A Woman's Heart Week 1/Day 1
The Empty Garden
Our first lesson is titled An Empty Garden where we find ourselves in the book of Genesis, the book of beginnings. This is where God first introduces His desire to meet personally with His children...in the Garden of Eden.
"They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. Then the Lord God called the man, and said to him, “Where are you?’" – Genesis 3:8-9
God’s desire from the very beginning was to meet personally and intimately with His children. Sin separated man from God, breaking personal communication, personal meetings between man and God.
As I read Genesis 3 again, this time for the purpose of this study, I read it from a different perspective. As I read verses 8 and 9 in Genesis, it hit me – God was going to meet with Adam and Eve. Although I knew this, it never hit me the way it did this time. I realized that this was a natural and normal event in the Garden of Eden....God meeting with them.
God must have frequently walked through the garden in the cool of the day to enjoy personal fellowship with Adam and Eve. I can’t begin to imagine what that must have been like.
Beth Moore’s goal through this study is to teach us the purpose of the tabernacle – a place for God to meet and dwell with His people.
We learn in Exodus 25:8, that God instructed the sons of Israel to build a tabernacle. "Let them construct a sanctuary for Me, that I may dwell among them." – Exodus 25:8
Just as in the beginning, the purpose of the tabernacle was to provide a place where, once again, God could meet with His people – and dwell among them. (Ex. 25:22; 29:42-43; 30:6,36) And in that, the tabernacle served as a 'foreshadow' of God's redemption plan...Jesus Christ.
Through the fall, the perfect fellowship was broken. But through Jesus, God has given us the gift of reconciliation with Him. Much like God covered Adam and Eve’s nakedness with the skin of animals (shedding of blood), God has covered our sin with the blood of Jesus, who died to cover our sin (2 Corinthians 5:18).
And, just as Beth shares in today's lesson...God still seeks our fellowship. He still values time with us. He still pursues us.
When God said "that I may dwell in their midst" (exodus 25:8), He used the word (ya'adh) that means to betroth, to give in marriage, to meet by agreement, to come together, permanently stay.
Beth writes: "God's glorious, incomprehensible desire to meet with humans is the cornerstone on which we will build over the next 10 weeks. What did God have in mind when He wanted to meet with man? The Hebrew word for meet is ya'adh,* meaning: to appoint, fix (a place or time), to 'betroth', give in marriage, to meet by agreement, come together.
*Covenant Essays, T. Hoogstein What a thought! God's 'meeting' with us is not merely to 'say hi', as in a passing fancy, to 'betroth', to come together as one...that we might be the Bride of Christ.
The Lord of lords, the King of Kings desires to take up permanent residence with us, to be in an intimate relationship with His people, you and me...meeting with His bride within the depths of their hearts, ministering to their souls, watering their thirsty spirits.
Whoa...
The depths of our hearts are made to be loved and to love our Heavenly Father, our Abba, Daddy. And His spirit searches ours, knows our inmost being...and still desires us. Deep inside of us is a place that only He can fill
"He has put eternity into man's heart.." (Ecc. 3:11). And when we seek Him - He promises to be found.
~ pastor m.
