Do you remember playing “hide and seek” as a toddlers? It was a fun game. I could, however, never understand why my older sister always knew exactly where to find me! Being a year and a half younger than her, she knew where the best places were to hide. I took the first available place each time and she knew it and caught me out time and again. Yet as I grew older, I cottoned onto her “cleverness”. Our parents always knew where we hid when we were naughty. Strange is it not … parent always know where the kids are to be found? Please read:
Ge 3:8 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. 9 But the LORD God called to the man, “Where are you?” 10 He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.” 11 And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?” 12 The man said, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.” 13 Then the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”
1) No place to hide. Older folk might recall a radio program on Radio South Africa called “No place to hide.” It was a spy drama involving the British and Russians. The thrust of the story was that in each case, be it a British or Russian spy, there was no place to hide. Each time a spy thought he or she had a good cover, they were discovered. We get the picture that Adam and Eve knew they sinned, were ashamed of their nakedness, clothed themselves with fig leaves and hid from God. Is it possible to hide from God? Many try … I remember doing the same thing. It’s called blocking God out from the mind by filling the mind with anything and everything else. Can one hide from God? Decidedly not because God is omniscient! God knows all things all the time. There is nothing happening anywhere in creation that is away from God’s sight and knowledge. The word “hide” carries the meaning of “fear of anger”. Not only did these first parents sin, they understood that there were consequences for their sin. They hid from God because they were afraid of God’s anger. Is this perhaps an indication that they, in knowing good and evil, understood God’s wrath?
2) The call of God. Hide as they may, God knew where Adam and Eve were, yet he called them. The word “called” seems to have the concept of summons. That is, God summonsed them to appear before Him in the Garden. God was not seeking information as to where Adam and Eve were when He asked … “Where are you?” Some think God could not find them or was not aware as to their condition since they fell into sin. This would be wrong. God is sovereign … all knowing, all seeing, all powerful. He is absolute intelligence! Nothing escapes God … not even a man and women hiding in the lush bushes of Eden. This was a summons!
3) Why would God summons them? Why would he not firstly find them and pronounce judgment because of rebellion? The answer is what we expect of God. He is kind and gracious. He takes the initiative calling man to come to Him for grace and mercy. Did He not say so often when creating … “it was good”? (Chapter 1:9, 12, 18, 21). Yet once all of creation was complete … that is after he made man, we read:
Ge 1:31 God saw all that he had made, and it was very good.
Man was the cherry on the top of creation. God created man to love Him because he made him in His image and likeness … and even though man sinned, God remained the God of grace, mercy and kindness. He reached out to man. Man hid from Him yet He came to man, summonsing him for an audience!
4) An audience with God means something important.
(1) Observe that God summoned the man:
Ge 3:9 But the LORD God called to the man, “Where are you?”
He did not call him out of hiding. He called the man … why? Because God issued the probationary Command in chapter 2 to Adam not Eve. Remember that at that stage Eve had not yet been created. Adam was not only appointed head (2:15), he was issued with:
Ge 2:15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”
Although Eve sinned first, as said before she did not break this command … her husband did!
(2) Responsibility and accountability. A good friend always teased about his age. At the time he was around the mid 50’s. He would say he is the oldest 19 year old in Pretoria because should he get older he would need to take responsibility for his actions and be accountable. Naturally he was joking … but what he said is so accurate. As adults we are responsible and accountable for our actions … to the government, to parents, to employers, to the spouse and family … but most importantly, to God! God’s grace must be seen in that He gave Adam the opportunity to take responsibility and be accountable for breaking the Probationary Command.
5) Adam the guilty one. We will be unpacking Adam substituting for us in the Garden. We shall deal with how his sin has been imputed to the human race. We shall see how this disobedience affects us as a race and how it impacts the planet itself. From all this we shall also see how everything in our world that is not of God is controlled by the devil and his demonic forces and how chaos and havoc reigns making life miserable without Jesus. We shall see that, but for now … consider this …
6) God is gracious and merciful. Even though you (or anyone else) might seek God, it is actually God working by His Spirit within you respond to His Gospel summons to come to Him. Whether pulpits tell us we must call upon Jesus or whether we say I went to Jesus … the reality is that God in His grace has taken the initiative and summons us to come to Him. The reason being, that we can never say something like … “I gave God a chance” … or … “I gave my heart to Jesus” … placing me in the controlling seat. Salvation is always at God’s initiative. He chose to send His Son into the World. The Son chose to die substitutionally for lost sinners. The Holy Spirit births truly repentance sinners into God’s forever family. Salvation is God worked and provided. He calls (summons’) sinners to appear before Him in repentant for pardon and salvation. Get this wrong and your salvation might not be Biblically authentic. He comes. He calls. He saves. Salvation is of God alone.
Eph 2:8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
To see the beauty of salvation we find that salvation is by grace through faith … it is a gift not works … the glory is God’s so we cannot boast … we are God’s workmanship created to do good works after being saved.
Glorious God our loving, merciful and gracious King, thank You for taking the initiative with Adam … and with us through Jesus Christ, for without Your actions we would be eternally lost. Amen.