Covenant With Creation | Genesis 2:15-3:24
Introduction
Promises are a funny thing. We have different ranges of promises, from, I promise I won’t tell anyone, all the way up to wedding vows. Some promises are small and a little silly, while others carry the weight of a lifelong commitment. But no matter how big or small the promise is, it means something because of the relationship behind it. And sometimes, even the smallest promise can stick with us for years… especially when it’s sealed with a pinky promise.
Now, if you don’t know my beautiful, wonderful, amazing wife Megan, she is the absolute best, the best person I know! Before I continue I just want everyone to know I did get permission to tell this story and ran this sermon by her just so we are all on the same page.
A very lovable quirk is that Megan has a lot of trouble staying awake during TV shows or movies. I found this out very early in our relationship, and it is really still something we are working through together now in our marriage. Well last year, Eli, Wyatt Kircher, Megan and I all started watching Severance together. Eli, Wyatt and I were all living together, and when Megan would come over, she would watch with us. So, we said, “Hey, let’s all try to watch together.” Of course, two episodes in, Megan falls asleep and misses the episode.
She tells us, “I will catch up on my own and be ready for episode 3 next time.”
Eli says, “You promise you won’t watch ahead?”
Megan says, “Yes, I will even PINKY PROMISE.”
A couple days later, I’m hanging out at Megan’s apartment, I turn on the TV and guess what pops up… Severance, episode FOUR!!!! I couldn’t believe this, I had to tell Eli and man since then their relationship just hasn’t been the same.
But here's what's interesting. It's a TV show. Nobody was in danger. And yet it still mattered. Why? Because the promise wasn't really about the show. It was about the pinky promise.
And notice what even little kids understand about a pinky promise. It isn't just information. It's not, here's what I'll probably do. It's a bond. Two people are now tied to each other, and we add a sign, the linked pinkies, because a plain, I promise, didn't feel like enough. We want to seal it.
Last week, we looked at People, Place, Purpose, and Presence. That showed us what life with God looks like. But we skipped over: what holds it all together? What orders the relationship between the King and his people?
The Bible has a word for it that we are going to talk about a lot today, and that is covenant.
The definition of a covenant is a binding relationship established by solemn promises and commitments. A contract tells you what you agreed to. A covenant binds you to a person. Marriage is a picture of that kind of relationship, but it doesn't define it.
Now, some of us might know the word covenant and think about it as a collection of disconnected Bible facts: the rainbow, Abraham, the Law, David's throne. And we tend to assume covenant is God's emergency backup plan, something he came up with after sin went wrong.
Sticking with our pinky promises… When was the pinky promise invented? Probably right after somebody got let down. We seal promises, because we're afraid they'll be broken. So, it's easy to assume God works the same way: he made a perfect world, we blew it, trust broke, and now he has to bind us with covenants to keep us in line. The Garden was the original plan, covenant is the repair work, and the whole Bible is God doing damage control.
But covenant is not God's backup plan. The shape of it is already in the Garden.
Today we're going to see three things: that covenant gives shape to life with God, covenant means trusting the King's word, and covenant carries the Story forward. So let’s go to our first point.
Covenant Gives Shape to Life with God
Genesis says:
The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "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."
Genesis 2:15-17 ESV
If we’re honest, when most of us hear this passage, we skip straight to the tree. The forbidden fruit. The one rule. That's where our eyes go, because that's where the action is. But I want us to slow down, because there's a whole garden sitting in these verses before we ever get to the tree. And last week, we already walked through it. We talked about People, Place, Presence and Purpose.
God's People. Humanity, made in his image. Genesis 1:28 says, “God blessed them.” Before God gives them a single instruction, he blesses them. And Psalm 8 looks back on this and says, “You have crowned him with glory and honor.”
God's Place. Verse 15 says, “The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden.” We can notice who's doing the action. Adam doesn't find the garden. He doesn't earn it or build it. God gives it.
God's Purpose. "To work it and keep it." And I love this one, because a lot of us assume work is part of the curse. Monday mornings, emails, traffic. But work existed before the curse. Vocation is a gift. God looked at humanity and said, "I want you to take part in what I'm doing."
And God's Presence. Genesis 3:8 gives us a glimpse of what ordinary life in the garden was like: the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day. God isn't distant. He is with us! Psalm 16:11 says, “In your presence there is fullness of joy.”
That's what Adam and Eve had.
So now we get to unpack, what holds all of that together?
Because People, Place, Purpose, and Presence is a beautiful picture. But a picture isn't a relationship. What makes this a life and not just a nice setting? Look at what God does in these verses. He doesn't just give those 4 Ps. He gives a relationship.
Verse 16 says, “The LORD God commanded the man.” God speaks, and humanity is invited to live in response to what he says. And he doesn't just hand out blessings. He calls them to trust him.
He Creates. Blesses. Speaks. Provides. Commissions. Dwells. That's a binding relationship, ordered by God’s word, built on his promises and his provision. This is exactly what we mean by covenant.
Then, we get to verse 16, where God says to Adam and Eve, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden.” Every tree. Before there is a single forbiddance of what to eat, there is an overwhelming yes.
Think about it like this. Imagine I invite you over to my house and say, "Make yourself at home. Eat anything in the fridge, use anything in the kitchen, sit anywhere you like, the whole house is yours. Just don't go in that one closet." Do you walk out saying, "That guy is so controlling?" Of course not. You'd say, “That guy Jack is such a wonderful awesome generous host!”
That is the picture in the garden. Adam and Eve are not placed in a garden of restrictions. They're placed in a garden of provision with one boundary. And I think we get this backward all the time. We read the command and assume God is withholding the good life. We think the rule is the thing standing between us and what we really want. But look at the text. God gives before he commands.
And the rest of Scripture backs this up. James 1 says:
Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights.
James 1:17 ESV
Psalm 84 says:
No good thing does he withhold from those who walk uprightly.
Psalm 84:11 ESV
And Paul in Romans 8:
He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?” That is the heart of the King who said "every tree."
Romans 8:32 ESV
And John says it plainly in 1 John 5, which we read a couple of weeks ago:
His commandments are not burdensome.
I John 5:3 ESV
God's command was not a restriction placed inside an otherwise good life. God's command was part of the good life. Say that to yourself the next time a command of God or an answer from him or direction from him feels hard. We can remind ourselves, the King who said, "eat of every tree," is the same King giving you the boundary. His word comes from the same generous heart that filled the garden.
The word covenant isn't used explicitly in Genesis 2, but the covenant-shaped relationship is already present. God takes the initiative. He provides. He gives humanity a vocation. He speaks a command with a consequence attached. And as the story unfolds, Adam's choice doesn't just affect Adam. It affects everyone.
It says in Hosea 6:
But like Adam they transgressed the covenant.
Hosea 6:7 ESV
And Paul sets Adam right next to Christ, in Romans 5:
For as by the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience the many will be made righteous.
Romans 5:19 ESV
When we hear the word covenant, we might picture contracts and fine print. But that's not the heart of it: Covenant is how God binds himself to people he loves.
This is a real relationship with a King who spoke, provided, and invited his people to trust him.
Look how good this relationship was. Genesis 1:31 says, “God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good.” Not fine. Not acceptable. Very good.
Genesis 2:25 says, “…the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.” Nothing to hide. No performing, no pretending, no wondering if you measure up. They were fully known and fully loved, by each other and by God. Nobody in that garden was afraid of his footsteps.
Think about the people in your life who know everything about you and still delight in you. That kind of safety is rare. And that is the life God made us for.
So, when we get to the sin and brokenness, I don't want us to forget what was broken. It's easy to let the broken covenant swallow up the beauty of the covenant that was there. Genesis 3 is heartbreaking, because Genesis 2 is so good. The deeper the bond, the deeper the ache. Before there was ever a broken covenant, there was a beautiful one.
Covenant tells us what life with God looks like: a garden of provision, a commission to work, a King who speaks and stays near. But it also tells us what that relationship requires. Not performance. Not perfection. Trust. Trust in the King's word.
And that's where we get our second point...
Covenant Means Trusting the King's Word
Let's go back to verse 17:
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.
Genesis 2:17 ESV
One boundary. And there is a serious consequence attached to it. God names death plainly here, and we're going to spend all of next week on what that means and what God does about it. For today, I want to ask a simpler question: why is that tree there at all?
If God is as generous as "every tree" says he is, why put a boundary in the garden? Here's what I think the tree is: a question made visible. And the question is this: will you trust God to define what is good, or will you decide that for yourself? Remember who we are in this Story. God is King. Creation is his Kingdom. And we are his image-bearers, his representatives. We were created to rule. But we were never created to be King.
Watch what happens when we continue into Genesis 3:
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?”
Genesis 3:1 ESV
Notice how the serpent opens. He doesn't start by saying “GO eat the fruit.” He starts with a question about God's goodness. "Did God actually say, 'You shall not eat of any tree in the garden?"
Did you catch what he did? God said "every tree," and the serpent says "any tree." He takes the biggest yes in the garden and turns it into a no. He takes generosity and changes it to scarcity. He wants Eve to look at the King and see someone who is withholding from her. That's the oldest trick in the book, but it still works. We don't usually doubt God's power. We doubt his goodness. We start to wonder if the boundary is really for us, or against us.
Then the serpent says,
"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."
Genesis 3:4,5 ESV
The funny thing is, they were already like God. Genesis 1:27 says they were made in his image. They already had a share in his rule. The serpent offers them what they already had, in the one way they were never meant to have it: deciding for themselves what is good and evil.
Eve looks at the tree. It's good for food. It's a delight to the eyes. It's desirable to make one wise. And she takes, and she eats, and she gives some to her husband who was right there with her. And he eats. Adam and Eve didn't just eat some fruit. They rejected the word of their King. They reached for the one thing that belongs to God alone.
That's covenant rebellion. And that's what makes covenant faithfulness so simple to define: it's trusting that God’s word is good, even when we can't see it from where we stand.
And watch what it does to everything we saw last week.
God's People. Verse 7 says, “…their eyes were opened,” and the first thing they see is their own shame. They sew fig leaves together. Then in verse 12, Adam looks at the woman and says to God, "The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree." Just a classic guy move right there, by the way. The one he called bone of his bone is now the one he blames. People fracture.
God's Place. Genesis 3:23 says, “…the LORD God sent them out from the garden.” We’ve talked about how devastating that was. The gift is lost.
God's Purpose. The work that was a gift in chapter 2, is now met with thorns and thistles and sweat in chapter 3. The same calling, but now it's a heavy lift.
And God's Presence. Remember how I said nobody in that garden was afraid of his footsteps? Verse 8 says, “… they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden,” and they hid. The King who walked among them to be with them is now someone they run from. And the garden is guarded from them returning.
People, Place, Purpose, Presence, all of it fractured, because of human sin, rebellion. What held it together was trust in the King's word. And this is why Genesis 3 is painful to listen to. It only hurts this much because Genesis 2 was that good.
But look at what God does next:
The LORD God called to the man and said to him, "Where are you?"
Genesis 3:9 ESV
God isn't hunting for someone to destroy. He's looking for the ones who hid. The first words after the fall are those of a searching God. And that changes the question we're asking. It's no longer just "what went wrong?" It's "what will God do?" Has humanity's rebellion ended God’s plans and purposes? Has he abandoned his People? His Place? His Purpose? His Presence? No.
And that is where the rest of the Story begins. And brings us to our third point.
Covenant Carries the Story Forward
Genesis 3 could have been the end of the Story. The Creator and King of everything gave humanity everything, and humanity reached for the one thing that wasn't theirs. If God were going to walk away, this is where we would expect it.
But thankfully, he doesn’t.
In Genesis 3, in the middle of the judgment, he makes a promise:
I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.
Genesis 3:15 ESV
Someone is coming. A Savior is coming.
Next, God himself steps in and covers them:
And the LORD God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skin and clothed them.
Genesis 3:21 ESV
They had sewn together fig leaves, but God is already acting. He is not finished with this relationship. And the rest of the Bible is the Story of how he keeps it.
Last week, Ryan talked about how many of us treat Eden like a flannel board. Full disclosure, I had to look that up. But the pieces go up, sin comes, and the pieces come down. Then Noah goes up, then Abraham, then Moses, then David, then Jesus. Scene after scene, and we never ask how they connect.
But the covenants aren't a series of random stories, and they aren't God trying one thing, watching it fail, and starting over. That is like us building IKEA furniture. We get to step nine, realize the panel in step three is on backward, and tear the whole thing apart to start over.
But for God, that is not the case, it is one Story, and what runs through all of it is a God who keeps choosing to be with his people in the same way, through a promise. God didn't have to relate to us this way. He is the King. He could have ruled by force and left it there. But again and again, he does something astonishing. He binds himself to us with his word.
Listen to the way he says it. To Abraham, in Genesis 17:
“…to be God to you and to your offspring after you.”
Genesis 17:7 ESV
To Israel, in Exodus 6:
I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God.
Exodus 6:7 ESV
In Leviticus 26:
I will walk among you and will be your God, and you shall be my people.
Leviticus 26:12 ESV
In Ezekiel 37:
My dwelling place shall be with them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Ezekiel 37:27 ESV
Same sentence, again and again. I will be your God, and you will be my people. This is God showing us that covenant is the means by which he remains committed to his people and advances his kingdom purposes, despite human rebellion
And God doesn't only say it. He seals it. After the flood, he sets a rainbow in the clouds and says in Genesis 9:
I will remember my covenant that is between me and you.
Genesis 9:15 ESV
Notice who is remembering. The sign is for us to see, but the promise is his to keep.
The writer of Hebrews looks back on this and says in Hebrews 6:18 that God made his promise with an oath so that “we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement…” A promise that depends on us is only as strong as we are. But a promise God makes depends on him.
Isaiah 54 says it like this:
For the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart from you, and my covenant of peace shall not be removed.
Isaiah 54:10 ESV
That is the beauty of covenant. God doesn't hold us at arm's length and issue orders. He draws near. He gives his word. He ties himself to his people, and he refuses to let go. And this is how his Kingdom comes. Think about how kingdoms usually advance. Through force. Through armies and conquest. But God's Kingdom comes through promises kept.
To Abraham, he promises a blessing that will reach every family on earth.
To Israel, he says in Exodus 19:6, "You shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation."
To David, he promises in 2 Samuel 7:13, a Son whose throne will last forever. Not a new set of rules from the outside, but God himself working on the inside. Each time, God isn't just announcing a plan. He is drawing his people closer to himself.
And then, on the night before he died, Jesus sits at a table with his friends, picks up a cup, and says in Luke 22:
This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood.
Luke 22:20 ESV
And just a few verses later, he says:
I assign to you, as my Father assigned to me, a kingdom.
Luke 22:29 ESV
How cool is that?! The covenant and the Kingdom are sitting at the same table. The covenants carry the purposes forward. Jesus fulfills them. Paul says in 2 Corinthians:
For all the promises of God find their Yes in him.
2 Corinthians 1:20 ESV
Every promise. Jesus isn't just the last stop on the map. He is where every promise has been heading. We will spend all of next week at the foot of that cup and what it cost. For today, I just want you to see that every road leads there.
One more thing… Covenant is not the center of the Bible. God is. His Kingdom is. Covenant is simply the way our King chooses to bring the Kingdom, by binding himself to his people in love.
So where is it all going?
Look at where the Bible ends:
Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.
Revelation 21:3 ESV
That is the same sentence God spoke to Abraham, to Israel, to a people in exile. At the end of the Bible, it is no longer a promise. It is a fact. And Revelation 22 adds one more line:
They will see his face and his name will be on their foreheads.
Revelations 22:4 ESV
The Bible ends where Genesis was always heading. Not with a King far away, but with a King who is with his people forever.
Last week we saw the Four Ps show us what. Covenant shows us how God carries those purposes through the Story.
Application
What do we do with this? Let me give you four things to take home.
First, we can stop treating God like fine print. A lot of us live as if our relationship with God is a contract: keep the rules, collect the benefits, and make sure nobody is cheating. But a contract tells you what you agreed to. A covenant binds you to a person. God didn't create us for a checklist. He created us for committed loyalty, a relationship held together by his promises and his word.
Second, when God's word feels heavy, go back to every tree. There will be moments when a command of God feels like a wall between you and what you want. Maybe it's how you handle your money, or a relationship, or forgiving someone who doesn't deserve it. In those moments, the serpent's question is waiting for you: "Did God really say?" And the real question underneath it is whether God is good. So go back to verse 16. The King who gave you the boundary is the King who said, "every tree." Psalm 119:68 says, "You are good and do good." Trust the one who gave before he commanded.
Third, read your Bible differently. Don't treat the stories and covenants like disconnected events. When you open your Bible, think, What is God preserving here? What is he promising here? And how is he moving his creation purposes forward? After his resurrection, Jesus walked with two disciples in Luke 24:27 and said "beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself." It was one Story the whole way through. With this perspective as we are reading, we can start to see the story unfold.
Finally, remember that your story is found within his Story. You are not a footnote. Galatians 3 says:
"If you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise."
Galatians 3:29 ESV
The promises God made to Abraham, to Israel, and to David had you and I in mind. We are not the center of the story but always have been a part of it!
Conclusion
I started this morning with a pinky promise. Megan, I love you, but I still can't believe it took just four episodes…
But think about what a pinky promise really is. It's a sincere commitment, made by a real person with real limits. We say, "I promise," and we mean it, and then life happens, and we can’t keep everything. Human promises are made with good intentions, but we can't see what's coming.
That is the story of Genesis 3. Humanity made a promise they couldn't keep, and the effects are felt throughout the whole Bible.
But God didn't walk away. His covenant faithfulness never depended on how well we held up our end. And notice something else. A pinky promise needs a sign, something to seal it. God gave his covenants signs too. To Noah, a rainbow stretched across the sky. And on the night he was betrayed, Jesus lifted a cup and said, "This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood." God didn't just make promises. He sealed them himself.
We made promises we couldn't keep. He made promises he always keeps. And he sealed them himself.
So let's remember where we've been. Covenant gives shape to life with God. In the garden, God gave before he commanded, and his command was part of the good life. Covenant means trusting the King's word. We were created to rule, but never to be King, and when we reached for what was his, everything fell apart. And the covenants carry the Story forward. Through Noah, Abraham, Israel, David, and the New Covenant, God carried his purposes toward Jesus, and in Jesus toward a new creation where his people dwell with him forever.
God created. Humanity rebelled. God remained faithful. Jesus fulfills. Creation is restored.
Covenant shows us how the faithful King carries those purposes forward, even through our rebellion, until Jesus brings them to fulfillment.
That is so cool! I’ve been thinking all week about how amazing it is that this is how our God chooses to accomplish his plans. He didn't have to bind himself to us. He could have ruled from a distance and left it there. Instead, he draws near, he gives his word, and he keeps every promise he makes. Even when we let go, he doesn't. And the story ends not with a King far away, but with a God who is with his people forever. That's the God we get to belong to!
But that leaves us with a question we cannot ignore. If covenant rebellion brings death and exile from God's presence, how can guilty people ever live with him again? How can covenant breakers live with a holy God?
That is where the Story takes us next week: sin, death, sacrifice, covering, and life.
For now, let's respond. We will not have communion this morning so let's take the next minute or so to write the next part of the story.
How would you summarize the sermon? What would you say about covenant?
You don’t need to use my version of these sentences, but here is my example for this section:
Covenant is how God binds himself to his people through his promises, calling us to trust his word. Humanity broke that trust, but God remained faithful. He fulfills his promises in Jesus and brings us toward the day when he will dwell with his people forever.
