Can you remember back to your childhood and recall a time when you disobeyed your parents? There were most likely definite consequences that you knew would follow. Perhaps you ran and hid, hoping that your parents would forget about your actions. You may have even tried to blame a sibling! Maybe you knew it was a serious misdemeanour when your mother said, "Wait until your father comes home!"
Let's have a look at what Adam and Eve did after eating the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil:
"When the cool evening breezes were blowing, the man and his wife heard the Lord God walking about in the garden. So they hid from the Lord God among the trees. Then the Lord God called to the man, "Where are you?" He replied, "I heard you walking in the garden, so I hid. I was afraid because I was naked." "Who told you that you were naked?" the Lord God asked. "Have you eaten from the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat?" The man replied, "It was the woman you gave me who gave me the fruit, and I ate it." Then the Lord God asked the woman, "What have you done?" "The serpent deceived me," she replied. "That's why I ate it." Then the Lord God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, you are cursed more than all animals, domestic and wild. You will crawl on your belly, groveling in the dust as long as you live. And I will cause hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will strike your head, and you will strike his heel." Then he said to the woman, "I will sharpen the pain of your pregnancy, and in pain you will give birth. And you will desire to control your husband, but he will rule over you. " And to the man he said, "Since you listened to your wife and ate from the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat, the ground is cursed because of you. All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it. It will grow thorns and thistles for you, though you will eat of its grains. By the sweat of your brow will you have food to eat until you return to the ground from which you were made. For you were made from dust, and to dust you will return.""
Genesis 3:8-19 NLT
Even after covering themselves with fig leaves, Adam and Eve still felt the shame and heaviness of sin deep inside and while they previously would have looked forward to meeting with God, now they were hiding from him!
God comes to them, knowing exactly where they are and what they have done. He comes patiently and calmly as he always did, before the darkness of night. God comes to them personally, addressing them by name. He comes in truth, showing them their lost position. This is just the way God has always come to mankind in our lost and fallen state.
Sin made Adam afraid of God, despite the fact that they had previously enjoyed a very close relationship. It made him not want to hear God's Word. Can you relate to this?
God gave Adam an opportunity to confess and repent. When we sin, we can confess our sins, repent and know that we are forgiven because of Jesus' death and resurrection. We need to be conscious of not trying to transfer the blame onto someone else. We see that this was Adam's response as he tried to blame Eve although he went further, he actually tries to blame God by reminding Him that He gave the woman to him!
The consequences follow and sadly, they were not just limited to Adam and Eve. Their actions have affected all of mankind through the ages, to this very day. There was also a serious consequence for the serpent and Satan. God was pronouncing defeat for our enemy where he would always fall short and never be victorious though he would try. Satan was in his own eyes, triumphant over Jesus at the Cross but what he didn't realise was that he was in fact defeated!
The enmity between Satan and mankind that God spoke of has continued. From Eve's offspring eventually came Mary who gave birth to the Son of God who would deal the final blow to Satan! God's plan wasn't defeated when Adam and Eve sinned because God's plan was to bring forth something greater in sending Jesus to redeem us all!
Prayer:
Heavenly Father,
Thank You that despite my sin and disobedience, You patiently come and meet with me. Thank You for making a way for our relationship to continue despite the fact that I was born into a world, tainted by sin since the Fall. Thank You for Jesus' blood and body given so that I am cleansed and set free from sin!
In His Name,
Amen.
"For you are the fountain of life, the light by which we see."
Psalms 36:9 NLT
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Light and Life for Today
SpiritualA daily devotional for your time alone with God. In an increasingly dark world, more than ever, we need to look beyond what we can see, past our present circumstances. In order to see the light and experience life as our Heavenly Father intended, I...
