The Beginning of Sin and Death

Father, we know that the devil doesn't want us to think about this text.

And you know, Father, how we ourselves, our minds quickly flit away from texts like this.

How easy it is, Father, for us to not hear and not even to notice that we're not hearing.

So we ask, Father, that you would be very kind to us.

You are always kind and pour out your Holy Spirit with might and power and deep conviction.

And grip us with your word.

And as we are gripped by your word, grip us with the gospel.

And this we ask in Jesus's name. Amen.

Please be seated.

So two weeks ago, part of the Bible text meant that we had to talk about abortion.

And transgender issues.

And last week, the Bible text meant that we had to talk about marriage, sexual knowing, and same-sex marriage.

Nothing controversial.

And this week, there's nothing big and controversial like that.

Except this is really, really a big passage of scripture.

I mean, why is there evil?

Why is there suffering and pain?

Why is it that God seems so hard to know?

Why is it that God seems like an abstraction and so distant?

And not only these things, but why is it that I do wrong things?

Why is it that often after a conversation or a meeting, I'm kicking myself because I was meaner or sharper or more angry or more cowardly than I desire to be?

Why is it that I do these things?

Why is it that I do these things?

These are really, really important human questions.

And the Bible text that we're going to look at today is the first step in coming to understand the answer to these things.

So it would be a great help to me if you got a Bible and you turned in them to Genesis chapter 3.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

And if you're unfamiliar with the Bible, Genesis is the very first book in the Bible.

So it's probably like page 2 or 3 in your Bible.

But Genesis chapter 3.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

And just before we start to read it again and look at it, I just want to share the older I get and the longer I think about these issues.

And I don't mean any disrespect to anybody else.

But the longer I think about these issues, there is nothing in the world in philosophy or spirituality or religion that is as wise as Genesis 1, 2, and 3.

When understood through the gospel.

I just, the more I think about these things, the more I think about how different groups try to understand the existence of good and evil and our longings.

I don't think Islam or Hinduism or Buddhism or secular thought comes even close to the wisdom of Genesis 1, 2, and 3.

This is just me sharing what I have discovered the more and more I think about it.

It is so wise and so true.

And if you get nothing else out of the sermon, if you spend the rest of the sermon thinking about your shopping list or what you're going to watch on Netflix tonight or whatever, I hope you don't.

But if all you get out of it is a desire to read the truth in Genesis 1, 2, and 3 and meditate upon it, then God has done a good work in your heart.

Now it's going to start in a very, very odd way.

In fact, it's going to start in a way that puts us off.

Look how it begins.

Genesis chapter 3, verse 1.

Genesis 3:1

Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made.

He said to the woman, did God actually say you shall not eat of any tree in the garden?

And as soon as I say that, some of you say, time out, George.

Okay, I thought you said this is a true story.

Talking snakes.

George, come on.

Like I thought you were making this case.

Like I've listened to some of your sermons and, you know, you're talking about creation and evolution.

You talked about Adam and Eve.

You talked about how they're real and how they're true and how they matter.

And now we come to talking serpents.

Like what's going on, George?

Well, that's a good question.

It's an honest question, isn't it?

Like a lot of us feel very uncomfortable about it.

So I just want to say a couple of things about this talking serpent thing.

The first thing is, and this is going to, I was really surprised when I discovered this.

But in the Middle Ages, a lot of Jewish commentators upon this, they believed, well, they actually believed in an early form of Narnia.

I mean, how many people have read the Narnia Chronicles or are familiar with the Narnia Chronicles?

If you're not familiar with the Narnia Chronicles, there's talking animals and there's animals that don't talk.

And believe it or not, a lot of Jewish commentators believe that in the Garden of Eden,

which wasn't the whole world, just a part of the world,

that in the Garden of Eden, all the animals talked.

And that outside the Garden of Eden, they didn't talk.

I think that's sort of cool, eh?

I'm not saying that's the answer to the text.

I just was really surprised that that was what some, like our Jewish friends for many centuries, some of them taught.

Listen, here's the main thing.

Sort of two main things about it.

First of all, I'm going to keep on assuming that Moses is the guy ultimately responsible.

I mean, ultimately, I believe it's God who caused it to be written, but at a human level, it is Moses.

If you don't agree with me, that's, you know, ultimately, nobody doesn't say who wrote the book, okay?

But tradition with Moses.

Okay?

Just remember this, right?

This is like, if you get, here's one of George's hermeneutical principles, okay?

Assume for a second Moses wasn't stupid.

Just assume.

Moses knew that snakes didn't talk.

I mean, that wasn't just something they figured out in 2017.

Like, if this text was written 1500 BC or 1300 BC or whenever it was written, they knew back then that snakes didn't talk.

So let's just assume for a second that they knew that.

In fact, it's actually a bit of an argument for the text because all the rest of the book of Genesis, as you read it,

it's describing, it's talking about in very historical and real terms, as if it's describing things that really happened.

I can just imagine almost Moses having a conversation with God.

Okay, well, God, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

You want me to put in a talking snake?

Like, are people going to lose the thread of this if I, you know?

And he had to trust to put in the talking snake.

But if you, here's the other thing, a more realistic thing.

If you go and you read in 2 Samuel, there's a very, very interesting pair of stories.

And in the first set of stories, it describes how David lusts after Bathsheba.

And then David, after he lusts after Bathsheba, he has an affair with her.

He makes her pregnant.

And then he conspires to make it look like her husband has made her pregnant, not him.

And when that plan doesn't work, he comes up with another conspiracy to have Bathsheba's husband murdered.

And that's successful.

And Uriah, Bathsheba's husband, dies.

And it's told, just in a straight narrative form, more detailed than I gave you, but it's told.

Then immediately after that, the whole story is retold in a second way.

Some of you who know the Bible know it, isn't it?

It's that Nathan comes and tells, who's a prophet, and tells David a story about a man who just had one little sheep.

And how this rich king came and killed the sheep.

And, you know, didn't use any of his own sheeps, but basically stole this one sheep of this poor person and killed it.

And David gets enraged and says, that man should die.

And then there's this famous line, Nathan says to the king, you are that man.

And it's very, very convicting.

This story here is a bit of both.

And one of the ways to understand the story is it's not saying that, by the way, that, I don't know, you know, Eve's walking around.

The snake says one thing.

She says something back.

He says something.

She says something.

He says something.

She says something.

And that takes you about, I don't know, like 15 seconds.

She eats the apple.

It's not an apple.

Eats the fruit.

Wham.

Who knows?

This interaction could have taken place over hours or weeks.

There's no sense of that.

It's on one hand like the story of Nathan confronting David with the story of the sheep.

To try to communicate the historical thing that David actually did to bring it home to him in a very, very powerful way.

And so in many ways, this story is more like that.

It's describing something that happened that's real.

But it's introducing symbolism and imagery and language that's compressed.

And let me tell you, I, every day this week, when I was reading this text and memorizing it, I would have to stop my preparation.

And I know this is saying more about me than it is about other people because my brain isn't very big.

But I would feel like my brain was going to explode because there's so much in this text.

And I would have to stop preparing because I would just have to say, God, there is so much.

I didn't say God in a swear word.

I mean, I'm actually talking to God.

And I said, Lord, there is so much.

I feel like my head is going to explode.

My heart is going to explode.

And God in his wisdom compresses whatever it is that really happens into this very short, in five verses, the interaction.

And in one verse, the fall and the beginning of death, sin and death and tragedy.

And then in a few verses, the beginning of a sense of how God graciously responds in simple language that you could read to a child and they would understand.

It's a brilliant piece of writing.

And it's more like, you are the man.

That's how it's written.

But it's describing something real.

The other thing by this, by the way, is this story is part of a big story in the Bible.

And the big story in the Bible is that God makes all things good.

Then evil arises in his created order.

And then God promises he's going to deal with it.

And then he deals with it in the person of his son.

Then we live in a time of the already not yet knowing that God is going to bring all things to a proper end.

And then comes the very end.

It's part of an overarching big story.

So the serpent, as illus, is brought into this.

And it's not really made clear who he is until you actually get to the book of Isaiah.

And you get to the book of Ezekiel.

And most of all, until you get to Jesus.

But you see the consequences of the act in a very powerful way very, very quickly.

So let's read verse 1 again now, okay?

Okay, hopefully, you know, you're with me.

The time out has come.

Okay, we have a talking serpent.

It's a very powerful image, isn't it?

Now, the serpent, verse 1, was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made.

Just, by the way, one of these things.

I didn't know this until I did my language research.

The word crafty in the original language sounds almost the same as naked in the original language.

So the previous story ends with the man and the woman being naked, but unashamed and embarrassed and unafraid.

And so this, the way this is written, the writer is saying, I'm telling you a brand new story, but in a very, very subtle way.

If you were listening to it in the original language and you hear the two words which are almost identical, but just slightly different, you see that the story is tying the two of them together.

And so now the serpent was more crafty or shrewd than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made.

This is really, really, really big.

If you could put the first point up, that would be great.

Evil is not equal to God's goodness.

And God did not create evil.

I mean, there's, you know, one of the problems with Hindu thought.

It's not that Hindu thought is immoral.

Hinduism teaches many, like, very common moral things that is just part of the common moral teaching and understanding of humanity.

But one of the problems with Hindu thought is how you ultimately accept that there is, in fact, a real difference between good and evil.

Because at the end of all things, there's just God.

There's just God.

And there's just oneness.

And it's actually sort of a challenge for Hinduism when you probe into it.

And if that's what the real reality is, that there's just one with no difference and no distinction, how do you make clear the distinction between good and evil?

And there's other schools of thought that make it look almost as if good and evil are equal.

And it's very easy for us to want to try to blame God for evil.

But when it says here that the beast of the field that the Lord God had made, what we're seeing here is that it's not that somehow or another, whoever the serpent is,

and it's not going to become clearer until you start to read Isaiah and you start to read Ezekiel and you start to read what Jesus has to say.

And then you start to read the apostles who've learned from Jesus.

And then you see in the book of Revelation and you see the carrying on of the images and you see the deepening of the teaching.

And it's not going to be very clear right now who it is and what exactly it is that the serpent is.

But what's going to be very, very clear is that the serpent isn't somehow equal to God.

And what's going to be seen here is that it isn't as if somehow there's this separate force of evil that's just the same as God that somehow invades God's good creation.

There is a type of invasion here.

But what the text is making clear is that all things that exist were made.

And what you're seeing here is that the beginning of evil and the beginning of sin comes from the very creatures that God had made.

That the serpent and the power behind the serpent were made by God and that they were originally made as good and that Adam and Eve are made and they're originally made as good.

And that it's in these good things that God has made that out of these good things evil and the breaking of creation is going to come out of the creatures.

And it's the beginning of a long type of reflection that you can have.

But the text by saying in these very, very simple words that the serpents made, and we already know that Adam and Eve are made,

then we're going to see that when this first act of evil and rebellion happens,

and the things which lead up to it, is it comes from the made things, not God.

And if it comes from made things, not God, then it's not equal to God's goodness.

God didn't create evil.

In fact, we're going to see that from the very entrance of evil into the created order,

that God is going to act with justice and opposition to evil, but also with great grace and mercy and compassion

without any compromise to his justice and his opposition to evil.

So read it again.

You know, at this rate, it's going to be 13 verses, 15 minutes.

You can do the math.

It's going to be a two-hour sermon.

No, we'll go a little bit quicker.

Read verse 1 again.

Now, what did God actually say?

So, if you're like me, most of us just can't instantly remember what God said,

but just look, it's probably on the same page, just look at chapter 2, verse 7.

If you look at chapter 2, verse 7 through 9, you get to see what God says.

And then in verses 15 and 16, look what it says.

So verse 7,

Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the bread of life,

and the man became a living creature.

It's a description of the creation of Adam, the second creation story, as it's called.

Verse 8,

And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed.

And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.

The tree of life was in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,

also by implication in the midst of the garden.

And just go down to verse 15 and 16.

So by the way, just before you get further,

the Bible doesn't actually talk much about the tree of life until it gets to the New Testament.

It's sort of, it's mentioned very briefly at the end of Genesis 3.

We'll look at that in a couple of weeks.

But the, it doesn't touch much about it.

But in terms especially of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, it's just a tree.

It's not a magical tree.

It's not a tree that has particular powers.

It's just a tree.

And that's going to be very, very important.

The thing about, the thing about the tree isn't that somehow the tree is magical or special,

that the fruit is somehow special in and of itself.

It's going to be an opportunity.

The tree is just an opportunity for God to give the human beings, Adam and Eve,

a simple command that they are to obey.

They don't have to learn the Westminster Catechism.

They don't have to learn the Heidelberg Catechism.

They don't have to memorize the whole book of Psalms.

They have one tree, one simple command.

And you can't have love without freedom.

And the way that they show that they love the Lord and that they're free

is to follow one simple command.

That's all it is.

Look at verse 15 and 16.

The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and to keep it.

And the Lord commanded the man, saying,

You may surely eat of every tree of the garden.

Notice that?

You may surely eat of every tree of the garden.

And the implication is, listen,

you know, there's thousands, I don't know, hundreds of thousands of trees,

different type of fruit.

Adam, I love you.

I've provided for you.

The fruit is delicious.

Eat as much as you want, whenever you want,

as varied as you want.

Come on in.

Eat to your heart's content.

That's what it means by saying surely.

You may surely eat of every tree of the garden,

but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil,

you shall not eat.

One tree.

Thousands or hundreds of thousands of trees,

you can eat.

Eat as much as you want.

One tree, only one tree.

Don't eat of it.

And what does it say?

For in the day that you eat of it,

you shall surely die.

So let's go back to what the serpent says to Eve.

He says to the woman,

the second part of verse one,

Did God actually say,

You shall not eat of any tree in the garden?

Notice that?

By the way,

so much temptation in our life,

and so much problem comes by,

that's a very simple thing.

Did God actually say?

You know, like,

when we're having,

when I'm having discussions,

you know,

around maybe issues around,

you know,

it's easy when you're having conversations

with people around slavery being evil,

because Christians and our secular society,

we all agree that slavery is evil, right?

And there's,

you know,

it's very easy to have a conversation around,

I don't know,

like political oppression,

or torture,

or,

you know,

profound economic injustice.

Like,

it's very easy to have conversations with our friends,

because what our culture says,

and what the Bible says,

we're saying the same type of thing.

But when you get to things where our culture differs from the Bible,

and then you get talking to Christians,

or people just trying to figure out the Christian faith,

who are trying to get around it,

like it almost always comes up,

did God actually say?

Like,

did God actually say?

Isn't that just like a bit of a cultural thing

that you don't have to follow anymore?

Like,

isn't that just a narrative device?

Like,

isn't that just like a bit of a mythological thing?

Did God actually say?

Like,

this is as new

as the most recent class

in theology or spirituality.

And it's as new

and as current

as our most recent conversation.

Did God actually say?

And notice,

he gets it all wrong.

He basically wants to say to Eve,

did God actually say,

you can't eat any of these trees?

Like,

whoa,

what a weird God.

Like,

you're pretty in the midst of all these trees.

God's weird,

isn't he?

You know,

the other thing that he does here,

which is harder to know,

I didn't know this until I looked at

and did my language studies.

Notice in verse,

the first part of verse one,

it says,

Lord God.

And in the second part,

it just says God.

You know why that's significant?

That Lord and God put together.

God is in a sense,

the general word

that if they had been talking

abstractly about God

to Egyptians

or to Hittites

or Assyrians,

they could use this general word for God.

That's the word God.

But Lord

is a relationship word.

it's a little bit like,

you know,

every one of my children

at some point in time,

they,

when they were very young,

at a certain age,

all of them would start calling me George.

And I would have a conversation with them.

I would say,

there's seven billion people on the planet

who can call me George.

There's only,

let's say,

with my last kid,

there's only nine people

in the entire planet

of seven billion

who can call me dad.

dad.

And you're one of them.

So call me dad.

And Lord

is more like dad.

It's a relationship word.

It's an intimate word.

But notice what the serpent does.

He uses the abstract word,

the distant word,

the generic word,

rather than the personal word for God.

You know,

this is so true of me.

One of my problems

in my Christian life

is I start to think

more and more

that God's an abstraction.

abstraction.

It's one of the ways

that I make God more distant

when he becomes

an abstraction to me,

a generality to me,

an argument to me.

And we see that right here.

The serpent says,

abstraction,

not dad,

not the personal name,

but the abstraction.

And notice how Eve responds.

See,

and this is all the way

through the story.

So how does Eve

going to respond?

First of all,

if you read Genesis 2,

Eve should actually say,

you know,

you're not talking true of God

and part of my job

is to protect this garden

so that only true

and honorable things of God

are said,

so you need to leave.

That's what she actually

should have said.

But what does she say instead?

Verse 2,

and the woman said

to the serpent,

we may eat of the fruit

of the trees

in the garden.

And by the way,

she admits the word surely.

She's saying,

yeah,

yeah,

yeah,

yeah.

God sort of lets us

to have the odd bite

of a grape or an apple.

Like she's left out

his provision,

like his throwing open

his arms and say,

eat to your heart's content.

She doesn't say

to the serpent,

he said,

I can eat of every tree

in the garden

except one

to my heart's content.

Instead,

she says,

yeah,

I'm allowed to eat

the odd bit of fruit.

You know,

isn't that so true

of your life?

I'm just speaking here

to Christians.

You know,

isn't that so true

that it's so easy

for me to start,

for you and me

to start forgetting

how good God is?

Like,

I remember,

this is quite a few years ago,

I was really,

really down

about how much money

I had.

Okay?

And then it was

one of those times

as if God spoke to me

and said,

George,

have you ever missed a meal?

Have you ever had a night

where,

you know,

apart from times

you might voluntarily

have gone out

to sleep under the stairs,

have you ever had a night

that you haven't had clothes

or roof over your head

or no food?

And I said to God,

so to speak,

that's never happened

to me once, God.

And it was as if

he said back to me,

he said,

what are you complaining about?

Like,

rather than me

waking up every day

and thinking,

God,

there's another day

where I breathe,

and thank you

that my mind,

it's not the best mind

in the world,

but it still works.

And thank you

that I had a good night's sleep

and thank you

that I can live

in a safe city

and thank you

that there's food

for me waiting

to eat in a few moments

and thank you

for the,

rather than counting

my blessings,

so many times

in my life

I don't count

my blessings

but start to think

that somehow

God is cheap.

You know,

that's what she does

right here.

Say it again,

and the woman said

to the servant,

we may eat of the fruit

of the trees

in the garden,

but God,

and she uses

the abstract word,

not the personal word,

said,

you shall not eat

of the fruit

of the tree

that is in the midst

of the garden,

neither shall you

touch it,

lest you die.

She added something

to God's word.

By the way,

by the way,

right here you see

the heart

of all religion

and spirituality.

You know,

if you're here

and you're a Jewish person,

I don't want to offend you,

but the Bible

actually doesn't say

that you can't eat

meat and dairy

in the same meal.

Actually doesn't say that.

It just says

you can't take

the calf

and kill the calf

and cook it

in its mom's milk.

What does religion do?

It wants to add to it.

And that's what religion

and spirituality does.

You see,

on one hand,

it makes God

more harsh,

and the other hand,

it makes him seem

like he's distant,

and the other hand,

it wants to add

to God's word

to add rules on it

because God isn't smart enough

to add enough rules,

so our church

has to make up God.

You screwed up, God.

Like,

you should have said

more no's.

So because you forgot

because you screwed up,

we're going to add

the no's you missed

because we're like God.

One moment,

that's the fall.

That's Genesis 3.

That's sin.

Let's just hope

we don't remember that

because we can't read

Genesis 3

because there's

a talking serpent.

And we're really

sophisticated

and smart

and wise

and cultured

and all that

type of stuff.

And it forgets

lest you surely die.

Like,

she's messed everything up.

Verse 4,

but the serpent said

to the woman,

you will not surely die.

In other words,

God's wrong.

You're not going to die.

And then he says,

for God knows

that when you eat of it,

your eyes will be opened,

and you will be like God,

knowing good and evil.

You know,

basically,

it's just this blatant thing,

God's wrong.

Don't trust me.

I mean,

in other words,

don't trust God.

Trust me.

I'm smarter than God.

I know better.

You know,

you know,

this might sound like

it's something that

when it's put so blatantly,

nobody believes it.

But let me tell you,

when I was in university,

like 100 million years ago,

just after they invented

the fire and the wheel,

if you went to university,

there were constant,

constant things

about Marxism

and Christianity

because Christianity

wasn't good enough

in and of itself.

we had to learn from Marx

or you had to have

different things

about science

and Christianity

because guys like B.F. Skinner,

they have to correct the things

because God's word

isn't adequate enough.

And now you might have to be

a feminist and a Christian

or queer and a Christian

or postmodern and a Christian.

And we don't actually go

from this text

to realize

that what they're saying here

is that I need to listen

to a French guy

or I need to listen

to Germaine Greer

or I need to listen to Marx

and I need to listen to Jesus

because the fact of the matter

is that it's the,

you know, Jesus,

I ultimately trust the Bible.

There's several reasons for it,

but at the end of the day,

I trust it because I believe

that Jesus really rose

from the dead.

And he trusted the Bible

and he told me

to trust the Bible

and you know what?

If he can rise from the dead,

he tells everybody

he's going to die,

he's going to rise from the dead,

he rises from the dead

and vindicates who he is

and Marx didn't do that.

Nobody else did that.

I'm going to trust Jesus.

I'm going to trust Jesus.

So here in verse 4,

the serpent just says,

this is what I say.

I say something different

than God, believe me.

Verse 5,

for God knows

that when you eat of it,

your eyes will be opened

and you will be like God.

You will be like God.

You will be like God.

You will be like God,

knowing good and evil.

In verse 6,

so the woman,

when the woman saw

that the tree was good for food,

that it was a delight to the eyes

and that it looked like

the type of tree

that would make you wise.

And here the word for wise

means give you practical power.

That's what it means.

Practical power.

That's what I want.

I want effective power.

You know,

that's what I want.

Not just,

oh, you know,

these are some really good ideas

or some insights.

I want power.

Practical power.

Because I want to be like God.

She took the fruit

and ate.

And she also gave some

to her husband

who was with her.

And he ate.

And he ate.

Could you put up

the next point,

Adam?

I mean, Andrew?

In Adam's fall,

even though it mentions

Eve primarily,

it's interesting

that the Bible primarily

puts the obligation

for the fall on Adam.

That's a whole other sermon

as to why that is.

Part of it,

I think,

is actually is that

while Eve was

getting confused

by the serpent,

Adam just did it.

He just did it.

I'm going to do it.

There's other reasons,

but it's a whole other sermon.

But if I'm going to help you

read the Bible,

I have to put it this way.

If I put it another way,

I'm actually not helping you

read the Bible.

And at the end of the day,

I want you to be able

to read the Bible

for yourself.

In Adam's fall,

I did not become evil.

I was in a conversation

with somebody

a couple of weeks ago,

and he said to me,

you know,

George,

I think people are evil.

Like,

are you evil?

I'm evil too.

I think people are evil.

Isn't that what

the Bible teaches?

And I said,

that's not what

the Bible teaches.

That's not what this text

is going to teach us.

In Adam's fall,

I did not become evil.

I became bent and broken

from my highest heights

to my deepest depths

with nothing left untouched.

You see,

human beings still have heights.

Listen to Bach.

What a creative genius.

Read Pascal's Ponses.

Read some really

excellent literature.

Look at the paintings

of Michelangelo

or

Van Gogh

or

just

human beings

have heights.

And we also have depths.

Both depths

in a bad sense,

but depths

in a good sense.

Why is it

that I can be married

to the same woman

for

almost 36 years

and there's still

more to know?

Human beings

have depths.

And what the Bible says

is that we don't become evil,

we don't lose our heights,

we don't lose our depths,

but that there's nothing

in me that hasn't

in some way

be touched by the fall,

that in some way

is bent.

And it's not sort of

bent in such a way

that I can still use it perfectly,

it's bent in such a way

that it's broken.

If you put up the next way

to put the same type

of idea, please.

Each and every human being

is bent and broken

by an ongoing desire

to be God.

I thought about

putting a God,

but I thought,

no, no, no,

you know,

I'm going to leave it

like that because,

you know,

some of us

just want to be God.

Some of us

are sure to content

to share Godness

with our wife

or something

or our best buddy.

There can be two gods,

you know?

Some of us want

to have our party,

like the Nazis

were quite happy

to have the German people

be the gods

and everybody else not,

you know?

But

every human being

is bent and broken

by an ongoing desire

to be God.

So for each

and every person,

only the true

and living God

can rescue

and help them.

That's what's going

to become so obvious

in the text.

By the way,

the Jewish people

don't believe in the fall

as a general rule.

It's something that

developed later

in Judaism

and especially

with Christianity,

it became to full flowers.

It became clear

and clear.

I mean,

some Jews believe it,

but it's not necessarily

a characteristic

of Jewish thought.

But what this text

is saying is

if in fact

every human being,

it's not just talking

about something

that Adam did,

but that I also have

this ongoing desire

to be God

that I need to die to.

And if I have

this ongoing desire

to be God,

even after I have

been saved,

I have an ongoing

desire to be God.

And if not only

I have an ongoing

desire to be God,

but I'm also bent

and broken,

then I can never

leave my bentness

or my brokenness

or my desire

to be God

to fix myself,

it brings me

to the point

of realizing

that unless God

does something,

I am doomed.

Only God

can do something.

Only God,

and only if he has

mercy and power,

he needs to do something

because I cannot

do it myself.

And we see it

right here

in the story,

how God

begins almost

immediately,

it's very,

very interesting.

How is God

going to respond

to this?

And some of you

might be saying,

well,

it's really,

really mean of God

to sort of cause

all of this human

beings,

like,

why did he go

ahead and say,

okay,

Adam,

Eve,

you did this,

wham,

I'm going to

bang you with

my hammer,

and I'm going to

bang you with

my hammer,

so now you're

bent and broken,

and it's all

because God

is mean.

If he had just

been a little bit

more patient,

not banged me

with his hammer,

then I wouldn't

be bent and broken,

and I wouldn't need

mean,

and maybe he's

a little bit angry.

There was a few

years ago,

a guy who used

to come to the

church,

I get an email

on a Monday

morning,

he just called

me like 20

names,

all bad,

and a whole

pile of anger.

I said to my

wife,

this must be

one of those

emails where

he was really

mad,

he fired off

the email,

and he should

have waited,

because I looked

at it on Monday,

but he sent it

right after church.

So I talked to

him a little few

days later,

and I began

trying to be

gracious by saying,

you know,

I almost said

the guy's name,

we'll call him

Bob.

You know,

Bob,

that's probably

one of those

emails where

you think about

it,

and afterwards

you realize

you shouldn't

send it.

And he said

to me,

no,

I did think

about it for

a while,

I'm in every

word,

I'm not

taking a

word back.

I thought,

whoa,

this is going

to be an

interesting

conversation.

But that's

not what went

on here in the

text.

Look at what

happens with

God,

look at

verse 7.

God doesn't

do anything to

them.

They broke

and bent

themselves.

the words

of judgment

from God

are going

to come

in when

we look

at this

text in a

couple of

weeks after

Easter,

verse 14.

He does

nothing in

judgment.

Adam and

Eve broke

and bent

themselves

by their

act.

Like,

this is

very,

this is

very powerful.

And what

you're going

to see,

you're going

to see,

it's going

to get

unraveled.

You're going

to start

seeing the

human life

unraveling in

the rest of

the story.

And then in

Genesis 4,

which we're

going to look

like in

four weeks,

you see then

all of a

sudden murder

enters in.

You see that

sin grows and

spreads.

And then you're

going to see

that polygamy

enters in and

more murder and

proud claims

against God.

And it just

starts with this

one little thing

that at the

end of chapter

two,

Adam and

Eve are what

we ultimately

truly in a

heart of

hearts just

long for,

that we

could just

be open,

that we

could be

transparent,

that we

could just

be open

and transparent

with ourselves,

we could be

open and

transparent with

others,

we could be

open and

transparent with

God,

and that there

wouldn't be

anything within

us of shame

or of guilt

or of deception

or of masks

or of keeping

people at a

distance,

that we would

just be right

from the depths

of our being

to our heights,

that there would

just be an

openness and a

transparency before

each of us,

but all of a

sudden,

when they take

this,

I am naked.

I am naked

because the fact

of the matter is,

if I want to

actually become and

think that I'm

equal to God,

I don't know,

I'm pretty puny,

and I want to

be, all of a

sudden, I'm

naked.

And it's not

like they don't

respond by saying,

I need God's

mercy, oh,

Lord God,

I've just called

you God, but oh,

Lord, what have I

done?

I need your mercy,

help me, I've

broken myself,

but they want to

hang on to that

desire to be God,

and if you

desire to be

God and you

are made of

dust, then your

very existence

witnesses against

you and you

feel naked.

God still sees

them perfectly

and clearly.

His sight has

not been affected

by their act,

but they cannot

bear his sight.

And Adam wants

to be God and

so does Eve want

to be God and

they cannot bear

each other's sight

and nakedness is

now a problem and

God has done

nothing.

They've broken

themselves.

And look how God

reacts in verse

eight.

Does he want to

say, does he

say, whoa, the

thunderbolt goes

down, whoa, I'm

going to grab you

and shake you, I'm

going to do

something because

I'm so mad at

you.

But what is his

words are the

first words to

fallen human

beings?

It's in verse

eight.

And they heard

the sound of the

Lord God walking

in the cool of the

day.

By the way, the

cool of the day

really means the

breeze of the day.

It means he's

come with the

Holy Spirit.

And he's walking

with the Holy Spirit

moving in the trees,

moving in the faces,

moving where they're

hiding.

He comes to them

and the man and

his wife hid

themselves from the

presence of the

Lord.

And the word

presence can also

mean the word

face.

They don't want to

see his face.

They hide from his

face.

I hide from the

face of God.

I have a deep

addiction.

On one hand, I

long for the day

when I can look at

the face of God

and stand before

him naked and

unashamed, clothed

in the righteousness

of Christ.

At the same time, I

have a deep

addictive fear of

the face of God

and being naked

before him.

And my life as a

Christian is caught

in the dynamics of

these two desires

and longings.

And the work of

grace is to both

fan in a flame

within us a longing

and a yearning for

that day when we

can stand before

God face to face

unashamed.

And the same work

of grace and power

of the Holy Spirit

and power of the

word of God is to

call me day by day

to die to my

desires and my

addictions to hide

from the face of

God.

Read verse 8

again.

And they heard the

sound of the Lord

God walking in the

garden in the cool

of the day.

And the man and

his wife hid

themselves from the

presence of the

Lord God, the face

of the Lord God

among the trees of

the garden.

But the Lord God

called out to

the man and said,

where are you?

Where are you?

Could you put up

the next point,

please?

This is really,

really important.

It's a matter of

tone.

In grace and mercy,

the Lord God came

to draw Adam and

Eve out of hiding.

He did not come to

drive them deeper

into hiding.

Even the hardest

parts of God's

word.

God said, is God

the shepherd of

our souls calling

to his lost

sheep to come

home?

He never said,

even his hardest

teaching is a

call to know

who we are before

God in our heart

of hearts and to

come to him and

to stop hiding.

This is the

shepherd looking

for his lost

sheep.

This is the woman

in the parables of

Jesus looking for

her lost coin.

Where are you?

And the man said,

I heard the sound

of you in the

garden and I was

afraid because I

was naked and I

hid myself.

He doesn't come

out of the trees.

He doesn't come

to God.

He stays hidden.

But he calls

back.

He's now afraid

of God.

Not a holy fear,

but he's just

afraid of God.

His rival.

How can I be a

rival to the

one who holds

this unbelievably

vast galaxy in

existence?

How can I be the

rival to that?

To him?

And God then

says, doesn't say,

oh, you're so

stupid.

I hate you.

I want to break

you.

I want to beat

you up.

No, what has

God said?

Another question.

Who told you

that you were

naked?

Have you eaten

of the tree of

which I commanded

you not to eat?

The man said,

now note this.

The man doesn't

say, God, can I,

I really need

your help.

Can I come, can

I come out of

hiding?

Can you fix me?

Lord, it is

just, it is just

so sad.

I just did it.

I just did it

because I wanted

to be God

and I know it's

wrong.

But what does

the man say?

The woman whom

you gave me,

this is your

fault.

It's the woman's

fault and it's

your fault.

If it wasn't for

you and it wasn't

for her,

everything would

be fine.

you see the

breakdown of

relationships,

the fear,

the accusation

now against

God, the

blasphemy

against God,

the slander,

the accusation

against God,

the accusation

against the

woman,

the fall

grows.

Look at

verse 10

again.

Verse 11,

who told you

that you were

naked?

Have you eaten

of the tree

of which I

commanded you

not to eat?

The man said,

the woman whom

you gave to

be with me,

she gave me

the fruit and

I ate.

Then the

Lord God,

notice here that

when God

reappears back

to Lord God,

even his name,

all the way

through his

speaking to

them,

his name,

he hasn't

changed his

name.

He's the

God who

desires to

be in

relationship

with them.

Verse 13,

then the

Lord God

said to the

woman,

what is this

that you

have done?

And the

woman doesn't

say,

oh,

Lord,

please help

me.

Please,

please help

me.

What does

she say?

The serpent

deceived me.

It's the

serpent's

fault.

And I

ate.

Boy,

you know,

doesn't this

describe our

life and our

existence today,

the beginning

and how it

is?

You know how

hard it is to

make an

apology?

Most of us

don't make

apologies,

we make

excuses,

where we

try to

bowl our

way out of

things.

It's so

true.

So here,

just,

oh,

I've gone

way,

here,

just in

closing,

can you put

up the

last point?

Only Jesus

Christ,

only Jesus

Christ

turns take

and eat

from a

reminder of

sin,

shame,

and death

to a

reminder of

salvation,

grace,

and eternal

life.

Look at

verse 6

again.

How does it

describe what

the woman

did?

the verbs?

She took,

she takes

the fruit,

she eats,

and she

gives,

and he

eats,

and evil

enters the

world.

Turn to

Matthew

Matthew 26 · chapter mention

chapter 26.

And in

Matthew

Matthew 26:26–29

chapter 26,

verses 26

to 29,

look how

Jesus speaks

when he

institutes the

Lord's

Supper,

Holy Communion.

And in

here,

what Jesus

is doing

is Jesus

knows that

he's about

to die on

the cross,

that his

death upon

the cross

is the

long-foretold

promise that

God has

made that

he was

going to

make things

right himself.

And so,

his son

is going

to die

upon the

cross,

and his

death upon

the cross

is going

to be the

means by

which we

can be

made right

with God

if we

receive it

by faith.

And he's

instituting

the Lord's

Supper so

that we

remember

what Jesus

did for us

on the

cross,

that every

time we

celebrate

communion,

on one

hand,

it is like

Americans

doing the

Pledge of

Allegiance.

When we

receive

communion,

it is us

making our

pledge of

allegiance to

the one

who has

redeemed us.

When we

receive the

Lord's

Supper,

we are

reminding

ourselves

that we

need a

Savior,

that only

God can

have mercy

on us

and rescue

us and

start to

restore us.

And it

is renewing

our covenant

with Almighty

God and

remembering what

Jesus has

done for us

on the

cross.

And just

as Eve,

in this

story,

she takes

and she

eats,

so Jesus,

when he's

about to

institute this

new covenant

meal,

that people

will understand

after his

death and

his resurrection

what it is

that he has

done for them

on the cross,

that they are

to receive

by faith,

that is for

the worst

sinner or

the person

who hardly

thinks they've

saved at all,

that every

single human

who puts

their faith

and trust

in Jesus,

he will

turn no

one away,

he will

accept you

as his

child,

he will

make you

his child

by adoption

and grace,

he will

clothe you

with the

righteousness

of Christ,

he will

begin to

restore you

and to

heal you

and to

fit you

for the

new heaven

and the

new earth

that we

receive by

faith and

this meal

reminds us

and how

does Jesus

describe it?

Now as

they were

eating,

Jesus took

bread and

after blessing

it,

broke it

and gave

it to the

disciples and

said,

take,

eat,

this is my

body.

And he

took a

cup and

when he

had given

thanks,

he gave

it to

them saying,

drink it

of it,

all of you,

for this

is my

blood of

the new

covenant,

which is

poured out

for many

for the

forgiveness

of sins.

Only

Jesus Christ

turns take

and eat

from a

reminder of

sin,

shame,

and death

and turns

it into a

reminder when

we receive it

by faith,

him by

faith,

of salvation,

grace,

and eternal

life.

Please stand.

I'm going

to invite you

to join

with me in

a prayer.

If you

could put

it up.

I think

it's going

to take

two slides.

If the

Lord has

pressed upon

your heart,

your need

for a

Savior,

for some

of you,

maybe this

is going

to be a

conversion

prayer because

it ends,

it begins

with confession

but it

ends with

acknowledging

who Jesus

is and

you're asking

him,

Jesus,

to be his

disciple.

But for

all of us,