And He Walks With Me Series

When Jesus was about to be born to Mary, an angel appeared to Joseph and said “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us). Matthew 1:23

GOD WITH US!

Over the next few weeks, we’re going to be looking at God’s desire to be with us. And today I want to focus on a short verse in Genesis that tells us “(Adam and Eve) heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day.” (Genesis 3:8) Now, that’s a very simple statement - but to me it implies that this was normal behavior for God. It’s almost like it was common for God to come down and walk in the Garden with Adam and Eve, and regularly spend time with them.

One author said that this verse “suggested a closeness and intimacy and fellowship. The natural implication was that God did this a lot perhaps daily ‘in the cool of the day’” (Randy Alcorn)

A major commentary stated that God’s walk in the garden “Suggested an enjoyment of fellowship between (God) and our first parents” (New American Commentary)

There’s even an old hymn that tells us… that this was exactly what God wants. (SING IT WITH ME)

“I come to the garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses. And the voice I hear falling on my ear, the Son of God discloses. (Chorus) And He walks with me, and He talks with me, and He tells me I am His own;

And the joy we share as we tarry there, none other has ever known. (2nd Verse) He speaks, and the sound of His voice is so sweet the birds hush their singing, And the melody that He gave to me within my heart is ringing.”

The very creation of Adam tells us that people (like you and I) are special to God. In Genesis 1 we’re told that, when God created the world, He SPOKE everything into existence. He’d say “daisies”… and daisies would pop out of the ground. He’d say “elephant”… and there’d be huge mound of dirt that would shake itself off and there’d be an elephant. There were Showers of birds coming out from the trees. Butterflies fluttering all around. And Bees got to work on the flowers as if they hadn't a second to lose. (this description is loosely based on the creation story in “The Tales of Narnia – The Magician’s Nephew, by C.S. Lewis)

Everything God created was instantaneously alive at the very sound of His voice

But when God created Adam - He did something different. He got down into the mud and he shaped Adam from the dirt of the ground and He formed and shaped Adam… IN HIS OWN IMAGE. And He breathed into Adam the breath of life. God didn’t do that with anything else. Just with man. Because God wanted to create us differently… in His own image.

BUT WHY? Why would God go to all that trouble in creating mankind? I mean, obviously we were the height of His creation… (PAUSE) but why bother to create us differently? WellGod created US as He did because He wanted to spend time with us. He walked in the Garden with Adam and Eve; In Genesis 5 we read that “Enoch walked with God” (Gen 5:22, 24); And in Genesis 6 “Noah walked with God” (Genesis 6:9).; when Abram was ninety-nine years old the LORD appeared to Abram and said to him, "I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless”

Genesis 17:1: And when God led Israel out of captivity… He told them “I will walk among you and will be your God, and you shall be my people." Leviticus 26:12

And on… and on … and on.

God created us because He wanted to spend time with us. He wanted to walk with US. YOU ARE THAT IMPORTANT!

In fact, one of my favorite passages says “The eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him.” (II Chronicles 16:9) God is LOOKING for someone who wants to walk with Him - someone who will be loyal to Him. He’s looking… FOR YOU! And, if we do it right, we can become a mirror image of the God we love. Jesus said “Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.” Matthew 5:16

LET ME REPEAT… GOD WANTS TO WALK WITH US.

Oddly enough… it appeared to me that a lot theologians and preachers struggle with this idea. I mean, it seemed like the very idea that God would want to spend time with us - that He would DESIRE to walk with us - (well) it was hard for many religious men to grasp. I looked at a number of sermons on-line (I typed in “Walk With God”) and I was struck by the fact that that all the sermons I saw had preachers viewing the idea of “walking with God” as being all about US… but not really about God. The sermons focused on the idea that we MUST walk with God. It’s REQUIRED of us. We NEED to do it. But NONE of the sermons I saw focused on the idea that God really WANTED US to be near Him.