Eve Ends - I'm back.

Genesis 3:16-24 To the woman he said, "I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you." To Adam he said, "Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, 'You must not eat of it,' "Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return." Adam because she would become the mother of all the living. The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. And the LORD God said, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever." So the LORD God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.

So I finally got around to cleaning out the garage. Wow! Happy New Year to me! Those poor garbage men who had to pick up all that trash. Of course, when I cleaned out the garage it was three days before garbage day so I had a nice pile sitting there for the last two days. But - as is usual when I'm not looking for it - God teaches a lesson. . .

Whenever I would receive packages from work, I'd empty it out, and into the garage it was thrown. Do you know what comes in those packages? Peanuts. The styrofoam packing kind. Do you know what happens to styrofoam packing peanuts when you put them out on your curb in an open box on a windy day? Let me tell you - As I was walking back and forth from the garage to the curb, I noticed these little buggers starting to fly away. I looked at them, debating whether I really needed to chase after them. How festive my street would look with little white pieces of confetti strewn about. Reluctantly, I bent down to pick the pieces up. That's when the wind started to blow. All the little parts of styrofoam in the nice little group began to scatter as I bent down - blowing further down the sidewalk. Now it was a race against time to pick them up - that's when God spoke.

The last few verses of chapter three lays out the punishment for Adam and Eve - how sad. We can break apart their punishment and add insult to injury about their sin and how we are affected by it today - but I'd like to look at something else. After God has given them their punishment - He makes them some clothes and dresses them. The itchy leaves that they, in their sin, had used to hide themselves, were taken away by our Father and replaced with soft suede and fur. How quickly and easily Adam and Eve could've turned and ran from God after their punishment - but because they didn't, they were able to see the love of God.

The styrofoam peanuts ran when the wind blew - just like we run when trouble seems to come our way. And when God leans down to gather us back into His arms, we start to take off even faster. I wonder, "why doesn't God just let us go - why doesn't He just say 'forget it' (which is exactly what I wanted to do when those pesky packing things kept running off)". That's when I realized I could ask my children for help - "Come and get these things!" How cute those kids were chasing after those peanuts. I think that's exactly what God does. He calls on us to chase after His lost. How much pride must fill Him as He sees us try to help Him gather those that have "blown" off.