• LESSON 2 (January 11) • Perfect Fellowship Interrupted  *  Think for a few moments about the nature and purpose of veils. You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone.” Isn’t that the truth in many aspects of life? Only once we’ve lost someone or something do we come to truly appreciate what was once “perfect” and uninterrupted. Pre-Genesis 3 is a picture of perfect fellowship with God. • What is a veil? • List some examples of when veils are used? • Perhaps most significant, why are veils used? Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” (Gen 

-28) Genesis 1:31 beautifully summarizes, “God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good.” • Mankind in relation to God? “Very good.” • Mankind in relation to each other? “Very good.” • Mankind in relation to other aspects of Creation? “Very good.” • God’s call for mankind to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it? “Very good.” Genesis 2 provides even greater detail. And the LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground the LORD God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. (Gen 2:8-9) Can you imagine how perfect a garden planted by God himself would be? Genesis 2:10-14 mentions bountiful God-provided water for the nourishment of the garden. “The gold of that land was good; bdellium and onyx stone are there” (Gen 2:12). Above all, the tree of life was in the midst of this God-planted garden. The one “not good” thing mentioned was the idea of the man being alone (Gen 2:18). So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. And the rib that the LORD God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed. (Gen 2:21-25) That last statement is absolutely key. Everything that God has made and done is very good. Mankind has been enabled to enjoy fellowship with God and relationship with each other that has the potential to be very good. There is no reason to hide. There is no reason to fear. There is no reason to be insecure. There is no reason whatsoever for shame. God had provided only one prohibition. “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, 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 shall surely die.” (Gen 2:16-17)Pre-Genesis 3 life is perfect.Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” (Gen 3:1-2)The woman correctly responds to the serpent by quoting the prohibition of God. She understands what her Creator has prescribed and prohibited.But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” (Gen 3:4-5)In that moment, Eve has a choice. Adam has a choice

150118 Altars of the Patriarchsone

A Study of the Tabernacle, the Temple, and the Transforming Glory of the Lord. [Inancient times the chosen race prepared Jehovah’s dwelling place.The people feared the voice of Him who dwelt between the cherubim.But once a year their priest would hail Almighty God beyond the veil.“Behold your King!” That shameful cry was echoed back as “Crucify!” The blood was shed that could atone,the Lamb that was Jehovah’s own.That darkest hour, His last exhale, fulfilled God’s plan and tore the veil.Now we, Jehovah’s ransomed race,may enter His Most Holy Place.By faith our prayers ascend to Him who reigns among the seraphim. We boldly bow, and thus prevail, with God who dwells beyond the veil.