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| {Art print by Megan Gilger.} ***This was written 14 years ago - while I was a student at the U of A*** |
I
remember playing hide and seek as a child. I lived in the country
close to my cousins, who were older than me and mostly boys. I was
the youngest grandchild at the time. You can probably imagine how
scared I would get whenever it was my turn to hide. I would tremble
as I hid in the barn behind large bails of hay. Almost inevitably, I
would have to leave the game early, so I wouldn't wet my pants.
I
was scared to play the game and I was scared to hide. I didn't like
being alone and sneaky. I preferred to jump out from behind the dark
corner and yell, “Here I am!” My family hated it because I would
cause the game to end {before it even got started}. I like to be out
of hiding. I liked to be at {home base} where it was safe.
Whenever
the Lord gave me the title for this chapter I immediately thought of hide and seek. I imagined Adam and Eve hiding behind the lush bushes
in the garden. I see them crouched down peeking to see if their
Creator could see them. They waited there in anticipation of being
caught. Crouching there with nervous stomachs and anxious thoughts
flowing through their minds. I am sure there hearts raced as they
were hiding, waiting, and scared.
In
Genesis 3 the Lord tells us the story of Adam and Eve's temptation
and thus {the fall of man}. Take time to read Genesis 3 and ask the
Lord to show you something new and exciting from His Holy word. Ask
Him to show you something you have never noticed before!
Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”
2 The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’”
4 “You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5 “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
6 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. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. 7 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.
8 Then the man and his wife 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. 9 But the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?”
10 He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.”
11 And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?”
12 The man said, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.”
13 Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?”
The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”
14 So the Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this,
“Cursed are you above all livestock
and all wild animals!You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dustall the days of your life.15 And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring[a] and hers;
he will crush[b] your head, and you will strike his heel.”
with painful labor you will give birth to children.
Your desire will be for your husband,
and he will rule over you.”
through painful toil you will eat food from it
all the days of your life.18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.19 By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return.”
16 To the woman he said,
“I will make your pains in childbearing very severe;
17 To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’
“Cursed is the ground because of you;
Why
did Eve decide to eat from the tree?
What
initially attracted her to the fruit?
Was it the thought of rebellion or
the beauty of the fruit?
It
is interested how sin looks so appealing. It may be the desire to
have the wrong friends or to feel loved at any cost. It might be a
temptation to overindulge or take something from someone else {that
doesn't belong to you}. It might even be as simple as a little lie to
make yourself look better than you really are. Whatever the desire, it looks good and attractive, just as it did to Eve. Verse 6
says that, "the fruit was good, pleasant, and desirable, but it was
also forbidden."
At
what cost are you willing to succumb to the sin in your life? You
see, Eve didn't have to sin just because she was tempted. She sinned
because she chose to sin. She made a decision that isolated her from
God and sent her into hiding.
Genesis
3:8 says, “And they heard the sound of the Lord walking in the
garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves
from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden”
What
immediately happened to Adam and Eve as soon as sin crept in?
Do
you think they were afraid of what God would think or say? Are You?
What
does verse 8 tell us that they hid from?
They
didn't hide from sin or the devil. They didn't hide from each other
or the animals. No, they hid from the presence of the Lord God. Have you ever hid from God or are you hiding form God right now? Has
sin crept into your life and you are embarrassed? If you are hiding right now, jump out of hiding and
yell, “Hey! I am over here, Jesus, I am over here!” Tell God
exactly were you have been and stop playing games with God. You see,
Jesus longs to be with you, not just in pursuit of you! Jump out
from behind your sin and let him catch you in His embrace. Just like He searched for Adam and Eve in the garden, He is searching for you.
Genesis
3:9 “Then the Lord God called to Adam and said to Him, 'Where are
you?'”
