GOD SPEAKS all there is into creation with that first thunderous word: “LIGHT: BE!” And on and on He continues to generate all there is in the universe by His Word. He exerts His will to imagine into existence the macrocosmos and the microcosmos, with infinite attention to detail, and puts it all into motion. And on top of it all is His glorious plan for the crown of His creation: Adam. He is preparing a place for him in this wonderland.
the Lord god formed a man from the dust, breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.
God the Creator stops speaking, and He stoops to make this special one, the one who is to be His child, in His image. He forms you, cell by cell, knits you together in your mother's womb, and then breathes into you His very breath. And you become a living soul, made in His image, designed to dwell with Him forever in love and joy.
My parents were thrilled by the news that they were going to have a child. They prepared the nursery, shopped for outfits, sought advice, looked through books of baby names, and told everyone they knew the good news. And when I arrived, they rejoiced and gave me their last name.
now the Lord god had planted a garden in the east, and there he put the man. . . . trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food.
And as you are growing up, you learn His voice. He cares for you, feeds you, carries you everywhere, and earns your trust. Such is love in a little one, you know. Trust. He designed you and the rest of creation to keep it this way forever. Forever, you and Him, Him and you, sharing life together in unbroken fellowship and unhindered love.
And so I moved into that nursery and wore those outfits and received ample snuggle time. And I began my journey to fulfill my destiny.
they were both naked, and they felt no shame.
You and I had no shame in our nakedness, either. It didn't even occur to us as toddlers that there was anything to hide. We may have lied, we may have been selfish, but we didn't know it. We didn't yet have the knowledge of evil, you might say.
Then you had to go and grow up, didn't you? You receive more freedom as you grow into your ability to be responsible. As you should. But you want more. So you demand more. You determine to prove to yourself and to others that you can make your own decisions. You can decide for yourself what path you want to take. The warnings go in one ear and out the other: "The road of self-will is the road to destruction. It will not go well for you outside of the lines."
You and I followed that same inexorable path, of course. My life was changed forever the day I learned the word “NO!” Or so I thought. I liked it because I felt like I was the one who was in control. “NO!” became the symbol of my independence, when I could set my own course and only comply when I was in agreement. I was setting the stage for my own death, but I didn’t know it yet.
and the lord God commanded the man, "you are free to eat from any tree, but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die."
Up to this point, you have known all about good. What is good to eat and drink. What is safe and healthy to do. What to say and how to act. But there is that one rule that He set, and it is eating at you, isn't it? You want more than anything to . . . what? . . . know what it's like to take a ride on the wild side? You are curious, that's all. Satisfy your curiosity, just this one time, and you'll be back before they notice you were gone.
I knew all about good up to this point. What’s good to eat, how to talk to others and how to treat my sister. I knew about good. But that’s not all that I wanted to know all about. I wanted to know what it was like to do evil. There’s just something about the human spirit that can’t leave well enough alone, and I just had to know what it was like to do something deathly dangerous, something evil, something to satisfy my sick curiosity. In those safe confines of my parents’ protective rule, I hadn’t yet seen this thing called evil, and it was eating a hole in my soul.
now the serpent was more crafty . . . he said to the woman, "did god really say, 'you must not eat from any tree in the garden?'"
A so-called friend, who maybe is a bit older than you, comes into your life, and uses straw man logic to draw you out to an illogical conclusion. The straw man logic goes like this: “Did God really say you could not eat anything? points out how limiting your life under this protection really is. It was bound to happen, of course. It has happened for every human who has ever walked this planet. But woe to the one who introduces you to the end of your innocence. This older friend lets you know that you haven't known what real freedom is yet, you haven't seen real beauty, and you haven't lived for yourself. Do your own thing, your friend says. And, ironically, the peer pressure to follow someone into doing what you think is your own thing is too much to resist. Your fallen friend convinces you of what you wanted someone to tell you all along: The grass is far, far greener on the other side.
For me, it was a neighbor who was my age. He had shaken free from his own parents’ advice, and he planted a doubt in my impressionable mind that my parents really had my best interests in mind with their rules. He questioned my parents’ goodness. Why were they so limiting? Are they some kind of control freaks? They can’t live my life for me. Pride tells me that I have a better idea. He asks, “Did they really say that?”
"you will not certainly die. for god knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like god, knowing good and evil."
It is forbidden, of course. That’s the point. But this, this thing, it looks so pretty, so adventuresome, so . . . so grown-up, that you just can't help but to cross over, just once. Become the master of your own fate, captain your own ship, disobey by doing something stupid and tempting and forbidden. Prove that you are . . . well, . . . like God. Yeah. Your own boss.
I made the choice that day to experience what it means to know evil. I had known plenty of good, but this one little secret seemed awfully attractive when compared to boring goody-goody stuff. I bit.
when the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it.
Everything about it feels so right. Delicious and beautiful, and it will indulge you. Because pride, well, pride is a positive thing, right? Besides, you will do just enough for your curiosity to be satisfied. Then you can at last know good—and evil. No more having to wonder what it’s like to take a ride on the wild side. Satisfy your curiosity—just once—and everything goes back to the way it was before. Right? Wrong! It can never be the way it was before.
Pride. Self-will. Thinking that my way is better than God’s or my parents’ or anyone else’s. That was my choice. But what starts in curiosity leads to a habit, which grows into addiction and ends in death. Every. Time. Just like God said.
then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
Of course, after a few moments, or days, or years, of fixating on the forbidden thing, you just can't take it any more. You give in to the temptation, and you discover immediately what happens. Suddenly, shame happens. You cover. You hide. You make up a story or an excuse. Anything to keep you from being the bad guy in your own story.
In the moments after my fall, my mind turned to blaming my parents themselves for being such rule freaks. If they didn't care about making me obey so much, then I wouldn't be feeling this guilty shame right now. I rejected the guilt and tried to hide the evidence. If I got caught, I reasoned, maybe I could throw my friend under the bus. "I was just playing here, innocent and by myself, and he did it. Surely it wasn’t me."
then [they] heard the sound of the lord god as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the lord god among the trees of the garden.
Those very trees that God Himself planted and brought up, which were designed to bring joy and pleasure to the man were now perverted in their use. Now they are used to hide him. Mankind has become wild.
So it is with you, isn't it? The very things that once brought you innocent pleasure have become perverted, haven’t they? You hide the evidence and rehearse your act of pretending that you didn't do anything wrong, or that you don't feel guilty. You felt the guilt, but it will take a while for you to admit it, even to yourself.
I stopped openly talking with my parents right about then. Suddenly, they were an embarrassment to me, and I couldn’t have said exactly why that was. But now I know. They were right on top of my dirty little secret, and it had me running scared. I had become the worst of all creatures: An Adolescent.
but the lord god called to the man, "Where are you?"
You know, your parents already know what you did. They did the same thing when they were your age, with varying consequences and reactions. And do you think your grandparents--those friendly old people who love you so unconditionally--know that you have done wrong? YES! And certainly God sees through you. They ALL know.
They are asking you those questions, not because they don't know, but because they are waiting for you to admit it yourself. This is like one of those games of hide and seek you played with them over and over when you were really little. They knew exactly where you were, because you weren't very good at hiding, or at being patient. But they went throughout the room saying in a voice that was for you, "I wonder where __ is?"
he answered, "i heard you in the garden, and i was afraid because i was naked; so i hid."
“The man had heard the warning
yet still went on his way
He ate the fruit that morning
and found the price he’d pay
And he heard the Spirit coming
And he trembled deep inside
And he tried to make a leaf make do
for what clothes could never hide
But the Hound of Heaven heard his pounding heart
and Love would not let him go
A conscience clear with worth the cost of confrontation and God cries,
”Adam! Where are you?
Adam! I miss you.
Adam! I love you!””
Do you know how many chances God gave Adam and Eve to sin before He lowered the boom on them and gave them consequences? What would you think? Three times? That seems like something God would do; it certainly works in baseball, and a lot of parents use that one. Just to be sure they really, truly understood the badness of doing this, and knew what the consequences would be. "Next time, young man!" Maybe the patience of God would go Seven times? Seventy-seven times? Seventy times seven times? Of course, you probably know the answer: one. What God said he would do, He did. End of discussion. Reminds me of Ananias and Sapphira many years later. No need for warnings if the ground rules have already been put in place. So this was one, two, three strikes you’re out at the old Garden of Eden.
and he said, "who told you that you were naked? have you eaten from the tree that i commanded you not to eat from?"
Your friend had opened with a question, “Did they really say...?” It was all designed to start you in doubting, and then directly contradicted your parents. "It won't happen. They are just keeping you from having fun."
Now your parents also open with a question, knowing how obvious the answer is. But Daddy wants His child to confess, rather than coming with accusations.
Q: Where are you?
A: I'm hiding because I was afraid.
Q: Why are you afraid?
A: Because I am naked.
Q: Who told you that?
A: I figured it out on our own. All of a sudden.
Q: Have you done what I commanded you not to do?
A: It was not my fault. You let it happen.
Q: What is this you have done?
A: It was not my fault. My friend deceived me into thinking it was cool. Don’t blame me.
Q: Did you hear me say that in the day that you do this, you will die?
A: Well, yes, sort of. But my friend . . .
Q: Is that what you call a friend?
A: I guess not, now that I see what happened. But he said that You wouldn't carry it out.
Of course, your parents will never let that so-called friend come over to the house again. And they get to dealing out the consequences that they had promised. Because they love you too much to let you rebel and think it's a win for you.
i will make your pains in childbearing very severe . . . cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat . . . by the sweat of your brow . . . until you return to the dust.
And we are now officially on Plan B. It was not supposed to be like this. The fellowship has been broken, the voice disobeyed, trust broken. There is no path forward without severe loss. It was the day of death. The word "death" means "separation." Sure enough, separation from God has already happened. And the soul's separation from the body is on its way, as well. And death still is the era when our greatest enemy claims us all, one by one. This is the day, the era of death.
the lord god made garments of skin for adam and his wife and clothed them.
Plan B it is. It's not that God was surprised by this. It's not that He had no Plan B in mind. He knew, and He planned for it. But it was a costly plan. According to the Genesis account, there seems to have been no death at all up to that point in time. But God takes an animal and kills it. The first blood is shed that day, and it is God who does the shedding. He destroys an innocent animal that was never intended to die, in order to cover the shame of the most important creatures ever. Blood is on their hands.
It was not the last time innocent blood would be shed.
And that's how it works. You do the sin. God pays the price. Not a bad deal for us, is it? Plan B. He is the God of plan B, after all. He knew you would fall, and made arrangements ahead of time for fellowship to be restored by this sacrifice of atonement and covering of the innocent for the guilty.
Plan B? It's not a problem, if you actually have something better in mind than just patching the hole in the boat. The Lord actually had it in mind from before the foundation of the world, and it was the Most Romantic Act, ever. He was pursuing you, and He'd rather die than be without you.
But I'm getting ahead of myself.
YOUR ENCOUNTER
Two things had been necessary to restore fellowship with God: Confession and Atonement. Your confession, and His atonement. Your role is to confess; Christ’s role is to make you one with God again.
So let's take inventory of known areas of sin that are still in your life, and let’s experience anew the clean slate that the Lord’s Plan B brings you. You can watch this video, or I recommend that you do it yourself. Use the free app, Reverse Cam to record as you write out this confession from the Book of Common Prayer. Export it and play it backwards, and rejoice that your sins have been removed from your record, as if they had never been on that paper to begin with, and never to be seen again! Record your feelings in your journal, and share about your experience.
“Most merciful God,
I confess that I have sinned against you
in thought, in word, and in deed
in the things that I have done
and in the things I ought to have done
I have not loved you with my whole heart
I have not loved my neighbor as myself
I am truly sorry and I humbly repent
for the sake of your only Son, Jesus Christ
have mercy on me and forgive me
that i may delight in your will
and walk in your ways
to the glory of your name. Amen.
”