Adam’s Declaration of Independence
Genesis 3:1-12
February 10, 2008
For the next few weeks, I want to concentrate my messages on a few of the Bad Boys of the Bible. They are, to be sure, a mixed lot: Adam, Cain, Abraham, Jacob, and Samson. I can make the case that some are worse than others. I can also argue that none of them were completely free of redeeming qualities. Some of them are those we count among our heroes of the faith. Yet even these heroes had their Achilles heels. Even these heroes had their times of trouble.
None of these men were all “bad” nor were they all “good.” They were a mixture of the two. When they were good, they provided us with a glimpse of God in action. When they were bad, they were bad with a capital “B.”
I thought that Lent would be an appropriate time to look at these bad boys. I think that next year, we will spend some time with the bad girls. Lent is an appropriate time to do this because it is in this season that we are brought face-to-face with our own “badness.”
No, we are not terrible people. None of us here are bad to the core. In fact, I believe that all of us here today are much more “good” than “bad.” Still, we all have our moments, don’t we? We all have those times when our goodness gets away from us. We all have those times when sin enters our lives and we turn away from God. We all have those times when we intentionally or accidentally, walk away from the positive values we have been taught. We all have those times when we just find it easier to be bad.
The season of Lent confronts us with our badness and forces us to acknowledge our sin. The season then asks us to seek forgiveness from God and then promises salvation through the empty tomb of Easter.
But to get to the empty tomb, we first have to go through the cross. To get to salvation, we first have to journey out of our sins. To get to the light of forgiveness, we first have to experience the darkness of disobedience.
I believe that these bad boys can assist us in coming to grips with our sins. I think that they can then show us the path out of the abyss so that we can stand on the mountaintop of God’s grace, forgiveness, and healing.
All of that discussion brings us to our first bad boy - Adam. I think that a lot of us have had mothers who have told us that if we can’t say something nice about someone, then just don’t say anything. Let me at least keep the first part of that admonition. As I said, not all of the bad boys we are going to talk about were bad all the time. Adam is no exception.
To begin with, Adam was special because he was formed in the image of God. When you read the first two chapters of Genesis, you find something interesting. In chapter one, God creates by speaking. He speaks and the light is created. He speaks and the sky is created. He speaks and the waters are separated from the earth. He speaks and the sun, the moon, and the heavens are created. He speaks and the plants are created. By way of contrast, chapter one does not say that human beings were created by speaking. It only says that people were made in God’s image.
Chapter two gives us a little clearer picture of the creation of human beings. God took a more hands-on approach when it came to Adam. Adam was much too important to just speak into existence. God took a little extra care and extra effort with Adam. Chapter 2:7 says that the man was formed from the dust of the ground, and God breathed life into him. Clearly, there is a special relationship here.
He was given authority over the animals. Adam was the one who was given the responsibility to name everything in the animal kingdom. If it weren’t for Adam, we wouldn’t know the difference between an ant and an aardvark. Without Adam, we would most likely call a horse a cow and a dog a cat. We would look at a duck-billed platypus and not know what to call it at all.
God made Adam and enjoyed a special and unique relationship with him. Adam was given a remarkable level of freedom, but from the first it is clear that God is still the one who is in charge. Adam was put in the midst of the Garden of Eden, with its lush vegetation, fruit bearing trees, and everything needed to sustain human life. All of it was for Adam to subdue, and use, and exercise dominion over.
Adam’s problems actually began with God. I’m not suggesting that his problems were God’s fault, but simply a logical consequence of forgetting about the limits and choices that come with free will. In the Garden of Eden, Adam was told that everything was for his use – except – the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Eat of that, he was told, and you will die.
Adam had a choice, but there were consequences. Death was a possibility. I’m not sure that physical death is meant here, but rather a spiritual death: separation from God and disintegration of their relationship. To eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil would be Adam’s declaration of independence from God. That would be a statement of Adam’s disregard for God’s protection, distrust of God’s care, and desire to go his own way without God.
At this point, God noticed that Adam was alone and decided that he needed a helper. None of the creatures of the animal kingdom provided the necessary companionship needed by Adam, so God took from him a rib and with it, created the woman, Eve.
There is an abrupt change at the beginning of chapter three. The text immediately moves from the creation story to the story of the conversation between the serpent and Eve. It is not just a passing chat, but a deep theological discussion, about God’s prohibition of the eating of the fruit of a certain tree in the midst of the garden. The serpent asked Eve what God had said. Eve replied that God said that they could eat of any fruit of any tree except that which comes from the tree in the middle of the garden. And then Eve elaborated some beyond what God had actually said by insisting that they should not even touch it, or else they would die.
The serpent told Eve that they wouldn’t die. God had, he said, withheld important information. You see, he told her, eating of the tree in the middle of the garden would endow them with divinity, and they would become like God themselves. Right there, at that point, Eve decided that a taste of the fruit was necessary. Finding the fruit sweet and juicy, she gave some to Adam, who without hesitation, ate as well. He didn’t hesitate. He didn’t ask any questions. He didn’t resist. He just sunk his brand new pearly whites into his afternoon snack.
What happened next set the stage for a drama that affects humankind to this day. God came looking for the newlyweds in the evening. It just so happened that they were in hiding because they had discovered that they were naked and so were hiding in their shame. God got right to the point. Have you eaten of the fruit of the tree in the midst of the garden, God wanted to know.
And here is Adam at his self-justifying, responsibility-denying, chicken-hearted worst. She did it. Eve is at fault. She is the one who gave me the fruit. She had a bite first and then enticed me to eat it. It’s all her fault. I wouldn’t be in this situation if it weren’t for her.
And if that’s not bad enough, he said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me the fruit from the tree and I ate.” So it’s really not even Eve’s fault. It’s God’s fault! Adam is ashamed, afraid, and embarrassed. He refuses to accept responsibility for his own actions. He made his own decision and then blamed Eve and God.
He made his personal declaration of independence from God. He made it clear that he felt he wasn’t bound by the rules. He rose up on the back of his free will and made the break – quick and clean. And when forced to confront the results of his disobedience, his response was to whine about its unfairness.
So, tonight we have looked at our first bad boy. As I said at the beginning, none of these bad boys are completely without redeeming qualities. Adam was creative and imaginative as he named the creatures of the sea, land, and air. He was tender, at least at first, to Eve, when he composed his love song to her. “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one shall be called Woman, for out of Man this one was taken.”
But his “badness” is glimpsed in his refusal to be obedient. He showed his badness by his act of defiance, which was his personal declaration of independence from God. Because of that action, a new word entered the human lexicon: sin. Because of the first Adam, humankind was subject to all sorts of consequences, leading to the necessity of a second Adam who would come to provide salvation.
Tonight, we begin the season of Lent; that long, six-week journey toward Easter and the empty tomb. It is a season of self-examination. It is a season of being honest with our-selves and with God. It is a season when we recognize the depth of our own sin.
We may not want to admit it, but we have learned too much from bad boy Adam. We have too often followed his example and declared our own independence from God. We too often have made the intentional decision to go our own way, do our own thing, and thus, have had to suffer the consequences.
This is the season to admit our sins and seek forgiveness. This is the season for us to declare, not our independence, but our dependence on God. As you come forward in just a moment to receive the ashes on your foreheads, may that act be a genuine signal of your intention to be obedient to God.
