Welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Genesis. This is study #16 of Genesis, chapter 2 and we are continuing to look at Genesis 2:17:

But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

We have discussed this in previous studies, but God set up the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil,” and God set it apart from all the other trees in the Garden of Eden by placing a commandment upon it: “Thou shalt not eat of it.” They could eat of any other trees in the garden, but not of that one tree and this is what the Law of God does; it tells man that they can do this or this, but they cannot do that. It tells them, “Thou shalt not kill,” or “Thou shalt not steal,” and “Thou shalt not commit adultery,” and so forth. God’s Laws give direction to man and if we obey the Law, it is good. If we disobey the Law, it is evil. That is why this tree was called the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil.” As long as Adam obeyed, it was good and there was no transgression, but once Adam and Eve disobeyed, they experienced “evil.” They had knowledge of evil in overstepping the Law that God had established and it was evil. That is what sin is, as it is the transgression of the Law.

It is very much like a lawn that is protected by a fence and has a “No Trespassing” sign. The owner owns the property and all others are not allowed on the property. If you go beyond the boundary of the fence and onto the land, you have transgressed. This is exactly what God has done with His Laws throughout the Bible. Actually, the Bible is a Law Book and God has established boundaries that govern His creature, mankind. We are obligated and duty bound to follow those Laws. We are not independent agents as we like to think. We are servants of God and that is why we were created. When we do follow the Law and keep God’s commandments, we are happiest. We will also have the greatest blessing and it is the best thing for us and others in our lives if we stay on the right side of the Law. It is when we go beyond the bounds and “eat of the tree” that all kinds of problems come and all kinds of difficulties enter our lives. Just look at all the sinful pleasures that man partakes of and, again, and again, you can see the negative consequences.

God first established the Law by saying, “Thou shalt not eat of it,” and then He laid out the consequences: “For in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” If you break God’s Law, the consequence is that you will die. Ultimately, that is how it is for us today in whatever sin we have committed in our lives. What does the Bible tell us? It tells us the same thing in Romans 6:23:

For the wages of sin is death…

This restates it, but it says the identical thing that was said in Genesis 2, verse 17: “for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” Literally, it says, “dying, you shall die,” and that was the consequence for breaking the Law and that is why it says in Ephesians 2:1:

And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;

Even when we were dead in sins…

We are “dead in sins” because we have broken the commandment and broken the covenant. We have stepped over the line that God has established in His royal Law. If you are guilty in one point of the Law, you are guilty of all the Law and you are subject to death because the Bible says, “The wages of sin is death.”

The Lord tells us in Ezekiel 18:4:

Behold, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine: the soul that sinneth, it shall die.

This is the consistent teaching of the Bible from the beginning when God established the Law in the Garden of Eden and all the way through the Old Testament and into the New Testament. It is the Law of God and if you or I break the Law, we die. That is what sin brings us.

As far as Adam and Eve, when they broke the Law they died in that very day in their soul existence, as it says in Ezekiel 18, verse 4, but they also brought upon themselves their (eventual) physical death. Rather than living forever, they died after a few hundred years. Today people would love to live 930 years and they act as if that is like eternity, but it is as nothing. We know it is nothing because we are living at a point thousands of years after Adam lived his life and died. Even if you live a thousand years or “a thousand years twice told,” as it says in Ecclesiastes, death makes any span of life in this world vain. It is temporal. It is only eternal life that is true life and, of course, that is the life that God gives by the faith of Christ to His people. The children of God live forever and, therefore, we have genuine life – we have eternal life.

Let us go back to Genesis, chapter 2 and move on to Genesis 2:18:

And JEHOVAH God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.

At this point in time, God has created Adam, the man. He formed him from the dust of the ground. God had not yet created Eve, the woman, so for a very short period of time Adam was living on the earth alone. He had no mate. There is no woman and, obviously, when God says, “It is not good that the man should be alone,” we understand that he needs a mate. There needs to be a female so there can be procreation and children can be born. That is the only way that mankind could develop into future generations, so we can see that it is not good that the man should be alone. God said he would make him a help meet and God brought Eve into being.

That is the historical understanding of why God made the woman, but what about the spiritual teaching? We know that Adam was a “figure of him that was to come,” a type and figure of the Lord Jesus Christ. Later on when God causes Adam to experience a deep sleep and He takes one of his ribs to create the woman, we see the spiritual dimension. In this case Adam was picture of the Lord Jesus who dies and from His side comes forth the bride of Christ, the eternal church. If that is the deeper spiritual meaning, then there must be a spiritual meaning when God says, “It is not good that the man should be alone.” That also has to have a spiritual application because the man Adam is a type of the Lord Jesus. To put it another way, it is like saying, “It is not good for the Lord Jesus to be alone.” We wonder about that because we know that within the Godhead He is not alone. The Lord said this in John 16:32:

Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is now come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me.

We understand that God is One God and, yet, three Persons, so there is fellowship between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit and God is not alone in that sense. When we look up the word “alone” that is used here in Genesis 2, verse 17, it does lead us several times to the Person of God. For instance, it says in 2Kings 19:15:

And Hezekiah prayed before JEHOVAH, and said, O JEHOVAH God of Israel, which dwellest between the cherubims, thou art the God, even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth; thou hast made heaven and earth.

God is the God “alone” and that is how the Bible refers to Him in several places. It says in the New Testament: “God only wise.” That word “only” can also be translated as “alone.”

It also says in Psalm 148:13:

Let them praise the name of JEHOVAH: for his name alone is excellent; his glory is above the earth and heaven.

This word repeatedly points us to God, but, more specifically, when God says concerning the man Adam, “It is not good that man should be alone,” we know that the help meet God would make is the woman, a picture of the bride of Christ, the elect. We also know that everything God made was “good.” Every bit of the creation was “good” and then God said, “It is not good that man should be alone.” We have to wonder about that because God is now saying it is “not good” that man should be alone. How could this apply to God? How can that be true of God who alone is God, who alone is wise, and who alone is exalted? I think we can start to get the answer when we look at Isaiah 63:3:

I have trodden the winepress alone; and of the people there was none with me: for I will tread them in mine anger, and trample them in my fury…

This is referring to the Lord Jesus Christ who underwent the wrath of God alone. He experienced the wrath of God for His elect that were predestinated to salvation. Their sins were laid upon Him, but He is the one that must experience the wrath of God by Himself, alone. God is “alone” in the sense that He is bearing the sins of His people. When Christ bore the sins of His people, He is sin laden. He bore those sins at the foundation of the world and made payment for their sins, so it could be said: “It is not good that man should be alone.” It says in John 12:24:

Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.

We can understand that “corn of wheat” that fell to the ground and died as Jesus. He died alone, just as the high priest went into the Holy of holies once a year, alone, in order to offer a sacrifice, which was a picture of the atoning work of Christ. The payment made for sin was accomplished alone: “Of the people there was none with me.” After He died alone, He brought forth much fruit, the entire company of the elect that God has saved. This is the idea in our verse in Genesis 2:18:

And JEHOVAH God said, It is not good that the man should be alone…

It is not good that Christ was alone bearing the sins of His people. Why was it not good? It was because He had become sin for them. If you look up the two words “not good,” they are not found all that often. It says in 1Samuel 26:13-16:

Then David went over to the other side, and stood on the top of an hill afar off; a great space being between them: And David cried to the people, and to Abner the son of Ner, saying, Answerest thou not, Abner? Then Abner answered and said, Who art thou that criest to the king? And David said to Abner, Art not thou a valiant man? and who is like to thee in Israel? wherefore then hast thou not kept thy lord the king? for there came one of the people in to destroy the king thy lord. This thing is not good that thou hast done…

There are the two words, “not good.” David is saying to Abner that what he had done was “not good” and then looks what it says in 1Samuel 26:16:

… As JEHOVAH liveth, ye are worthy to die, because ye have not kept your master, JEHOVAH'S anointed…

This is probably the best way of understanding what God is saying in Genesis 2:17: “It is not good that the man should be alone.” Christ is alone suffering the wrath of God and it is “not good” because He is bearing the sins of His people and He is, therefore, worthy to die. Again, when Jesus bore our sins, He was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. That is when Christ died. Later we will see that Adam experiences a “deep sleep” and that is a picture of what Christ had already done and the woman comes forth as result. So the spiritual meaning in God saying, “It is not good that the man should be alone,” it is really a statement that indicates that Christ had to suffer and die. It was not worthy for Him to live. He must die to make payment for the sins of His people. So God says, “I will make him an help meet for him,” and this refers to the whole company of the elect.

We will have to pick up this idea in our next Bible study.