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Lenten devotions 2008

FEB. 7 - EDEN'S LONGINGS
By Jim Brenneman, president

SCRIPTURE: Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7 (NRSV)
Scroll down for complete Scripture.

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DEVOTIONAL:
The season of Lent invites us to reflect on those desires, some inherited, some learned, that lead us away from life's gardens into life's wildernesses. We, like Adam and Eve, desire to have our physical hungers satisfied (Genesis 3:6a). We, like they, are mesmerized by beautiful objects and people, a "delight to the eye" (3:6b). And we like they, crave scholastic superiority (3:6c). Granted, satisfying our physical, aesthetic and intellectual desires are necessary conditions for the good life created for us by God (Genesis 1). Nothing wrong with that! However, when those primal desires, as good as they were created to be, begin to woo us away from God, separate us from others, or distance us from God's best intentions for us, then soul death soon awaits us (2:17). We might blame other Adams, Eves or Serpents (3:12-13), but, let's face it, we are the ones who too often choose of our own free will to eat the forbidden fruit.

In a sense, the Lenten season is an annual 40-day reenactment of life in the wilderness. In Lent, we relive the pain and sorrow of expulsion from the Garden. In Lent, we come face to face with choices we have made that expose our raw, naked selfish selves to God (3:7). In Lent, we can also repent; turn back toward the Garden with longing. Then, we wait – wait for Easter, that glorious day when God in Christ comes back from the dead to clothe us in forgiveness and lead us out of the wilderness, home to Eden. There our physical, aesthetic and intellectual desires will truly and finally be satisfied.

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SCRIPTURE: Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7 (NRSV)
The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man, 'You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.'

Now the serpent was more crafty than any other wild animal that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, 'Did God say, "You shall not eat from any tree in the garden"?' The woman said to the serpent, 'We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden; but God said, "You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden, nor shall you touch it, or you shall die." ' But the serpent said to the woman, 'You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.' So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate; and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves.
Posted at 21:04 #