EDEN: THE GARDEN OF GOD

EDEN: THE GARDEN OF GOD

Song of Songs (details not known)

One felt, dear brethren, that it might be profitable to pursue a little further what we were speaking of together on Lord’s day afternoon. We were noticing then that one of God’s earliest thoughts that found expression was that He intended to have a garden, and He did have one even before the present scene was formed. Before man was created scripture indicates that God had a garden; we do not know where it was, all that we know is that God entrusted that garden to Satan, the greatest being that He had ever made. It says in the prophet Ezekiel, “Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering.” There was, somewhere in the universe of God, a spot that was particularly formed for the pleasure of God, and Satan was entrusted with it, but he sought to get out of the garden the gain of it for himself — the pleasure of it for himself — he usurped God’s place. It says, “The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden.” God planted it, it is a wonderful expression; out of the ground the Lord God caused to grow every tree that was pleasant to the eyes and good for food, the tree of life in the midst of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Adam was then entrusted with the care of it, to dress it and keep it for God. He ministers to God’s pleasure, and Satan cannot bear that — he marred that garden. But you see, dear brethren, God never gives up His thoughts. He would not be God if He did: “The counsel of the Lord, that shall stand” and His thoughts to everlasting. God’s thoughts could never fail, and so God pursues His thought to have a garden. In the Book of Revelation we read, “To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life which is in the paradise of God.” God has still a paradise; if Satan marred the first one and spoilt the second one God has still a paradise. “The tree of life which is in the paradise of God.” Where is it? Where Jesus is — that is the centre of God’s paradise, and that is secure.

People think they would be more happy if they had more to minister to themselves, but nobody is happy until they touch the spot where God is ministered to. God is the only Being that has a right to be ministered to, that has a right to seek that everything should minister to Him. You remember it says, “Thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.” Why did God create the universe and everything in it, streams, rivers, seas, mountains, trees, flowers? To minister to His pleasure. If we tried to do anything with ourselves as object it would be sin, but God is so glorious and so blessed that it is right for Him to make everything subservient to His pleasure, because He is God. Just in the same way it is right for God to demand worship. If I asked anybody to worship me I should deserve the judgment of God. In Acts when Herod was arrayed in his royal apparel the people cried, “It is the voice of a god and not of a man,” and the angel of the Lord smote him and he was eaten of worms.

The Lord says, “Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God,” because He is God.

I just wanted to pursue a little further the thought of the garden for God, particularly having in mind the thought that each local company should bear the character of a garden. In the several passages we have read this evening you get the word in the plural, “gardens.” “Thou that dwellest in the gardens” — not only in the garden, but the gardens. Let us look at what the Spirit of God indicates as found there. When the Lord goes into His garden what does He find there? Genesis 2, gives us the main features, but this scripture develops it in detail. “A garden enclosed,” (Song of Songs 4: 12), that is the first feature. You could not have a garden without an enclosure — there is a wall round it. God wants things living, I do not think God is interested in a museum. Men are, because of man’s limitations, he cannot make a living thing, so he gathers up dead things and stuffs them and puts them in museums. God is not interested in a museum. He does not want a local company to be a museum with forms and ceremonies, and dead things that remind you of what once was; He wants a garden — things living. You must have a wall for a garden because there are other elements over that wall that could get in if you did not have a wall. Nothing was to come into the garden that the Lord planted in Eden. He put a wall round it; that wall was subjection to God. God indicated the boundary that man could move in — that boundary was the will of God, what God had said, the boundary or fence or hedge beyond which you could not go; that was so that the garden should not be spoiled, but you see man broke down the boundary. “Whoso breaketh a hedge, a serpent shall bite him,” and man broke the hedge and the serpent did bite him, and he dies because he would not keep within the wall.

When that blessed paradise in the Person of Jesus was here in manhood, He kept always within the wall. Many times the enemy tried to get the Lord to break the enclosure, he approached the Lord in every subtle form it was possible, to try and get the Lord to break down the enclosure — subjection to God’s will. But the Lord was not deceived like Adam. He said, “Get thee behind me, Satan.” He recognised the serpent, the deceiver, as trying to break down God’s hedge. When he came again to try and do the same thing through Peter, Peter says, “Pity thyself, Lord,” consider for yourself and not for the pleasure of God, but the Lord says, “Get thee behind me, Satan.” He kept within the enclosure.

If we are to have a garden in Malvern we shall need the enclosure. There is no garden, one would speak affectionately, and there can be no garden for the Lord without the enclosure; there may be everything for the benefit of a man, but there can be nothing for God, you must have an enclosure for a garden. There is that which is unsuitable for God, the brambles, the thorns and the briars; every principle of evil must be kept out if you are to have a garden. If a bramble got into your garden what would it do? Become king. No plant that God ever plants would be king, the spikenard would not, the fig, the olive would not, nor the vine, but the bramble would be king. Let one element of this world into your garden and it will soon become king. You must have an enclosure, and every principle of this world, wherever you find it and in whomsoever you find it, must be refused first in our own hearts and then in every association and every practice and every doctrine that is allowed, because the garden wall has to be kept up. The holy city has a wall great and high in that coming day of glory, because evil is still in the universe. We have not then come to the eighth day, and even in the seventh day evil is still existent and may become active, so the holy city has a wall great and high. God’s garden in that city is not interfered with.

When you come to the details of the garden you find that the first introduced by the Spirit of God is a paradise of pomegranates. The New Translation of that word “orchard” is “paradise.” A paradise of pomegranates — what does a pomegranate mean? What kind of pleasure does God get out of seeing a paradise of pomegranates? In this country we hardly ever see one, but if you looked at one you would understand. If you open a pomegranate you find within row after row of little cells, and each cell is occupied by a seed — all in perfect order, each seed has its own distinctive place, but all bound together livingly. It is a divine figure of unity; God loves unity: “How good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity.” It is part of God’s paradise to have each brother and sister locally filling their own particular place. There is a place for each one, the assembly is not a congregation where one person ministers and everybody else are onlookers. The assembly is that every brother and every sister has got a definite place to fill in relation to the Lord’s interests, but all bound together, distinctiveness always, but no independence — all livingly bound together in one whole, yet quite distinct as to personality. God loves to see each brother and each sister taking up their own part. What a wealthy community even fifty or sixty would be instead of leaving it to two or three.

God loves to see a paradise of pomegranates, every one filling his own little cell, but bound together in living bonds. How you see that in the Lord Jesus as man, what unity was there, a paradise of pomegranates. He says, “That they may be one even as we are, I in them and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one.” What great evidence of unity! The great expression of unity is seen in Christ, that blessed Man; though a divine Person He held His place as a man perfectly, but in absolute unity with the Father “that they may be one as we”, John 17: 11. The Father had His place, the Son had His place, the Spirit had His place, but they were one — absolutely one. “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” Such was the unity that if you saw the Lord you saw the Father. Not that you saw the Father personally, but there was such absolute unity that in seeing the Lord in manhood you saw the Father in expression. That evidently is one great feature of God’s garden. There could not be anything for God’s pleasure if there was not unity, because it is “trees.” Trees are not doctrines, they are living things. It is what is maintained in living men and women, not in the prayer book, not in the book on the shelf at home, but maintained in living persons, that is what trees represent.

You have the paradise of pomegranates in God’s garden, then you have all trees of spices. I cannot go into what they all represent, but the Spirit of God calls attention to the spikenard and the cinnamon and the calamus. The trees of spices area great feature in God’s garden, trees that give a beautiful savour, no garden is complete without them. We know what those spices make up, they make up the incense. Incense is made up of all those spices blended together. What is incense? David tells us, “Let thy prayer come up as incense.” No garden could ever be complete without prayer. Just look at that paradise in Jesus, how all the trees of frankincense are there growing in great verdure, listen to Him praying. The disciples heard Him one day and they said, “Lord, teach us to pray,” we should like to pray like you. The fragrance of that prayer came into their nostrils and they said, “Lord, teach us to pray.” He says, “When ye pray say, Father, thy name be hallowed.” What incense, what a beautiful smell! The vials are full of odours, which are the prayers of the saints. “Father, thy name be hallowed, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” What an odour going up to God from His garden. In John 17, it says. He “lifted up his eyes to heaven and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee.” What incense! Glorify Thy Son. What for? “That thy Son also may glorify thee.” What a blessed odour to go up from the earth, that very earth that has grieved God.

Think of what the world is as God sees it. It is like Egypt. It says of Egypt that the land stank. Why? Because of the blood that was lying about everywhere and because of the frogs. Think of the stench of the world at the present time, the moral death on every hand. Every novel and every picture show and every wireless set in our house will bring in the stench of this world — moral death, blood and frogs, the unclean spirits that come out of the mouth of the beast — the frogs that are causing Christendom to stink. But then we come to the garden, and God gets from His garden all those wondrous odours — hearts that pray in the prayer meeting and at home in respect of God’s glory and God’s interests. “Thy name be hallowed.”

Incense is the prayers of the saints. They are not the prayers that Jacob prayed. This is one of Jacob’s prayers — I leave each heart to say how far it is true of us. “If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace; then shall the Lord be my God... and of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee.” There is no incense in that. Incense is the longings of the heart that God should be glorified. We do not go to the prayer meeting to ask for bread to eat and raiment to put on, but to pray about God’s holy interests, that His name may be glorified. That is what you find in the garden. God always answers that.

You remember God says to Moses, “Let me alone.” That is a remarkable word for God to say to a man. “Let me alone. I will blot them out and make of thee a great nation.” And Moses prayed. He says, What will Egypt say? They will say that Thou broughtest them out but couldst not bring them in. Moses went in and spoke to God about His great name. “Thy name be hallowed.” God says, “I have heard thy prayer.”

God could not resist a prayer like that. He said to Moses, “Let me alone.” But Moses was so free of himself that he did not wish to be the head of a great nation himself. He wanted God’s name to be honoured instead of dishonoured in the eyes of Egypt. God always answers those prayers.

Think of Elijah. He prayed to the Lord. He put the sacrifice and poured on the water and then again and again. And then he prayed and he said, “Lord God of Abraham. Isaac, and of Israel, let it be known this day that thou art God in Israel, and that I am thy servant, and that I have done all these things at thy word. Hear me, O Lord, hear me,” and the fire came down and consumed the sacrifice. Elijah was concerned in his prayer that God should be known, it was not a question of Elijah personally, it was God.

Trees of frankincense in the garden — men and women living in Malvern who are deeply concerned about the glory of God, the honour of His blessed name — what frankincense that is to God! Then it says, “Awake, O north wind; and come thou south, blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow out.” I understand that to be the One that controls the winds sees fit to call at times for a period of adversity and then a period of prosperity, so that the spices may flow out more abundantly. When was there a north wind like the cross? It blew from the north in all its force upon His blessed Person at Calvary, but the spices flowed out. The north wind carried the very fragrance of those blessed trees of frankincense; how we have rejoiced in the odour of them until this day. He prayed as the north wind came upon Him. Whether you look at Him in the garden of Gethsemane or the prayer upon the cross, “Father, forgive them,” what an odour! the odour of a heart that desired only forgiveness. Then the south wind blew, it was a south wind on the mount of transfiguration — a moment of great prosperity, a moment of great glory, a moment of wonderful approval of heaven, and it says that as He prayed the fashion of His countenance was changed. The odours flow out, whether you have the north or the south winds. That is what the Lord would do. He would blend the influence of both the north and south winds to make the odours flow out of His garden!

Look at that beautiful garden in Bethany, it has a hedge all round it, it is separate from the whole atmosphere of the world outside where they are planning the murder of Jesus, but there is a wall round Bethany, quite a different place — what pomegranates grew there, what unity there was between Martha and Mary and Lazarus. They made Him a supper, every one of them had their part in it. What wonderful trees there are in that garden. Mary had got a box of ointment of spikenard which she kept. You could not get into the house without getting the fragrance of it, but then the north wind came. Lazarus died — what adversity filled their hearts! Then the south wind came, the Son of God came down and raised him from the dead, then the house was filled with the odour of the ointment. The Lord may bring in here locally a period of great testing and then a period of great blessing, young coming in, souls getting blessing, but it is all to send the odours out, the odours of the spices flowing out for God and for Christ — that is the garden.

In the next chapter it says, “My beloved is gone down into his garden” to enjoy it. I love to think of that “My beloved is gone down.” I wonder what He would get if He came down here. Supposing the Lord walked into Malvern amongst His people, what would He find? It tells you here “I have gathered my myrrh with my spices.” He has been there and He has got the prayers and the longings of the saints for the glory of God — that is Mine, “I have eaten my honeycomb with my honey.” My honeycomb, My honey. The honeycomb, as we know, is the mutual state of affection amongst the saints — that mutual condition — cell after cell, but all one — that is Mine, says the Lord — that is for Me. “I have drunk my wine”; every bit of joy in the hearts of God’s people the Lord says, “That is Mine.” You may say it is ours, but the Lord says, “First of all it is Mine.” I have drunk My milk; milk in the scripture is connected with the intelligence of the saints — the mental milk of the word — every bit of true intelligence in our minds is the result of the Spirit of God. “Drink, yea, drink abundantly, O beloved” — He shares it all with us.

Passing on to the next chapter how the Lord continues, “I went down into the garden of nuts” that is the reading meeting. Trees of frankincense are the prayer meetings particularly, but the garden of nuts is the reading meeting. What is inside a nut is a seed, and the seed has life in it. It is not a tree, it is not anything fully grown and developed, but it is a seed, and the good seed is the word of God. That is what we come together to read for, that we might get His word, not to dispute about points, but to get seed. We come together to get the benefit of this garden of nuts, to get into our souls the seed of God’s word that will bring forth life and fruit for Him. I do not think you could tell of how much value a seed is, nor what you will get from that seed, but God can tell — that seed has the elements of life in it. A divine thought put into a heart is capable of revolutionising a whole life, because the seed has life in it. So we come together and the Lord comes down. It says, “I went down into the garden of nuts.” He takes account of how the seed is developing in the hearts of the saints. “To see whether the vine flourished,” the Lord comes in and He has a look at the vine to see how it is getting on. The vine is the life of Jesus, “bearing about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.” The pomegranates, to see if they bud; He comes to see if unity is beginning to take shape, if the buds of the pomegranates are developing.

“Or ever I was aware, my soul made me like the chariots of Amminadib.” “My soul set me upon the chariots of my willing people,” Song of Songs 6: 12. He was lifted up in the affections of the willing hearts of the saints — there was a place for Him. “Or ever I was aware” — one loves occasions like that, we sometimes touch it for a moment or two — the Lord comes in and immediately there is a place for Him in our hearts.

How you can see these features in the early church. You think of that wonderful garden in the beginning of Acts, what a wall there was round it. Ananias and Sapphira tried to get over the wall, but the wall was there. What unity was there. They had everything in common they did not call anything any had his own, such was the paradise of pomegranates. Then the trees of frankincense — they prayed and the house shook. What did they pray about? “Behold, Lord, their threatenings: and grant unto thy servants, that with all boldness they may speak thy word, by stretching forth thine hand to heal; and that signs and wonders may be done by the name of thy holy servant Jesus.” That is the kind of prayer they prayed; how the Lord could come in and how the word of God grew and multiplied. That is the principle of the garden of nuts. The seed grew and developed in the hearts of the saints.

Then it says the Lord came down into His garden to gather lilies. What a lily He got when He got Stephen out of the early church. The lily is a flower that the Lord indicates we are to consider. What marks them is that they have wonderful garments — “not Solomon in all his glory was arrayed like one of these.” You never saw a man better dressed than Stephen; what splendid apparel he had, the very character of Christ coming out of him, and the Lord gathered that lily and took it up into the heavenly paradise! He wants lilies here, men and women wearing the blessed garments of Christ, so that as you meet them you are reminded of Christ in what they say, and are, and do. He has gone into His garden to feed among the lilies; the Lord finds joy and food for His heart among the lilies. Those eleven in the upper room were all lilies; they were clothed more gloriously than Solomon.

Then at the end it says, “Thou that dwellest in the gardens, the companions hearken to thy voice; cause me to hear it.” The Lord comes into His garden to speak; it is where you will hear His voice. What a blessed thing that is; there is a condition locally where the Lord’s voice can be heard, “Thou that dwellest in the gardens.” He can live there; the conditions are such that He can live there. “The companions hearken to thy voice; cause me to hear it.” I do not know anything more blessed for any of us than to hear His voice. He will speak in the gardens; I could not tell you what He will say; nobody knows. What did God say in regard to Christ, the blessed garden that was seen in Him? “This is my beloved Son, hear him.” He did not tell you what He would say.

The Lord grant that there might be such conditions here that there might be the joy of hearing His voice in the garden.