God saw that it was "Good"

 In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth. And He saw that they were "good." And then He created the Garden of Eden, and He put Adam and Eve in the middle of it. And that too, He called "good." God Himself walked in the Garden, enjoying the sights and sounds of his creation, as well as the company of his first man and woman. And it was good, at least until something went terribly wrong. 

And so we have a question here. What does this word "tov," which we translate as "good," really mean in its original language, in this case, Hebrew? It can be translated in a number of related ways:

1. Functioning properly 

2. Aesthetically pleasing 

3. Well organized 

4. Useful for a purpose 

5. Morally good 

But, rather than pick one, let us say that the Garden of Eden was an archetype of ALL of these "good" values. It had everything that human beings could imagine that they need to live well. They had clean air, sweet water, edible plants, companion animals, a desirable mate, a relationship with God, and eternal life. Indeed, Adam and Eve had no reason to ever think about leaving this place. And as long as they continued to live in parallel, by will and thought and action, with God's hopes for them, they never would have to leave. The Garden of Eden was, among the other meanings, useful for a purpose. It was the perfect place for humans to learn to love, trust and obey God, until they could be elevated to heavenly status.

But Adam and  Eve imagined that the one thing they were forbidden might offer them access to great thoughts that God was not sharing with them. They had been told not to eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. And one of God's angels, who did not agree that humans could be worthy of God's plan to bring them into Heaven, decided to tempt them to disobey. So that tree's fruit appeared beautiful to their eyes, and it seemed likely to taste sweet upon their tongues. The "angel" suggested that its secrets might make them as great as God Himself. So, they listened to the Betrayer, and sought the forbidden knowledge, so that they might become their own authority. Thus, when they diverged onto their own path, they parted ways with God, and learned that they had to leave the Garden. 

And once they had left Eden, they discovered that they were not sufficient to sustain their own lives, and they were going to die. They found that they had to labor for their food, which was now less dependable and less nutritious than what they had known before. Plus, the animals no longer trusted them, and stayed away from them. Nor could they trust even each other, as blame and pride and jealousy divided their willingness to share and cooperate, and to live together in peace. 

But the one lack that they noticed above all others was the absence of an intimate relationship with God, and they did not know how to mend the rift that that loss had left behind in their lives. Indeed, it was the loss of God's continual presence that was causing the sense of endless longing, which was slowly causing them to die. They were, by the exercise of their own wills, outside of God's willing them to live. 

Part Two:

So, we all agree that God is good, by a priori definition, because we, as creatures, measure goodness by the standard that God reveals to us. But perhaps we may dare to ask, how does God measure what He decides is good? Is "good" an absolute kind of Being-in-Itself, or is it simply whatever God feels like He wants it to be, just because He gets to define it to suit Himself? Does God refer to a clear and specific, standard definition that states what kind of thing, in what kind of relations, is to be the measure of "good" by which everything else must be judged, including his own divine behavior? Or does He and, by default, do we have to merely observe how He speaks and behaves and declare: God said it, God did it, therefore it must be "good," no matter how strange, or even possibly repulsive, it may be? 

I believe that the Bible, as God's Word, gives us the answer to this question. Indeed, once we have received his Holy Spirit into our hearts, we will know, by our consciences, that there is an objective standard, by which we must judge our own thoughts and actions. You will object, not everyone will agree on what their consciences say is right and just. But that is because we are still sinful, fallen creatures living in a fallen world. Our minds have not been fully regenerated, nor shall they be in this life, although we can try to clear our hearts of selfishness and fill our minds with God's Word, so that we can better reflect his image and likeness. Such is the life mission for which we are created, to be as a lens or mirror through which the world can see the Presence of God with us. The world as it is now, including the materials of which we are made, obscure and defile our ability to reflect God. But God knows that, and He knows how to fix it, to clean and polish and purify us, when we have passed through this world. And then we shall see clearly, and not as through a glass darkly, what He wants us to see. We will see God's righteousness. 

Where does this "righteousness," this good standard come from? Jesus told us this, so that we could try to apply it, even in our fallen state. No other religion has the Golden Rule. "Do unto others what you would have them to do unto you." It is the rule of loving each other with the compassion of knowing how they will feel in response to your action as it affects them. This is not merely theoretical, but a lived experience of being a Trinity, a Triune God. It is difficult for us, but its vistas expand far and wide for God, applying not only to us but also to the lesser creatures, so that they too may not be made to suffer unnecessarily. As three divine persons in continuous intimate relationship with each other, intimately affected by every thought and every decision, every plan made and action done by either or both of the other two persons with whom One shares the Infinite introspection and projection of compassion and love, by which the entire Cosmos of the Heavens and the material worlds were created, God knows how to consider the feelings of another person before He acts. He knows what is pleasing to each other, and what is sorrowful, or even offensive, to them. 

And still, He can be impulsive, especially in his judgment of what He finds provocatively offensive in the contemptuous actions of his creatures. That is what happened when the first peoples chose to ignore Him, and decided to define their own morality after their own understanding of good and evil. Their iniquity so offended God, All Three of Him, that He decided to wipe them off from the Earth, all but a chosen few, and start over again. The result was the Great Flood that drowned the entire world, and wiped out the first beginnings of civilization. There are a half dozen stories about this around the world, which suggests that maybe Noah was not the only nearly righteous person God could find, but they were truly few and far between. And the new beginnings elsewhere didn't fare much better than the one which remembered the story we now keep. 

But despite his impulsive capacities, God does not act capriciously. God has a standard for an objective measure of what He should consider to be good. When the flood was over, and the devastation was assessed, God knew that it was not good. The Bible records that God repented what He had done. It was not all humanity, and certainly not all of his creatures, that was wrong. They had been declared good when they were created. So God reconsidered what He had done, and promised that He would never do that again. The rainbow in the sky, after it rains, is the sign of his promise to forbear in his anger and judgment. It will last until He can bear our insolence no longer, at which point, He will make everything new, to make the final outcome something of a better kind - all cleansed of the contamination and contagion of the Fall. 

Part Three: 

But in the meantime, we here on Earth continue to try God's patience. We disregard his Word in the Bible, and act like we don't care that He is calling us to an eternity where we will be blessed. John the Baptist proclaimed to all who would listen that God was giving us one more chance to change our hearts and follow the right path. He told us to repent our willful defining of whatever we thought should be good or evil, according to our own understanding. God's patience was not going to last forever. He said that we should "flee from the wrath to come." And some believed. So that when Jesus came to be baptized, John pointed him out. "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world." And some heard, and followed Him. 

And so Jesus taught them about what the Father had decided would be the eternal standard of what is "good" so that they could be saved. And when He was done preaching, He himself became the sacrifice to bridge the awesome gap between humanity and God, so that those who believed in Him would be reprieved from the curse of sin, and they would not die like Adam and Eve who were cast from the Garden. And his disciples told as many people as they could, and wrote the Gospels so that we can hear the story even today, and know what is good.

But the Day of the Lord, and his judgment is still coming. Our civilization is growing ever more prideful, assuming for ourselves that we know what is good, and what is evil. And our ways are not God's ways, nor are our thoughts like His thoughts. We take pride in behaviors that He has called abominations, and declare our freedoms to be more important than the respect for life. Even when God sends us warnings in the form of diseases that assault those who are too proud to accept reproof, we deny that it has any relation to our lack of morality or humility. And so, the day when God's forbearance ends will inevitably arrive, and we refuse to expect it.

When that second calamity arrives, those who do what is offensive to God, and mock his attempts to call them to repentance shall be destroyed, as well as all of their works that propose to defy Him and his plans. We cannot achieve by pride what He plans to do for us. But God will still have mercy for those who have placed their trust in Him. He will save as many as have believed in his Son. It will not be just an indiscriminate incineration of every last sinful being, of every nasty thing, everywhere on the Earth. He will rescue everyone who has listened to Him and responded with faith, who loves Him and each other as He requested to the best of their capabilities. And for those whom He chooses, He will create a brand new starry Heavens and a clean new Earth, for us to begin a new life. And there, we shall find it possible to know and do what is right. We will no longer be constrained by a fallen nature, and we can be truly loving with each other.

And then God will have what He wanted all along, a species of sentient beings, humans, to know and love Him, to be the reflection of his image and likeness, to carry his Presence within them wherever they go in their world. And we will have eternal life, sharing the Garden of Eden with God, and all of his creatures, in the full knowledge that we are blessed, and called according to God's purpose in Heaven ... even so far as to be called to rise to the Heavens and take our place among the angels.