There is a famous scene in a well-known movie that makes me scream every time I see it. I don’t scream out loud, but inside I’m yelling, “No!!!” The movie is Ben Hur, and the scene is when Ben Hur’s sister leans her hand on a loose tile on the roof of the Hur house. Gravity then takes over, and the tiles fall upon the Roman governor, who was riding on a horse below. That one tiny act—an almost meaningless shift in weight on a roof tile—triggered a cascade of suffering. The result? Chaos and unending misery for the Hur household.
And so, it is with life. Seemingly minor incidents can lead to massive consequences, like a single match igniting a gas-filled house. Strike it, and everything explodes into a thousand pieces.
That’s what happened in Eden.
Every time I read the account of Adam and Eve’s sin in Genesis, I’m internally crying out, “No!!!” Just one bite. One act of disobedience. But it was the ultimate opening of a can of worms—an act that set off the most destructive chain reaction in human history. Every single thread of human suffering begins in that moment. Every cancer diagnosis. Every grave dug. Every child crying in pain. Every lie, theft, act of hatred, adultery, broken marriage, hurricane, tornado, famine, suicide, and war. Every lonely night. Every fear. Every funeral. Every tear. They all trace back to a single, terrible moment.
“What was lost in Eden will be restored by Christ. Because of what Jesus did on the cross, the curse will someday be reversed.”
We can only imagine what Adam and Eve had—and what they lost. Picture a life without aging, death, sorrow, or fear of tomorrow. No curse on creation, no venomous snakes or poisonous weeds, no predators tearing each other apart. No pain, no partings, no goodbyes, no dread of disease or disasters. Instead of God’s wrath looming over humanity like a dark and threatening storm cloud, we would have basked in the warmth of His smiling face, like the sun shining at full strength. It would have been joy unspeakable and pleasures forevermore.
They had Heaven. And their one sin brought Hell to Earth.
But this isn’t just wistful dreaming. If that were the case, we’d only have a tragic story from ancient history. But the Christian doesn’t just look back—we look ahead. We’re not mourning a lost paradise as much as longing for the one soon to come. Jesus taught us to pray, “Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10). What was lost in Eden will be restored by Christ. Because of what Jesus did on the cross, the curse will someday be reversed.
And while we’re imagining what the world will be like then, here’s an amazing truth: We were created in the image of God, and one of those unique traits is imagination. But God Himself doesn’t “imagine.” Why? Because He already knows everything. He doesn’t formulate ideas because He doesn’t need to figure anything out.
“Known to God from eternity are all His works.” (Acts 15:18)
God never has to guess, learn, or be surprised. He doesn’t dream or discover. He is not in process. He is perfect in knowledge.
And strangely enough, this truth offers us deep comfort. It’s precisely because God cannot do certain things that we can completely trust Him. One of the most glorious impossibilities is this:
“…it is impossible for God to lie…” (Hebrews 6:18)
This means that when He makes a promise, it is rock solid. It’s not imagination, hope, or guesswork. It’s a promise. And when He says that the kingdom is coming, that He will wipe away every tear, that there will be no more death, sorrow, crying, or pain—it’s not a maybe. It’s a guarantee. We stake our eternity on it.
Speaking of guarantees, let me tell you about my son Daniel.
Daniel has three children, one wife, and 25 chickens. My wife, Sue, and I have 27, but that’s beside the point. We both regularly renew our flocks with baby chicks. One of Daniel’s newly bought chicks had some unique markings and quickly became his favorite. But one day, the little bird vanished. He searched everywhere. Nothing. It was gone.
Five days later, he heard a faint chirping. He searched again—still nothing. Two days later, he opened the lid to the food tray and saw a few feathers. To his dismay, the chick had apparently crawled in and died there. But then—another faint chirp. It was alive. He scooped it up, gave it water and food, bathed it, and within hours, it was running around.
Later, Daniel did some research and found that an eight-week-old chick typically can’t survive without water for more than 24 hours. This one lasted seven days. It was, by all natural laws, impossible. But there it was—alive.
That chick was immobilized in food, hopeless and unseen. That was us: dead in sin, helpless. But God saw us. And His hand reached in—not to simply restore us but to resurrect us, to give us eternal life. What a Savior.
So, the next time you find yourself silently screaming over Eden, remember this: Jesus didn’t come just to fix what was broken. He came to make all things new.
And that is not imagination. That’s a promise.
