Genesis 3:8-13 ESV

⁸ And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool^[a]  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?”^[b] 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?” ¹²  The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.” ¹³ Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this that you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”

The Word of God for the Children of God. Gloria! In Excelsis Deo! Alleluia! Amen.

From the time of the fall into sin, people have tried to hide from God in many ways.

Today many publishers and media outlets compete to attract people’s attention by making outrageous statements.

Some have even said, “God is dead,” and, “God is not good,” adding to the ways of hiding from God by going on the offensive against him.

There is nothing new about such claims.

Even 3,000 years ago, King David heard similar remarks and wrote,

“The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God’” (Psalm 14:1).

Adam and Eve hid from God because they were afraid.

They knew they had disobeyed God and that evil had gained a foothold in their hearts.

In their shame, they could not face the Lord as he came to meet with them.

Adam tried shifting the blame to Eve.

By rupturing their relationship with God, they ­became estranged from one another.

Some play the blame game by saying that evil in the world is God’s fault, and they refuse to believe in him.

As alienation from God grows deeper, people hide from one another.

They fear that if their real selves became known, no one would like them.

But God forgives. Have you asked his forgiveness today?

What about that forgiveness – what was the plan there?

From the beginning, God walked in the garden to have fellowship with Adam and Eve.

Today’s passage tells us they hid from God.

What was going on?

Why did they want to hide from the Lord?

The answer is simple: as we learned from previous readings, they became self aware, they realized they had disobeyed God and were afraid and ashamed.

Sin is disobedience, and the result of sin is separation from God.

Disobedience builds a wall between us and our Creator.

Because of sin, we are afraid, we have fear and hide ourselves from him.

We inherited this tendency to disobey God from our first parents.

Because of their sin, we are unable to live the way God wants us to.

Yet God still wants to have fellowship with us and to walk with us each day!

He wants that walk so deeply that he went to extraordinary lengths to restore what we had broken.

In his Son, Jesus Christ, the Father will go the extra grace-filled mile to bring us back to his side.

Adam and Eve were afraid of what God might say or do to them if they were found out, because of their disobedience they both felt the deep need to hide.

While there certainly were consequences for their sin—consequences that we still experience today—there was also forgiveness and grace.

God continued to care for them.

He didn’t just leave them to themselves.

In fact, from the very moment of their sin God began to shape history toward reconciling Adam and Eve and all of their children to himself – he dressed them.

While God hates sin, he loves us and has gone to extraordinary lengths to bring us back to him. Forgiveness and grace are God’s gifts to his people every day.

There is a good, powerful, and loving God pursuing an intimate relationship with you and I and everyone else.

You an I and everyone else were created by Him and for Him, so that you might know Him and serve Him with a purpose.

Being gut-level hard honest with God about your feelings, struggles, sin, and questions is His desire. He doesn’t want you to keep hiding and feeling stuck. 

The Bible says God wants your broken and contrite heart (Psalm 51:17) because He is the only one who can heal you and help you overcome your struggle.  

God’s brutally Honest Feeling Towards Us

God does not want to “fix” our struggles.

He wants to heal us from it.

Our sin struggle is not the problem, though it can feel like it is.

You and I and everyone else can see the damage it causes in your relationships, job, and health. You, I and everyone else have tried various ways to break the pattern, break the sin-cycle, and nothing ever seems to work, so you feel stuck. 

The Bible explains why your efforts to break the habit or pattern don’t work…

• “For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find.”—Romans 7:18

Ecclesiastes 3:10 says that God has placed eternity in your heart and made everything beautiful in its time. This is God’s honest feeling toward you. 

However, because of the brokenness in the world, we seek many things apart from God to fill our hearts – blame games, finger pointing, and find purpose.

But the Bible says we will never ever find true satisfaction until we live in the purpose for which we were created—to be in an intimate relationship with God. 

Brutally meditate, ponder upon where you are in your life in this exact moment.

How long have you been trying “everything you can, with every ounce of energy you have” to fill a ‘tiny’ hole in your heart and your soul that only leads to pain? 

There is good news.

There is always good news – despite what sin would have you believe.

There is hope.

There is always hope – despite what sin would choose to have you believing.  

God invites you to come out of hiding and open yourself up to His healing. 

Why You and I “Hide” from God

Let’s recap this …

Do you, I and everyone else find ourselves hiding from God like Adam and Eve?

Their choice to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the Garden of Eden gave sin entry into the world and caused them to feel shame.

Romans 5:12 reads, “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men because all sinned.” 

Genesis 3 explains why we hide from God—because Adam and Eve naively hid…

And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 

Then the Lord God called to Adam and said to him, “Where are you?” 

So he said, “I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself.” 

And He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you that you should not eat?”—Genesis 3:8-11 (emphasis added) 

God’s Invitation to Be Honest with Him

God went to them – already aware of the situation – wondering their response.

God asked them two questions…

• Where are you?
• Did you eat from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?

In other words, God called out to them, God told Adam, I have created you for a relationship with Me, you disobeyed your father, and you are hiding in your sin.

All I require of you right now is for you to be gut-level and brutally honest with Me—this is why I am asking these hard questions.

“What can we do together to resolve this, to restore a right relationship again?”

It was Adam, Eve’s opportunity to “come clean” with themselves, have serious conversations with God, to live and work together again with their Father God.

It is really no different today than if a parent approached their child with an awareness of something “out of place” and they want to hear from their child.

They want to know “what happened?” and “what role did you play in that?”

It is an opportunity for us to work together to restore our relationship.

God is extending mercy and forgiveness by saying:

“Your coverings are insufficient.”

“Here are some real clothes …”

I invite you to come to me and tell me what you’ve done. I will cover you. 

God is good and all the time He loves you, me an everyone else even when we all collectively struggle in a sin cycle. He wants everyone to come out hiding from…

• Sin
• Him
• Others 
• Yourself 

Hiding only traps and isolates you because you are created for a relationship with God and others.

Because of the fall, we all have the disease of a rebellious nature that seeks pleasure and desires to rule our own lives.

This fallen nature wants to determine good and evil for itself. 

For Adam and Eve, there was still a consequence for their sin.

But God showed provision and mercy by killing an animal so they could be properly covered.  

• “Also for Adam and his wife the Lord God made tunics of skin, and clothed them.”—Genesis 3:21

You and I and everyone else have undoubtedly already experienced any number of consequences from our sin, desire nothing more but find the thickest patch of bushes too, but here, God wants to provide all of us a way for us to be healed and regenerated.

He wants to show you and I and everyone else maximum possible mercy. 

So then, as we’ve explored being honest with God, it’s time to honestly ask,

Hmm, “Do you, me and everyone else want God’s sovereignty, or do you, I and everyone else want God to leave me alone, allow me to keep going in my sin?”

God is good, and all the time God is good – God is not trying to keep you and me and everyone from goodness, but rather God is protecting you and I and everyone else from evil. Once you, I and everyone else can finally see God from this new perspective, you start to see His plan for your healing, freedom, and purpose. 

What Does It Mean to Be Honest with God?

God does not expect us to be sinless, but He does invite us to be honest.

Being honest with God means… 

• You show Him your heart
• You open yourself up to vulnerability
• You talk with Him about the ways you self-protect
• You tell Him about your sin struggle
• You let Him know what you are thinking and feeling
• You admit your weaknesses

“And He said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”—2 Corinthians 12:9-10

How to Be Honest with God…

As you come to know the power of being honest with God about your struggle, you also realize…

• Hiding your of sin is expensive–it costs you peace of mind, peace in relationships, and sometimes financial peace.
• You are tired of the cycle. You feel stuck and want to move forward.
• You are experiencing the damage of your sin and pain. You see how your relationships, health (physical, mental, and emotional), and finances are being impacted. 

Being Honest with God 

Stop hiding. 

As mentioned, hiding only traps and isolates you.

It creates an environment where the power of sin is bigger than the power of God in your life.

But God wants to flip this around for you.

He wants you an I an everyone else to come out from our hiding places so He can finally shed His ultimate light upon the darkness and begin to heal us all. 

• “He who covers his sins will not prosper, but whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy.”—Proverbs 28:13
• “O God, You know my foolishness; and my sins are not hidden from You.”—Psalm 69:5
• “O Lord, You have searched me and known me. You know my sitting down and my rising up; You understand my thought afar off.”—Psalm 139:1-2

Be humble. 

There comes the inevitable point when you, I an everyone else want to be healed more than the sum total of our concern with what other people will truly think.

Though this can be a low point from the world’s point of view, it’s actually the place where our Sovereign God’s power begins to sweep over us all and we begin to finally experience the freedom and understanding we’ve been searching for. 

• “When pride comes, then comes shame; but with the humble is wisdom.”—Proverbs 11:2
• “Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time…”—1 Peter 5:6
• “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. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”—Matthew 11:29-30

Reach out.  

When you, I and everyone else are honest with God, He will likely start to speak to everyone of us about our reaching out to get the help we all need to overcome our hopeless sin struggle. 

This can be brutal, this can be overwhelmingly scary, but it’s also a moment to trust Him.

You and I are not meant to take on this burden alone.

You, I and everyone else absolutely need every God ounce of maximum support. 

• “A man who isolates himself seeks his own desire; he rages against all wise judgment.”—Proverbs 18:1
• “Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted. Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.”—Galatians 6:1-2
• “For by wise counsel you will wage your own war, and in a multitude of counselors there is safety.”—Proverbs 24:6

God knows your struggle.

God knows my struggle.

God knows everyone’s struggle.

He still pursues every single one of His beloved children so He can heal us all and fulfill the purposes He has for your life, my life and everyone else’s life.  

The day we decide to stop hiding, be humble, and get gut-level honest with God, it will change our lives.

It is the day the Holy Spirit touches your heart in a new way—a way that opens up a path to God’s abundant healing and regeneration. 

It is a powerful moment because we are finally taking a critically important step toward God’s invitation to begin restoring all those broken and hurting places of sin and shame and hiding self, and become confident in who you are in Him.  

It is time to know you are never alone,

It is time for me to know I am never alone

It is time for everyone else to know they are never alone and our Father God simply wants us to take a walk in His Garden, heal you, me and everyone else.

Reach out and take the next step of healing today.

Walk out and away from the bushes and take the next step of healing today.

In the name of God, the Father and God the Son and God the Holy Spirit,

Let us Pray,

Creator God, your hand threw the stars into space and the same hand reaches down to me with a gentle touch. I don’t have the strength to deal with the situation I am facing, please uphold me with your righteous right hand. I don’t know what to do, please help me. You say that I do not need to be afraid or dismayed because you are my God and you are with me. Help me to know your presence in the midst of my circumstances and draw strength from you. Through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

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