Some people have explained salvation in terms of trying to get back to the Garden. The idea of Salvation is certainly about people and even all of creation returning to our full and proper relationship with God our creator. In Revelation Chapter 22 it speaks about us being restored to the presence of the Tree of Life and of God Himself.
Some people have asked do we need to be restored. Why do I need to get back? Why am I away from the Garden? Why am I punished for what Adam and Eve did? I never ate from the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge; how come I suffer the consequences? I look at the consequences of Originating Sin like this: Our lives are affected by the choices of Adam and Eve, our original parents, in much the same way that our lives are affected by the choices of our actual parents and their parents before them. Adam and Eve were evicted and moved from the Garden of Eden; therefore Cain, Abel, and Seth weren’t born in the Garden of Eden.
I was born and Susan and I were raised on Vancouver Island here – like Adam and Eve were raised in the Garden. However our youngest child was born and our eldest two daughters were mostly raised off the Island. We left the Island before our second child was one year old for our work with The Salvation Army. It wasn’t sin that caused us to move away – like it was with Adam and Eve –but our children had no more say over the fact that they were born and raised off the Island than Cain, Abel, and Seth did that they were born out of the Garden. As our children live with the results of our actions –both good and bad: a life of serving the Lord but also growing up without family nearby – so we all live with the results of our ancestors actions – not just moving from one place to another – but the results of all kinds of choices they made: our parents, our grandparents, and their parents, all the way back to our original parents. That is in part why and how we are suffering the consequences of originating sin.
I was born and Susan and I were raised on Vancouver Island here – like Adam and Eve were raised in the Garden. However our youngest child was born and our eldest two daughters were mostly raised off the Island. We left the Island before our second child was one year old for our work with The Salvation Army. It wasn’t sin that caused us to move away – like it was with Adam and Eve –but our children had no more say over the fact that they were born and raised off the Island than Cain, Abel, and Seth did that they were born out of the Garden. As our children live with the results of our actions –both good and bad: a life of serving the Lord but also growing up without family nearby – so we all live with the results of our ancestors actions – not just moving from one place to another – but the results of all kinds of choices they made: our parents, our grandparents, and their parents, all the way back to our original parents. That is in part why and how we are suffering the consequences of originating sin.
The Bible also speaks about the way that we and our parents can return to perfect love, to the Garden. In Genesis 15, through the ceremony of the smoking firepot and the covenant with Abraham we are shown that God will give up His Life (through Jesus Christ) as a consequence of our transgressing our covenant with God and as this will lead to our salvation insofar as Jesus will take the punishment for our sin. [2]
Doctrine 6 of The Salvation Army reads: We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ has by His suffering and death made an atonement for the whole world so that whosoever will may be saved.
In The New Testament we are told a little bit about this:
· Galatians 3:13: Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a pole.”
· 1 Peter 2:24: “He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.”
· Romans 5:6: You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.
· Romans 5:17-18: For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ! Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people.
· 1 John 2:2: He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.
Jesus made it so that we can experience Salvation now as we spend time with Him and He also provided for a time when the Tree of Life from the Garden will return. Revelation 22:1-5 speaks about at the end of our age when God will come down with Heaven in the New Jerusalem and there once again will be the Tree of Life, freely available to all of us:
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 2 down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. 3 No longer will there be any curse [like Paul said in Galatians]. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. 4 They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. 5 There will be no more night [Jesus is the Light]. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.
Even though sin and death entered into the world through Adam and Eve and we have been living life outside of the garden, Jesus is the light and he is returning and bringing back with Him the Tree of Life from the Garden.
Salvation begins today and lasts forever. Today, as you have accepted Jesus as your Lord, you can walk with Him as if you are in the Garden. And if you would like to live forever in the New Jerusalem where the Tree of Life from the Garden grows, where there is no more pain, no more suffering, no more sin, no more hate, no more death, no more deceit; where everyone is honest and loving and serving our Lord, you can. All you need to do is ask. Jesus has done the rest.
Let us pray.
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