The name of the first is Pison: that is it which compasseth the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold;
Genesis 2:11 belongs to the account of Eden, the beautiful garden home and Paradise of God that God prepared and gave to Adam and Eve, where humanity began and where God instructed Adam in sinless beauty. The first river is Pison, also called Pishon, which compasses the whole land of Havilah where there is gold, showing that Eden stood in a land enriched with gold and silver and precious stones, with four rivers running by it and every tree pleasant to the sight and good for food planted in it. The river, the land, and the gold are left without further explanation.
The gold of Havilah was part of the rich minerals, precious metals, and precious stones placed in the earth to enrich it for the good of people and to remind them of God, and the things of nature are an expression of God's love. Adam was created with mind and will and moral faculties after the similitude of God's mind and will and was placed to dress and keep the garden in the pleasant employment of caring for it as the first to labor together with God, not apart from God and opposed to His law, with nothing interposing between Adam and Eve and their Maker. Eden was a wonderful provision of love with everything in nature pure and undefiled, with fruits, flowers, and beautiful lofty trees flourishing and everything Adam and Eve required abundantly supplied, showing the holy and happy estate of humanity in Paradise, connected with God and beloved by God.
The place where the first Adam began in purity and holiness was the place where Christ as the second Adam began, yet the first Adam was in every way more favorably situated than Christ. Adam and Eve were placed with permission to eat of every tree but one, and their loyalty was tested by prohibiting the fruit of the tree of knowledge. Under the smallest test of obedience Adam listened to Satan's insinuated doubts and accusations against God and accepted the forbidden fruit from Eve, and by transgressing God's law they ate, sinned, were excluded from Eden, and lost it, losing a holy, sinless, pure, undefiled nature, opening the floodgates of woe upon the world, and leaving depraved posterity. Adam lived among people for nearly a thousand years as a witness to the results of sin and faithfully sought to stem the tide of evil in obedience to the command to instruct his posterity in the way of the Lord, carefully treasuring what God had revealed, repeating it to succeeding generations to his children and children's children to the ninth generation, describing Paradise, repeating the history of the fall, telling of the sufferings by which God had taught him the necessity of strict adherence to His law, and explaining the merciful provisions for salvation, yet few gave heed and often he was met with bitter reproaches for the sin that had brought woe upon his posterity.
That Eden glory remained in the world before the Flood in giant forests, blooming gardens resembling Eden, fountains, streams, lakes, and the precious things of the mountains and valleys, with the curse resting lightly, but the inhabitants looked on those gifts as exclusively their own as if they themselves had brought them into existence and made the very treasures meant to remind them of God the means of forgetting Him in ingratitude and disobedience to His law, bringing the curse and the destruction of the Flood upon themselves. Eden in its original perfection cannot be expected on this earth now because sin has desecrated the earth and something mars even the most desirable place, yet the things of nature though marred by sin still speak of that Eden home. The Eden home where humanity began will be restored in grand beauty in the hereafter, with garden and field life free of sin's blight and sorrow and open to study, given to the faithful as their own to cultivate under the supervision of God, when the earth shall be filled with the praise of the Lord, and Christ drew illustrations and lessons from nature in simple, appropriate, sympathetic, and cheerful teaching that joined truth to familiar associations and sympathies.
Jesus Christ paid the price to ransom humanity from the hands of Satan so the obedient may be brought back to that Eden home. Those who search the Scriptures, place themselves in right relation to God, refuse to transgress as Adam and Eve did, obey all God's requirements, overcome as Christ overcame by perfect obedience to His Father's commandments, faithfully cultivate the soul now and become skillful workers in God's vineyard through faith and love and patience, and bend their own footsteps heavenward will be brought back to it, point others to it, and be prepared for entrance into restored Eden and for work in the garden of God.
Genesis 2:11 belongs to the account of Eden, the beautiful garden home and Paradise of God that God prepared and gave to Adam and Eve, where humanity began and where God instructed Adam in sinless beauty. The first river is Pison, also called Pishon, which compasses the whole land of Havilah where there is gold, showing that Eden stood in a land enriched with gold and silver and precious stones, with four rivers running by it and every tree pleasant to the sight and good for food planted in it. The river, the land, and the gold are left without further explanation.
The gold of Havilah was part of the rich minerals, precious metals, and precious stones placed in the earth to enrich it for the good of people and to remind them of God, and the things of nature are an expression of God's love. Adam was created with mind and will and moral faculties after the similitude of God's mind and will and was placed to dress and keep the garden in the pleasant employment of caring for it as the first to labor together with God, not apart from God and opposed to His law, with nothing interposing between Adam and Eve and their Maker. Eden was a wonderful provision of love with everything in nature pure and undefiled, with fruits, flowers, and beautiful lofty trees flourishing and everything Adam and Eve required abundantly supplied, showing the holy and happy estate of humanity in Paradise, connected with God and beloved by God.
The place where the first Adam began in purity and holiness was the place where Christ as the second Adam began, yet the first Adam was in every way more favorably situated than Christ. Adam and Eve were placed with permission to eat of every tree but one, and their loyalty was tested by prohibiting the fruit of the tree of knowledge. Under the smallest test of obedience Adam listened to Satan's insinuated doubts and accusations against God and accepted the forbidden fruit from Eve, and by transgressing God's law they ate, sinned, were excluded from Eden, and lost it, losing a holy, sinless, pure, undefiled nature, opening the floodgates of woe upon the world, and leaving depraved posterity. Adam lived among people for nearly a thousand years as a witness to the results of sin and faithfully sought to stem the tide of evil in obedience to the command to instruct his posterity in the way of the Lord, carefully treasuring what God had revealed, repeating it to succeeding generations to his children and children's children to the ninth generation, describing Paradise, repeating the history of the fall, telling of the sufferings by which God had taught him the necessity of strict adherence to His law, and explaining the merciful provisions for salvation, yet few gave heed and often he was met with bitter reproaches for the sin that had brought woe upon his posterity.
That Eden glory remained in the world before the Flood in giant forests, blooming gardens resembling Eden, fountains, streams, lakes, and the precious things of the mountains and valleys, with the curse resting lightly, but the inhabitants looked on those gifts as exclusively their own as if they themselves had brought them into existence and made the very treasures meant to remind them of God the means of forgetting Him in ingratitude and disobedience to His law, bringing the curse and the destruction of the Flood upon themselves. Eden in its original perfection cannot be expected on this earth now because sin has desecrated the earth and something mars even the most desirable place, yet the things of nature though marred by sin still speak of that Eden home. The Eden home where humanity began will be restored in grand beauty in the hereafter, with garden and field life free of sin's blight and sorrow and open to study, given to the faithful as their own to cultivate under the supervision of God, when the earth shall be filled with the praise of the Lord, and Christ drew illustrations and lessons from nature in simple, appropriate, sympathetic, and cheerful teaching that joined truth to familiar associations and sympathies.
Jesus Christ paid the price to ransom humanity from the hands of Satan so the obedient may be brought back to that Eden home. Those who search the Scriptures, place themselves in right relation to God, refuse to transgress as Adam and Eve did, obey all God's requirements, overcome as Christ overcame by perfect obedience to His Father's commandments, faithfully cultivate the soul now and become skillful workers in God's vineyard through faith and love and patience, and bend their own footsteps heavenward will be brought back to it, point others to it, and be prepared for entrance into restored Eden and for work in the garden of God.