Introduction.
Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where [is] the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk [therein], Jeremiah 6:16.
This one verse says everything about how God calls people and how they generally respond to God’s call. God says we should find the good path and walk therein, because it leads to life, but we humans rebel against God and choose to follow the path that suits us best, even if it leads us to perdition.
Even before Adam and Eve sinned against God, they were warned against going their own way. They could eat from all the trees that God had planted in the garden of Eden, all of which it was pleasant to the sight and good for food, with one small prohibition – do not eat from the tree in the midst of the garden, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. On that day Adam and Eve ate from this tree began this story that never ends.
What was the first thing God did when the people He had created and whom He loved had broken His commandments? The very day they sinned against God, He called them by saying, «Adam…where art thou?» This was to make them realize what they had done, but sin was already a fact, something that people throughout history have had to struggle with.
It is beyond any doubt what God’s wishes are for the people He created. God only wants the best for us, which is repeated throughout the Bible from the creation in Genesis to the restoration in Revelation. In Jeremiah 29:11 God says: “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future”, (New International Version 1984).
Let us also look at what God will do when He restores the world. In Revelation 21:1 we read.
And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea … and in Revelation 21:5, the Creator says … Behold, I make all things new …
Why God will make all things new is because of sin that came in and destroyed the world. The world was perfect from the Creator’s hand, we have God’s own word for that in Genesis chapter 1, and verses 4, 10, 12, 18, 21, 25, where God says of what He created that it was good. When God had created man, He said of everything He had created that it was very good (verse 31).
God created a world that was perfectly adapted to humans and their needs, and God gave them this world as a home in which they could live. Into this world where everything breathed harmony and joy, and where all nature praised the Creator, God placed man. It was a world that had been made ready for humans and all God’s rich gifts were available in abundance to the first humans, and God himself was present where humans were to live.
All this testified to God’s great love for the human race, and He gave them dominion over what He had created. The Garden of Eden was truly God’s paradise on earth. When humans were created, they were sinless, and they walked around in the Garden of Eden with their God, and they could see their Creator face to face.
The first people knew God’s law, the Ten Commandments, which are the constitution of God’s kingdom. In addition to the Ten Commandments, they were given a special commandment to test their loyalty to God. We find the special commandment in Genesis 2:16-17, where it says: “And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: 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”.
There are many who do not believe that the Ten Commandments existed before Moses had led Israel out of captivity in Egypt. Such a claim falls on its own unreasonableness because all nations, countries and kingdoms have their laws. This was also the case in “God’s kingdom”, and this is also how it was in the Garden of Eden, and of course God’s law applied to humans in the Garden of Eden as well. There is no nation, country, or kingdom where there are no laws that regulate what one has the right to do and what one cannot do, and behind the laws there is always a penalty for transgression.
God’s highest desire for humans was that they should love their Creator because of His infinite and boundless love. But God did not want to force Adam and Eve to love their Creator, He wanted them to love their Creator precisely because God had given them the best they could get – God’s love – expressed in the form of a world more beautiful than any living people today can imagine.
Because God did not want mankind to be pre-programmed robots who do what they are told without having the opportunity to choose, He gave them free will, so they can choose what they want to do. This despite the risk inherent in the principle of free will. They could choose what they themselves wanted to do regardless of the consequences this might have.
That God gave humans free will is one of the greatest proofs of God’s infinite and boundless love for his creatures. God was fully aware that this principle – free will – could be abused, and that it would then cost His own Son, Jesus, the life. Still, God gave humans free will, a freedom they could use to choose to follow God’s commandments, or if they wanted to break God’s commandments. What a wonderful, great, and loving God we have!
All Bible texts are from King James Version 1611/1769, unless otherwise stated.
Part 1; The first rebellion and the great flood.
Since the dawn of time, God has told the people He created that they should walk in His ways. Why does He do that? Did not God create people with the right to choose what to do – what we call free will? Does God place limitations on us? Does He still not allow us to do as we please?
These questions are something we must look into, because they are all important questions in this context. But first we must go to Genesis 2:16-17 again, where it says: … Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: 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.
Why did God say this to Adam and Eve? Was it to limit their freedom, or was it for other reasons? If we look at how many different trees there are that bear good fruit today, we can assume that there were many more trees that bore good fruit at the time Adam and Eve were placed in the Garden of Eden. It therefore undeniably seems a little strange that God should refuse them to eat the fruit of this one tree that stood in the middle of the garden. Then the questions above also become relevant in relation to whether God denies us certain things and wants to limit our freedom.
What we have to do in this case is to put it into the right context, as here as otherwise it is the war between good and evil, the war between God and Satan. When God forbade them to eat from this tree, He also said that if they did they would die. This is what Satan turned upside down and said ye shall not surely die. Suddenly Eva had to use her free will, she had to choose between two opposites.
We do not know all that the serpent said to Eve on this day. He may have said something like this: «Look at me, I am a serpent, I have eaten of the fruit and can speak». Eva had also never heard a lie, because God does not lie, therefore the lie was something new to her, and this probably caused her to have doubts. Did the snake speak the truth? Maybe she thought like this: Snakes don’t talk, but this snake talks … what is God hiding from us?
It is implicit in Genesis 2:17 that God says: if you do not eat from the tree that gives knowledge of good and evil, which means that you keep my commandments, then you will have eternal life. Satan is always looking to take away from people the happiness they have in society with God, whether it was there in the Garden of Eden or it is in our days. If he can get people to break God’s law, that is, to sin, then Satan knows that he can tear people out of God’s hands and thus achieve a victory over God.
Let’s take a look at what happened that time in the Garden of Eden.
We know from the spirit of prophecy that God had told Adam and Eve about the enemy (Satan) who was lying in wait to deceive them, and that God had said to them that they should never go separately. One day Eve walked away from Adam and ended up in the middle of the garden. There she sees a snake coiling around the trunk of the forbidden tree. The serpent was the most beautiful animal God had created. It had beautiful wings with all the colours of the rainbow.
It says in Genesis 3:1 that the snake was more cunning than any other animal that the Lord had created. Now this snake called Eve’s attention, and she went closer to see what it was the snake wanted. Eve did not realize that the enemy God had told them about could use the most beautiful creature as a medium. This was the first mistake she made.
Yet she had neither touched the tree nor tasted the fruit, but her curiosity had been awakened. Then the snake talks to her and asks: «Yea hath God said: Ye shall not eat of any tree in the garden?» (Genesis 3:1). Here we see Satan casting doubt on God’s integrity, something he will develop during the conversation.
Now Eve commits her second mistake, she engages in a discussion with Satan, and answers «We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden: But of the fruit of the tree which [is] in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die», (Genesis 3:2-3).
What is Eva doing here? Not only does she engage in a conversation/discussion with Satan, but she also distorts God’s word. God said to Adam and Eve: «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», (Genesis 2:17). Eve adds: «neither shall ye touch it», and with this she makes herself even more vulnerable because she added something to God’s word. When we add or subtract something from God’s word, we put ourselves in a position that is very unfortunate for us. We equate ourselves with God.
What does God say about adding or subtracting? In Deuteronomy 4,2 God says through Moses: «Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish [ought] from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you», and in Revelation 22:18-19 God says through John: «For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and [from] the things which are written in this book».
Now Satan follows up with the first lie of history: «Ye shall not surely die», (Genesis 3:4), and with this Satan says that God is a liar, and that «… God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil», (Genesis 3:5).
These lies that Satan brought were something new to men. They had never heard a lie before, and we can imagine that Satan followed up by saying through the serpent something like this: “… behold, I am a serpent, and I have eaten of this fruit, and I can talk. Do other animals talk? … … there you see Eve; God does not want you to become like Him».
It was only after Eve had been seduced that she «saw that the tree was good for food…» (Genesis 3:6), she had not seen that before she discussed with the deceiver. Then she ate the fruit and brought fruit to Adam who also ate.
Had the people followed this special commandment, had they refrained from eating of this fruit, they would have chosen the good way, and then they would have walked on it. Instead of keeping the commandment God gave them, they broke this commandment, and then they actually said to God that we will not walk the good way you have recommended us! The result, as we know, was fateful.
In His love, God allows us to go the way we want to go; however, it is with sorrow in His heart that God looks at all the wrong choices we make. God knows that every time we go our own way it takes us further away from Him. But, He does not stop us, and this is what is so paradoxical about the free will we have been given. God has given us free will, and this is an eternal principle, we ourselves must choose to stop and turn around and find our way back to God’s ways, the ways we have removed ourselves from through disobedience to God’s commandments.
When Adam and Eve were confronted by God about what they had done, they actually blamed God for what had happened. Adam said: «The woman whom thou gavest to be with me …» (Genesis 3:12), and Eve said: «The serpent», by implication the one thou created, «beguiled me…», (Genesis 3:13). We see that from disobeying God they went a step further and blamed God for what had happened.
Shortly after this, when Cain and Abel, Adam, and Eve’s two first sons, had become old enough to bring their own sin offerings to God, we see that sin has developed to the extreme, and that within a generation. Cain kills his own brother.
After Cain killed his brother, he took one of his sisters with him and moved away from his parents. He settled in Nod, which lay east of Eden. There, Cain continued the rebellion against God and built the first city in history which was named after his son Enoch (Genesis 4:16-17). Why was building a city a rebellion against God? God told Adam and Eve that they should «be fruitful, and multiply and replenish the earth» (Genesis 1:28).
From this time on, people have always been divided into two groups, «the sons of God» (Genesis 6:2), those who do God’s will and «the daughters of men» those who do according to their own desires.
During creation, God also laid down the guidelines for how people should live together when He instituted marriage between a man and a woman. Lamech, Cain’s grandson, was the first to take two wives (Genesis 4:19). This was the beginning of polygamy. We see that within a few years sin had become widespread in scope, and if we move forward to Noah’s time we read that «God saw that the wickedness of man [was] great in the earth, and [that] every imagination of the thoughts of his heart [was] only evil continually», (Genesis 6,5).
For 1500 years sin had become so great that God had to stop mankind from completely destroying itself in its sins. But the rebellion against God was so deeply rooted in the people that it was not many years after the great flood that the people were again on the path of destruction, the path that leads away from God. But despite all the opposition to God, He is nevertheless both gracious and patient with us and does everything in His power – without breaking people’s free will – to bring them back to Himself.
God raises up Enoch and Noah.
Before we look at Enoch and Noah, let’s look at what God says through his word to Adam and Eve after they broke God’s law. What God does for us is to give us reminders through his servants the prophets. This is something He has done throughout history.
Already at creation, God gave humans his commandments and laws, and said, among other things, that they should not eat from the one tree in the middle of the garden (Genesis 2:16-17). If we turn the pages to the next chapter in the Bible, to Genesis 3:17, we see that God reprimands Adam because he had eaten from this very tree. In this verse we find a rather special sentence when God said to Adam: … because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife …
We do not know how long it was from creation until man rebelled against God, but surely they had walked with God long enough that they should know that they should obey God’s voice. Nevertheless, we read that Adam, instead of following God’s voice, followed his wife’s voice, and disregarded what God the Creator had said to them.
Since that fateful day, God has reminded people time after time that they must walk the way He tells them to walk. Our problem is that we think the road God asks us to walk is narrow, winding, and difficult to walk, and believe that we can choose to walk the road that looks like an autostrada, without turns, hills and which is wide and easy to walk. Actually, the way God asks us to go is the main road, while the one most of us prefer are the ancient paths. Here is what God says through the prophet Jeremiah: Because my people hath forgotten me, they have burned incense to vanity, and they have caused them to stumble in their ways [from] the ancient paths, to walk in paths, [in] a way not cast up, (Jeremiah 18:15).
Jeremiah continues to chastise and correct God’s people, and in chapter 31 verse 21 he says: Set thee up waymarks, make thee high heaps: set thine heart toward the highway, [even] the way [which] thou wentest: turn again, O virgin of Israel, turn again to these thy cities.
Why does God continue to chastise and direct his people through the prophets? There are two good reasons for that. First, God loves all people, absolutely everyone, and He does not want anyone to perish. Therefore He directs us. Second, God knows what is best for us. When God had created Adam and Eve, He said: 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. It was not to limit their freedom that God said this, but to protect them.
Those of us who have or have had small children know that we sometimes have to tell them what they are not allowed to do, for example, that they are not allowed to play outside in the streets where cars circulate. Our children will perceive this as a restriction, because they do not understand how dangerous it can be. In the worst case, they are run over and killed by a car. We as parents know that and therefore we want to protect our children. So also with God. He wanted to protect people from the consequences of breaking God’s commandments, which surely lead to death, because the wages of sin, as Paul says in Romans 6:23, is death.
Despite the fact that Adam and Eve had daily communion with the Creator, and could see Him face to face, and despite the fact that they should know that the Creator did everything possible for men, they chose not to go the way He said they should go. Instead, they chose to follow the path Satan led them down.
There is not much in the Bible about what happened in the years after the Fall and up to the Flood, but we have some brief reports. When Adam and Eve had their third son, Seth, it is written in Genesis 4:26: «And to Seth, to him also there was born a son; and he called his name Enos: then began men to call upon the name of the LORD». It was now that the group that we can call «the sons of God» began to call on the Lord’s name. We can assume that Seth and his descendants preached the gospel to the other group that had distanced themselves from God, those we can call «the daughters of men».
622 years after creation, Enoch was born. Not much is said about Enoch either, and everything that is written about him in the Bible can be summed up in one verse, «And Enoch walked with God after he begat Methuselah three hundred years, and begat sons and daughters», (Genesis 5:22). Enoch had a very special experience in his life together with his Creator, and he must have had a very special relationship with God. In Gospel Workers 1915 edition, Ellen G. White writes the following about Enoch:
After that he walked with God three hundred years. During those earlier years, Enoch had loved and feared God and had kept His commandments. After the birth of his first son, he reached a higher experience; he was drawn into closer relationship with God. As he saw the child’s love for its father, its simple trust in his protection; as he felt the deep yearning tenderness of his own heart for that first-born son, he learned a precious lesson of the wonderful love of God to man in the gift of His Son, and the confidence which the children of God may repose in their heavenly Father. The infinite, unfathomable love of God through Christ, became the subject of his meditations day and night. With all the fervour of his soul he sought to reveal that love to the people among whom he dwelt … // … Enoch’s walk with God was not in a trance or a vision, but in all the duties of his daily life. He did not become a hermit, shutting himself entirely from the world; for he had, in the world, a work to do for God. In the family and in his intercourse with men, as a husband and father, a friend, a citizen, he was the steadfast, unwavering servant of God … // … In the midst of a life of active labour, Enoch steadfastly maintained his communion with God. The greater and more pressing his labours, the more constant and earnest were his prayers. He continued to exclude himself at certain periods from all society. After remaining for a time among the people, labouring to benefit them by instruction and example, he would withdraw, to spend a season in solitude, hungering and thirsting for that divine knowledge which God alone can impart … // … Communing thus with God, Enoch came more and more to reflect the divine image. His face was radiant with a holy light, even the light that shineth in the face of Jesus. As he came forth from these divine communing, even the ungodly beheld with awe the impress of heaven upon his countenance … // … His faith waxed stronger, his love became more ardent, with the lapse of centuries. To him prayer was as the breath of the soul. He lived in the atmosphere of heaven … // … As the scenes of the future were opened to his view, Enoch became a preacher of righteousness, bearing God’s message to all who would hear the words of warning. In the land where Cain had sought to flee from the divine presence, the prophet of God made known the wonderful scenes that had passed before his vision. Behold, he declared, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of His saints, to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds. [Jude verses 14 and 15, (51.2 to 52.4)].
Still, the wicked would not listen to Enoch, and in the end God took him up to heaven without him seeing death. Sin continued to develop, until it came to a point where God said enough is enough.
Noah was born 1056 years after creation, and when he was 480 years old he received a mission from God, and the reason why he should do this: «… The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch. (Genesis 6,13-14).
It reportedly took 120 years to build the ark, and all the while Noah preached the message of salvation both with his work and by preaching. Noah said that a rainstorm would soon come, and the waters would kill all people except those who chose to turn to God and enter the ark with Noah and his family. But since it had never rained a single drop, they did not take notice of the warnings Noah gave. They considered him a fool and continued to live their evil lives where everything revolved around pleasure and exploiting others for their own wealth.
Part 2; The tower of Babel.
It appears in the story about Noah that he was the only righteous person on earth, and it is written in Genesis 6:8 that Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD. Along with Noah also went his wife, his three sons and their wives.
After the waters receded after the flood, Noah and his family got out of the ark, and all the animals they had were released. What they didn’t realize was that they had an invisible vice with them that also went with them through the flood. Anyway, the first thing Noah did was build an altar to the Lord and he offered a burnt offering of every clean bird, and every clean animal to God. Everything was now seemingly in balance with the Creator again.
Slowly but surely, life began to return to normal, and now the first children were born after the flood. Magog was one of Noah’s first grandchildren, and it is worth noting this name, because it is later used to describe the peoples who are enemies of God’s people in the end times. As there were more and more people, they began to settle inland and fulfilled what God had asked them to do.
Although we get a small insight into what happened between Noah and his sons (Genesis 9:18-29), it was only after Noah’s great-grandson, Nimrod, began to build cities that the invisible cargo that was on the ark became visible. Before the flood Noah and his family had lived side by side with the wicked and it must have made an impression on them all what they both saw and experienced before the flood came. Now opposition to God flourished again through Nimrod’s actions.
God said, as we know, that people should settle all over the earth, not in groups larger than a family. Nimrod said, «let us build ourselves cities» and in that way Nimrod became the foremost king on earth to rule over other people. The first city Nimrod built was Babel, then followed Erech, Accad and Calneh in the land of Shinar, and Nineveh, Rehoboth, Calah, and Resen in Assyria. A total of eight cities.
When Noah built altars and offered burnt offerings to God, God made a covenant with all living things on earth which God said that would never again destroy the earth with a flood of water. This was also opposed by Nimrod, and he built a tower in Babel that would reach all the way to heaven so that they could save themselves from the next flood (Genesis 11:4).
However, God did not allow this to be carried out, and we read further in Genesis 11:5: And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. This is the first indication of an investigative judgment. God comes down to earth to see what is going on and then to judge based on what is seen. It is not that God did not know what was going on in Babel, but it was to tell all other creatures in the entire universe that His judgment is righteous.
God’s judgment on the inhabitants of Babylon was that he confused their language and scattered them over the whole earth. Babel, later called Babylon, also means confusion (Genesis 11:6-9).
God calls Abraham.
After Nimrod began his rebellion against God by building at least eight cities, the rebellion continued to develop, and it now assumed more forms than before the flood. Sun worship became the leading religion in the world, and this religion they took with them as they settled all over the earth. And we still find sun worship on all continents to this day, even in the most remote places we find sun worship. Although it takes different forms, it is basically the same everywhere. The sun is worshiped as the giver of life. There is therefore every reason to believe that all religions started as monotheistic religions which gradually began to worship more and more Gods. We also see the same within the Catholic Church. They claim to worship God the Creator, but have absorbed about 11,700 saints, beatified and groups to whom one prays. From being monogamous, the Catholic Church has become highly polytheistic.
When sin had once again become great on earth, God chose to raise up a man who was to bring the gospel of salvation out to all peoples, tribes and nations. The choice fell on Abram, and it was probably not a coincidence. Abram, or Abraham, was born 1948 years after creation, and it is not inconceivable that Abraham knew Noah personally, because Noah died at 950 years old in 2006 years after creation, when Abraham was 58 years old.
It is implicit in the story of Abraham that he had a longing for something other more the gods his father worshipped. Abraham’s family lived in Ur of Chaldea, or Babylon. Many different gods were worshiped there, but none of them satisfied Abraham. It was common to have gods for everything between heaven and earth in Abraham’s time, but these were gods who could not help people with anything. Perhaps what Noah told about God had influenced Abraham, but he did not know where to find this invisible god that Noah had preached to him.
At some point, before Abraham was 75 years old, his father, Tarah, and his entire family, including Abraham, moved out of Ur in Chaldea and settled in Haran. When Abraham was 75 years old, God came to him in a dream and said: «… Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto a land that I will shew thee: And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed, (Genesis 12:1-3).
Abraham did not ask God why he should do this, but he took his wife Sarai, Sarah, and his nephew Lot with him. They gathered their belongings and their servants and set off towards the land God would show Abraham, without him fully knowing where it was. There is much to be learned from this. God called Abraham and told him to leave his own family and go to a place completely unknown to him. Abraham’s response to God’s call was to depart without objection. Abraham put himself completely in God’s hands.
How do we react when we receive a call from God? Many times we are dismissive and make excuses for not listening to God’s voice. Would we set out on a journey like Abraham did without knowing where we were going, and separate ourselves from our family?
Abraham obeyed God’s call, and God blessed Abraham in every imaginable way, and he even received a visit from heaven (Genesis 18), and Abraham knew that one of the three who came to visit was the Creator. There are many who do not want to accept that Jesus, who is the Creator, visited Abraham when he lived in Mamre, but if we read the conversation Abraham and the one person who visited him had, we see that this person is something more than just an angel as many claims this person is. In Genesis 18:17 we read: And the LORD said, Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do
If it had been an angel, the text would have been different, then it would not have begun with: And the LORD said. Then it would say, for example: thus saith the Lord! Furthermore, this person says: Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do. An angel cannot undertake this without telling that it is a message from God. In other words, this verse confirms that Abraham received a visit from God the Creator.
Why was Abraham chosen by God? The main reason why God called a man was that God wanted this man to start some kind of reformation. Almost the whole world had ended up where the world was in Noah’s time, and the apostasy was enormous – again. For this, God needed a person who was willing, obedient and who had the ability to carry out this mission. As we saw above, Abraham did not ask God why he should separate from his family and embark on what seemed to Abraham a random journey without a predetermined destination. Abraham took the task head on, and the knowledge of God the Creator began to spread over the land wh