COVENANT OF EDEN

For the LORD will comfort Zion, He will comfort all her waste places; He will make her wilderness like EDEN, and her desert like the garden of the LORD; joy and gladness will be found in it, thanksgiving and the voice of melody – Isaiah 51:3

God made a covenant with Adam and Eve before the fall. The articles of this covenant included His commands for them to: be fruitful, not sterile; increase by multiplication; replenish and subdue the earth; rule all His works; cultivate, preserve, and protect Eden’s garden; freely eat of all fruits; but refrain from eating of the tree of knowledge (Gen.1:28 – 2:17). These were the obligations of Adam and Eve to the covenant. The blessings and privileges were immense: joy, bliss, peace, a fruitful watered garden, nourishing rivers, vast resources, provisions, pleasures, serenity, and abiding divine presence.

This covenant was however conditional upon obedience: “But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shalt surely die” (Gen.2:17). Disobedience deleted the efficacy of the covenant, but Redemption through Christ restores all that was lost: “For if by one man's offense death reigned through the one, much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ” (Rom.5:17). Christ has redeemed us to reign in our restored gardens of Eden, with all the blessings therein!

Although the original Eden was lost to the horror of Sin, the Covenant Word says: “For the LORD will comfort Zion, He will comfort all her waste places; He will make her wilderness like EDEN, and her desert like the garden of the LORD; joy and gladness will be found in it, thanksgiving and the voice of melody” (Is.51:3). I believe that the LORD desires to restore unique “Edens” for each of His children at various levels of life – personal, family, home, neighbourhood, city, and nation.

The Father’s Loving Heart is for our supernatural satisfaction; a taste of heaven on earth. This Eden is a no-go zone to the devil and his hosts! It is never associated with barrenness, desolation, ruin, and waste: “So they will say, ‘This land that was desolate has become like the garden of EDEN; and the wasted, desolate, and ruined cities are now fortified and inhabited” (Eze.36:35). The Covenant of Eden cancels curses and the blights of Sin and Evil. It deletes desolation, waste, and ruins; and restores the joy, bliss, peace, and abundance of salvation and eternal life in Christ (Jh.10;10b).