This series is taken from Burning Heart who are an organisation who are passionate about equipping churches with high quality, professionally produced and theologically rich teaching films and series. The Director is David Ingall who was the Rector of Holy Sepulchre London, an HTB Network church plant in the City of London. For more information visit their website https://www.burningheart.org
In this second session David explores how law courts and broken cars can help us understand God’s judgement.
7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
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.”
It all seems to start with Adam and Eve’s relationship with each other.
We read that ‘the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realised that they were naked.’ Physically nothing’s changed, and they must’ve known before that they weren’t wearing any clothes. Somehow though, they realise their nakedness in a new way. There’s a new self-consciousness and a new sense of shame and vulnerability with each other. They react by stitching together some fig-leaves and trying to cover up, trying to put up barriers between them.
As we continue, we discover that this isn’t just some simple misunderstanding. Adam and Eve no longer trust each other, and it quickly
becomes clear why. When God asks Adam what is going on, he immediately tries to shift the blame onto Eve. There’s a betrayal as he tries to wriggle out of any responsibility and leave her to face the consequences on her own. This perfect human relationship is now broken and mired in shame, blame and recrimination.
It’s not just that relationship that goes wrong – Adam and Eve’s relationship with God is also destroyed in that one moment of sin. There’s a tragic beauty to the description of God walking in the garden in the cool of the day. It tells of a time when our relationship with God was normal,
simple, and natural.