Re:Verse reading–Genesis 3:8-24 (day three)
“He must not be allowed to…take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” The man and woman had taken on knowledge that they could not manage, thereby condemning the human race to every kind of evil that results from power without wisdom. And as punishment, God kicked them out of the garden. But was it punishment? Is this ejection from Eden rather God’s mercy in action, rescuing us from an almost unimaginable outcome? Let’s do a thought experiment. If in their state of acquaintance with evil, they had also taken on immortality, what kind of existence would that have been? Living forever as beings subject to evil would have been living forever in hell. This is not the end that God had determined for his creation. God loves–while we were yet sinners.
