Garden City

1.Comer makes much of the fact that the very first thing the Bible shows us about God is that he works. Why does it matter that God is, before anything else, a Worker and a Maker? How does that change how you think about work?

1.Comer explains that in the ancient Near East, a king would erect an 'image' (a statue) in a territory to represent his rule and presence there. How does this historical background reshape how you understand the phrase 'made in the image of God' in Genesis 1:26–28?

1.Comer draws attention to the Hebrew words used in Genesis 2 for Adam's work in the garden: 'abad' (to work or serve) and 'shamar' (to keep, guard, or protect). These are the same words later used for priestly work in the tabernacle. What does it mean that Adam's gardening was priestly — that ordinary work was always meant to be an act of worship?

1.Comer describes the fall not just as a moral failure but as a vocational failure — Adam and Eve abandoned their calling to rule and protect the garden by failing to guard it against the serpent. Does that framing change how you understand the gravity of what happened? Why or why not?

1.Comer draws a distinction between 'calling' (the broad human vocation to be an image-bearer) and 'vocation' (the specific shape that calling takes in your particular life). How does it help to separate these two ideas? How do they fit together?

1.Comer describes Jesus as the 'new Adam' — the one who succeeds where the first Adam failed, not just morally but vocationally. How does seeing Jesus as the model of true humanity and true image-bearing change how you read the Gospels?

1.The Bible begins in a garden and ends in a city. What does that trajectory — from garden to city — suggest about God's intention for human civilization and culture? Does it surprise you that the eternal state is described as a city?

1.Comer argues that the Western economy runs on manufactured discontent — the constant message that you don't have enough, aren't enough, and need to acquire more. Where do you feel that pressure most acutely in your own life?

1.Comer describes Sabbath as a protest — a weekly act of defiance against a culture that defines us by our productivity. Does Sabbath feel like protest to you, or does it feel more like deprivation? Why?

1.Comer invites readers to see all of life — work, rest, relationships, creativity — as a single integrated practice of following Jesus rather than a set of separate compartments. What would have to change in your daily or weekly routine for that integration to become real?

1.Looking back over the whole book, which chapter or idea had the greatest impact on you? What made it hit so hard — was it something new you learned, something you already knew but had never articulated, or something that challenged a belief you'd held for a long time?