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,"… 8 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 among the trees of the garden. 9 But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” 10 And he said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” 11 He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” (Genesis 3:1a, 8-11, ESV)
What was the first sin? It has been described in different ways: pride, greed, ignorance, being deceived. In the end it doesn’t matter what you call the first sin, there is one undeniable reality that remains. At the root of the first sin was a failure to be satisfied by God and God alone.
As we look at what faith is, we must take the time to consider that faith must be pointed at something. Faith that is not moving, or said another way, faith that does not cause us to move is not faith. Faith is an action word. What makes this word different and unique when we talk about it in a Christian sense is that the object of our faith is not a place or state of being. The object of our faith is actually something that is really unexpected. As followers of Jesus and believers in the Gospel of Jesus, the object of our faith is God. God is the only object in all of the universe that is worthy of worship and devotion.
Now that we have the obvious statement out of the way, we have to take this a step further and realize what we are saying. God is not merely the one that calls us to a better life. God is the better life that we are striving to have. God is not merely offering us joy and peace and grace in this life. God is the joy and peace and grace that are lives need. To get to the point: If God is not enough, then nothing else will be either. What we have to see is that as we are looking for the things that God offers to us because of our relationship with Jesus, we fail to see that what God is offering to us is himself.
Look at this statement that Jesus gave to the disciples in John 15:
28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30, ESV)
What is the location that Jesus is inviting us to? It is not someWHERE, but rather to someONE. Come to ME. Jesus is not saying that in being physically close to him we will find peace and rest. Jesus is saying that he is the peace and rest and if we are in relationship with him we will have what we are longing for.
I will admit, this is not an easy subject to think about or consider. But, we have to take the time to understand what this means for us. I don’t remember who said this first or who said it to me, but it has never left me. It goes like this, “We are so busy looking at God’s hands, that we have stopped looking at God’s face.” I don’t know about you, but this is very true of me. I can fall into the “give me” game that I forget that what God is interested is in the “with me” game. God wants us to be with him.
This is the sad scene that we find in Genesis 3. God has created paradise, but that is not enough. God has given freedom, but that is not enough. God has given them responsibility, but that is not enough. God has given them pleasure, and that is not enough. God has given himself, and we see that even this does not satisfy the first couple. Why was it so “easy” to trick and trap Adam and Eve into sin? It was easy because when we are given everything we want, we think that there is more to be had. There was nothing missing in Eden. Everything that they could have ever wanted was there, but in an attempt get more they lost it all. We still haven’t figured that out. We still are trying to exceed the boundaries of God’s love and grace.
There it is. The great sin is not that Adam and Eve disobeyed God. I am not diminishing this. The great sin was that they believed that they needed more than what God has provided for them. As we walk this path of faith, we must recognize that faith is not the ever increasing experience of new things. Faith is the simple delight in the same thing, in this case, God himself. God is the only thing, and he is also everything.
Where are you? Have you allowed the extravagant opportunities of this world distract you from the simple joy of fellowship with God? Has your heart been dulled by the constant barrage of stimuli offered to every sense? What is it that is keeping you distracted from looking forward to those moments spent with God in the “cool of the day”? Until we allow God to satisfy our every need, longing, desire and appetite we will struggle to live the abundant life that Jesus promised.
Faith is… totally and unashamedly satisfied with the Person of God.
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