Grace Multiplied

Scriptures for Lent: The First Sunday

Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7

Romans 5:12-19

Matthew 4:1-11

If you prefer to dip your toe in the water before getting into the pool, it's time to take a deep breath. The Scriptures that open this Lenten season will plunge you directly into highly charged and, perhaps, deeply personal matters of life and faith. They will introduce you once again to temptation and consequences, the human condition, and a faith-filled way out.

It all begins with Eden, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, a snake, and the first couple. The Genesis story is, in some ways, so familiar that its meaning can easily be overlooked. Yet there is power in this story as you consider what it means for each of us to try, in the words of Scripture, to "be like God" (Genesis 3:5). The Scripture brings with it the pathos of guilt and vulnerability, the agony of consequences, and in the end a moment of redemption.

Paul's letter to Christians in Rome pulls together his lifetime study of the Torah (also the first five books of the Christian Bible) and his understanding of what Jesus' life was all about. Beginning with his understanding of the ways sin entered the world, he presents Jesus as an instrument of grace multiplied. This grace, for him, was both life-as-he-knew-it shattering and life-as-he-discovered-it freeing.

The Gospel tells of Jesus' forty days in the wilderness. After a very long time of fasting and prayer, he faced three temptations that forced him to choose between the kingdom of heaven and the kingdoms of this world. Each one held enormous possibility as he began his public life. Each one holds enormous possibility for us as well. Yet Jesus saw the demonic in each of them, claimed his future as Son of God, and prepared to introduce the kingdom of heaven to a suffering world.

LEAVING EDEN GENESIS 2:15-17; 3:1-7

In 1983 Charles McCullough wrote a book called Heads of Heaven, Feet of Clay. I do not remember much about the book, but I do remember the title. It speaks plainly to me about our humanity: created to reach for the stars and yet stumbling through often self-inflicted mire.

The Book of Genesis says it in another way, and it is our story as well. We are the characters in the plot. We are Adam. We are Eve. And we can see ourselves in the story of the garden, as the saga of Genesis 2 and 3 begins. Everything was just perfect. As the story goes, all earth's creatures could communicate with one another. The two humans lived in a state of—well—perfection. They could enjoy their days, eat when they wanted to eat, sleep when they wanted to sleep, play when they wanted to play. They were naked, but no one noticed. No one cared.

Their diet was apparently vegetarian. They were allowed to eat all the fruit they wanted, with one exception. They could not eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Why not? Because, as God put it to the couple, you will die if you eat that fruit.

The four-legged snake was a pretty sly character. In fact, Genesis 3:1 says it was "the most intelligent of all the wild animals that the LORD God had made." In Hebrew, the phrase "most intelligent" is a play on the sound of the word naked. The humans were naked and susceptible; the snake was crafty and "intelligent." Curiously, the woman did not fear the snake. Perhaps, in Eden, there was nothing to fear.

The snake initiated the conversation:

Snake: "Did God really tell you not to eat fruit from these trees?"

Woman: "That's not true. We can eat lots of fruit. We just can't touch anything from the tree in the center of the garden. If we do that, we'll die."

Snake: "Not so! This is what will really happen: You will have a whole new vision of what the world is all about. In fact, you will be like God!"

The woman was hooked. After all, who wouldn't want to be like God? How much effort do we all expend trying to control the world around us? How often do we unconsciously set ourselves up as our own god, forgetting the One who is Creator of the universe? Perhaps her sin (and ours) was not so much in eating the fruit, but in the effort to be god-like.

You know what happened next. The woman ate the fruit, loved it, and gave some to Adam. Then the plot really thickened. They discovered they were naked, and vulnerable. Their first order of business was to try to clothe themselves. They did not manage well, because they chose fig leaves, and fig leaves are scratchy. Their fumbling efforts left them with an attire that must have felt like they were wearing scouring pads.

The story continues in the remaining verses of Genesis 3, and I invite you look at it and think about it. They were found out. God called out: "Where are you?" (Genesis 3:9). Well, they were hiding. What else would you do if you were scratching as if you had poison ivy and didn't want to be seen? They also did not want God to find out where they went wrong. Of course, that plan lasted for a very short time. God quickly figured out that the humans had eaten from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

God asked, "What have you done?" The blame-shifting that happened next would have made good stand-up comedy.

The man said, "The woman YOU gave me, SHE fed me" (3:12).

The woman said, "Not my fault. The snake tricked me" (3:13).

The snake kept quiet for a change.

What is there about human behavior that is so reluctant to accept responsibility? Therapists and priests both know that confession really is good for the soul. It is often terribly difficult to admit wrongdoing, yet it is the path to healing and restoration. "I'm sorry" can be one of the most powerful sentences in the English language.

Consequences, after all, are consequences. God told both the humans and the snake it was time to leave the garden. The snake would from that time on crawl upon the ground and be hated by humans. The man would till the soil, and he would forever have to work for food. The woman would have pain in childbirth.

So they left Eden forever. But there is a fascinating little footnote in this story. It is almost—but not really—an afterthought. God's judgment is, after all, tempered with mercy. As they left the garden, God offered a gift of love: God made the man and woman a new set of clothes to replace the fig leaves. The label on their new clothes read: Made of Leather (3:21).

What has it meant in your life to try to be like God? What have been the results? When have you tried to avoid responsibility by shifting blame? Where in your life have you experienced consequences tempered by mercy?

GRACE MULTIPLIED ROMANS 5:12-19

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