God Plants a Garden and Forms Humans

[Gen 2:4-14 HCSB] "These are the records of the heavens and the earth, concerning their creation at the time that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens. No shrub of the field had yet grown on the land, and no plant of the field had yet sprouted, for the LORD God had not made it rain on the land, and there was no man to work the ground. But water would come out of the ground and water the entire surface of the land. Then the LORD God formed the man out of the dust from the ground and breathed the breath of life into his nostrils, and the man became a living being.  The LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there He placed the man He had formed. The LORD God caused to grow out of the ground every tree pleasing in appearance and good for food, including the tree of life in the middle of the garden, as well as the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  A river went out from Eden to water the garden. From there it divided and became the source of four rivers. The name of the first is Pishon, which flows through the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold. Gold from that land is pure; bdellium and onyx are also there. The name of the second river is Gihon, which flows through the entire land of Cush. The name of the third river is the Tigris, which runs east of Assyria. And the fourth river is the Euphrates."

Observations:

Who did what?

• The LORD God formed the man out of the dust from the ground. 
• The LORD God breathed the breath of life into his nostrils. 
• The man became a living being. 
• The LORD God planted a garden. 
• The LORD God placed the man he had formed in the garden
• The LORD God caused every tree pleasing in appearance and good for food to grow in the garden, including the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. 

Summary: So, God planted seeds in an environment, God placed people in the environment, then God caused every tree pleasing in appearance and good for food to grow. And there were rivers with pretty sparkly things in them. 

What choices were made? 

• The LORD God chose to for man out of the dust of the ground. 
• The LORD God chose to breathe the breath of life into the man's nostrils. 
• The LORD God chose to plant a garden. 
• The LORD God chose to place the man in the garden. 
• The LORD God chose to cause every tree pleasing in appearance and good for food to grow.   

Applications:

Today, does God plant seeds (I'm seeing a metaphor here...), place people in the environment where those seeds will grow, and then cause those seeds to grow? In fact, I see God's promises as seeds. And there's totally this part of me that want's to see God's promises for my life come true in the same amount of time it takes me to read this passage. God makes SO MANY promises in the Bible to the Israelites, but it really takes time (We're talking centuries here, sometimes millennium) for them to come to fruition. God makes so many promises to His children, and as His child, can I just confess, I wish they would all come true INSTANTANEOUSLY. Now, I am thinking about the passage of time in these verses. Naturally, I want to infer that God planted, God placed, God caused to grow, all instantaneously, I mean, that's how quickly I can read it. But I wonder, and I wonder both ways... 

• What if it wasn't instantaneous? What if man was placed in a bare garden and got to watch it grow? Was he hungry? He had never experienced food before... would he know what hunger was/ would he feel it during the time he was watching the garden grow? What would the process of watching every tree pleasing in appearance and good for food grow look like? I can totally imagine Adam having the wonder of a child and getting super excited over every new tree as it blooms, marveling at it's beauty, uniqueness, and placement *wants to be there* **side tangent: this is why one of my requests to God once I get to heaven is to re-watch all of human history like a movie**
• But then, what if it was instantaneous? What if everything before the choice to disobey was instantaneous? What if after the choice to disobey, God allowed the process to slow down to teach us patience and to enforce the necessary character building that must happen when you are born under the curse of sin/death? What if... what if... what if?

To Participate:

If you're reading my thoughts, please feel free to share your own thoughts by clicking on the "comment" button below. Also, please feel free to explore other questions, or other aspects of this passage by asking questions that I didn't cover, like: 

• Who said what? 
• What other choices could have been made? 
• What were some short term results of the choices that were made? 
• What was the long term impact of the choices that were made? 
• What do the choices show us about the people who were making them (spiritually, morally, ethically)? 
• Today, do we see people experiencing the world the same way? What does this tell us about people? 
• Today, do we see God doing things the same way? What does this tell us about God?