🌳“When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate.”
In 2012, after Hurricane Sandy swept across the East Coast, teams from the U.S. Forest Service surveyed forests along the Atlantic shoreline. What they found was unsettling. Hundreds of trees—red maples and Atlantic white cedars—were still standing tall. Their trunks were firm. Their branches full. Their bark looked healthy.
But every one of them was dead.
Saltwater from the storm surge had seeped deep into the soil. The trees absorbed it slowly. Salt doesn’t kill a tree immediately. From the outside, everything can look fine. But inside—at the root level—the tree loses its ability to take in life. Within weeks, entire “ghost forests” stretched across parts of New Jersey and New York. The researchers called them zombie trees—standing, but lifeless.
When you read Genesis 3, think of those trees.
Eve didn’t reach for the fruit because it looked dangerous. Scripture says it looked good. Nourishing. Desirable. Harmless. Just like those “zombie” trees appeared strong long after their roots were poisoned. The serpent’s question—“Did God really say?”—slipped in quietly, like salt into the soil.
Adam and Eve were still standing. Still walking. Still talking. But something inside them had begun to wither.
Genesis 3 reminds us that not everything that looks alive is healthy—and not everything God warns us against looks harmful at first. Some things destroy slowly, from the roots up.
Yet the story doesn’t end in a ghost forest. The God who walked into the garden still walks toward us. And through Christ, He restores what sin has drained and brings life back to dead roots.
Reflection: Where do you see the effects of the Fall most clearly—in the world around you or in your own heart—and how does God’s promise of redemption speak hope into that brokenness today?
EVENING—Loss of Life
Focal Passage: Genesis 3:22-24
🌳 “So He drove the man out; and at the east of the garden of Eden He stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword which turned every direction to guard the way to the tree of life.”
After sin entered the world, God did something both sobering and merciful. He closed the way back to the tree of life. Cherubim were stationed at the entrance to Eden, and a flaming sword guarded the path. Humanity was no longer free to return and eat from the tree that gives life.
This was not cruelty. It was protection. To eat from the tree of life in a fallen state would have meant living forever in brokenness, corruption, and separation from God. Eden was lost, but God refused to let death have the final word. The guarded gate was not the end of hope; it was the beginning of redemption.
In the morning we saw how sin poisons quietly, like saltwater seeping into the roots of a tree that still looks alive. By evening, the damage is fully revealed. Adam and Eve are alive, but no longer whole. Still breathing, but cut off from the source of life. What looked harmless has now brought separation.
Yet even here, grace is present. God does not abandon His creation. He clothes Adam and Eve. He promises a coming Deliverer. And He begins the long work of restoration that will one day reopen the way to life. Scripture later tells us that access to the tree of life is restored through Christ, who bore judgment so that life could be given again.
The guarded tree reminds us that life cannot be taken on our terms. Life must be received on God’s terms. And tonight, we are reminded that every boundary God sets is ultimately meant to protect life, not withhold it.
Reflection: Where have you mistaken God’s boundaries for restriction, rather than recognizing them as protection meant to preserve life?
Closing Prayer: Father, help me trust Your heart even when I don’t fully understand Your ways. Thank You for protecting me from what would harm me and for working redemption where I see loss. Teach me to rest in Your mercy and to hope in the life You promise through Christ. Amen.
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