Where Are You? | Genesis 3:8–15

God’s Questions

If you’re ever watched any crime documentary or movie you will see at some point when the police finally catch the bad guy, they bring back to the station, put them in a room and let them sit there for a while and that is what happens in real life too. Then the detective comes in, acting like he’s your best friend, trying to put you at ease so you relax and he starts asking questions about the crime he believes you committed.

This questioning goes on for hours usually and some of the questions may seem like they don’t matter and actually, sometimes they don’t, they ask those to simply gauge your reaction to certain things, to get a feel for who you are. When they have established that, then they begin asking the real questions, the kind they ask where you should have an attorney with you.

A lot of the questions they ask, they already know the answer to so why do they ask them? They want to see what you will say and how you act, from the words you use to how you’re sitting, to see if anything changes. They want to see how readily you will lie to them, that is why they ask those questions.

God asks Adam and Eve, “Where are you?” Does this imply that God doesn’t know something and is reduced to asking Adam for information? Of course not, he knows where they are and why they are there. He wants to see if Adam will be honest with him and to get him talking about why they are hiding.

This is one of the most familiar texts we have, the fall of mankind, how it all started, who’s to blame and the affect of sin on our life and the world. But what we may not know are some of the details that aren’t often talked about and explained, so that is what we’re going to look at today and why they are important.

In the garden we find Adam and Eve, God’s creation, in the most beautiful place on earth that had ever been created. We cannot even imagine what this place looked like or smelled like, but it was amazing because it was the place where God had placed mankind so that they would not lack for anything in their life, everything was provided for them and they needed nothing. They had it made in ways we can’t even understand. There was no need for anything, food was provided, water, everything that they needed was there, and God was there too!

Not just in a spiritual sense but a physical one. God would come to the garden and walk them, talk with, just there to hangout if you will and that had to be amazing, just walking around talking to God and he is right there with you. I can imagine that God with them both just walking around the garden one day and they see a bird flying through the air or a deer walking through a field and God points to it and says, “hey, what do you think of that I created? They look pretty good don’t they?” Maybe they saw a flying squirrel going from one tree to another and Adam saying, “I’m not sure what you were trying to do with that one though.”

But, we know that scene didn’t last for too long because of a tree. In the center of Eden.

The New King James Version Chapter 2

“Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat

This one tree of the knowledge of good and evil has caused more confusion, destruction, death and evil than any other thing known to man and they ate from it and from that point it has God asking Adam and Eve questions that he should never had to ask them, “where are you?” The Garden’s stewards were now fugitives from the Garden’s owner.

We have been talking about salvation, the kingdom of God and the closeness of God in our lives over the last several weeks. We have looked at how John the Baptist came announcing that the Kingdom of God is near, and just how close we want that kingdom in our lives in a very real sense. Now we have to ask ourselves that when the kingdom draws near to us, how do we respond to the presence of God in our life?

Where are we in our faith? We have to identify where we are before we can begin relocating.

Do we run toward God and our faith or do we run away, scared to get to close because if we do then it may mean that we have to make real substantial changes in our life, we may not be able to live the life we want to anymore and submit to God. In the quest searching for this kind of relationship with God, we have some things that work against us and all of those things come from one place, this single miserable tree and what makes it worse, is that there was another tree that they could have chosen from but they didn’t.

“The tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.”

Ge 2:9.

That’s right, there was another tree. At the center of Eden were two trees, the tree of life and the tree of good and evil, one represents a relationship with God and the other was separation from God. They were only told not to eat from one of them, not the tree of life.

The Teacher’s Bible Commentary The Fall of Man (Gen. 3:1–7)

When God created Adam, he created him innocent but not virtuous. There is a difference. Innocence is one’s condition before he knows the difference between right and wrong. He is innocent because he is not aware of evil. A person is virtuous when he comes face to face with temptation and rejects the evil in favor of the good. Adam had not yet become virtuous; he was innocent. God intended that Adam should progress to the point where he could overcome all temptations; then he would become virtuous, or righteous. However, he fell short, and we have been following his example ever since.

The Teacher’s Bible Commentary (The Fall of Man (Gen. 3:1–7))

The scene in the third chapter of Genesis is not only something that happened to Adam and Eve thousands of years ago. It takes place in the life of every person. Individuals today have similar experiences and yield just as Adam and Eve did.

The Teacher’s Bible Commentary The Fall of Man (Gen. 3:1–7)

In Genesis the serpent is both literal and figurative. He is not called Satan, although the New Testament later identifies him as such (Rev. 12:9). An ancient story of why snakes crawl on their bellies is used to picture the invasion of the human realm by demonic power. Genesis 3:15 clearly describes the conflict between the human race and evil forces, not simply hostility between people and snakes! The serpent is a “creature” formed by God. Whatever trouble exists in the universe has happened within it. God’s world is not challenged by rival forces outside it (as in dualistic polytheism) but from within, and subject to his control. Later Satan is always described as a fallen angel, never a rival god

In Genesis 2:23 it says that Adam in his delight broke out into poetry at the first sight of Eve, I bet he did. But what did Eve think about Adam? She said nothing. apparently she was more interested in something else, the most wonderful person that Eve knew was not Adam, it was God. The serpent comes to her and tells her that if she wants to be like God, she must eat of this tree. What’s wrong with wanting to be like God? Isn’t this something all of us should want? The thing is, there are no shortcuts to that relationship, to be like God you must have righteousness as well as knowledge.

The serpent was a shortcut to salvation if you will and that doesn’t work. And why this tree and not the tree of life? Sin often looks more appetizing, better looking, better for us, it feeds our ego, fuels our pride and elevates our understanding of our status.

The serpent made her think that there wasn’t anything wrong ignoring God, made her believe that God wasn’t someone she had to listen to or obey. God had told them, that you eat of this tree you will surely die but the serpent assured her that, “you’re not going to die”, don’t worry about it, and she took that first bite, gave some to Adam and he took a bite and that was it. Evil in the form of a serpent told them something was good when it wasn’t, they tried it and they loved it, for a moment. Their eyes were opened, saw they were naked and hid from God.

That is what sin does, it fools us into thinking that something God says is bad is actually good for us and we take that bite and for us, just like them, it was too late, it had a hold on them. We are approached every day with sinful things, they’re going to look good, look wonderful, God says to us that this thing is bad but the sinfulness in us tells us to go ahead and we do and then we try to hide that sin from God, from each other but just as in this case, God knows.

The blessing here is that even though God knew what they had done, he came back for them. He didn’t leave them there, he still provided for them, clothed them, fed them because he loved them just as he loves you and he comes back to us each and every day but why is that, other than love that is?

God wants to get us back to that other tree, remember that one? The one that the Bible barely mentions, the tree of life? That tree represents God’s presence, relationship, eternal life with him. After this event, God guarded the tree and kicked them out of Eden and they would spend the rest of their lives in sin and pain, nothing would be easy for them ever again. The ground that once simply provided food, would now have to be worked to sustain them even to this day, “both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you.” Just as a thorn in an undeveloped blossom and stunted growth, so our lives have been stunted by the sin of this world.

I’m willing to bet that you’ve known the pain of sin in your life, a life separated from God at one point in your life, maybe even right now and God tells us that even though we have to deal with the evil that had been unleashed into the world that access to that tree had not been cut off, it’s still there but it would take the New Testament to get us there.

The fight to get us back was long and difficult but God fought for us. He fought for us from Eden to Egypt, from Jericho to Jerusalem. God fought for us using people, such as Moses, Ezekiel to Elijah, Joshua to John the Baptist. As great as they were, they couldn’t get us back to that tree of life, they couldn’t defeat the serpent, by God working in them, they could keep the serpent held off but they couldn’t heal what he had done.

But it required the thorns taken from the ground mentioned here, placing them on the head of Jesus of Nazareth to get us back to that tree of life, that relationship, that eternal life with God our Creator. This is the blessing for you today, that while the battle rages on, don’t quit, don’t give in, don’t stop fighting against the evil of this world, sin has been defeated because of yet another tree, perhaps the most important, the tree that held the body of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.