gold, the delim, these beautiful gems, the beauty of this atmosphere that he's describing is a tip off to us of what God is speaking to us through Moses as he writes this book. The Garden of God is a special place where God plants man, where he puts man into this garden.

The word garden means an enclosed area. An area for cultivation, an area where you plant a garden. It's a park that's surrounded by a hedge of some kind. It's got a wall around it of some kind. Now in the ancient world, kings always had their personal garden. Remember Ahab and Naboth vineyard, your Bible reader, you remember that Ahab wanted Naboth's land so he could plant his own garden next to his palace. Why was that so important? Because we're a king to have a garden, a king, in fact, the word that's used here for garden in the related term in some of the other ancient language, in the Persian language, for example, the word, the related word means a royal park. What's significant about that?

What's significant about it is this is the place where man lives in the presence of God in the garden. There's an important amount of attention that's given in this text to the description of this garden. It is an Eden, which means delight. And so it pictures this as an idyllic and a delightful place to be and to rest. The description of the garden is deliberately given to us in a way that without a shadow of a doubt, foreshadows the description of the tabernacle that was found later in Exodus chapters 25 to 27. What does he do this? Because that's where God was going to dwell after the fall when he called his people Israel out of Egypt, both places where man could enjoy the fellowship and the presence of God.

And notice in verses 9 and 10, in the garden, you have this beautiful, these beautiful lusche trees, including the elusive tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, a river that divides into these four headwaters, special cares given to locate the rivers and tell you the land they flow through. And he describes the character of these lands in which these rivers flow. They're rich in gold and precious jewels. And their location was related to the promised land that God was going to give his people. In the tabernacle, the golden candlestick, for example, it was a stylized tree of life and the falling of its light on the 12 lobes of the presence symbolized God's life, sustaining his people.

In the New Jerusalem, there's going to be a river that flows out of the throne of God, and it's got a water, the trees of life that are going to bloom and bear fruit 12 months out of the year. It's amazing how he ties together this throughout the scriptures. What is tied together is the Garden of Eden and this atmosphere in the presence of God, the tabernacle, the promised land, and the New Jerusalem. When the New Jerusalem comes down, by the way, one of the problems that you have in understanding the New Jerusalem is that it is so large when it comes down out of heaven that if it is going to be planted there in Israel, it is going to cover more than the land of Israel. It's huge. It's cubed, it's beautiful because it's a description of the presence of the living God.

And the point of this description of the Garden is to show the glory of God's presence through the beauty of these physical surroundings that he describes. This is really common in the later prophets. Let me read to you some verses out of the prophets that refer to the Garden of Eden and the dwelling of God and God's promise of a future dwelling with His people. We come into this building and I know there are people come and visit our church and they don't stay because they just can't stand the thought of worshiping God in a high school cafeteria. They want to be in a beautiful place and I don't blame them. I don't blame them. It's great to be in a beautiful place that all the surroundings and accoutrements remind us of the presence of God that we know that God doesn't dwell in buildings, does he?

He dwells in a living building, a building that's made with living stones. But we still are interested in the surroundings and when we build a church, not if, but when we build a church building, we want it to have a certain look and feel to it, don't we? Because we have a purpose in being there. We want to be reminded of the presence of God. And the writers here describe the physical surroundings of the Garden, but listen to the prophets. Isaiah, chapter 51, verse 3, the Lord will surely comfort Zion. And we'll look with compassion on all our ruins. That is the city of Jerusalem. He will make her deserts like Eden, her wastelands like the Garden of the Lord. Our Secariah 14, on that day, living water will flow out from Jerusalem.

Haggai later, proclaim the glory of God's presence in the New Temple, it gives a description of the gold and the precious metals of that temple. Listen to this. Haggai, chapter 2, I will fill this house with glory, says the Lord Almighty. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine declares the Lord God Almighty. And then finally, listen to the culmination of this as you go through Scripture, and you look at these places, listen to the words of John, the Apostle, the book of Revelation, as he looks forward to the presence of God coming down, the Son of God, the Lord of glory coming back to this earth to dwell among his people. He puts it this way. He stresses the gold and the precious stones that pictured the glorious presence of God among his people.

He says, the wall was made of jasper, and the city of pure gold, as pure as glass. The foundations of the city walls were decorated with every kind of precious stone. In chapter 2, then the angel showed me the river of the water of life as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb down the middle of the great street of the city. And on each side, the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. You see, the good life is living in the presence of God. The tragedy of the fall, this man is cast out of the garden, out of the presence of God. And the glorious salvation today, when you turn to Christ, if that you enter in in a very wonderful way, not a full way, not like we're going to have in the future, but you enter in in a wonderful way to live in the presence of God.

We are his building, his dwelling place upon this earth. The good life is living in the presence of God. Jesus said in the upper room in John 14, 18, I'm not going to leave you as orphans. I'm going to come to you. Speaking of the Holy Spirit, the reason he pours out the spirit and the spirit comes in to us is to mediate the presence of Jesus Christ. God dwells among us in the person of his son through the power of the Holy Spirit. It's why at times it does feel like we've been caught up to the third heaven when we worship him. I think that's true, especially corporately, when believers get together and they can finally disconnect from every distraction in this world and sometimes that happens.

And their minds are so fixed from the glory of this Christ that we love so much. Our hearts are lifted up and we stop looking at each other, stop noticing what somebody's wearing and what's going on in the next row and we begin to worship out of hearts that enter into the very presence of the living God. See, that's the good life. That's the good life. Living in the presence of the living God, the Apostle Peter said to believers like you and me, new covenant believers, he says, you also as living stones are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ, living in the presence of God. You know the next step flows right out of that and it's wonderful and it is the fact that Adam was living in the garden, in the presence of God, but he was also living with a glorious purpose.

Notice in verse 15, then the Lord God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and to keep it. The purpose of God putting man into the garden and there are several clues for us here to see what he's really talking about when he says that he put him there to cultivate and keep it. First of all, the word that he uses here for he put the man in the garden is unlike the word back up in verse 8 where it says the Lord God planted a garden in the east of Eden and there he placed the man whom he had formed. Here he uses a completely different word and it's a word that is reserved for special usage in the Old Testament. The God uses it in two ways. It's used when God puts his people in a place of rest and safety, whenever God takes his people out of danger and puts them in a place of rest or in safety like when the angels took a lot out of Sodom it says they put him out of the city, he uses this word and over and over again this word is used in this way.

The second way that it's used is the use of the dedication of something in the presence of the Lord to put something in the presence of the Lord has set apart for God alone. The manna was set in the holy of holies to remind them of God's provision in the desert. This word means that Adam, the selection of this word, emphasized the fact that God was placing Adam in a special place for a special purpose, set apart the God in a place of safety in a place where he experienced the presence of God. But there's another hint in this verse regarding what Adam is actually doing there in cultivating and keeping in this garden and that is that he puts them there to cultivate and keep it but there's much more here than first meets the eye.

It has to be more than he's simply a gardener in the garden of Eden. Now I know that would be a great job, wouldn't it? It would be a gardener in the garden of Eden. That would be a great place to work but it's got to be more than that. Because later on when the fall of man occurs and the curse upon man comes he is relegated to cultivating the earth, to working the ground by the sweat of his brow. What's going on here? Well notice these two words, the word cultivate and keep. The word cultivate is used many times in the Old Testament but it's used 40 times along with this other word to keep, to cultivate and to keep. When it's used of farmers it does mean working the soil to cultivate and no doubt Adam had some responsibilities in the garden that related to the ground.

But it has a much higher sense than that when it's used together with this second word. It's commonly used in the sense of the priests of God serving God in the temple. It refers to spiritual service of worship of the priesthood. It's used in the tabernacles of the duties of the priest. Now think of this, Adam is put in the garden where the presence of God is and he is put there to serve as a priest before Almighty God. In fact 15 times this word is translated worship to worship. He is put there to worship God. Now all of life is to be worship for the believer. The thing we do when you change your spark plugs is to be worship. Boy there's a new thought, you know when you get the wires crossed, your reaction is to be worship.

The word keep means to guard to watch, now it has the simple profane sense of the guard over something but it's even more commonly used of God's servants observing God's commandments in the context of the tabernacle. In other words this is priestly language. The Levitical responsibility for guarding the tabernacle, for working in the tabernacle before God as his priests, representing the people before God. And here's man, this unique being who's created the image of God placed in the garden in the presence of God to act as a priest for all the earth as he approaches God. Striking when these two words are used together 40 times, the little over 40 times, most often they speak of the priestly service of worship and obey.

Casuto in his commentary on this section refers to the rabbinical view of this. What did the Jews think this was referring to? He says they understood it to be to worship and to obey. Adam was put in the garden to worship and to obey. John saleheimer in his commentary on Genesis says, man is put in the garden to worship God and to obey him. Man's life in the garden was to be characterized by worship and obedience. He was a priest, not merely a worker and a keeper of the garden, or John Winham, a British commentator says, man is placed in the garden to kill it and guard it. Just as in the latter days, the Levites were instructed to guard the tabernacle. Man's labor in the garden is indeed a kind of divine service for it is done for God.

And in his presence, it's an interesting thing when you compare the creation account of the Bible with other ancient cosmogenies and myths about the beginnings of things, the enuma elish, which is the Babylonian story about the creation of all things, speaks of man being created to work in order to relieve the gods. So the gods wouldn't have to work, man, was made to work in labor to supply for the needs of the gods, but the biblical narrative gives no hint that the creator is shuffling off his work on demand. We see a picture of a working God in the garden. He scoops up the dirt. He has his fingernails dirty and he scoops over and he breathes into man. He breathes in breath of life. You see, he assigns man a meaningful task.

He assigns him a meaningful task. It isn't that God has created a world. Now, there's all this work to do. We've got to create some man to do the work, but rather he places the man there to have a meaningful life of worship and obedience to God. The good life is living with a God-given assignment. That's part of the good life. That's part of the life that Christ has called you to you, to live a life with a God-given assignment. Now, the assignment varies, doesn't it? In this room, there are people who are going to be mathematicians and painters and mechanics, businessmen and business women. Stay at home moms. The most important job in the world, but he's giving you an assignment. It's a God-given assignment and living with an understanding of that assignment, is a part of the good life.

When you understand your life is fulfilling, a significant role that God has given to you. The Apostle Paul says, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it for the glory of God. Whatever you're involved in, do it for the glory of God. As I said before, Ephesians 2.10 says, for a learious workmanship created in Christ Jesus, God has created you for a purpose. He says we were created in Christ Jesus for our good works, which he has beforehand determined that we should walk in them. These four are danded, that you would accomplish your work in this life as a priest of God. Do it for the glory of God. The Adam was in the garden with a great purpose, as a priest of worship and obey. You know, that's a great test.

Put your work and your labor and your efforts and your daily life to that test. Is it, can it be characterized by worship and obey? The last thing we want to look at is found in verses 16 and 17. And that is, the good life is living according to God's personal command. If you look at verse 16, says, the writer says, Moses says, the Lord, God commanded the man saying, from the any tree of the garden you may eat freely, but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat. For in the day that you eat from it, you will surely die. Now, you know later, as we look at the temptation when Satan comes along and he says, as God said, you shall not eat of all the trees of the garden, he plays to the weakness, and he does that today.

He will notice your kids, and you tell them they can't do one thing, they say, you don't let me do anything. Isn't that amazing? No, it's just this one thing you can't do, but that's how we are, isn't it? You don't let me do anything. And that's how he responds when she succumbs the temptation of the serpent. God puts this command on them, why? Because he cares about them, and they're made in the image of God, and God, get this, get this. God knows what is good. And God knows what is not good. Boy, you did learn that in Sunday school, didn't you, when you were in kindergarten, that's a profound truth. God knows what is good, and God knows what is not good. And all of you've come, this, you've come up against the commandments of God, and you said, I want to do this, and God says I can't do it.

Just remember, God knows what is good, and God knows what is not good. You know he doesn't even explain to us in this text why eating the tree of the knowledge of good and evil would have the effect it did other than the fact it was disobedience. It was nothing in the tree that was poisonous, it wasn't as though God had created something that would do detriment to a person physically, it was simply because it was disobedience, and because he said, mom said, God said, there's a further confirmation here of this meaning of to worship and obey, God commanded the man whom he had created. You see the animals, he just puts certain instincts within them that shape their lives, but with the man who's created the image of God, he commands him, he gives him a command.

It's important that throughout the Torah, throughout the law, throughout the five books of Moses, enjoyment of God's good land is made contingent on keeping God's commandments. I think about that for a second. The enjoyment of this good land of God that he's giving to his people is contingent upon obedience to the commands of God. Turn with me to Deuteronomy 30. I want you to see this with your own eyes, and I'm sure you will see the implications for your life and my life. Deuteronomy 30, verse 15, God says to Moses, see, I have set before you today life and prosperity and death and adversity in that I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in His ways and to keep His commandments.

By this time, there are many more commandments than there were in the garden of the garden that was one commandment, but here He says to walk in His commandments, to keep His commandments and His statutes and His judgments that you may live and multiply and that the Lord your God may bless you in the land where you are entering to possess it. But if your heart turns away and you will not obey but are drawn away and worship other gods and serve them, I declare to you today that you surely perish. You will not prolong your days in the land where you are crossing a Jordan to enter in to possess it. Simple principle. You can just learn this, this is better to learn trigonometry. You can learn this, truly.

In order to enjoy the good blessings of God, you must obey His commandments. We believe in salvation by grace along through faith alone and Christ alone. Salvation is not of works, listen, you man should boast, but I can tell you, until you obey the command to believe you will never experience that salvation, and unless you are obeying the commands of God, you will enjoy the salvation you have, will you? Do I have an amen? Because you have all experienced that. When we live in disobedience to His commandments, we don't enjoy the salvation which He has given us. And there is a great inference here of God's command in verses 16 and 17, and it's important for us to understand that, and it's this, that God alone knows what is good.

God alone knows what is good for man, and God alone knows what is not good for him. And to enjoy the good man must trust and obey the living God. That's just the fact. If man disobeys, you'll have to decide for himself what is good and what is not good. The modern man says, Yippee, that's exactly what I want. I want to live a life where I say what's good and what's not good. But you don't know, only God knows. God knows what is good for man, and what is not good for man. That's what He says throughout the word of God. Exactly. The opposite of what modern man believes is that God and God alone knows what is good for man. This is the commandment, John says, that we should believe on the name of His Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another as He gave us commandment.

And this is the love of God that we keep His commandments and His commandments are not burdensome to us. See, keeping the commandments of God as they come down to us through Christ Jesus, keeping the commandments of God in Christ Jesus is what brings the greatest blessings in all of life. And they're not burdensome. They're not burdensome to the believer who believes on the Lord Jesus Christ. And you know what He says to every person that you ever talked to in this world, this is this commandment that we should believe on the name of His Son, Jesus Christ. Why would you tell people that? Why would you tell people you know if you want to be saved from the penalty of sin and the effects of sin and you want to become a child of God you have to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.

Why would we tell them that? Because that's what's good for them. Why do we tell our children that? People look at evangelical movement in America and they think we're just a bunch of brainwashers. We get these little kids in these classes and we brainwash them. We know what's good for them. One of the most pathetic things about our culture is that parents are afraid to tell their kids what's good for them. What's good for them? Imagine if you went home today and started telling your kids the truth about what was really good for them. Like transform your home. There's one last thing which we're going to look at next week and that is, it's not theirs. As living with God given, a God given companion.

This is the last piece of the good life and that is having a God given companion. But I'm going to save that for next week. But I want to ask you, are you living the good life? Are you living the good life? Only God can provide it and He has provided it in Jesus Christ. The reason we come around this table this morning to celebrate the Lord's Supper is because we have believed on the name of Jesus Christ. Everyone who takes this loaf and drinks from this cup is saying, you're saying by those actions, I have rested my faith in Jesus Christ alone. I have obeyed God's command to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved and I've found Him to be faithful and true and I celebrate that. 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 17 tells us how we can live with the understanding that we are the creation of God's hand.

Paul says, therefore, if any man is in Christ, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature. The old things have passed away. The whole new things have come. You know what? Everyone in this room who knows the Lord Jesus Christ, you've been given everything you need to live the good life. You know how chapter 2 ends? Chapter 2 says, at the very last verse of chapter 2 it says, and Adam and Eve were naked and they were not ashamed. What are you saying? They were unabashed. They were full because God had provided everything in all the world that they needed. That's what God has provided for you. He has provided you everything. If you simply by faith will embrace it, live the good life. Let's pray that we'll come to the Lord's table.

Our Father, we are grateful this morning for your goodness, that you're a God who loves to make your people happy and joyful and full of appreciation and gratitude for your good gifts. We thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ who is at the center of the good life because He brings us all these things that we looked at this morning that you provided for Adam and was lost in the fall. He has brought to us a deep awareness that we are children of God, that we live in the presence of God, that we live according to the assignment of God. We have purpose in our lives because you've called us to worship and obey, and He has given us the commandments of God and the commandments are not burdensome. We pray, oh God, this week.

We live out our Christian lives. It would be a time of great rejoicing in the good life that you have given to us. We thank you. Praise you. In Jesus' name, the first glory. Amen. If you brothers come up.