Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Welcome to the Ready for Eternity
podcast, a podcast and blog dedicated to
inquisitive Bible students exploring
biblical truths that might not be fully
explored in typical
sermons or Bible studies.
(00:20):
My name is Eddie Lawrence.
The story you're about to hear is a
fictional retelling based
on the true biblical story.
It imagines what could have
happened behind the scenes.
You know, there's something to be said
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for watching the story
unfold from the beginning.
Most folks only hear about what happened
in that garden second hand, but there was
someone there who saw it all.
Someone who understood
what was really at stake.
He watched them from the shadows, these
curious creatures that had been shaped
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from dust and breath.
They were fragile things, so utterly
unaware of the forces
swirling around them.
The morning light caught the dew on their
skin as they moved through the garden,
and he had to admit they were beautiful,
beautiful and doomed.
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The one called Adam bent to examine a
flower, touching it like it might break.
Such care in those mortal hands, such
reverence for the smallest of creations.
Behind him, the one called Eve laughed at
something, a butterfly perhaps, or the
way the light danced through the leaves.
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The sound carried across the garden like
silver bells, pure and unburdened by the
weight of knowledge.
Now, here's what most people don't
understand about what happened next.
Those too knew nothing of what lay beyond
the garden's borders, nothing of the
vastness of creation that stretched
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beyond their simple paradise.
They knew little of the other beings, the
ones who had served faithfully since the
first word was spoken into existence.
The ones who had sung as stars came into
being, who had watched galaxies spiral to
life, who had stood at the right hand of
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the Almighty through all of creation.
And yet here they were, these creatures
of clay and breath, given dominion over
all of it, not the immortal spirits, not
the beings who understood
the true scope of divine power.
Them, these children who could barely
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comprehend the garden they wandered
through, let alone the
infinite expanse beyond.
The watcher felt a stirring of what he
would later come to
recognize as disappointment.
Maybe the Creator would see how unsuited
they were for such responsibility.
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One needed only to observe them for a few
moments to understand their limitations.
They ate when hungry, slept when tired,
marveled at simple things
like flowers and streams.
Where was the wisdom
needed to govern creation?
Where was the strength
to bear such a burden?
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He and his companions had discussed this.
They had wondered whether this was the
Almighty's way of teaching them patience.
Perhaps he meant for them to guide these
mortals, to be their counsellors in the
great work of stewardship.
But the more he watched, the more he saw
how completely the humans
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had been given this honor.
They named the animals with an authority
that came directly from above.
They tended the garden with hands that
carried divine blessing.
They walked in the cool of the evening
and spoke with their Creator
as partners, not as servants.
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As partners, the thought burned in him
like a coal pressed
against his very essence.
This pair of two-legged animals, barely
conscious of their own existence, were
treated as companions while the immortal
beings remained what they had always
been, servants, messengers, guardians.
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Beautiful perhaps in their purpose, but
servants nonetheless.
He began to move closer to them day by
day, not close enough to be seen, but
close enough to listen,
close enough to learn.
The one called Eve was
particularly fascinating.
She asked questions, so many questions.
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She wondered about the world beyond the
garden, about the tree that stood in the
center of their domain, about the nature
of the light that
came from their Creator.
Questions.
When had he last asked a question?
But she questioned everything, and in her
questions he began to see
the seed of possibility.
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She was not content
with simple existence.
She wanted to understand, to know, to
become more than she was.
In this, at least, humans were like them.
Eve looked at the tree in the center of
the garden with curious eyes.
She circled it sometimes, careful not to
touch, but clearly fascinated by the one
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thing that had been forbidden to them.
He watched her watching it, and he began
to understand what needed to be done.
It would be so simple, really.
A few words, carefully chosen, a
suggestion planted at the right moment.
He would be open in their eyes.
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He would be giving them the chance to
make their own choices about the gift
they had been given, or perhaps he would
be revealing what he suspected was true,
that they weren't ready
for such responsibility.
Either way, the
Creator would see the truth.
The morning came when she stood alone by
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the tree, her hand
almost touching the bark.
Almost but not quite.
The war in her expression was clear,
curiosity battling with obedience, desire
wrestling with duty.
The time had come.
He took a form that would not frighten
her, something beautiful and wise that
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belonged in the garden.
He spoke to her of knowledge, of
understanding, of the divine nature that
waited just beyond her reach.
She told her truths for the most part,
that the fruit would open her eyes, that
she would indeed become like the Creator,
knowing good and evil.
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He was careful to ensure
certain truths remained unspoken.
She listened.
She considered.
She reached out her hand, and in that
moment watching her fingers close around
the forbidden fruit, he felt
something he had not expected.
Not triumph, but a strange hollowness.
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She was so trusting, so eager to grow
beyond her limitations.
It was so easy, but it
was too late for regret.
She ate, gave to her
husband, and he ate as well.
And their eyes were
opened, just as promised.
They saw themselves clearly for the first
time, naked, vulnerable, mortal.
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And they saw him coming
in the cool of the evening.
And they hid.
The confrontation that followed was swift
and terrible, questions asked and
answered, guilt acknowledged and
consequences pronounced.
They would leave the garden, would face
hardship and pain and death.
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The earth would resist them.
Their bodies would fail them for lack of
access to the tree of life.
Their children would know suffering.
The Watcher observed it all from the
shadows, expecting to feel vindicated.
Here they had made their choice, and look
how it ended, with
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failure and consequences.
Surely now the Creator would see the
wisdom in giving dominion to those who
understood responsibility.
Instead divine attention turned toward
the place where he hid, and he felt the
weight of that gaze
like a physical thing.
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Come forth, came the voice, carrying no
anger, only a sadness that
cut through him like a blade.
He emerged from the shadows, taking his
true form once more.
Around him the garden seemed to dim, as
if the light itself
recoiled from his presence.
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"You have done this
thing," the Creator said.
It was not a question.
"I have shown you the truth," he replied,
surprised by how small his voice sounded
in the vast space of the garden.
"I have revealed what I knew you would
see, that they made their
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choice, and look how it ended.
They chose knowledge over obedience,
their own will over yours.
Give the dominion to us, as it should
have been from the beginning."
The silence that followed seemed to
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stretch forever, and in that silence he
felt the first stirring of something that
might have been fear.
"You think this was only about them?"
the Creator said finally.
"You think this was about their choice?
What else could it have been?"
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"This was about all of
you," the voice continued.
"About the choice each of you would make
when faced with my design.
About whether you would choose love or
pride, service or dominion.
About whether you would trust my wisdom
or your own understanding."
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The words hit like physical blows.
He saw it then, the real test, the real
choice, not theirs, but his.
Not their worthiness, but his willingness
to accept what he could not understand.
"They will learn," the Creator said,
looking toward the place where Adam and
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Eve had hidden themselves.
"They will grow.
They will become more
than they are now, not less.
Their mortality will teach
them to value each moment.
Their suffering will
teach them compassion.
Their separation from me will teach them
to reach for something
greater than themselves."
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"And what of us?"
he asked, though he
already knew the answer.
"You have chosen," came the simple reply.
"You have chosen to see them as rivals,
rather than as children to be protected.
You have chosen to see their gifts as
theft, rather than as grace.
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You have chosen to see my love as
favouritism, rather than as the natural
overflow of a heart that
contains room for all."
He wanted to argue, to
protest, to demand justice.
But he found he had no words.
The hollow feeling in his chest had
spread, consuming everything he had
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thought he knew about
himself and his purpose.
"You cannot stay here," the Creator said,
and there was grief in that voice.
"You cannot remain in the place of peace
when you have chosen the path of war.
You cannot serve love
when you have chosen pride."
And so it was decided.
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The choice had been made.
The path was set, which would eventually
see war break out in
heaven and him cast out.
Eventually when the
time came, he would fall.
Not cast down in anger,
but released in sorrow.
But he would not fall alone.
Others who had shared his thoughts, his
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resentments, his certainty that they knew
better, they would fall with him.
They would find themselves in the deep
places of the world that would be Adam
and Ebe's inheritance.
From there they watched as the humans
took their first steps
beyond the garden's borders.
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They saw them learn to work the stubborn
earth, to birth children in
pain, to grow old and die.
They saw them fail again and again, but
they also saw some of
them learn, grow, love, hope,
sacrifice for one another.
They saw a few of them become more than
they had been in the garden, not less.
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And that's when the real fury began.
The fallen one watched as these pathetic
two-legged animals, these beings of dust
who had ruined everything, somehow kept
getting back up, kept
trying, kept hoping.
Even after they'd proven themselves
failures, even after they'd lost
paradise, they acted like they still
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mattered, like they still had some claim
to the creator's attention.
Regardless, they did still have his
attention, his love,
his plan for redemption.
The rage that grew in the darkness was
unlike anything he'd felt before.
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It wasn't the cool disappointment of the
garden anymore, it was
hot, consuming, relentless.
They didn't deserve
what they'd been given.
They didn't deserve the second chances,
the patience, the love that kept reaching
down to them even after
they'd thrown it all away.
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And he, he had chosen to see only what
they were, not what they could become.
He had chosen to see only his own
deserved place, not the larger story of
which they were all apart.
Now in the darkness he
remembers the garden.
He remembers the moment when everything
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changed, when the innocent questions of a
curious woman became the catalyst for
humanity's greatest
tragedy and his greatest mistake.
He remembers and the understanding only
makes the hatred burn hotter.
He was the one who fell
first and fell farthest.
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He was the one who taught them to doubt,
giving them the very thing
that would make them grow.
He was the one who prevented their access
to the tree of life, resulting in death,
never understanding that
mortality would teach them to live.
He was the one who
believed he knew better.
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He was the one who started the story that
he thought would end with their
destruction, but which became instead the
greatest tale of redemption ever told.
You want to know who's
been telling you this story?
Who was there to see it all unfold?
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I am the serpent in the garden and I hate
every moment of what that means.
You know what's the final insult?
You don't even know my real name.
Oh, you think you do.
You've got your traditions, your guesses,
your legends passed down through the
ages, but my enemy made sure my true name
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was never written in his holy books.
Just the serpent, the adversary, the
accuser, like I'm some nameless force of
nature instead of who I really was.
I had a name once, a beautiful name
spoken with love in the time before time.
Now it's been scrubbed from the record,
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erased from the story,
forgotten by everyone except me.
Even that was taken from me.
My very identity reduced to my function,
my rebellion, my failure.
So when you tell this story, when you
think about what happened in that garden,
remember that the one who changed
everything, who set it all in motion, who
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gave humanity its first taste of
knowledge and death and
the long road to redemption.
He doesn't even get to
be remembered by name.
I know how this ends.
My defeat is certain.
My doom is sealed, but I'm still here.
And every one of you that I drag with me,
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every heart I twist, every image of him
that I corrupt, it wounds him.
And wounding him is all I have left.
Thanks for listening to the podcast.
We hope this episode has deepened your
understanding of scripture.
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For more biblical studies, visit our
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That's the word "ready," the number four,
and the word "eternity."
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That's all for now.
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Keep studying your Bible, growing closer
to God, and getting ready for eternity.
See you next time.