Are You Hiding From God?

The third sunday after pentecost

Shepherd of the Hills Ev. Lutheran Church (WELS)

Genesis 3:8-15

8 Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?” 10 He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.” 11 And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?” 12 The man said, “The woman you put here with me —she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.” 13 Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” 14 So the Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this,

“Cursed are you above all livestock and all wild animals!
You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life.
15 And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers;
he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” (NIV)

The dreaded sound of the garage door opening causes the children to stop dead in their tracks.  They instantly drop everything they’re doing and run for cover, scurrying to the safety of their supposedly secure hiding spots.  Attempting to make as little noise as possible, they quietly listen for the next frightening sounds of the door opening and the sure-to-follow footsteps of dad walking into the house.  They are terrified.  They know he knows.  Their disobedience was discovered and now it was time to face the music.  They didn’t know what their punishment would be, but they knew it was coming, and theyknew it would not be pleasant.  And so the unwanted words that came out of his mouth were horrifying: “Where are you?”

Another scenario: The eagerly anticipated sound of the garage door opening causes the children to stop and stare at each other, wide-eyed with delight.  They instantly drop everything they’re doing and start to run for the door, hoping to meet dad as he walks through the door into the house.  He had been away for a few days on a trip, and when dad came home from a trip, he didn’t come home empty-handed; he always brought them gifts.  They didn’t know what their gifts would be, but they knew he’d have them, and they couldn’t wait to see them.  And so they were ecstatic to hear the welcome words come out of his mouth even before they were able to meet him at the door: “Where are you?”

The exact same question can be a source of dread or delight.  Hearing it can make a person cower in fear or beam with excitement.  What determines a person’s response to that question is very often that person’s prior behavior.  If there has been no wrong-doing or misbehavior, then the question, “Where are you?” is nothing to fear; but if guilt is involved, then the question is one no one wants to hear.  

How did that question sound to Adam’s ear when he heard the Lord God call to him?  It filled him with fear, which mind you, was a newfound feeling for Adam.  He had never known fear before.  There was no reason to, because previously there had been nothing at all to fear in a perfect, unblemished world.  But that had forever changed as a result of the most devastating event the world will ever know, an event more devastating even than the world-wide Flood, the Holocaust, the dropping of atomic bombs, or any plague or natural disaster that has ever happened or ever will happen.  Our first parents were deceived at the Fall, and their disobedience sent the world spiraling into the chaos and disarray of sin.  One can understand why Adam must have been afraid to face God.

Notice how the effects of sin in the once perfect lives of Adam and Eve immediately became evident.  First they had recognized their nakedness, something that had not formerly been a problem, until their view of each other and all things became blurred by sin.  So they covered up as best they could thinking that might make things right again.  But their guilt remained, and it showed itself in how they responded to the sound of the Lord God walking in their midst.

One can reasonably conclude that God must have walked among them previously, since they recognized the distinct sound of him walking in the garden.  But now that sound made their heart rates sky rocket as it filled them with terrible anxiety.  Luther understood these verses to be describing Adam & Eve as being completely on edge, ready to jump out of their skin at the slightest sound, so that even the slightest rustle of a leaf would have been enough to shake Adam and Eve to the core, especially once they knew God was calling for them.

The effects of sin were crystal clear in Adam’s response to God’s question, “Where are you?” (v.9).  “[Adam] answered, ‘I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid” (v.10).  How pathetic sin had made Adam!  Had he not heard the Lord God in the garden before?  Why was there reason to fear him now, if never before?  Then, as if convincing himself that it was a perfectly legitimate reason to be hiding from God, Adam explains that his fear was a result of his nakedness.  Again, hadn’t Adam been naked previously without any shame or reason to hide?  What had changed?  Why suddenly was nakedness a reason to cause Adam to scurry for cover, the same way a host of helpless insects do when the rock under which they’re hiding is suddenly overturned?  Finally, how absurd of Adam to think he even could hide from God!  Was there any cover in all the created world that could somehow keep the created hidden from the Creator?

When pressed by God, Adam’s behavior becomes so shockingly familiar to us: sin does not like to stand alone, so it often seeks the company of another sin and another.  Rather than coming clean when given the chance, Adam resorts to the default tactic of a sinful and fallen world: blame.  What’s more, he spreads the blame out between not just one, but two others – both God and Eve. “The woman you put here with me – she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it” (v.12).  “It’s not my fault,” reasoned Adam, “it was the woman who gave me the fruit.  Oh, and in case you forgot, God, you’re the one who put her here with me in the first place, so if you hadn’t put her here, none of this would have happened.”  See what fools sin makes of us!  See how irrational it makes our reason!  For Adam to dare draw the conclusion that this whole thing was God’s fault is to show unmistakably how sin had turned the world on its head.

But we don’t need Adam’s example to show us that, do we?  When we as children of God find ourselves acting instead as children of the world, we cannot ignore the very same question of God as it is echoed in our conscience or as we hear God’s law: “Where are you?”  And the question terrifies us, for we know that it is our own sinful actions that have turned these three simple words into something to fear and dread.  Rather than using the opportunity to confess, to admit our sin openly and honestly before the God who sees all, we follow in the very same path paved for us by Adam.

First we try to hide.  We avoid God’s house.  We avoid God’s people. We avoid God’s Word. We think that by avoiding all of these things our sin has gone unnoticed or overlooked, simply because we’ve avoided any associations by which it might be pointed out!  Like Adam, how pathetic we are, thinking we can hide ourselves from the all-seeing, all-knowing God, without whom nothing would exist. Like the child first learning to play hide and seek, we stand out in the open, in plain sight for all to see, then we cover our eyes and think we’re suddenly hidden from God.  But the reality is that we’re exposed and naked in our sin before him, and try as we might, we cannot do a single thing to hide our sin and shame.

Then, when we realize we cannot hide it, we resort to the same default tactic Adam used: we blame.  “Lord, I wouldn’t drink so much all the time if my life weren’t so crummy and depressing.  If you’d just prove that you love me like you say you do and make things better for me, then I wouldn’t need to drink.”  “I had to lie because my friends said everyone would get in trouble if I didn’t.  I was just looking out for them; it’s not my fault.”  “Don’t blame me for robbing you with my lack of offerings, Lord; after all, I’ve got a family to take care of and bills to pay – if you want me to give more, then give me a better-paying job.”  “I wouldn’t give in to all the sexual temptation everywhere around me if my wife would do a better job of fulfilling those needs for me.”

God comes to us, asking, “Where are you?” and we try to hide and we try to blame.  But all God really wants is one thing: confession.  He wants us to admit that we have not lived as he made us to live and that our sin is no one’s fault but our own.  If we recognize that, then we can start to see the good behind God’s “Where are you?”  Think of how different those words sound as they come from the mouths of a search party looking for lost survivors.  That question then means life.  It means someone has arrived to save me.  It means hope and rescue!  Think of how different those words sound as they come from someone bearing a gift.  That question then means you’re about to receive something, to get something good.  Then the question fills us with sheer delight.  It promises goodness and blessing.

That’s ultimately why God approached Adam. God wanted Adam to see that his sin was his fault and it was his consequence and punishment to bear… and by doing so, God could in turn show Adam that it would be his promise, his grace, and his forgiveness that would ultimately come through Jesus.  The final result would be that Adam wouldn’t need to bear the consequence of his sin because Jesus would instead.  That was the promise God made to the serpent, to Satan. Even though he had brought God’s perfect creation into ruin, the Lord God would have the last laugh.  Speaking with unmistakable clarity about the promised Savior of the world, God said to Satan, “he will crush your head.” (v.15).     

Because Jesus did crush Satan’s head, God’s “Where are you?” does not come from a desire to punish and condemn, but to soothe and forgive; to comfort and console. He wants us to admit the seriousness of our sin, so that we might fully know the seriousness of his salvation.  It is for real, and it is ours.  May we come then, when he calls.  “Where are you?”  Here I am, Lord, in your house, to hear the absolution that my tired soul yearns for.  “Where are you?” Here I am, Lord, at the waters of my baptism, where my sinful flesh has been drowned.  “Where are you?” Here I am, Lord, penitently approaching your Supper to be reminded that Satan has indeed been crushed.  Dear Christian, because of Christ, there’s no reason to hide. Amen.

“For the freer confidence is from one’s own works, and the more exclusively it is directed toward Christ alone, so much better is the Christian it makes.” (Luther)