II. HOW DID WE GET HERE? OUR* CHURCH IN THE 21ST CENTURY *Mennonite/Anabaptist. HUMANS MAKE A WRONG CHOICE –THINGS GO BAD: Consequences and the Promise of a Way Out (What really happened in The Garden of Eden?)

Read Genesis 3

1.     So, what is the first thing that we are told happens in this story? We learn of a specific animal now, a serpent or snake, and how is it described?

Is it really craftier than any other wild animal that God had made?

2.     What might that mean? From what we know of snakes today, are they really that smart compared to other animals? Or is this writer referring to what the specific snake did?

3.     What is this talking snake anyway? If we look at how this whole story is treated in the rest of the Bible, and even discern its meaning here, the humans are obviously being tempted by something that is beyond them, let alone beyond the animal kingdom. This has really been understood as the snake being possessed by the devil on this occasion, and we know the devil never wants anything good to come out of what God does.

4.     So, what else is being introduced too? A force for evil. So far we had read that everything that God had created was a good. What happened between chapters 2 and three? Or when and where did this evil come from? There are other passages in the Bible that indicate that there is this other powerful super natural creature called Satan or the devil. It seems that Satan was perhaps once the most prominent of God's angels but rebelled against him and was cast out of heaven. Ever since, we see through the story of the Bible, Satan has waged war against God and his creation.

5.     What do we learn about God in this chapter that we perhaps had not yet learned from chapters 1 and two?

a.              We learn from verse three that God had evidently told the humans that they could not eat of the fruit of the tree that was in the middle of the garden, let alone touch it, or they would die.    We see that God had told the man this in 2:17, before the woman was created. The man no doubt told the woman about this, but it would have been a second-hand command to her and perhaps they stayed away from the tree to avoid that, until now. Perhaps that is why the devil thought the woman would be easier to tempt.

b.              But what does the snake say? They would not die that but their eyes would be opened and they would be like God, knowing good and evil.

6.     Is the snake telling the truth?

7.     What does the woman take away from what the snake says? She believes that the snake is telling her that this tree is also good for food, a delight to the eyes, which they probably already knew, and that it was desired to make one wise.

8.     So what does she do? She eats some of it and also shares some of it with her husband. They could do this because, being created in God’s image, they were given what we know as free will. They were able to make a choice. However, not being God, their will, when used, did not always lead to good results.

9.     So, what happens next? Do they become wise? What do they learn about good and evil?

a.     The first thing we are told is that they realize that they are naked and quickly stitched themselves some fig leaf clothes to cover their nakedness. What is the wisdom or the

knowledge of good and evil in that? Well, perhaps a bit of both. We know how nakedness and its temptations often leads to evil in our world, so maybe it is wise to cover up.

b.     The man and woman realized there was a difference between them and got the notion it was  shameful, not good and needed to be hidden. So, there is some evil in that too. We had not been told prior to this that there was any negative difference between man and woman. Now, a barrier begins to develop between the sexes. God’s good world is going bad.

10.   Why have these changes come into the world? Humans listened to another voice and not God’s. They disobeyed God.

11.   Why would they do that? Was there some fault in God’s image? Here we learn something else about how we were created in God’s image. What the humans did obviously shows they were

given what we have come to know as free will. They were able to make a choice. God did not make robots. However, not being God, their will, when used, did not always lead to good results.

12.   And what was the real thing that the humans somehow grasped that they could be if they ate this fruit? What had the snake said? They would be like God. And what makes people want to be like God? Is it not pride? Some say that is the first and basic sin and everything flows form that. Humans made a choice and they/we are responsible for that and what happens as a result.

13.   Now we learn something else about God we had not yet known. Remember how we talked about God being personal and revealing himself to us and wanting to show his love to us and be in

relationship with us? What does it say in vs. 8? It sounds as though God had a habit of coming to talk with the humans, perhaps on a daily basis, in the cool of he evening – when the breezes blew. Isn’t that a wonderful picture? Walking and talking in the garden with God? This was probably the time when God taught the humans everything they needed to know about the world they lived in and what they were to do in it, including how to look after it and how to reproduce and replenish the earth, which were the two commands he had given them.

 14.   But what did the humans do this time? They hid? Why? Because of the nakedness they had realized they were in.

15.   What is the message in that? Now we learn that somehow the wisdom, if we can call it that, of becoming aware of evil vs. good not only separates us from others, it separates us from God.

Now humans felt not only afraid of being exposed to one another, but being exposed to God. What a terrible outcome from making a wrong choice - fear entered the world.

16.   What does God say in verse 11? He knew exactly what had happened, did he not? But like all good parents, he wants to hear what his children have to say in their defense. He doesn't just come up with an active response right away.

17.   And what to the humans do? What do children usually do when they're caught? Sometimes they tell lies. Sometimes they blame. That is what Adam and Eve did. The man blamed the woman and the woman blamed the snake. We don’t want to be alone in our wrongdoing.  Thus, as we already again to notice, the man and woman became in some ways separated from one another, alienated from their creator and actually ending up alone, in spite of their wanting to be together. More problems created by disobedience.

18.   It does not seem that God gives the snake a chance to defend itself. Why might that be? Well, a snake is not made in God's image, it was not created with God's breath of life, so a real snake

would have nothing to say. It was only the devil speaking through the snake, and God is not going to give the devil any opportunities.

19.   So what is the upshot of all of this?  When we make a decision, there is always going to be an outcome and if it is a bad decision, result is usually a consequence . For whom? For all three, the snake, the woman and the man. What are they? 

a.     The consequences for the snake are threefold: it will have to crawl on its belly from now on. This suggests that it may have had legs like other animals prior to this.

b.     It will eat dust all the days of its life. This probably just refers to the fact that it would be crawling on the ground and so of course exposed constantly to dust.

c.     Verse 15, the second part, points to a further consequence. What does this really mean? On one level it obviously means that mankind now generally wants to kill snakes when they see them, striking their head. There will be a barrier how between snake and humans. Is that not so for most humans? Are most humans not more afraid of snakes than other animals, and perhaps women more than men? Seems like that all started here.

20.   On the other hand, poisonous snakes, which crawl on the ground, bite humans, quite often on the foot, because that is what they can reach.

However, there are other references in the Bible that point to a deeper future meaning to this. This is typical in the Bible. There are often several layers or different meanings to a passage, the first one having to do with when the action took place and other ones having to do with events in the future. We believe that here it is saying that there would someday be a man, Jesus, who would strike Satan a fatal blow, even though Satan thought he had struck Jesus a fatal blow when Jesus was killed. What Satan did not realize, was that in doing so, he sealed his own fate.

21.    So, what are the consequences for the woman?

a.     She would have increased pain in childbirth. Does this suggest there would have been some pain before that? Probably not, because we can't imagine pain being good. It

probably just means that the pain was going to be quite severe. This also points to the Hebrew biblical understanding of the central role of the woman as a mother. Now this role comes with problems.

b.     Secondly, it appears from the latter part of verse 16 that there would now be a negative component to the relationship the woman has with her husband. They may have been created equal. However, now it seems that in some ways the man would be the ruler.

We know from what we studied the last couple of weeks that this was not the way it was supposed to be. God created woman as a helper for man but it does not say she was not equal. Furthermore, when we read what Jesus and writers like Paul say in the New Testament, we see that certainly in God's new Kingdom, which Christ brought into existence, and which we can be part of when we believe, we are also to be equal. That is certainly the way we as believers should function in our families and in our churches.

c.     Another consequence that we can pick out here is guilt. The man and woman were ashamed of what they had done. Fear entered the picture and the humans wanted to hide from God when he came to look for them, as it seems he usually did.

d.     The woman also did not want to take sole responsibility for what she wanted to do and wanted to make excuses and blame others, which Adam did too. We don’t want to be

alone in our wrongdoing.  Thus, as we already again to notice, the man and woman became in some ways separated from one another, alienated from their creator and actually ending up alone, in spite of they’re wanting to be together.

22.  So what were the specific consequences for the man?

a.     Remember that man had been given the task of looking after the garden. Here he was told first of all that because of his disobedience, the ground that he was to work would be cursed. He would have to work hard now at getting his food out of it, including fighting weeds such as thorns and thistles.  Just like the woman’s main role of giving birth was affected by what they did, so is the man’s.

b.     But then there was also that final result, in the latter part of verse 19. Man was now going to die, return to the dust from which he had been created.  The good earth is no longer so totally good.

23.  There are two other points that we can see here, if you can pick them out.

a.     The first is that not only did the earth and the plants suffer, animals did as well. Some were killed, sacrificed, to make more durable leather coverings for the humans to cover themselves with instead of the flimsy fig leaf aprons they had made first. Another positive and redemptive way of looking at this tells us that even though they were disobedient, God still cares for and provide for his people.

b.     Then, God says because they might eat of the tree of life and live forever, they have to be banned from the garden. They can no longer even live in the place which God originally created and placed them in. Again, the mercy of God might be showing here in not sentencing them for  an immortal life to a world that was now no longer as good.
24. Some have been troubled by the use of the word 'curse' in 3:14 and 17. How we understand this seemingly harsh denunciation depends somewhat on our view of how scripture came to be. People who tend to take the Bible more literally, without understanding context, original languages and worldviews when it was written, tend to read 'curse' as an action God has taken.  Actually, it might often be more correct to understand sayings like this as God saying that you will be cursed, in the case of the snake, or the ground will be cursed, in the case of his words to Adam, as referring to the natural consequences of their actions, not something God willed. God never wills evil.  
    25. Another point that can be made with respect to texts in the Old Testament where, for example, it is said God said so-and-so, is that people then tended to see everything as ordained by the gods, and the early Hebrews might have been no better. So, if they defeated a certain tribe in battle, well God must have willed that, ergo... God said they should do that. Certainly again, one has to be careful about this. There are times when God in his infinite knowledge and justice does carry out judgment. For instance, take the case of the Amorites with whom the Israelites waged war when they returned from Egypt to Canaan. God had told Abraham 400 years earlier that this would happen, because he was, basically, 'not done with them.' How do we understand that? We can actually see the grace of God was at work here. The Amorites and other tribes around Israel in Canaan were very wicked. They burned their children in sacrifice to their gods in the hope that the gods would be appeased and grow their crops or give them success in battle. God basically gave them 400 years to 'clean up their act,' but they did not. So, God decided they had their chance and a lot of them were destroyed. Again, how much of it was active, how much a consequence of their own actions (see discussion of 'curse' above). God's mercy is limitless in some ways but it has its limits too. Even New Testament writers warn us not to test God's patience.

Read Genesis 4:1-16

1.     What happens, now that Adam and Eve appear to have been expelled from the garden? They produce the first two sons, Cain and then Abel.

2.     Why do you think the word knew is used for an obvious reference to sexual relations? Some interpreters say it links the area of sex with the shame and nakedness that occurred with new knowledge gained by eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Sex was no doubt created good, but their sin cast a shadow on it.

3.     What do you make of the statement of Eve's, that the Lord helped her produce a child? In the first instance, this could well simply refer to the fact that God had to teach and help his humans learn everything they needed to survive, including how to experience childbirth. It could also refer to Eve's recognition that she had survived the consequence of pain in childbirth and she attributes this to help from God. Thus, as we have already seen, in the midst of sin and its consequences, God still shows mercy. She might be rejoicing that, even though they have been punished, she, like God, can also bring forth humanity.

4.     So what happened to Cain and Abel? Cain became farmer and Abel the Shepherd. In the culture of those days, those who grew crops where given higher recognition then those who herded animals.

5.     What then do we read that Cain and Abel did? First of all, Abel brings God a sacrifice of his first born of his crop. Then it sounds as though Cain realized he too needed to make a sacrifice and brought some of his grain.

6.     Why do you think God accepted Abel’s sacrifice but not Cain’s? We really are not given an answer here, although later in the Old Testament we learn that God wanted the first of animals born and of the crops.  Perhaps this is because these are often the best, and God, we know, wants the best from us. It does not say that Cain brought the first of his crops and perhaps this is reinforced by the fact that it simply mentions that he brought them later. These might be the reasons that God favored Abel, but the text really does not tell us this so we have to be careful about drawing any conclusions here.

7.     Is there something else here we recognize between the brothers? Just as in other biblical stories, God does not always recognize the first born, which is what humans and their cultures have done. He looks for what people do and what is in their heart.

8.     What does Cain do? He killed his brother.

9.     What is the result of that?

9.In the first place, reminiscent of God coming into the garden looking for Adam and Eve after they sinned, God comes looking for Cain.

10.  What does he tell Cain? He does come at him with some of of an accusing tone. He tells him that what he is thinking his sinful and suggests that it is up to him to control it, that it is not too late to do so.

11.  What does Cain do? Not only does Cain not control his anger, he lets it grow and schemes a way to lure his brother into a field so he can kill him.

12.  Why do you think he would have done that? Away from the family I guess. When we do something wrong, we generally try to hide it. That’s human nature.

13.  What happens then? God again comes looking for Cain and makes it clear that he knows Abel is killed.

14.  What does Cain mean by this question "Am I my brother's keeper?" He might simply be referring crudely to Abel's occupation of a keeper of animals, saying that Abel is not his animal so he is not responsible for him. He might also be accusing God of not fulfilling his responsibility of looking out for the humans he has created, trying to absolve himself of responsibility as his answer has generally been understood anyway.

15.  What are the consequences for Cain? He will now not be able to farm any longer because the blood of his brother has cursed the ground for him. He will be a fugitive and wanderer.

15.Cain appears to be immediately afraid that his life is now in danger because he took someone’s life. Again, just as with Adam and Eve’s fear of God after disobeying him, here we see that sin also creates fear towards others. In this way, just as Adam and Eve's bad choice created differences and separation between them, as husband-and-wife, marital partners, and between them and God, this wrong choice of Cain's shows that sin in this world also creates separation and conflict between siblings.

16.  What does God do? He does not kill Cain; in fact, he somehow seems to shield him as a person that is not to be killed.

What again does it say about God? Even to a murderer, God is merciful. What does this say to us about capital punishment?