In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
I thought this was going to be an easy sermon to research and write.
The story is familiar. Every year in grade school I made a Creation booklet with a picture for each day, through the creation of Adam on the sixth day and God resting on the seventh day.
Most recently, I’d been though Gabriel’s excellent class on Genesis.
After I went to my commentary sources, – Matthew Henry’s 250-year old volume and Karen Armstrong’s “In the beginning”, which was written in 1996, Matthew Henry and Karen Armstrong began carrying in a debate in my head. I started over.
Genesis, most scholars agree, is not a factual narrative- there are even passages within Genesis that contradict other passages. Instead, it resembles the creation narratives from many other faith traditions: trying to answer the question of how we got here, and how a world created by a perfect god (or gods) could have so many troubles and trials.
The Hindus believe that we are in an endless cycle of creation, maintenance and destruction, each managed by a different god.
The Greeks believed that three primordial deities (two of them female) sprang out of chaos. The first mortal woman, Pandora, got too curious and unleashed a jar full of various forms of evil on the world.
The Babylonians believed that the god Marduk fought a battle with the goddess Tiamat (the primordial sea) to bring the earth onto being.
The creation story in Genesis is a radical departure from the earlier narratives. A single, peaceful, all-powerful God creates a perfect world and populates it with creatures of every kind, including humans. It is only on the day that humans are created that God sees that it is VERY good.
The Garden of Eden is perfect. There’s no need for clothes, a roof over your head, or central heating. The trees in the garden are all the food you need- Adam and Eve can be happy vegetarians.
God did, however, endow us with “memory, reason and skill”, and the results are seen almost immediately.
God had instructed Adam to work the garden and take care of it. One of the verbs in the original Hebrew is “shamar”, which is translated in the Greek Septuagint into a word that means “guard”, as a military sentinel would. Adam apparently didn’t do a very good job. Somehow the serpent slithered in and convinced Eve that eating the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil will make them as wise as God, Eve wants more.
Many commentators, of course, note that Eve was “the weaker vessel” and Adam didn’t protect HER from the serpent – and then when they were confronted by God he threw her under the proverbial bus.
None of the commentators I read noted that Adam could have chosen NOT to follow Eve’s example. One wonders what would have happened if he’d said No.
Regardless- Adam and Eve were both tempted by the idea of having more- in this case, the wisdom of God rather than just the wisdom God had given them. Then, having fallen for that temptation, they realized they were naked and afraid.
This happens everywhere in the Bible and it still happens to us. Sometimes our memory, reason and skill lead us to sin. God administers punishments but gathers us back in, clothes us in garments when we realize we’re naked and bails out his wandering humans again and again.
But there’s good news in all of this. My son’s pastor reminded us last month n a sermon in Des Moines that “God works though the failure of his people to accomplish his purpose.”
And, no matter what we do, “God’s purpose will prevail”.
The reading from Paul reminds us of God’s ultimate salvation: sending Jesus Christ to redeem us from our sins once and for all.
We’re reminded in the story from Matthew that even Jesus is tempted (and even the devil can quote scripture). Jesus prevails over the temptations because he keeps his eye on his purpose in this world and his future for eternity. Paul tells us to do the same in Second Corinthians verse 11:
“But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ”.
The fall of Adam and Eve led to the fulfillment of God’s plan for his people. As Paul wrote in Corinthians 15:22-
“Since by Man came death, by Man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive”.
There’s a wonderful hymn from a 15th-century text called “Adam Lay i-Bounden” that was part of the repertory of wandering minstrels in England. Unfortunately the Music Team didn’t have enough notice to prepare it as an Offertory hymn. The beautiful, archaic English is hard to follow but here’s a summary:
Before Jesus redeemed Adam, he lay in bonds for 4,000 years. (That was the age of the earth as measured by an Anglican cleric who added up the generations of the people in the Bible between Adam and Christ). If Adam had not fallen, Mary would not have given birth to Jesus and become Queen of Heaven. And for that we say ”Deo Gratias” (thanks be to God).
And what can we take from these stories today, which is the first Sunday of Lent?
We were created with free will and we will be tempted.
We need to take stock of our failings and our weaknesses- we all have them- so that we can resist temptation.
Still if we fall, God has a plan and God’s plan will prevail.
And for that we say, “Deo Gratias”.
