Ok… now that we have the framework for the Adam & Eve story let’s proceed with how that fits in with the growth of our faith. Remember the scripture from Tuesday?
Trust in the LORD with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding. Seek his will in all you do, and he will show you which path to take. Proverbs 3:5-6 (NLT)
That scripture (as far as I’m concerned) is the key to becoming a person of great faith. But it takes risk. Trusting always requires risk… even with God. Why? Because if you’re like me God’s paths don’t always make the most sense to me. My own paths often seem like the smarter way to go (or at least the more natural to me). Only when I trust God and take the risk of trusting His paths (by following them even when they don’t make sense to me) will my faith grow.
And that brings us to Adam & Eve.
Do you remember the story of the garden of Eden? Adam & Eve were given everything. God told them they could eat whatever they wanted to… there was only one limit for them.
You may freely eat the fruit of every tree in the garden—except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. If you eat its fruit, you are sure to die. Genesis 2:16-17 (NLT)
What I think God is saying here is,
“I want you to trust Me… but I’m not going to force you. Because to force you to choose the right way wouldn’t lead to a deeper relationship… it wouldn’t lead to love. So you’re going to have to trust that I have your best interests in mind.”
Have you ever struggled with the question of whether God had your best interests in mind? Have you ever asked yourself whether or not He’s right? These are scary questions to bring out and look at in the light of day, but I think these questions are at the heart of most sin (at least in my case they are). Adam & Eve struggled with them too. And those questions are what the serpent plays on when he tempts them.
He starts out completely twisting God’s words:
Did God really say you must not eat the fruit from any of the trees in the garden? Genesis 3:2 (NLT)
And Eve sees right through the serpent’s lies. But the temptation hits home… the serpent plays on Eve’s doubts (that I think must have been there already or it wouldn’t have been so easy):
“You won’t die!” the serpent replied to the woman. “God knows that your eyes will be opened as soon as you eat it, and you will be like God, knowing both good and evil.” Genesis 3:4-5 (NLT)
I think it’s interesting here that Satan doesn’t try to make the sin look good, as much as he tries to make God look stingy. Ultimately, that’s Satan’s only lie that works. His only lie is that God doesn’t have our best in mind. His only lie is to cast critical doubt on the character of God. And although we know that both Adam & Eve fall for that lie, I think it’s important to understand that faithfulness would have worked in this situation. If they had decided to trust God rather than the lie of the serpent the story would have turned out much different (at least on that day). They could have said,
“that’s a convincing argument you’re making… but God has always proved Himself to be trustworthy so we’re going to wait and talk to Him about this.”
They could have chosen that path… they could have chosen the path of trust and faith and risked obeying Him even though they were confused about why they couldn’t have any of the fruit from the tree that looked so yummy. But instead they choose a path that took them away from God… they embraced their fear and confusion that God wasn’t looking out for them and moved into a brand new world of self reliance. The trouble was, they weren’t nearly as good at caring for themselves as God was at caring for them.
So they run from God and their whole world falls apart. They ran because they found themselves in a place of doubt, fear, & confusion. The worst of it was, what they ended up finding was even more doubt, fear & confusion. And pretty soon this story of Adam & Eve begins to sound more and more like my own life.
If we’re not careful we’ll find ourselves spinning out of control all because we chose to trust our own judgments over God’s. When it’s at its worst I just want to yell, “stop this ride, I need to get off!”
Luckily there’s nothing keeping us on the “doubt, fear & confusion” ride in the carnival from Hell. God can work with us any time we decide to start trusting Him again… are you ready? I know my life ALWAYS goes better when I trust God over my own (completly immature) judgments.
Peace.
The scripture from Proverbs 3:5-6 is so clear to me and it really touches me. But the thing that I sometimes struggle with is seeing which path God is leading me to. I still have problems hearing His calling or knowing for sure if He is leading me down one path rather than another.
For instance, there was an incident that occurred between me & a close Christian friend (who lives in Florida) a year ago and as a result, we ended our friendship late last year b/c we’re both too competitive and have envy/jealous overwhelming us. To this day, she is constantly on my mind and I miss her friendship, but there is too much stubborness in me to reach out to her again. But I “feel” that God is leading me back to her and wants me to take another step to touch base with her (after I have ignored her couple attempts to reach me). However, I think I am ignoring Him by coming up with too many excuses not to…and as you would say Pastor Ed, “it’s not comfortable for me and it feels like a crazy idea!!”
Stopping right now, I don’t know why this situation came up b/c it wasn’t on my mind when I began writing this response, so that sort of goes back to my point about struggling to hear God’s callings! If He is talking to me to reach out to her again and regain her friendship, I’d LOVE to do it if I knew everything was going to be okay again and she wouldn’t think of me as an idiot…but it’s that “leap of faith” that my personality interferes with!
Sorry to keep going on, I guess I’m verbalizing my thoughts that were prompted by your blog entry (thanks!!). I should go and talk to the One who knows best about this, huh?? Thanks for getting the thoughts stirred up and I’m soooooo glad you’re back! Love reading the entries b/c they draw me closer to Him and help me to bring Christ into my everyday life!!
By: Brandy on March 30, 2009
at 7:03 pm
Hey Brandy,
Obviously I’m not as close to the situation as you are… but from what you’re saying it sounds like God is nudging you to contact your friend. I know stuff like that can be scary and I don’t want to make it seem like it’s no big deal. And what’s worse is, God doesn’t even promise everything will work out between you and your friend from Florida even if you do follow His leading and reach out (if that really is what God is leading you to do).
But what I can guarantee is that when we do what we feel like God is asking us to do things always go better for us (although not necessarily easier or more apparently successful). Does that make sense? I’ve learned that following God’s gentle leading doesn’t always lead to the result I thought it would or should. But it always leads me one more step down the path I’m supposed to be on and one step closer to the image of Jesus in my life.
Ed
By: ednjude on March 30, 2009
at 7:45 pm
I think you’re making perfect sense…I feel this overwhelming “nudge” (not a gentle one that you mentioned, lol!) to do this and I believe I will be flooded with peace over the situation, regardless of how it turns out. If I were still a teenager (thank God those years are more than a decade behind me!), I’d look at how a teen/child would do something just because their parents asked them to (well, most would do it after being told numerous times)…and they’d often do it to get the parents off their backs! But in my situation, I don’t want to try to mend a broken relationship to get God off my back. I really want to do it because of the emotions involved and because I feel it’s the right thing to do. No matter how it could turn out, I believe I’ll have peace about it because I did what God would want me to do.
So thanks to your initial blog entry, I really do feel as if God has tried to talk to me in so many different ways about this, but I have had my stubborn blinders on. The more I ignored, the harder he nudged. So after praying more about it and then of course this blog, I know what I need to do. I may not know how to go about doing it just yet, but at least I’m hearing His calling! I need to turn back to Proverbs 3 again to gain some more understanding! Thanks Pastor Ed
By: Brandy on March 31, 2009
at 6:44 pm