Genesis 3:24, commentary and pictures

God drove fallen Adam and Eve out of Eden and set holy mighty angels with a flaming sword turning every way at the east of the garden to bar all approach to the fruit of the tree of life. That tree had supernatural power to perpetuate life, and man created dependent on it had to keep eating from it to remain immortal, so cut off from it his vitality wore out into disease and death. The barring was mercy to keep fallen disobedience from becoming immortal, for had they eaten after transgression they would have lived forever in sin, so no descendant has passed the sword and there is no immortal sinner. It also defeated Satan's studied plan that they eat and live forever in misery, gain strength equal to angels, unite with him in rebellion and make Eden his throne as monarch of the world. Through Christ's life, death and atoning blood pardon is opened, and those who repent, believe and keep all the commandments are brought back to again eat freely of the tree when the guard stands no longer.

Expulsion and Its Guard

After sin God drove Adam and Eve out of Eden from the home where they had been happy, and set cherubim with a flaming sword turning every way at the east of the garden to keep the way of the tree of life, barring their return and any approach to take its fruit and live forever. Holy angels drove the disobedient pair out, and other angels were appointed to guard the gates of paradise and the way to the tree, so that having broken God's law by eating the forbidden fruit they lost all right to their Eden home and were shut out from eating what would have made sin immortal. The guards are holy, mighty, strong angels placed as sentinels, and beams of light flashing around them looked like glittering swords barring access to the tree. Each mighty angel held in his right hand what appeared as a glittering sword, with light flashing on every side like flaming swords turning in every direction to prevent the guilty pair from perpetuating a life of sin.

The cherubim set at the east were the same angels who before the fall had been appointed to guard Adam in his Eden home, now appointed to guard the gates of paradise and the way to the tree so fallen man could not return and make sin immortal. Expulsion did not at once remove Eden from the earth, for the garden remained long afterward with entrance barred only by watching angels while the fallen race could still gaze upon the home of innocence. At that cherubim-guarded gate the divine glory was revealed between the cherubim, the same glory afterward called the shekinah that abode in the holy of holies as the center of worship. There Adam and his sons came to worship God, renewed vows of obedience to the law whose transgression had banished them, reared altars and presented offerings.

That guarded entrance remained among men for many centuries as a silent witness to truth, where the glory of God was revealed and the first worshipers came. Cain and Abel brought their sacrifices there, and God communicated with them there, while Eden stood in sight with watching angels barring its entrance so that creation, the object of the garden, the history of its two trees connected with man's destiny, and the existence and supreme authority of God and the obligation of His law remained undisputed facts. Adam was commanded to instruct his posterity, and for nearly a thousand years he lived among men to the ninth generation as a witness to the results of sin, treasuring what God had revealed, describing Eden, telling the fall, and explaining the law and salvation, yet few gave heed and he was often met with bitter reproaches for bringing woe upon them. Cain in his high spirit thought the expulsion harsh treatment of his father Adam, finding the lesson that sin must be kept ever before the mind and that offering the blood of the slain lamb confessed entire dependence upon a Power outside oneself a torture, refusing to acknowledge dependence upon Christ and wanting God to come to his own terms.

The fall and expulsion took place before angels as witnesses. Those very angels had fought on God's side and triumphed when Satan sought supremacy in heaven, and from their exalted position had shouted for joy over the creation of the world and of the first parents to inhabit the earth. Those same witnessing messengers are now most intensely interested in working in closest union with the fallen, redeemed race, cooperating invisibly with visible human agencies to seek and save human beings perishing in their sins, to restore God's moral image in man and bind up the wounds and bruises that sin has made.

The guard also shut out Satan, for transgression had placed Adam and Eve in rebellion under God's wrath like Satan and his angels, and his plan was to unite with them in that fallen state, take possession of Eden and hold it as home, and gain access to the tree to make their strength equal to that of the holy angels so that even God Himself could not expel them. Angels like sentinels therefore blocked both Satan and the guilty pair from reaching the life-giving tree, defeating his claim to their Eden home as his dominion and headquarters where he would establish his throne as monarch of the world. Those angels were sent to guard the tree before any human being had died, which proves they were already in existence before the creation of man, are heavenly beings in nature superior to men, and are not the disembodied spirits of dead men, showing the connection of the visible with the invisible world interwoven with human history.

Life-Giving Tree's Power

The tree of life possessed supernatural virtue to perpetuate immortality, so that to eat of its fruit was to live forever. Its fruit was life itself and the antidote to death, while its leaves were for the sustaining of life and immortality. The tree is truth whose leaves the human family are to eat and live and whose fruit perpetuates immortality, giving a life which measures with the life of God. After sin entered, open access was closed and the tree was moved to the paradise above, yet its branches hang over the wall to the lower world so that through redemption purchased by blood people may still eat its life-giving fruit. The tree was a type of the one great Source of immortality, Christ, in whom is life and who is the fountain of life, the bread of life whose flesh and blood and words are spirit and life to those who come, believe, receive, obey and overcome, and to him that overcomes it will be granted to eat again of the tree in the midst of the paradise of God.

Endless life required continuing to eat from the tree, for man was created dependent on it to perpetuate the life God breathed into him. Cut off from its fruit after disobedience, human vitality gradually wore out until life became extinct, so that man became subject to disease and death and could not perpetuate a life of sin. By forfeiting the privilege of eating, Adam lost free access and the precious gifts and endowments given him, brought the whole human family under the death penalty so that in Adam all die, and forfeited an immortality that could not be passed on to his descendants. Eternal death, not eternal life, is the final punishment of all who continue in transgression, and being shut out made necessary Christ taking the penalty to give men probation to see the evil of sin and return to loyalty.

Barring Immortal Sin

After transgression it became necessary to drive man from Eden and separate him from the tree of life, because to eat of it after disobedience would perpetuate sin and preserve endless life in disobedience, making sin immortal. By breaking the law Adam and Eve and their posterity lost the right to the tree on which man was dependent for immortality, so cherubim with a flaming sword turning every way were placed at the east of Eden to keep the way of the tree lest fallen men eat and live forever as immortal sinners. The gate was closed and the life-giving tree guarded in every direction to keep the disloyal pair from touching it and continuing to live in sin, which was the very outcome Satan had hoped their disobedience would bring. Death entered the world because of transgression, and Christ gave His life not to abolish the law nor to make sin immortal but to suffer the full penalty of the broken law, to secure the right to destroy the devil who had the power of death, and to give man another trial and second probation to return to loyalty and keep the commandments. Death is therefore the result of sin and immortality is found only in Christ, so one who knows the result of disobedience and still continues in sin and disloyalty is no less a sinner than Adam was when driven out to work the earth from which he came.

The tree of life would have perpetuated immortality by its life-giving fruit, but the barrier kept fallen man from becoming an immortal sinner. Not one of Adam's family has passed that flaming sword or eaten from that tree, and because every one was barred from partaking, therefore there is not an immortal sinner. Immortality had been promised on condition of obedience and was forfeited by disobedience, and the soul that sins dies an everlasting death that lasts forever with no hope of resurrection, which is the final death of the wicked connected with this barrier.

Being shut out proves Satan's word Thou shalt not surely die false and proves that no sinner is immortal by nature. Adam was a created being dependent on God and on eating from the tree to perpetuate the life God breathed into him, but by disobeying he forfeited the privilege of eating, lost the precious gifts and endowments given him, and brought the whole human family under the death penalty so that in Adam all die. Eternal death, not eternal life, is the final punishment of all who continue in transgression, and hope for the fallen race lies only in the immortality brought within reach by the sacrifice of God's Son on conditions of obedience. By disobedience Adam lost the gift of life and immortality and became an outcast excluded from the tree with no power in himself to redeem the past or win back what was forfeited, and all born of Adam forfeit the same gift, so exclusion made necessary Christ's taking the penalty to give men probation to see the evil of sin and return to loyalty. By incarnation and by bearing the penalty of sin Christ was made fully competent to place man where he is no longer an outcast excluded from the tree, so that through repentance and receiving Christ as Life-giver man may win back the lost gift, be reinstated in favor, and stand again in his original position before God with a life more perfect, more full, and more complete than Adam forfeited.

Satan's Defeated Plan

After the fall a council was held in heaven to decide what must be done with the guilty pair, and all heaven was in agitation over the news. In that counsel the angels feared that Adam and Eve would take of the tree of life and become immortal sinners. God declared that the transgressors must be driven from the garden, and mighty angels were immediately commissioned to guard access to the tree of life. Holy angels were sent at once to expel them while another company of mighty angels guarded the way, each appearing with what looked like a glittering sword in the right hand.

That expulsion and guard defeated Satan's studied plan that having led them to disobey God and incur His frown and wrath they should then eat of the tree of life and live forever in sin, misery and disobedience, so that sin would be immortalized. Transgression had placed Adam and Eve in rebellion under God's wrath like Satan and his angels, and Satan planned to unite with them in that fallen state. His intent was that if they failed to obtain forgiveness they would eat from the tree and perpetuate an existence of sin and misery, gaining strength equal to that of the holy angels so that even God Himself could not expel them. Having conquered Adam, the monarch of the world, he had gained the race as his subjects, claimed their Eden home as his own dominion, and intended to possess Eden as his headquarters and establish his throne there as monarch of the world. To defeat that plan strong angels were placed as sentinels to block both Satan and the guilty pair from reaching the life-giving tree, with beams of light representing flaming swords turning in every direction, for Adam and Eve had forfeited all right to their beautiful home and were expelled from it.

Endless life requires continuing to eat from the tree, and cut off from it human vitality gradually fades until life becomes extinct, so none of Adam's family was permitted to pass that barrier to partake of the life-giving fruit. Because the way is thus guarded, there is not an immortal sinner. Yet Satan triumphed that as he had been shut out of heaven they were shut out of Paradise. Their expulsion was caused through Satan by his own fall, and he triumphed in making them suffer with him.

The fall began when angels had cautioned Eve not to separate from her husband in daily labor in the garden, because with him she would be in less danger from temptation than alone. Absorbed in her pleasing task she unconsciously wandered from his side, felt apprehension at being alone but dismissed her fears, deciding she had sufficient wisdom and strength to discern evil and withstand it. She gazed with mingled curiosity and admiration on the forbidden tree, questioning why God had withheld it. She was then addressed by the fallen foe speaking as a medium through the wise and beautiful winged serpent, whose musical voice and subtle praise of her loveliness kept her lingering wonderingly to hear a serpent speak instead of fleeing.

Eden After the Fall

Expulsion did not at once remove Eden from the earth, for the garden remained long afterward with entrance barred only by watching angels while the fallen race were still permitted to gaze upon the home of innocence. The hand that had planted and especially blessed it withdrew it from the earth when the tide of iniquity overspread the world and wickedness determined destruction by the Flood. He would not suffer it to feel the marks of the curse, but caught it up and preserved it as a specimen of His perfect handiwork at the beginning, free from sin's curse. That lovely garden still exists and is beheld with joy, and in the final restitution when there shall be a new heaven and a new earth it is to be restored to earth more gloriously adorned than at the beginning.

One teaching held instead that Paradise was taken up from the earth soon after the fall, because no place now on earth answers the description of Eden given by Moses. On that reckoning the garden with the tree of life no longer remains on earth but is in heaven as the New Jerusalem where God's temple is. Adam and Eve earnestly entreated to remain in the home of their innocence and joy, confessing they had forfeited all right to that happy abode and pledging strict obedience to God for the future. They were refused because their nature had become depraved by sin, they had lessened their strength to resist evil, and they had opened the way for Satan to gain more ready access to them. Since in innocence they had yielded to temptation, now in a state of conscious guilt they would have less power to maintain their integrity.

They bade farewell to their beautiful home in humility and unutterable sadness and went forth to dwell upon the earth where the curse of sin rested. They could no longer cultivate their beautiful Eden home but were shut out of the garden to work among thistles, brambles, thorns and weeds brought by the curse, which Satan had sown. The atmosphere was no longer mild and uniform in temperature but subject to marked changes, and the Lord in mercy provided them with garments of skins as protection from the extremes of heat and cold. Satan's promise that eating the forbidden fruit would give them higher perceptions to know good and evil and make them like the angels in heaven proved a lie. God did not cut off the supply of fruit but prepared most nourishing food and knew how to give proper nourishment in its natural state, a continued provision calling for thankfulness and for clear discernment without burdening the digestive organs by cooking a great variety and mixing foods until what was good to eat is rendered unwholesome and harmful. The labor that followed disobedience in struggling with stubborn soil for daily bread was harder than the pleasant work in the garden, but it also protected Adam from temptation and brought happiness.

Beautiful Eden was degraded by the introduction of sin. Even after the fall and loss of Eden, God in love and mercy preserved for the human family the beautiful handiwork first seen by man in Eden as specimens of the beauty in Eden and as an expression of His love. These beautiful things in nature have no soul and pass away, and God is not in them in person, though He cares for them as His husbandry and building; they are to direct minds from nature to nature's God. Eden remained barred to fallen man yet still sought by him, and the long-lived antediluvian race constantly devised how to contend with the universe of heaven and gain possession of it. God had endowed those men with great gifts, with gold and silver in abundance, and with inventions of art and human skill greater than the world knows today, but they perverted those gifts to exceed one another in devices, forgot the Lord, and filled the earth with violence.

Law, Death, and Redemption

Adam and Eve lost Eden and were driven out as retribution for transgressing God's express prohibition by taking the forbidden fruit. What looked like a small act unworthy of notice brought the fall and opened the floodgates of woe upon the world, proving that disobedience is never overlooked as small and never excused by mercy. God's justice in punishing transgression does not fail, His stated consequences are certain, His will is not optional, and His word and law are sacred. The guilt incurred was so great it required God to give His Son from heaven to die to pay the debt of transgression, which exalts the sacred character of the law and makes it possible for fallen man, after sin is repented of and forsaken, to be elevated to keep the law through the merits of Christ's blood. The Eden account records the law given to humanity, the penalty for disobedience, and the consequences of the first parents' sin as a warning that sin leads to death. They had stood in holy innocency enjoying communion with God and sinless angels, and after their fall they continued to observe the Sabbath, having learned that God surely punishes those who disobey His commands.

Through that disobedience in eating what had been forbidden to touch, death entered the world and man shut himself off from free access and right to the tree of life. The tree possessed supernatural virtue so that to eat was to live forever, its fruit the antidote to death and its leaves for the sustaining of life and immortality, and man created dependent on it to perpetuate the life God breathed into him forfeited that privilege. Cut off from it he became subject to disease and death, immortality was forfeited and could not be passed to descendants, the whole human family came under the death penalty so that in Adam all die, and eternal death not eternal life is the final punishment of all who continue in transgression. The fall divorced earth from heaven, and being shut out made necessary Christ taking the penalty to give men probation to see the evil of sin and return to loyalty.

The law could not be changed or abolished to meet man in his fallen condition or to pardon unconditionally, for to do so would set aside righteousness and the principles of justice. If any change had been possible Adam would have been pardoned and kept his home in Eden, but the law remains changeless in character with binding force upon every human being, so the penalty of death stood. God's benevolence was not set forth at the expense of justice, since that would exalt the impenitent sinner in his sin and encourage transgression instead of abating it. Therefore the Son stepped in and pledged His own life as the penalty, becoming man's substitute and surety to suffer the full penalty of the broken law, to secure the right to destroy the devil who had the power of death, and to give man another trial and second probation where eternal destiny is decided by obedience or disobedience, enabling men to return to loyalty and keep God's commandments.

Christ opened that way of escape by laying aside His robes of royalty, clothing divinity with humanity, and coming as a man of sorrows acquainted with grief, suffering insult, reproach and mockery though He was the Majesty of heaven. He took the transgressions of man and their just penalty upon Himself, gave His life as ransom, and paid the price by which fallen man through His merits is brought back into favor with God. Having insulted the Maker by believing Satan's words above the Lord's, humanity could no longer approach God directly and lay under sentence of death, but through faith in the Redeemer refuge is found and access and communication with God are restored through Him alone. He encircled the fallen race with His long human arm while grasping the throne of the Almighty with His divine arm, thus joining earth to heaven and fallen finite man to the Infinite God, bringing humanity across the gulf that closed the way to the tree, placing people within the dominion of mercy, and showing God's desire for closest union that they may be one with Christ as Christ is one with the Father. All who now live by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God will be brought back to the Eden home, for people cannot be happy without God and His love is not satisfied without them.

Outside Eden humanity lives driven from the garden and the tree, from the visible presence of the Lord and His holy angels and from communion with God, in a fallen world of sin, suffering, temptation, misery and death. Through disobedience the original condition was forfeited, the divine likeness was marred, and man became subject to death. Understanding education requires considering man's created nature and God's purpose together with this change through the coming in of a knowledge of evil and God's plan for still fulfilling His glorious purpose, which redemption must overcome by restoring people to the image of their Maker and the perfection in which they were created.

The Eden history belongs to sacred history as a golden link in the perfect chain of truth revealed from Genesis to Revelation, teaching creation, fall, law, penalty and merciful provisions for salvation, with strength and beauty reaching to eternity, including Christ's first advent, incarnation, divinity, atonement, life in heaven as advocate, and the office of the Holy Spirit. It is among the most important knowledge to be gained and to be exalted in every school, yet it is a great fact of creation that many professed Christians reject wholly or in part. Adam was commanded to instruct his posterity in the way of the Lord, and for nearly a thousand years he lived among men as a witness to the results of sin, carefully treasuring what God had revealed and repeating it to children and children's children to the ninth generation, describing Eden, telling the fall, and explaining the law and salvation and the necessity of strict adherence. Yet few gave heed, and he was often met with bitter reproaches for the sin that had brought woe upon his posterity.

That disobedience broke the appeal of obedience in the human mind, so people came to think they could choose whether to obey God, with Adam become a law to himself bringing discord and unhappiness in contrast to Christ's life of perfect and constant obedience set as example for all. Inherited bodily weakness and suffering are another repetition of that fall. The history of the fall began the continuing probation of the race, in which each person faces choice about the character formed: those who receive God's moral image become like Him, and those who refuse Christ's character lose heaven.

Regaining Tree and Eden

Sin drove humanity from paradise and removed paradise from earth, yet paradise may be regained through obedience to God's law and faith in Christ's atoning blood. Repentance for transgressing the law and faith in Christ as humanity's only Redeemer are acceptable to God, whose Son's merits avail for sinners, and Christ's death upholds the honor of the law while making such obedience possible as the condition for regaining right to the tree and receiving the heavenly blessing. Christ's victory over temptation redeems Adam's failure and fall through humble, firm obedience over the same ground where Adam fell. Those who continue to break God's law will not regain the lost paradise, but through Christ's grace people may obey acceptably and gain a home in Eden restored.

Through disobedience Adam and Eve forfeited all right to the immortal fruit of the tree of life and were driven from Eden under sentence of misery, sickness and death with no way of escape by human effort. Christ in close converse with the Father pleaded for the race and obtained permission to give His own life as a ransom, bearing human sin and taking the sentence of death upon Himself. That sacrifice opens the way back to the garden, so that through the merits of His blood the offender finds pardon for past transgressions, is washed and sanctified, is made able to keep the commandments, and by obedience is brought back to again eat of the tree and be restored to the life and glory humanity first possessed.

Obedience to the Father's law, the words of God spoken from Sinai which are the conditions of life, will give free access to the tree of life again, since transgression made Christ's reconciling death needful. Obedience to all the commandments was the condition of eating of the tree, for Adam fell by disobedience and forfeited by sin all right to use either its life-giving fruit or its leaves which are for the healing of the nations. Obedience through Jesus Christ gives perfection of character and right to that tree again, and only the loyal and true who keep God's commandments shall regain that right and enter through the gates into the heavenly city. The disobedient have no right, no place there, and can never enter through the gates, for rebellion can never enter; restoration requires being clothed with the provided wedding garment, the righteousness of Christ. The way back to the Eden home is opened through Christ and is entered by not transgressing as Adam and Eve did but by obedience to all God's requirements, overcoming as Christ overcame by perfect obedience, while continuing in disobedience perpetuates the fall to children and doing God's commandments gives right to the tree and entrance through the gates.

The gospel now places no flaming sword before the tree of life of the Scriptures. The "It is written" word to be preached is that tree of life, and the Scriptures resemble the Garden of Eden filled with every tree pleasant to sight and good for spiritual food, but in this garden the Eden prohibition is removed. Because Christ has taken the human family into close relationship to His own humanity and redeemed them by giving His life as Substitute to give a second probation, everyone has the privilege to put forth the hand to the soul-reviving fruit. No power can prohibit any soul from taking its fruit; all may partake to the full, eat, and live forever.

The tree of life possessed supernatural virtue so that to eat of it was to live forever, its fruit the antidote of death and its leaves for sustaining life and immortality, yet through eating the forbidden fruit of knowledge death entered and open access was closed. The tree was a type of the one great Source of immortality, Christ, in whom is life and who is the fountain of life, the bread of life and Lifegiver, and obedience to Him is the life-giving power that gladdens the soul. Whoever comes to Him never hungers, whoever believes never thirsts, and whoever receives His flesh and blood by receiving His words which are spirit and life has eternal life and will be raised at the last day. To him that overcomes will be granted to eat again of the tree in the midst of the paradise of God, for God as heavenly Husbandman transplanted the tree from Eden to the paradise above yet its branches hang over the wall to the lower world so that through redemption purchased by blood people may still eat by coming, believing, living by Him, obeying and overcoming. Jesus now stands to the world as the tree of life was to Adam and Eve, presenting Himself as the tree of life so that by feeding on His flesh and drinking His blood spiritual life is perfected and everlasting life restored, for eating His flesh and drinking His blood is eternal life to the receiver in the same way its fruit was life to them. The tree of life is truth whose leaves men must eat and live and whose fruit perpetuates immortality with a life measuring with God's life, while those who interpret the Word by their own ideas eat of the forbidden tree, accept fallacies in place of Thus saith the Lord, exclude themselves as Adam and Eve did, die in sins, and unless they repent will never gain eternal life.

Adam's separation from the garden lasts until the resurrection, when through repentance and faithful obedience he sees Eden restored and is again granted access, since disobedience brought the curse and obedience brings blessing. After sin it was necessary for an angel with flaming sword to block the way, but that guard will no longer stand in the way when the redeemed from all nations enter their heavenly home, and they will have free access. There the guard is gone, so the redeemed approach the wide-spreading tree freely and pluck its fruit with happy songs of praise, gathered with friends and relatives separated by death as a white-robed multitude washed in the blood of the Lamb.

The flaming sword barring the first pair marks the loss of humanity's original dominion, the earth originally given as man's kingdom betrayed into Satan's hands and long held by the mighty foe, cutting mankind off from his first home. From that departure God's children have watched, waited, longed and prayed for the promised events to come, and since that barring holy men have looked with longing for the redemption of the purchased possession when the first dominion returns. Then the great plan of redemption brings the earth back, all that was lost by sin is restored, God's original purpose to form the earth to be inhabited is fulfilled, and it is made the eternal inhabited abode where the righteous dwell forever under the first dominion. The disobedient cannot enter the holy city nor have right to the tree of life.

Warning and Daily Application

Adam's blaming of Eve did not save him from the result of disobedience, for after the ground was cursed for his sake he and Eve were shut out of Eden and barred by an angel with a flaming sword from gaining access to the tree and immortalizing transgression. Their being driven out for disobeying a command proves that being once in grace is not always in grace, and that transgressing God's law brings sure and awful results still testified to by the condition of the fallen race. As their transgression cost them Eden, transgression of the commandments now costs heaven and an eternity of bliss, for the law is the transcript of Christ's character so to disregard it is to disregard Christ, and only His imparted righteousness received by obedient faith enables overcoming since none can overcome in his own strength. The sinner who would regain restored Eden must therefore cease pleasing self, leave the side of the great rebel, repent for giving time and talents to the enemy, choose the good and refuse the evil, and seek the Lord while He may be found.

The fall came through desire for a single gratification of appetite, with curiosity and ambition, and through intemperate desire by which Satan overcame the first parents and caused loss of their Eden home. That eating what God had forbidden introduced sin with all its horrible consequences, and departure from Paradise began a worsening moral condition in which appetite in later generations became increasingly powerful and degrading. For Paradise restored, perverted appetite must be brought under strict control through temperance in all things, which has an important part in restoration to Eden. Indulgence of depraved appetite weakens power to resist evil and enables Satan to fasten evil habits upon man and ensnare him in the net of his devices. Eve lost all the glories of Eden when driven out after eating fruit God had forbidden even to touch lest she die, because she imagined eating would highly exalt her, which warns that imagining happiness will come from having one's own unrestrained way brings unhappiness and loss instead.

Gaining forbidden knowledge through Satan's deception rather than God's purpose estranged humanity from God and separated earth from heaven, giving acquaintance with sin and its results and driving the first parents from Eden with loss of access to the tree of life. Knowledge received from God's word would have been different and could have prepared them for life in paradise, while knowledge gained apart from God and driven by unsatisfied desires and unholy aims leads away from what God intended. Violation of God's law is the greatest loss and deepest injury conceivable, for it lost beautiful Eden and opened the floodgates of woe upon the world. From that expulsion sin grew worse until God destroyed the world by a flood saving only Noah and his sons, and since then sin has steadily increased until the present world lies under Satan with God's law trampled underfoot and fast becoming as before the flood. In view of sufferings sin is sure to inflict, every soul should avoid and abhor sin as hateful, feeling it better to suffer loss of all things than to depart from the least of God's commandments, with another trial granted in God's wise plans through Christ's sacrifice alone.

Adam driven from Eden is the first fall of the race, bringing sin and unutterable woe and lowering mankind physically, mentally and morally by disobeying the express injunctions and law of Jehovah, and his experience stands as warning not to violate God's law as he did. The race would be far more elevated if falling had stopped with his expulsion, but instead men deplore his transgression while repeating it by indulging appetite and passion in direct violation of God's law, producing a succession of falls. That continued disobedience as Adam had disobeyed brought further moral decline, disease and suffering, with men becoming more and more disobedient with only a few exceptions, and with persistent violation greatly aggravating evils and bringing a curse upon the whole earth. Adam and Eve had to leave the garden to live on earth under the curse, and they could regain their lost position only under the difficult conditions their choice brought, since Eden's perfection could no longer teach needed lessons. Paradise lost by disobedience when man was driven out is regained by keeping the precepts of God's law in home life and all business transactions, by obeying the light on the binding claims of law and lifting the cross before the world, by obedience to all the commandments, and by spiritual knowledge from studying the living oracles, for salvation depends on full and entire obedience.

That banishment for transgressing God's law provides the setting for Christ suffering outside Jerusalem beyond the city boundaries where felons and murderers were executed, bearing the curse as Substitute to redeem from the curse. Driving them out was mercy not arbitrary severity, and complaining about it as harsh and unjust comes from a murmuring spirit that refuses grateful remembrance of mercy, falsely charges God with being arbitrary and severe, and turns men from His justice, purity and love to accept Satan the cruelest tyrant, ending in oppression, violence and brutality. The flashing sword turning every way to guard the tree illustrates what appeared when divinity flashed through Christ's humanity as He cleansed the temple and drove out buyers and sellers with a whip of small cords, appearing as an avenging angel of terrible majesty before whom priests and rulers fled in terror and indignation, unable to act, linking desecration with judgment upon those who reject God's messages. That same flaming sword turning in every direction is God's reproof, warning and stroke of judgment hanging over Battle Creek when wrong plans men endorse are sanctioned instead of God's plans through self-exaltation and dishonoring God, bringing terrible results by destruction by fire. The threatened stroke came when fire destroyed the Review and Herald building, showing no carefully constructed fireproof human building is refuge when warnings only harden hearers, for one touch of God's hand sweeps every refuge away, as revealed in night scenes bringing distress, sleeplessness and horror of great darkness until the wrong is confessed, with the burden then taken away.

Paradise has gates that can be shut, and infidelity insinuating itself into youthful hearts closes those gates against them. Expulsion applied to the devil shows his character since being expelled: finding fault and condemning while calling it spiritual eyesight, tearing to pieces, sowing doubt, spoiling souls and churches by talk of inefficiency, contributing nothing to strengthen what remains. Church members who waste probationary time picking flaws, confessing bad habits without forsaking them, and keeping other minds in uncertainty show exactly that quality, proving a change of captains to Satan without knowing it. After expulsion Adam and Eve continued to observe the Sabbath, and their experience taught that God surely punishes transgression of His commands. They had been created full of light and knowledge, pure and perfect, bearing God's signature, loving their Creator, permitted personal communion and made only a little lower than angels, yet were driven out and lost their beautiful home because they believed Satan's lie rather than a plain Thus saith the Lord, exposing his continuing work through human agencies to make Jehovah's law of no consequence and to bring every deception so God's great moral standard and memorial of creation, the Sabbath, will not be respected.

Adam was not permitted to continue working in Eden because he believed Satan's misrepresentations and disobeyed his Creator, yet through Christ's mercy fallen men are now called back to work, called away from disloyalty to build character in obedience as laborers together with God. The expulsion teaches that God's word must be treated as sacred and His commands obeyed implicitly, lest taking forbidden fruit to live forever be barred by cherubim and turning sword, for Eden is the Paradise of God from which transgression excluded humanity. Their shutting out for a transgression that looked small but held selfishness proves God cannot approve any work with even one thread of selfishness, and began increase of sin in volume and prevalence continuing still. Yet divine benevolence was not cut off and love and care still flow earthward, for though expulsion brought sorrow and separation from communion, the case was not left hopeless or without provision, and through Christ's sacrifice a door of hope is opened for those who trust Him.