Who Taught you to Hide?
A lot of us are still hiding, and a lot of our marriages are in a state of hiding or ignoring. God asks a timely question that we should also let linger, “Who told you that you were naked?”
Who told you that you have to hide?
Who told you that your Father isn’t good?
Who told you that He can’t be trusted with the most broken parts of your life?
Who told you to hide from your spouse?
It isn’t God who wants you to hide – He’s already declared naked and unashamed Adam and Eve good – it’s the enemy. He wants you hiding; he is constantly reminding you and your spouse of your shame. That’s not God doing that; it is your enemy who is hell-bent on your destruction. It’s the enemy who would have you dying behind your fig leaf instead of naked before the one who can make you whole.
Adam and Eve have different instincts now that the not-god choice has been made. Look at what happens next:
“‘Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?’ The man said, ‘The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.’ Then the Lord God said to the woman, ‘What is this that you have done?’ The woman said, ‘The serpent deceived me, and I ate.’”
Adam’s cursed instinct is to pass responsibility to Eve, and Eve follows suit and passes it right down to the snake. It’s crazy to realize that in one sentence, Adam cut himself off from both his partner and his God, “the woman who you gave me.”
This is his chance to live into his design by taking responsibility for the garden, for himself, and his wife and he instead blames her and he blames God. Why did Adam and Eve pass responsibility? The same reason we do – they were afraid of the consequences. Remember that the command was eat this and die. Adam would rather sell out his bride than face the consequences of death.
Remember, also, that their job together was to bring creation under their stewardship, but now they pass the responsibility off to each other, and finally surrender it to the enemy. He’s fine with this, by the way. If you won’t take responsibility for where things are at, he’s more than happy to step in, take control, and watch it all burn.
What unfolds next is, I believe, the fundamental core issue in the marriage relationship. This will be known as “The Curse” throughout the Bible. This isn’t to say that God curses man and creation; rather, understand that this is the natural consequence of choosing not-god. I love how C.S. Lewis put it, “How can you, being separated from God, who in His very nature is life, not but wither and die?”
The Snake
“First to the snake he says:
‘Because you have done this,
cursed are you above all livestock
and above all beasts of the field;
on your belly you shall go,
and dust you shall eat
all the days of your life.
I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and her offspring;
he shall bruise your head,
and you shall bruise his heel.’”
Every time you see a snake slithering around like a drunk weirdo, it’s a reminder that things are out of design. It’s a sign to remind your heart that creation is now part of the fight. Creation, the animals, and the ecosystems of our planet, are now skewed. It’s not the way that it was designed to be, and all of creation feels the effects of this curse. Creation and humanity are not at peace. That’s why Paul can say to the church at Rome that all of creation groans and awaits the undoing of the curse. The earth has also been in subjugation because of the curse.
God is so compassionate, though, even in the first indictment of the curse, here is the beauty and revelation of the Gospel! It’s like the secret to unraveling this curse is hidden within the curse itself! That enmity between Eve and the snake will be handled by the offspring of Eve – that’s Jesus and the cross! More on that later.
Read more in Chapter 2 of Wed Into War.
Plus, we have a bi-yearly conference that expands more on this. Join us!
