Lent - Day 7 (February 25)

Larger Catechism – Day 7 of Lent

Question 20: What was God’s providence relating to the humans he created?

Answer:  God providentially put Adam and Eve in paradise and assigned them the job of taking care of it.

He gave them permission to eat everything that grew, put them in authority over all the creatures, and established marriage as a help for Adam. God allowed them to have fellowship with him, instituted the Sabbath, and made a covenant of life with them on the condition of their

personal, perfect, and perpetual obedience. The tree of life was a sign guaranteeing this covenant. Finally, God told them not to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil or they would die.

Today’s reading has three things on which I feel led to comment (There are so many important things in today’s reading that I could take an hour or two writing on them and several days to think and pray about them.  Therefore I am limiting my comments to three things. Additional note—It took over an hour to comment on these three things.):

1.       “God allowed them to have fellowship with him....”

2.       “…instituted the Sabbath…”

3.       “…made a covenant of life with them on the condition of their personal, perfect, and perpetual obedience.”

God allowed Adam and Eve to have fellowship with him.

People do not have the “right” to be in the presence of God or to have fellowship with him.  God had to grant Adam and Eve permission to be with him and to have fellowship with him. 

In the Book of Esther, Esther walks into the court of the king so that she can try to save her people.  She was not summoned by the king—he did not send for her.  She did not have permission to draw near to the king.  The king could have had her killed; instead, he allowed her to enter into his presence.  The perfect, holy, all-knowing, all-powerful Yahweh allowed Adam and Eve to come into his presence and be in relationship with him!  In much the same way God allows us to enter into his presence through Jesus Christ our Lord.  We do not deserve to be near him.  We do not have the right to enter his presence.  Instead, God allows us to enter into his presence.  The perfect, holy, all-knowing, all-powerful Yahweh allows us to come into his presence and be in relationship with him!

The word “fellowship” means to participate in the life of someone else.  God wanted to participate in the lives of Adam and Eve.  God wanted to walk with them in the garden.  God wanted to be in relationship with them.  Additionally, God wants to participate in our lives.  God wants to walk with us and be in relationship with us.  He wants to know what is happening in our lives.  God wants us to talk with him when we are happy and when we are sad.  God wants to know the desires of our hearts.  God wants to participate in our lives.  That is really cool!

God instituted the Sabbath.

God creates the Sabbath in Genesis 1—making it holy and a day of rest.  God further defines the Sabbath in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5.  God’s people, in an effort to keep the Sabbath, transformed the Sabbath into a set of “dos and don’ts.”  The Mishnah teaches the oral traditions of the Jewish faith and it is both a written authority and a basis for passing judgment.   The Mishnah list 39 categories of activities that are forbidden on the Sabbath.  (Note:  The complete list can be found at:  Sabbath )  Keeping the Sabbath became rules, Rules, RULES!

Today’s culture pushes back against rules.  We don’t want anyone to tell us what to do.  The great debate around the Super Bowl (other than deflated-gate) had to do with a Seahawk’s running back that didn’t want to take part in the “mandatory” meetings with reporters—either during the regular season and during the build up to the Super Bowl.  The running back had been fined for failing to talk to reporters throughout the year.  His actions became headline news.  He was taking on the big bully of the NFL.  One slight problem, his contract which he had signed, and for which he is paid millions of dollars REQUIRES him to do it.  It is a “rule.”  He doesn’t want to follow the “rules” of his contract.  We are much like that running back because we do not like people (or God) telling us what to do.  We do not like “rules.”

God has a “rule” (commandment) concerning the Sabbath.  People like that rule when an employer wants to require an employee to work seven days a week.  People don’t like that rule when it comes to keeping the Sabbath holy and a day of rest.

We need a Sabbath.  God wired the human body with a built in need for Sabbath.  We need a day to focus God.  We need a day that is holy.  We need a day that is not necessarily about us.  We need a day of rest—a time for our bodies, minds and spirits to be renewed and restored.  Today’s Lenten reading reminds us of Sabbath – that God instituted it and demands that we keep it.

God created a covenant of life on the condition of personal, perfect, and perpetual obedience.

This first covenant that we see in Genesis is referred to as the covenant of works.  It requires perfect and perpetual obedience.  God only gave Adam and Eve one law—don’t eat of a specific tree.  They couldn’t even do that one thing.  Adam and Eve’s disobedience broke the covenant.  Sin entered in.  Death entered in.  All of creation experienced the impact of the fall.  Adam and Eve failed at personal obedience, perfect obedience and perpetual obedience.

Before jumping to condemn Adam and Eve we need to take a look in the mirror and, when we do, we will see a person who fails at personal obedience to God, perfect obedience to God and perpetual obedience to God.  We break the covenant of works.

Recognizing our responsibility for the death of Jesus is part of what the journey through Lent is about. It is painful to think about the reality of Jesus’ horrible death—because of “me.”  He died because that was the penalty for breaking that covenant.  He didn’t break the covenant—you and I and everyone who has ever lived and will ever live are the guilty parties.  He died because of _________________ (insert your name here).

It would “feel good” if we could just jump quickly to the resurrection of Jesus and new life in Jesus.  Instead, during Lent we think about our participation in the death of Jesus. Our disobedience.  Our sin.  The death we deserve.  The grace we receive for Jesus is not cheap—it cost Jesus his life.