Are You Hiding In The Garden?
Have you ever done something so hideous that you just wanted to hide from everyone and everything, including God? In the book of Genesis, chapter 3 to be specific, Adam and Eve did that very thing. They were instructed not to eat the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil but after a crafty deception by a serpent with the gift of gab they found themselves disobeying a direct order from God. What do the creation duo do next? They do the only sensible thing in their minds; they hide from God in the fear and shame of their sinfulness.
This is illustrated in Genesis 3:8-10 “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. But the Lord God called to the man, ‘Where are you?’ He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.”
I notice several things in these short few verses that speak volumes to the love of our heavenly father. The first thing I notice is that despite our shame and sinfulness God still looks for us where we are hiding. God is God, He knew exactly what Adam and Eve had done and where they were hiding and he still pursued them. Adam and Eve hid among the very thing that caused them to sin in the first place, they hid “among the trees in the garden” and God went where they were. Lastly God knew they were naked the whole time and didn’t fault them for the things they lacked in knowledge (and in this case clothing). He loved them enough to look for them in their state of shame.
Are you hiding in the garden? God is still God and he knows that you are naked; he knows you are scared and because of your sinfulness you feel unworthy of having a relationship with him. There is good news, you are unworthy of God and your sin does separate you from him but he has made a way for you through his son Jesus Christ. Just like God pursued our first parents in the beginning He is also pursuing you, even in your nakedness. In Genesis 3:21 God sacrifices an animal to cover our sins and nakedness and gives the animal skins to Adam and Eve to cover up with. From the beginning there has always had to be innocent bloodshed to cover our deficiency, our sin. God did this once and for all in the pure and spotless lamb of Jesus Christ, His only son. God knows you're naked and he has prepared a way for you to cover your shame by the blood of Jesus. Will you accept his free gift? Will you come out of hiding or are you going to stay hidden among the trees in the garden?
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