Human beings were created primarily for intimacy with God. That God created man to share a common essence with Him bears out this truth. Heart to heart communion between God and mankind is both the basic and ultimate purpose of life. God enjoyed His companionship with humanity when He had uninhibited fellowship with Adam and Eve prior to their rebellion against Him. That state of affairs between Him and Adam and Eve before the Fall is God’s eternal plan.
    God did not create human beings to be independent and aloof from Him. By having spoken to Himself when it was time to make man, God demonstrated His intention for His presence to be man’s  natural habitat. The garden where God placed Adam and Eve is ‘Eden’—-a term that means delight or pleasure. Interestingly, the Bible, in Psalm 16:11, says, “You will show me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of joy; At Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” Think about it. Man was designed to know the path of life only as God Himself reveals it to him. Life in the truest sense of the word is unattainable without God’s active presence. No wonder Jesus said: “… “Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner.” (Jn 5:19). Remember, His expressed purpose of having come to the world was: “…that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance (to the full, till it overflows) (Jn 10:10 AMP). Yet, without revelation knowledge from the Father through the HolySpirit, Jesus could not bring life to anyone or anything. However, because He courted the Father’s presence by consistent communion with the Father, His experience, as He stated it, was: “For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does; and He will show Him greater works than these, that you may marvel. (Jn 5:20). The result was: “For as the Father raises the dead and gives life to them, even so the Son gives life to whom He will.” (Jn 5:21). Furthermore, the verse under consideration—(Ps 16:11)—says, “…In Your presence is fullness of joy; At Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” Note the emphatic connection of ‘fullness of joy’ to ‘Your presence’ and a decidedly similar arrangement between ‘pleasures’ and ‘Your right hand’. With a careful observation of what I have said above, you will discover that both God’s ‘presence’ and His ‘right hand’ refer to the same thing—the active display of His availability. On the other hand, you will also notice that a life full of joy and pleasures, as God intends the quality of life to be, is found only in the place of intimacy with God. From the foregoing texts of  Scripture, we can see that ‘Eden’ was a circomlocution for God’s presence. The garden of Eden was actually the garden of His presence or glory.
    So much does God cherish intimacy with mankind that, the moment Adam and Eve fell, He kick started His plan of redemption in order to restore human beings to their original place of intimacy with Him. God expressed His  planned redemptive programme in these words: “And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, And you shall bruise His heel.”” (Gen 3:15). The Seed of the woman was Jesus. God was willing to become a Seed in the womb of a woman and be born a human baby just to restore man’s access to His intimate presence. What a quality of love! The advent of Jesus on earth as a man, living in the day-to-day circumstances of humanity, was the highest expression of God’s yearning for mankind’s companionship and fellowship. Emmanuel—God with us—is the most eloquent display of God’s identification with man in his fallen state. In fact, God sent man out of the Garden after the Fall to prevent the current severance between them (God and man) from becoming a permanent condition, in the event of his eating from the tree of life (Gen 3:22). God passionately desires intimacy with YOU. Shalom.