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EDEN IN YOUR HEART! France, 24/4/81
--Part 6" of "The Garden of Eden!" DFO1174
1. WELL, PTL! TYJ! HERE WE ARE BACK IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN AGAIN! As the Music With Meaning Show sings, "Let's Get Back to the Garden", & that's what we're trying to do here. I don't mean back to the Garden just in the matter of nudity & innocence alone & beauty & tropical paradise, although that's what it's like, but what we're really trying to do here in this series of studies is bring the Garden of Eden into your heart.
2. WE'RE TRYING TO BRING PARADISE INTO YOUR HEART & mind & spirit & body, too. Because regardless of the strife-torn World & the confusion of this world, He says, "thou shalt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on Thee, because he trusteth in Thee" & "perfect love casts out all fear." (Is.26:3; 1Jn.4:18.) Therefore when you have the Prince of Peace in your heart, Jesus, you have peace of mind, heart, spirit, body & all!
3. THIS IS ONE REASON WE DECIDED TO NAME THIS SERIES "THE GARDEN OF EDEN." And our particular subject that we're studying in this series of little talks with you--they're not fireside chats, they're seaside chats--some of you who have seen some of the introductions may think they're girlside chats! Well, PTL! We believe in the beauties of God's creation, all of them, including the beauties of His crowning creation of all--the last & final & most beautiful creation--woman, Eve!
4. SO WHAT IS THE GARDEN OF EDEN WITHOUT A FEW EVES AROUND, HMM? I happen to be the only Adam in this one. Well, not exactly, we have some camera crew here too. But anyway, we're trying to bring you the Garden of Eden in atmosphere & especially in your own heart, through having the wonderful background, this beautiful creation of God as a background, & to bring you some beautiful music, almost angelic!
5. TO ME, THAT SOUTH SEA ISLAND MUSIC IS ALMOST THE NEXT THING TO HEAVEN! As I told you, Sol Hopi the inventor of the Hawaiian steel guitar, he used to sing like an angel & I used to think that he or I or both of us were going to float right up through the ceiling & go to heaven right then, it was so beautiful! To me, this is my idea of paradise! The beautiful South Sea tropical island, beautiful blue skies, fleecy white clouds, lovely graceful palm trees, beautiful flowers, whispering sea, & even the sea gulls have a rather haunting sound, an enchanting far away sound. Praise God!
6. SO GBY ALL, GLAD TO HAVE YOU BACK HERE TONIGHT!--And I'm glad to be back too. I like it down here, it's great, really nice, beautiful! This is one place I can finally unbutton my sweater & relax & I'm finally warm enough. TTL! In our Garden of Eden we not only have one sun we have four suns, (video lights) & I have two sons behind the camera & sound equipment besides. Praise God! GB'm all!
7. WELL, IT'S BEEN QUITE A REVELATION AS WELL IN OUR GARDEN OF EDEN. We figured that was a good theme for our lesson, since we're studying this last book of the Bible, called "The Revelation", so we've tried to give you quite a few revelations. And if you've seen all of our introductions, it's been quite a revelation, & I hope you enjoy them--beautiful! Nothing more lovely & revealing than the beauties of God's creation, PTL! Amen? Do you like it here? Well, great! Come back again sometime!--Next lesson, in fact!
8. WELL, WE'VE GIVEN YOU QUITE A FEW INTRODUCTORY LESSONS TO REVELATION, one Introduction & then one resume or Synopsis, bird's eye view of Revelation, & then we had one that I got off onto coconuts, so I called that one "Eden's Coconuts!" And then the next time I got off describing the Garden of Eden & Adam & Eve & how God made sex for you to enjoy, & so I have titled that "Eden's Sex!" Then we had such beautiful, beautiful lovely revelations here in the Garden, that the last chapter we called "Eden's Revelation!" So hallelujah! We're really getting down to the nitty-gritty now, right down below the heart & soul & into the very beginning of the text itself.
9. SO TO REFRESH YOUR MEMORY, & ONCE AGAIN LIKE THEY DO IN A CONTINUED STORY, you know, in the newspaper or wherever it is, they always give you one little paragraph to tell you what's gone before in case you missed it. We were outlining, resuming the whole Book of Revelation, which is a book about the whole history of the World from the time of John the Beloved Disciple, the Apostle who received this Revelation on the Isle of Patmos as an old man about 90 years of age, clear through to the very end of the history of man.
10. THE BOOK OF REVELATION LITERALLY COVERS A PERIOD OF 2,000 YEARS, FROM JOHN'S DAY TO THE VERY END, to the coming of Christ & even beyond that. It covers a period of 3,000 years 'cause it goes right on through the Millennium & the Battle of Gog & Magog into the final new World, New Earth & New Heaven on Earth in a beautiful, beautiful wonderful happy ending to this sometimes gruesome & troublesome period & story.
11. WELL, IT ALL BEGAN,AS THE FIRST PAGE SAYS HERE IN THE TITLE, "The Revelation", it says, "of St. John the Divine. "And then it turns right around & says in chapter one, "The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him, to show unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass; and He sent & signified it by His angel unto His servant John."
12. NOW THAT'S AN AMAZING FIRST VERSE INTRODUCTION because it does not say it is the Revelation of St.John, it says very plainly there it's the Revelation of Jesus Christ, Which God gave unto Him! It wasn't even Jesus Christ's own Revelation, God gave it to Him, "to show unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass. And Jesus sent & signified it by His angel unto his servant John."
13. SO THERE YOU HAVE FOUR STEPS IN THE PROCESS OF REVELATION: first it was God's, God was the One that knew all about what was going to happen. Only God could have foretold 3,000 years of history right to the very happy ending. In fact, not the ending, actually it's the beginning of Eternity! God first showed it to Jesus, then Jesus showed it to His angel, probably one of the archangels of God, such as Gabriel or Michael, & that angel brought it to John.
14. NOW THERE ARE FOUR CHANNELS OR SOURCES OF THIS REVELATION OF THE FUTURE, 3,000 years of future. One, God, then Jesus, then the angel, & not finally John, because John's telling it to us, & here I am tonight, John's telling it to me in his book here, so I'm the fifth in the line, & I'm telling it to you & you're the sixth, & I hope you'll tell it to somebody else, & that'll be a nice happy heavenly Biblical Scriptural Godly number seven!--Because we believe in witnessing, we believe in telling others about the Good News about the Bible.
15. AND BELIEVE IT OR NOT, ALTHOUGH THIS BOOK HAS A LOT OF BAD NEWS IN IT, it's gotta get worse before it can get better. So therefore we have to wade through all this horrible garbage of what man has done to the World & to mankind until we can come into the beautiful sunshine of the bright new dawn of God's day, the seventh thousand years of man's history--only this is going to be God's history & God's people & their history, PG?
16. ALL RIGHT, NOW LET'S GO BACK TO THE TEXT, SECOND VERSE. It says that John "bare record of the Word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, & of all things that he saw." John is telling you that he's telling you all the things that the Lord showed him. And now comes a blessing for you folks who are studying this Scripture with me, right now while you're reading this third verse you can claim it: "Blessed is he that readeth, & they that hear the Words of this prophecy, & keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand."
17. WITH EVERY PROMISE THERE HAVE TO BE SOME CONDITIONS. God makes promises, but His promises are contracts. He's the party of the first part, you're the party of the second part. He says, "I will do thus-&-so & such-&-such for you, providing"--provisions of the contract--"if you will do so-&-so for Me." And here He says He's going to bless you, if you read this and Hes going to bless you if you hear the words of this prophecy, providing you keep those things which are written therein.
18. YOU HAVE TO NOT ONLY HEAR, BUT YOU MUST OBEY & DO. Because God's Word says, "Be ye not only hearers of the Word, but doers also." And the thing He wants you to do the most is tell the good News you're hearing tonight, even if some of it's kind of bad news, it has a happy ending, TTL! You know, if we didn't have the darkness, we wouldnt appreciate the light. If we didnt have sickness, we wouldnt appreciate health. If we didnt have sometimes poverty, we wouldn't appreciate wealth, would we? And if we didnt have sin, we couldnt appreciate righteousness. And if we weren't lost, we couldn't possibly appreciate being saved.--So!
19. THIS IS WHY THE LORD HAD TO ALLOW SIN TO ENTER IN HERE TO THIS BEAUTIFUL TROPICAL PARADISE OF INNOCENCE, the Garden of Eden with the two most perfectly beautiful wonderful people in the world, Adam & Eve! Sometimes they're a bit maligned because they made a bad mistake, but youve made a lot of mistakes, too, haven't you? Adam & Eve were more perfect than you will ever be, until you get to Heaven, & I'm not too sure about even then.
20. EVEN SOME OF MY SPIRIT HELPERS MAKE A FEW MISTAKES ONCE IN AWHILE, or I don't always agree with them. We have little arguments, discussions, things they suggest I'm not always too keen about. I'll never forget one day in London when I was asleep, or virtually asleep in a sort of a trance & Abrahim my spirit helper was talking, my guardian angel. (See "Conversation With Abrahim!" No.1481.)
21. EVERYBODY HAS A GUARDIAN ANGEL, DID YOU KNOW THAT? And thank God, those of us who love the Lord & love Jesus, we have good guardian angels. I mean, they're really guardian angels. Some people have fiendish devilish angels who are anything but angelic--they're demons, evil spirits who cause them trouble & constantly annoy them & bother them, torment them, & they are tormented by these spirits because they do not have Christ in their hearts. They do not have faith in God & they are not obeying & following Jesus. They're not saved.
22. THEY DON'T HAVE THE PROTECTION OF GOD'S ANGELS, THEY JUST HAVE THE TORMENT OF THE DEVIL'S DEMONS! Sad, isn't it? But that's what happens when people reject the truth. When people reject the truth, God allows them to believe a lie, because what else is there to believe after they reject the truth?--Theres nothing left to believe but a lie! And when they reject Him & His good angels, then all they have left is the Devil & his demons!
23. THAT'S WHY PEOPLE SO OFTEN GO ASTRAY & OUT OF THEIR MINDS, become demoniacs, schizophrenics, all kinds of mental troubles & illnesses that science can't solve & doesn't understand because they refuse & reject the conception of a Spiritual World in which there are other personalities, both good & bad, affecting & influencing our lives.
24. ANYHOW, WE BELIEVE AND LOVE THE LORD & HAVE JESUS IN OUR HEARTS & ARE SAVED, meaning we trust Him for our salvation--not because we're good enough, but because we have accepted the gift of His salvation by grace, through faith, which is the gift of God, He says in Ephesians 2:8,9. "Not of works lest any man should boast, that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God."
25. ALL WE'VE DONE TO BE SAVED IS NOT TO BE SO GOOD OR SO RIGHTEOUS, because we were just as bad sinners as you, maybe worse! We just simply confessed that we were sinners & we didn't know how to overcome our sins. At the end of our rope, at wit's end corner, sometimes almost the end of our lives, we finally gave up trying to be good & trying to be righteous & trying to be saved, because we found it was a hopeless case, we just couldn't without the Lord. And then we just let Him in, & we let Him do it.
26.IF YOU LET JESUS INTO YOUR HEART, THEN HE'LL DO IT FOR YOU, HE'LL MAKE YOU GOOD. He'll help you to be good. He'll help you to do the things you should! As Saint Paul said, "The things that I would, I do not, & the things that I would not, that I do. O wretched man that I am! Who shall save me from the body of this death?" (Ro.7:19,24.) You know, because sin has entered into the World, right here in the Garden of Eden, the most perfect place in the World & the most beautiful surroundings, the most beautiful people, & although it was the most perfect conditions ever, sin entered in because of unbelief & disobedience.
27. WE HAVE THE MOST BEAUTIFUL SET-UP HERE TONIGHT, BUT SOME THING'S WRONG WITH IT. Something's wrong with the microphone, & so they're telling me by signals & signs & everything, "Please adjust the microphone!" So if you'll excuse me, here's the way we do it! Ha! I think one must be rubbing on the other one. If you want to see what the problem is, I'm wired for sound. What seems to be the problem? Have we got it now? Are you getting noise or something? OK? PTL! All right!
28. SEE HOW THE DEVIL FIGHTS THIS SHOW? He really fights this program, I'll tell you! We have more kinks & wrinkles & everything here & we have more little problems, & if he can't defeat you, he sure can annoy you. If he can't stop you, then he just slows you down. I think we got our problem cured, thank the Lord! We're supposed to get all these wrinkles ironed out when we first get started, but sometimes we don't find all the problems, & you find some little flaws.
29. JUST ABOUT THE TIME YOU THOUGHT YOU HAD IT MADE, just about the time you thought everything was perfect, "I've got the right job, & the right wife & wonderful kids, a beautiful home, nice car, everything is going fine!"--& then suddenly something goes wrong & you wonder why!
30. BECAUSE YOU LEFT OUT THE MOST IMPORTANT INGREDIENT OF HAPPINESS--GOD! His Holy Spirit of Love & His Son Jesus Christ, & you can't be happy without God! He has created your own heart & life with a vacancy, a hollowness, an emptiness, an aching void that only He can fill, because He created you, & He made you. He created you to love Him. You're His Creation, you're His child, He wants you.
31. HE HAS BEEN SO GOOD TO YOU & MADE YOU & MADE THIS BEAUTIFUL WORLD for you to live in with all these lovely beauties, & all this pleasure & all the satisfaction of the flesh--all made for you to enjoy by God Himself, not the Devil! The Devil is the author of confusion; he's not the author of genuine pleasure, genuine happiness, genuine fleshly satisfaction, even sex! God's the Author of it all! He made it for your pleasure & your enjoyment--the whole World & all its beauty & its beauties, & even sex!
32. BUT YOU'LL NEVER BE ABLE TO ENJOY IT TO THE FULL WITHOUT HIM, because He saved one spot in your heart, the very heart & core of your life, He saved for Himself, & if you don't fill it with Him & His love, & His Spirit of Love & His Son Jesus Christ, you'll always have that emptiness there & wonder, "What's wrong? I've got everything!--But still I'm not satisfied or happy!"
33. THERE ARE RICH PEOPLE WHO HAVE EVERYTHING & YET THEY'RE MISERABLE, & they're so miserable they've made themselves sick with worry & problems. "The rich man cannot sleep for the abundance of his riches", the great Solomon said. He aught to know, he was pretty rich. "Whereas", he said "the labouring man lieth down & his sleep is sweet." (Ecc.5:12.)
34. EVEN THE LABOURING MAN CAN BE HAPPIER THAN THE RICH, because the rich can't stop worrying about how to hang on to all the riches & how to get richer, quicker; whereas the poor labouring man hasn't got anything to worry about anyhow, except getting to his job on time & trying to survive & he doesn't have really as much to worry about, he has fewer things to worry about than the rich man.
35. THE RICH MAN HAS GREAT ABUNDANCE, great houses, lands, factories, bank accounts & all, so many things to worry about that he has a terrible responsibility & burden on his shoulders--including perhaps you as one of his employees! Many a rich man feels a great feeling of responsibility & obligation to his thousands of employees, or perhaps it's even a handful of employees, knowing that unless he succeeds, he won't have the money to pay them & feed them & take care of them & their families.
36. MANY RICH MEN ARE VERY CONSCIENTIOUS, BELIEVE IT OR NOT, not all rich people are evil. God didn't say riches were evil, He said that the rust of them would be held against you rich. "Oh, ye rich men, weep & howl, for the canker of thy gold & silver will be a testimony against you!" (Ja.5:3) What does that mean? The gold & silver you have put away instead of putting into use, the gold & silver you stockpile instead of putting in circulation, instead of sharing it with others who needed it, sharing more of it with your employees, sharing more with the poor, sharing more with your fellow man & fellow executives & workers.
37. "IF YOU WITHHOLD, IT WILL TEND TO POVERTY", but He said, "he that scattereth abroad it increaseth"! (Pr.11:24.) Think of that! I've found the more I give away, the more God gives me. I can't even give fast enough to make up for how fast God gives to us. But we keep putting it all right back into His service, producing more magazines & more books. Our magazine has grown from a little tiny four-page leaflet, until now it's 220 pages, & two other magazines besides, & we have just published a new, almost 800-page book besides many other books.
38. THE MORE WE INVEST IN GOD'S KINGDOM, the more we scatter abroad, the more we share with our various units around the World, the more we give to the missionaries, the more we invest in Music With Meaning, the more we invest in all these publications & missionary work & all of the things we're doing for mankind in 80 countries & 40 languages around the World with 40 million pieces of literature distributed every year, & preaching the Gospel to over 400 million people every year, no matter how much we give, we can never outgive God!
39. SO IT'S NOT JUST BEING RICH THAT GOD HOLDS AGAINST YOU, BUT HOW YOU USE YOUR RICHES--if you share them & feel an obligation to help the people that you support & who work for you & so on. And so it is. God gives, & He keeps giving & giving & giving. It doesn't matter how much you give, if you keep giving, even give till it hurts, God will give till it hurts, & He did when He gave His Son, Jesus Christ.
40. HIM HE GAVE UNTIL IT HURT, THE GREATEST HURT OF ALL, to see His Own Son dying on that cruel cross in agony & crying out, "God, Father, where art Thou? Why hast Thou forsaken Me?" Why did He have to forsake him? He had to forsake Him to let Him die as a sinner has to die, without God, & suffering the penalty of His sins & the worst part, the feeling of being forsaken by God!
41. WELL, YOU DON'T HAVE TO DIE LIKE THAT NOW, BECAUSE JESUS HAS DIED THAT WAY FOR YOU. Thank God, He didn't stay dead, & even while dead He visited the spirits in prison in the heart of the Earth & preached the Gospel to them, & I believe they got saved! Many people who are down there in Purgatory & places like that, called a prison, why would He have preached to them if there weren't hopes for them? I believe if any of them believed & received the message, they were saved, PG! Hallelujah?
42. SO THE LORD HAS GIVEN EVERYTHING HE CAN TO MAKE YOU HAPPY, but you'll never be happy unless you receive it. God gives it as a gift, but you have to stretch out your hand & take it in your hand. It's like His Word here. Here's the Bible, it has the truth, it's got everything in it that you need to know--about God, about creation, about where you came from, why you're here, where you're going & how to get there, how to be happy as well as how to be miserable. It's got the truth here, all truth, all you have to do is to reach out your hand like that & accept it as a gift like that, from God, His Word.
43. BUT IF YOU DON'T BELIEVE THIS BIBLE, THIS TRUTH OF GOD, WHAT IS THERE LEFT TO BELIEVE? Nothing but the lies of the Devil & the lies of science falsely so-called, pseudo-science. We were watching on video today how many scientific hoaxes have been perpetrated on the World, scientists who wanted to prove something, or they wanted to believe something, or they wanted to find out something, something they wanted to prove. So finally they just couldn't stand it & they faked it, like the Piltdown man & evolution, & all that baloney! I almost used a naughty word then. I'll try not to use it, but it is bullshit! It is! Worse!
44. EVEN BULLSHIT DOESN'T STINK AS BAD AS THE LIES OF SCIENCE FALSELY SO-CALLED, pseudo-science, of which St. Paul warned dear Timothy, "Beware of the lies of science falsely so-called!" (1Tim.6:20.) Because once you reject the truth of God about creation, about God, & about Jesus, & about happiness & the proper rules of life & living & love, there's nothing else to believe but lies & the Devil!
45. WHEN YOU'VE REJECTED GOD, YOU HAVE NO GOD LEFT BUT SATAN, like Adam & Eve in the Garden, sad to say, when they accepted Satan's lies & believed him instead of God & stole the forbidden fruit of the Tree of the knowledge of Good & Evil. Education, mind you, is what led man astray & has been leading him astray ever since--knowledge!--Of good & evil!
46. THEY HAD EVERYTHING A HEART COULD DESIRE! They were perfect! They were healthy! They lived in an absolutely perfect World with no curses, no poisonous reptiles, insects, ravenous beasts, nothing like that; there was peace between man & beast, they didn't kill & eat each other. Think of it! Perfect World--no sin, no war, plenty, only peace, & yet they weren't satisfied! They had to have knowledge, they thirsted to know more!
47. THEY KNEW ENOUGH ABOUT GOOD, REALLY, THAT'S ALL THEY DID KNOW WAS GOOD. But they were tempted by the Devil to know about evil! Hmm! "Wouldn't you like to hear some nice little juicy evil bit of gossip or some nice little juicy tale?" People have an inordinate affection, a terrible craving for the macabre,m sometimes--the wrong kind of people, evil people. It's a sort of an evil curiosity, that's what it was.--A fascination for evil!
48. AND WHEN SATAN TEMPTED THEM TO EAT OF THIS FORBIDDEN FRUIT of forbidden knowledge of evil, they made the mistake of believing him instead of God! They believed the Devil, Satan, instead of God's Word. And as a result, they took the fruit, ate it, & sure enough, immediately they began to realise what evil was, & the worst evil was, the first evil, they realised that they had committed evil, & that evil wasn't that attractive after all!
49. BEFORE THAT, IT WAS NO SIN, IT WAS NOT EVIL TO BE NAKED, totally nude, wandering around the Garden, they never heard of clothes! They never knew what clothes were! Never! And there was nothing evil about sex, they participated in sex many times before the Fall. That was the first commandment God gave them was to be fruitful & multiply, have sex! He made the sexual organs, He made the nerves that make it pleasant & enjoyable & ecstatic! He created the sexual orgasm for you to enjoy, long before the Fall of man, & they enjoyed it!
50. BUT ALL OF A SUDDEN, SUDDENLY THE DEVIL HAD PUT IN THEIR MINDS THAT IT WAS EVIL! Ah! I've been wondering where that came from all the time, the idea that sex was evil, & that nudity was evil. I wrote a long treatise just recently on "The Devil Hates Sex!"* Of course, I knew the Church got that idea from the Devil, because it's wrong, contrary to God's Word, but it appeared instantly in the Garden of Eden from the very beginning. Instantly he put in their minds that nudity was evil, & the sexual parts were evil, that sex was evil! A lie of the Devil! The knowledge of evil! *(See #999.)
51. AND RIGHT AWAY THEY TRIED TO COVER UP, & MAN'S BEEN TRYING TO COVER UP EVER SINCE, & his cover-ups are multitudinous! You do a lot of covering up, don't you? Do you always tell the truth? Don't you always try to present your best side & hide your worst? That's one reason a lot of people wear clothes, they're not all that all-fired pretty underneath! I know I'm not. I'm just a big old man, & I don't think men are really all that gorgeous, like women. maybe that's just my opinion because I'm a man.
52. DEAR MARIA OVER HERE SEEMS TO THINK I'M BEAUTIFUL! Now you can tell to look at me, I'm not beautiful! But she thinks so, because she loves me! And if you think I'm beautiful, it's probably because you love me, because love has that extra eye that sees beauty where others can't see it. My enemies look at my picture & they hate me! They look at me as some kind of an evil, devil, demon, guru monster that's trying to subvert all their children! So you see, it's all in how you look at things, whether it's good or bad.
53. ADAM & EVE HAD BEEN LOOKING AT EACH OTHER FOR GOD KNOWS HOW LONG!--A long time! We're not told how long. We're only told how long that Adam lived until he had a son, & we're not even told that Cain's his first son, for that matter. But anyhow, they had been looking at each other's nudity & sexual parts, totally exposed & unclothed for a long time & been enjoying sex & never thought of it as being bad or evil before!
54. BUT WHEN THEY TOOK OF THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE TREE OF GOOD & EVIL, SUDDENLY THEY THOUGHT NUDITY WAS BAD! The Devil put the thought in their minds that sex was evil, & it was wrong to show the sexual parts! I don't think they're all that beautiful, they're functional. Sexual parts were not made for adornment, I would say, except perhaps a woman's bosoms. Almost every part of a woman is beautiful. Maybe you women think us men are beautiful. I'm sure God must have thought Adam even was beautiful because He made him, so I'll just have to grant you that maybe to you, men are beautiful, but to us men, women are beautiful. But PTL!
55. ALL WAS BEAUTIFUL THEN UNTIL SATAN PUT IN THEIR MINDS THROUGH EATING THAT KNOWLEDGE OF EVIL, fruit of evil, that sex was evil, nudity was bad, they should quickly start covering up! And what was the first thing God said to them when He came? First of all He said, "Adam, where art thou?" Usually Adam came out there & met Him in the evening & they walked together in the cool of the evening. God walked with man in the form of a man, Jehovah: Jesus Christ was there & walked with Adam in the Garden, think of that!
56. AND ADAM & EVE SAID, "WELL, WE WENT & HID OURSELVES BECAUSE WE FOUND WE WERE NAKED." And right away, God knew--of course He'd already known--He said, "Hast thou eaten of the tree which I forbade thee to eat, the knowledge of Good & Evil?" They had gone & hidden themselves & tried to clothe themselves. God right away knew that they had this evil thought that nudity was evil & that sex was bad, because that's what the Devil gave them to think. Well, that's the way sin entered in: Thinking sex & nudity evil!
57. THE GREATEST SIN WAS NOT JUST EVEN EATING OF THE FRUIT OF THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOOD & EVIL, the greatest sin was not believing God, rejecting His truth & believing the Devil's lie & obeying the Devil instead of God! And then sin entered in & they became conscious of their nudity as being something wrong & sex as being evil, all thoughts put in their hearts by the Devil's lies!
58. BECAUSE IN GOD'S SIGHT NEITHER NUDITY NOR SEX WERE EVIL & the first man & the first woman were created stark naked & I'm sure went at the sex immediately when they saw each other & how beautiful they were! They had that desire, & there was nothing wrong with it at all, in fact God commanded it! It wasn't until the Devil's lies entered into their hearts did they think that nudity was wrong & sex was evil!
59. BUT THE DEVIL HAS BEEN PROMULGATING THAT LIE EVER SINCE, that it's wrong to be naked & sex is something evil, dirty, vile! How horrible! How terrible to so twist the truth of God into a lie! And yet, you know, in a way it was good. You notice I've been quoting this Scripture time & again, "The Tree of the knowledge of Good & Evil". Because until they knew what evil was & how bad it was, although they had nothing but good, & they saw nothing but good, & they thought nothing but good, & everything was good, & they were good, & nothing was bad & nothing was evil, they didn't know it! They couldn't appreciate it.
60. HOW COULD THEY TELL IT WAS GOOD IF THEY'D NEVER SEEN ANYTHING BAD? How could they tell it was righteous or good, if they'd never seen any evil? How could you tell anyone was beautiful if you'd never seen anyone ugly? Huh? In order to truly have the knowledge of good & appreciate it, & really appreciate it as being good, God permitted them--He didn't force them to, He let them make their free choice--but He let the Enemy test & tempt them & offer them the knowledge of evil!
61. WHEN EVIL ENTERED IN, GOD ALLOWED IT, TO SHOW THEM THE GOOD THAT THEY HAD LOST! Because you'll never miss the blessing until the blessing is gone. You'll never know how good it was to be strong & well until you're sick in bed, right? You never know what it is to be poor, unless you've been rich, & you'll never know what it is to be rich unless you've been poor. See, you just can't appreciate light unless you've been in darkness, & God had to allow evil to enter in, in order to help us to appreciate good. That's why it was the tree of the knowledge of good & evil.
62. IT'S NOT THIS TREE I'M SITTING UNDER HERE RIGHT NOW, don't misunderstand me. But it's the Tree of knowledge that I'm building for you right now, I'm comparing the good & the evil & trying to show you which is which so you'll know the difference & be able to choose between them. And God's Word says, "Choose the good"--(taps Bible)--"and eschew the evil." (1Pe.3:11.)
63. IF YOU FILL YOUR HEART WITH GOD'S GOOD TRUTH, ALL THESE GOODIES HERE, YOU WON'T WANT THE DEVIL'S EVIL LIES, you won't believe them, because you know the truth, thank God! That's what God has given us, the truth, & that's what He's given us in this Book we're starting to study here, about 3,000 years of history, 2,000 years already past, another 1,000 years to come, & then all Eternity, here in the Garden of Eden.
64. TO ME, THE BIBLE IS LIKE A GARDEN OF EDEN--it's so beautiful, with such beautiful flowers of truth, & green plants of growth of the knowledge of good. It's so beautiful with the Tree of Life here, by these living waters of His Word that give you everlasting eternal life & happiness! God's Word to me is like a Garden of Eden! It's beautiful, it's perfect, it's good, it's all beautiful!
65. OH, THERE ARE A FEW UGLY THINGS IN HERE THAT HE HAS TO TELL about the Devil & about man's sins & of all the troubles it has caused, sad to say. But without that you wouldn't appreciate how good it is. Without a few storms here, even in the Tropics, you wouldn't even appreciate how beautiful it is here & how nice it is to have it nice & calm & peaceful, like today here as you've seen.
66. LIFE WITHOUT ITS STORMS, YOU WOULDN'T APPRECIATE THE TIMES OF THE CALM & THE PEACE. I remember in the William Tell Overture, I used to love to listen to that, it's so beautiful! There's the coming rumbling of the storm, & then it breaks loose in all its fury!--Then finally it wanes & there comes that beautiful calm after the storm. You didn't really appreciate it as much before the storm, it was calm then, but I'll tell you, after you went through that terrible storm of that terribly raucous music, you appreciated the nice calm afterwards!
67. KIND OF LIKE THIS ROCK MUSIC, YOU KNOW? It's like the guy that was beating his head against the wall in the insane asylum & they asked him why he did it. He said, "It feels so good when it stops!" So, you don't really appreciate it until it stops. You don't appreciate how bad this rock music is until it stops, then you're so thankful!
68. YOU WOULDN'T APPRECIATE THE CALM & PEACE OF THIS LIFE UNTIL AFTER THE STORM; that's when you really appreciate it. You know when you appreciate your health the most, is after you've been sick, right?--Then how you appreciate it! Oh, & you never appreciate a little bit of necessary funds as much as when you've been flat broke, & then the money come & then you're so thankful! But God allows that, He allows the bad or the evil to show you you never had it so good, & to be more thankful for when things are good & when things go good, & when you have God--the Good of all goods--& you'll never be happy without that good in your heart--God's good!
69. --THE GOOD GOD, THE LOVING GOD, THE KIND GOD, THE MERCIFUL GOD, Who, if you'll just receive His Son Jesus Christ in your heart, He'll forgive all your sins! He'll come into your heart & fill your life with love & happiness & joy & blessing & fruitfulness & satisfaction & sense of fulfillment & accomplishment, of being good to others & of accomplishing something good in this World by the helping others. Only when you love God & thy neighbour as thyself will you ever find that kind of good, & that kind of happiness, because that good is only found in the food God & His Son Jesus Christ!
70. HAVE YOU FOUND HIM? HAS HE FOUND YOU? Oh, yes, He has, He's knocking at your heart's door right now as I'm speaking, asking to come in, & all you have to do is open the door & let Him in. All come in, & all you have to do is pray with me & say: "Jesus, please come into my heart. I believe You're the Son of God. I believe You died for me. Please forgive me of my sins & come into my heart, Lord Jesus."
71. (SINGS:) "INTO MY HEART, INTO MY HEART, COME INTO MY HEART LORD JESUS! Come in today, come in to stay, come into my heart, Lord Jesus!" Hallelujah! TYJ! PTL! Help them to believe, Lord, help them to receive You right now, Your gift of love & salvation & mercy, in Jesus Christ, that they may have Thy Garden of Eden in their hearts. They may not live in a Garden of Eden outside today, but they can have Eden in their hearts, Lord, through Thy love, Thy mercy, Thy forgiveness, through Thee, Jesus, in Jesus' name, amen. PTL?
72. DID YOU INVITE HIM IN? IF SO, HE'S IN YOUR HEART NOW, HE PROMISED! If you'd open the door, He said, "He said, "I will come in!" In this very book we're going to come across that very verse, think of that, marvellous verse on salvation! He said, "Behold, I stand at the door & knock: If any man will open the door, I will come in!" (Rev.3:20.) He was knocking when I was speaking to you, wasn't He? You felt Him knocking wanting to come in, & you wanted Him to come in, & you opened the door just by wanting Him to come in!
73. AND IF YOU PRAYED & ASKED HIM TO COME IN, HE CAME IN, & He's going to fill your heart & life with love & He's going to make you love everybody & want to tell everybody about His love, about Jesus, & how happy He has made you since you've let Him come into that empty heart & fill it with Himself & His love, for Himself & for others, to bring the Garden of Eden into your heart & into the lives of others.
74. YOU CAN BRING EDEN INTO EVERY HEART THAT WILL RECEIVE JESUS IF YOU'LL TELL THEM ABOUT HIM, & if they'll ask Him in! Isn't that wonderful? Would you like to live in this Garden of Eden? Well, you can, just by letting Jesus into your heart. He'll bring the Garden of Eden into your heart, which is the best of all, because I might have to leave this Garden of Eden here, a hurricane might come & wash me away, who knows? Or there may be war, or there may be this or that.
75. BUT NOT EVEN THE DEVIL CAN EVER TAKE THAT GARDEN OF EDEN OUT OF YOUR HEART, Jesus in your heart, faith, love, happiness in your heart. We have Heaven in our hearts! We don't even have to be in Heaven yet, we have a little bit of Heaven right here, right now, in our hearts, PTL? Hallelujah! TYJ for the Heaven in our hearts!
76. (SINGS:) "HEAVEN IS HERE, IS HERE RIGHT NOW! Heaven is here & I'll tell you how! Jesus to know is Heaven here below! Heaven is here, is here & now!" I'll bet that woke up some folks here in the camp, huh! Ha! Maybe it woke up all the neighbours, I hope not! Hope it's not too late you're showing this picture there in your camp, or your Home, or wherever, because I'm apt to get inspired & burst forth in song & wake everybody up!
77. I WANT TO WAKE YOU UP!--FOR JESUS! I want to wake you up to the horror of the life you're living in sin & all that ugliness & evil & misery & sickness & all the rest, & tell you there's a better place. There's a Garden of Eden! Hallelujah! TYJ! (Sings:) "Let's get back to the Garden! Let's get back to the Garden! Let's get back to the Garden of Love!" I don't know the song, but you can hear it on our MWM tapes. But it's something like that anyway. I wish we had it to play you tonight, right now, but we'll play it for you another time, OK? PTL! GBY! WLY!
78. WE HOPE YOU'LL GET BACK TO THE GARDEN, & maybe you've never been there, so we hope you'll just get to the Garden! And most of all, we hope you'll get the Garden in your heart! "In the Garden of My Heart." (Sings:)
"In the cool of the day, He walks with me.
In the rose-bordered way, He walks with me.
In holy communion, we have such sweet reunion,
In the Garden of my heart!"
PTL? Hallelujah! I haven't thought of that old song for years! Ha! Hallelujah! PTL! Well, the Lord brings them back to me every once in awhile. Don't be surprised what I burst out with!
79. YOU KNOW, I USED TO BE A SINGER, I used to earn my living singing, & when I got into this kind of work, preaching the Gospel, I thought I'd never sing again. It looked like I was just writing & all alone & never had anybody to sing to but my wife, dear Maria, & she goes about the house singing so sweetly, she doesn't even know that she's singing, she's so happy, & it cheers my heart too.
80. I THOUGH I'D NEVER HAVE A CHANCE TO SING PUBLICLY AGAIN, but all of a sudden, here I am! I intended to make just a nice little Bible study for you, the Book of Revelation on Bible Prophecy--deep & very important heavy truths from the Word! I never dreamed I'd burst out into song & sing you old songs that I haven't sung for years & though I'd forgotten! But you see, the Holy Spirit is faithful, He's been programming this commuter--computer! Ha! Computer too, ha! Were strangers & pilgrims here, thats for sure!--Commuters, perpetual commuters on this Earth. Heaven's our home!
81. BUT HE'S BEEN PROGRAMMING THIS LITTLE COMPUTER HERE FOR A GOOD MANY YEARS with all kinds of things including those songs, & every now & the I guess when His Spirit wants one to pop out & pass it on to you, He just presses the button in my heart, & out comes the song & you get the read-out! Ha! Ha! Or the sing-out! PTL! Hallelujah! GBY all! Thanks for coming! We'll see you again next lesson in the Garden of Eden, another revelation! Bye-bye! God bless & keep you in Jesus' name & make you a blessing! Amen.
82. (Comments after video is over:) I GOT THROUGH THE FIRST THREE VERSES, HOPE YOU'RE HAPPY ABOUT THAT! (Maria: Yes, Honey!) I don't know why I kept having to get into all this theology about sin & the Garden of Eden, Adam & Eve, sex, & all the rest. It must be needed! Because after all, it is basic theology. Obviously the Lord thinks it's more important for them to know about salvation than it is about the future. I think the future's important & for our Family, but apparently He's somehow going to use this as an evangelistic things & it's more important for people to know about what happened in the Garden of Eden, sin, & good & evil & salvation & all the rest, & why it happened!
83. THAT THOUGHT NEVER STRUCK ME SO BEFORE!--They didn't think sex was bad or nudity was evil until the knowledge of evil entered in, the Devil's own lies, so therefore that's another proof--I wish I had used that in that Letter--that it's a lie of the Devil! It's part of the knowledge of evil that came into man's heart, that nudity was bad & we should hide & sex was evil!
84. IT'S A BASIC TEACHING OF THE DEVIL FROM THE VERY BEGINNING & almost the first thing he showed'm! Think of that!--That nudity was bad & sex was evil!--Attacking at the very root of the creation of God, because without nudity you've got no sex, & without sex you've got no children, & he was trying to cut man off right there at the start! Isn't that something?--How about you?
NOTES & QUESTIONS:
Copyright (c) 1998 by The Family
