While listening to our senior Pastor preaching online this morning I had a revelation about Adam before and after eating the forbidden fruit.
God had told Adam not to eat the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil. I believe that tree and that fruit were the obsessions and lies of this world which are in complete opposition to God's wisdom, love and truth.
Adam had been living in the Garden of Eden and we are told that he was naked. I don't think that just meant unclothed. I think that it meant that Adam was innocent, trusting and truly a blank slate, unaffected, honest and open! He was supremely happy and at peace. God saw him and delighted in his innocence and openness. God walked beside him and they were in constant communication. Adam needed nothing more!
Enter the serpent! I don't know how he entered the Garden, whether it was through the roots of the forbidden tree or that he was maybe a normal snake that had been corrupted by the fruit of that tree. Whichever it was, he was a servant of the enemy and his goal was too see the collapse of all that God had set in place for His children.
So he cajoled Eve into questioning God's instructions. "Did He really say that you would die if you ate this fruit?" She had not known God as long as Adam had so maybe the serpent found her to be more easy to manipuate. Eve then persuaded Adam to taste the fruit and once he had done so he knew that he was naked and was ashamed. So ashamed that he hid from God when he heard Him coming.
Of course there's no way to hide from God so He called out to Adam and asked why he was hiding, even though He already knew. He must have felt the separation when it happened and it was a source of great sadness to Him.
Though God still loved him dearly, He had to evict Adam from the Garden - out into this unholy world where God would not be able to walk beside him anymore since He cannot associate Himself with sin.
Adam had been happy, at peace and needed nothing else all the while he walked and was in constant communion with God, but then he turned his face away and was corrupted by the sins of the world. He chose worldy things instead of trusting in God's love to provide all that he needed and his life from that moment on was hard and cold and empty! Here then is my revelation!
I'm just like Adam and Eve, but in reverse!
I was unhappy, unloved and unlovable - dead in my sins. I knew my nakedness and covered it in my shame! I looked for happines and peace in all the wrong places; the wrong people! I was so far from God that, though I believed He exisited, I knew that I was unworthy, so why would He trouble Himself over me? That's just how I saw myself and my life. I believed these awful lies!
Now that I am saved I realise that He was pursuing me all my life! He never left me! Just as He always watched over Adam and his descendants, He watched over me too! He knows me through and through as He once knew Adam, and He never gave up! When I called out to Him in desperation, even though I wasn't saved, He sent help in some form or other! He was preparing me for the day that He knew I would return to Him.
I am His now and I've never been happier! Why would I ever give up on God when He never gave up on me?
My story isn't unique. People the whole world over are coming to the realisation that God is their only salvation and that He loves and wants us all to return to Him, no matter what we've done!
He is pursuing you too! Stop struggling to find happiness in a world that is ruled by the enemy that comes to steal, kill and destroy every chance for peace, love and acceptance! God is our saviour so give yourself over to Him! He will wipe the slate clean of all your sins as though they never happened. I promise, as a former sinner myself, that you'll find it was the best decision of your life!
And the people said,
Amen!
No comments:
Post a Comment