Show Don't Tell: Genesis 2:8-14

Instead of saying "God planted a garden in Eden," walk your congregation through the gates. Smell it first—the impossible perfume of a thousand varieties of flower, fruit ripening on every branch, soil so rich it's almost sweet. This isn't a garden in the backyard sense; it's a paradise engineered for pleasure. Trees designed to delight the eye before they ever feed the body. A river so abundant it splits into four and waters entire civilizations. Feel the cool mist on your skin. Hear water tumbling over stones worn smooth by a current that has flowed since the foundation of the world. See gold glinting in riverbeds—gold that no human has yet learned to covet. And there, in the center, two trees unlike all others: one offering life without end, the other offering knowledge at an unspeakable price.