EDEN AGAIN--2
As we have been thinking about what the Garden might have been like with no sin, what would Adam and Eve done?  They might have left the Garden, to go into the world.  So what would they have done outside the enclosure of the Garden?

  We can mention three things.  First, Adam and Even might have gone out of the Garden to follow the Spirit into Palestine, the land flowing with milk and honey.
  Second, Adam and Eve might hae spoken of the knowledge of God they gained while they walked with God in the cool of the evening.
  Third, their family could have been a blessing to the world, that through them all people everywhere would be sons and daughters of God.

  When we read through the OT, we find that God did just those things.

  God did lead Moses and the people out of Egypt and into the Promised Land, Exodus 14 and Joshua 3.14.
  God did give Moses the knowledge of Himself from Exodus 19, the Law, the ordinances and ceremonies.
  And through Jesus every man and woman can be blessed by God with salvation and holiness.

  This is the message of the NT.  So let's look at that message a little closer.

  Salvation in the NT has three time aspects to it.  First, it is a sure thing.  Paul says--that God chose us before the foundation of the world--before we were born, Ephesians 1.4.  In Acts 15.11 Peter is in Jerusalem saying--We believe that we are saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, in the same way as they also are (Gentiles).  Peter uses the aorist tense, meaning 'we are saved' is a completed action when Peter said it.  In Romans 8.24 Paul says--in hope we have been saved--and this is an action completed in the past.  All of this says salvation is completed, it is finished.

  Second, salvation has a continuing element in it.  The same Paul describes salvation in 1 Corinthians 1.18 as a process: to us who are being saved, it is the power of God (Romans 1.16--power of God).  In 1 Cor. 15.2 Paul uses a conintuous present tense--by which also you are saved if you hold fast the world which I preached to you.

  Third, Paul uses salvation in a future sense.  He says--Much more then, having been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him, Romans 5.9.  In 1 Cor. 3.15 Paul uses the future tense when he says--If any man's work is burned up, he shall suffer loss but he himself shall be saved.

  This may remind us of the expression--You have been saved, you are being saved, you will be saved.  I hope this tells us salvation is not a closed room but a living relationship with a living God.

  So why does something which has been determined before we were even born have to be lived out now and culminated in the future?
  It's like playing catch with your Dad.  He throws the baseball to you so that you can throw it back to him.  God chose you to be His so that you would be His in your life, to glorify His name.  Matthew 5.16 says--Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.  Notice how Jesus does not say 'glorify God,' a tone of distance and separation.  He says, 'glorify your Father,' your own heavenly Father who made you, gave you breath and His Spirit, to be His glory on the earth.
  The apostle Paul says this to the Ephesians when he says--in order that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places, Eph. 3.10.

  We are here to show the universe that God has shared His glory with us who believe.  Maybe the purpose of the Garden all along was to show the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places of God's love for those who show His glory.  Halleluiah!

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I've written a tragedy in the manner of Shakespeare, about Judas.  Anyone wishing to read it, just email me and I will send it pdf.  Paul