HIDING IN THE BLESSINGS!

In Genesis 3:8 and 9, we read that God came down into the Garden of Eden to walk and fellowship with Adam and Eve; however, Adam and Eve were nowhere to be seen. Of course, God knew where they were because He is God! But still, He called out to them and asked, “Where are you?”

“Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God” (3:8). Adam and Eve had sinned and their sin was a cataclysmic turning point for all mankind. When they failed, they were embarrassed and afraid and no longer wanted to be in God’s presence, so they hid among the trees of the garden. The word “presence” in verse eight can also be translated to mean “face.”

All the trees in the Garden of Eden were fruit bearing (Genesis 1:11). God had put them there for Adam and Eve to enjoy and to be fed from, but now they were using the trees illegitimately to hide from the presence of the Lord. The disobedient always hide themselves from the presence/face of the Lord. “Hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne!” (Revelation 6:16).

“Where are you?” God called out to Adam and Eve. I believe He was calling them back to Himself, giving them a reference point to begin to move back toward. I don’t believe He was angrily chiding them or rebuking them. He was lovingly calling them to intimate fellowship with Him as a concerned father would call one of his disobedient children to himself. This is the cry of a heartbroken Father reaching out to the children He knows have lost their way.

I believe God wanted Adam and Eve to fully enjoy the abundance of the Garden. He wanted the lush vegetation to be refreshing for them, to bring shade when it was hot, and cover when it was wet. The trees were not only beautiful but they bore fruit and in their harvests they provided more than ample food for the family of God.

For Adam and Eve to be using the trees as a hiding place was a perversion of what God had intended. To take what God had planned for blessing and use it as a hiding place was not what God had planned. To take the blessing of the Lord and use it to try and replace fellowship with the Father is heartbreaking, I believe. God wants His people to enjoy the Garden/His blessing and its fruitfulness but not to hide in it.

Psalm 67:1-2 gives very significant detail as to the purpose of God’s blessing to His people.

“God be merciful to us and bless us, And cause His face to shine upon us, Selah That Your way may be known on earth, Your salvation among all nations.”

I believe the church of 2008, with its over-emphasis on what God can do for me, on what I can get from God, on how God’s blessing will bring me temporal success, has caused the church to go into hiding among the trees of the Garden. Embarrassed by our carnal response, we have gone into hiding among the blessings of God. We are using the blessings of the Lord in a vain attempt to cover the nakedness of our foolishness. We have gone into hiding among the trees rather than encounter God’s face because we are embarrassed and afraid.

The prophetic call of God’s Spirit to the church is, “Where are you?” The call is that of a loving Father reaching out to His children and calling them out of hiding and back to Him. It is a call to come out from under a tree and back into our rightful place in intimate fellowship with the Father. In fellowship with the Father we enjoy the intimacy of our relationship with Him and we enjoy the fullness of the fruitful Garden.

“If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land” (2 Chronicles 7:14).