PARADISE RESTORED by H. A. St. John

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Nov 13, 1893

PARADISE RESTORED.

By H. A. St. John

BY ELDER H. A. ST. JOHN.

WHEN Adam and Eve passed out of Paradise, they bade it a long and sad farewell, and after a time it passed from sight if not from memory. The only gleam of light that came to them as giving hope of a possible return was the somewhat obscure yet intensely interesting promise that the Seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head. We fancy that when Eve gave birth to her first-born son, she clasped him to her bosom with maternal love, augmented with the hope that this was the promised Seed that would lead them back in some way to their Eden home. This seems at least to be hinted at, if not indicated, by the fact that she called his name Cain, which means, "I have gotten a man from the Lord." If such was her fond hope, she was doomed to a most bitter disappointment, for he became a murderer, and only took a long step farther away from their former Eden home of purity and peace.

Generation after generation came and passed away, but the promised Seed did not appear among men. But that first promise of a conquering Seed was not allowed to lose its luster, but its light was increased and intensified from time to time by additional rays from the throne of the Eternal Father, through human oracles, his holy prophets. At last the long-promised and long-looked-for Seed came. He was born in Bethlehem, and the loving Father above said to his mother, "Thou shalt call his name Jesus," and so they did.

It is a central truth that, ever since Paradise was lost to the human race, the only hope held out by the Creator to the teeming millions of earth's inhabitants of a return to the perfect bliss of Paradise restored was through this Seed of the woman, the Second Adam, yea, the divine Son of God. The first time that the word "paradise" is mentioned in the New Testament is by the Promised One, the Lord Jesus, amid the agonies of the cross, in the promise made to the penitent thief, "Verily I say unto you to-day shalt thou be with me in Paradise." He was the first and only one born of woman that could truthfully make a promise of admission through his guidance and leadership to Paradise.

The reader will see at once that this promise of Christ forever settles the question as to the existence and preservation of Paradise. Now we know that Paradise is somewhere. It was not destroyed by the flood—it is certainly not upon the earth—and as it has been removed, the question recurs, Where is it? The first promise of Christ relating to Paradise was made to only one person, the penitent thief. But later the same promise was made to all overcomers. Said Jesus, "To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of God." The tree—the same tree of life—is in the same Paradise, awaiting the overcomer.

The apostle Paul in holy vision was caught up to the third heaven, Paradise. Hence we learn that Paradise is in heaven—in the third heaven. Certainly we are learning the whereabouts of Paradise, and this is not all. We have learned that the tree of life is in the midst of Paradise, and in the last chapter in the Bible we are informed by the Lord Jesus that the river of life is there, and also the throne of God and of the Lamb. Besides we are told that they are all in the New Jerusalem. Hence we have now found that it is indeed a blessed truth that God did preserve a portion of his original beautiful creation intact from the curse, that Paradise is now in heaven, that it is, or is in, the Holy City so graphically described in the book of God, and to its glories sinful men are invited. The conditions of admission will next claim our attention.