After God had made all of the plants and animals, birds and insects, he made a garden, a kind of outdoor laboratory where some of them could live together, learn to get along and behave in ways that bless one another. And then he said to himself, “We need a gardener to work with us and watch over everything. Someone who can make decisions and take responsibility for what happens here.”
People have always wondered why God said “we”. Some think he was talking to angels, but I don’t think so because they haven’t been introduced to the story yet. Others have wondered if he was talking to the things he’d created. I rather like that idea because it’s nice to think of God talking to his creatures, but it doesn’t really seem to me that this is something they were going to do together. No, I think it’s something we can sort of understand but not quite. I think there is only one God, so to say that God is more than one is too much. But – and this is just a guess of course – God is so great and magnificent that one isn’t really quite enough. There is a definite oneness about God, but there is a manyness too. This may be why most people have always thought that there are many gods. And it’s a funny thing, but the Hebrew word for God, the Old Testament word, is Elohim, a plural word. It really means Gods, even though the Bible always insists that he’s only one. More mystery.
Anyway, God made a man. He made him out of the soil, just as he had the animals and plants, and put him in charge of the garden. “Take care of it”, he told him, “and it will take care of you.”
God could see that the man was the kind of creature that needs someone to work with and share his life; the kind who shouldn’t be too much alone. So he made a partner for the man, a woman, and he made her out of the man because the man and woman were essentially and mysteriously one thing. He set some boundaries for the man and woman: told them to stay in the garden, to do their work together, and he told them what to eat and what not to eat.
Well, if we thought the sun and moon and stars seemed a little iffy, or if we were concerned about what might go wrong with the birds and plants and animals, we needn’t have bothered; it’s this new creature, this man/woman thing, that causes all the trouble. And, as we will see, even God eventually begins to have serious doubts about whether mankind was a good idea.
Of course, we need to be honest here. When we talk as though human beings might not have been worth the trouble, we’re sort of pretending. We can’t really imagine a world without us, but we have to admit that we have been a serious problem to God and the world and ourselves. It’s a kind of confession, like when we admit that we’ve caused a lot of grief to our parents, or friends, or spouse. It’s a way of saying that we’re grateful that they didn’t throw us our with the trash last Tuesday, and that we wouldn’t fault them if they had.
Confessions of this sort are a good thing, but they’re a bit dangerous in a way. If they’re real they invite an examination of how much trouble we’ve really been. It’s like opening a conversation with your mom and dad about your teen years and how much suffering you caused to those who love you. But, painful as it might be, it can help us understand how precious we actually are and how much we’re really worth, not just because of all the good things about us, but because we cost so much.
The Bible is the story of this conversation with our Father. It talks of the awful things we’ve done, and some pretty awesome things too. It talks of the mistakes we’ve made, and even some mistakes God may have made. – It’s a hard conversation for everyone. – But it also tells of how much God loves us, and what he’s done and suffered to stay connected. There’s a lot of bad news in this story, but good parents make good children, and if Shakespeare was right when he said “All’s well that ends well”, it’s good news in the end.
Next... so, what on earth have we done!
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