The Story of the World (and Us) according to the

Bible (2)

The Story of the World (and Us) according to the

Bible (2)

Disaster!Disaster!

Creation Disaster! Restoration Someone A New Restoration Begun Special Community

Completed

GenGenesiiss

HistoricaHistorical l books, books, Psalms, Psalms, etc.etc.

MattheMatthew Mark w Mark Luke Luke JohnJohn

Acts, Acts, Paul’s Paul’s letters, letters, etc.etc.

RevelatiRevelationon

Old Testament

New Testament

Life, blessingLife, blessing

In the beginning—God’s plan:In the beginning—God’s plan:

GodGod And And God God saw saw that that every-every-thing thing was was very very good!good!

Adam, Adam, EveEve

Let us Let us make make human human beings in beings in our image. our image. Let them Let them take care take care of the of the garden for garden for us.us.

But then Adam and Eve But then Adam and Eve decided decided notnot to listen to to listen to

God!God!

GodGodGod’s life God’s life wasn’t wasn’t shared shared with the with the world.world.

Death Death began to began to squeeze squeeze the life the life out of us.out of us.

Evil and violence Evil and violence spread spread everywhere.everywhere.

violenceviolence

deathdeath

hatehate

greedgreed

warwar

Adam, Adam, EveEve

How did that happen?How did that happen?

• The Bible does not talk a lot about the origin of the evil, violence and death now present in God’s world.

• It focuses most of its attention on– What disastrous things evil does to us and to

God’s good creation, and– What God decided to do about it.

How did that happen?How did that happen?The Bible does talk about an enemy of God and of all

that God wants and has made—including us.

• God created us to live, to be full of life.

• God created us to be full of love, for him, for his world, and for one another.

The enemy wants us to be full of death, and finally to die.

The enemy wants us to ignore God and hate one another.

How did that happen?How did that happen?• God created us with the freedom to choose to

love him or reject him.

The enemy wants us to use our freedom to reject God.

Chapter 3 of the book of Genesis tells the story of how God’s enemy got us human beings to

reject God’s way of life.

2 great questions in the Bible:

Why do we listen to the enemy?

Why does God continue to love us?

The first effect of our rejection of God’s way of life is

1. On ourselves:

Before the rejection we read: The man and his wife were naked but they didn’t feel any

shame. What is shame?

After the rejection we read: The man and the woman realized what they had done and saw that they were naked. Why would they feel shame now?

The second effect of our rejection of God’s way of life is

2. On our relationship with God:

After the rejection we read: The man and his wife heard the Lord God walking in the garden. They hid from him among the trees.

Why would God come to the garden?

The second effect of our rejection of God’s way of life

The Lord God called out to the man, “Where are you?”

Why would God ask that question?

“I heard you in the garden,” the man answered. “I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid.” Why did the man hide from God? What made him afraid of God?

Does God want us to be afraid of him?Should he have been afraid of God?

The second effect of our rejection of God’s way of life

Therefore: The Lord God drove the man out of the Garden of Eden….

What does that mean?

The third effect of our rejection of God’s way of life is

3. On our relationships with one another

When God asked the man what he had done, he said, “It was the woman you put here. She made me do it.”

The woman said, “The snake tricked me.”

The third effect of our rejection of God’s way of life

Before the rejection, the man and the woman were happy together. The two of them were like “one person.”

Now, after the rejection, God tells the woman that she “will long

for her husband and he will rule over her.”

The fourth effect of our rejection of God’s way of life is

4. On our relation with nature.Before the rejection: The Lord God put the man in the Garden of Eden. He put him there to work its ground and to take care of it.

After the rejection: The Lord God said, There will be a curse on the ground because of what you did. You will have to work hard and sweat a lot to get food from the ground

God must make a decisionGod must make a decisionThe enemy had succeeded on getting us to join

him against God. What would God now do?

1. God could destroy us and all that he had made, declare his creation a mistake and a failure.

2. God could lure us back to his side, reverse the effects of our rejection and restore his creation to what he wants it to be.

Or,

The Bible tells the story of how God began (and continues today) to lure us all back to him and to his way of life.

Consequences of the Great Rejection

Consequences of the Great Rejection

We remember that we were driven out of God’s garden.

Outside of God’s garden things go from bad to worse:

Cain kills his brother!

Consequences of the Great Rejection

Consequences of the Great Rejection

A man by the name of Lamech kills people simply because they “hurt” him!

Then there is a list of people with a disturbing, final thing said about them: They died.

Created to live, now we die.

Consequences of the Great Rejection

Consequences of the Great Rejection

The list of people begins in Genesis, chapter 5, and continues in chapter 11. We notice that people live fewer and fewer and fewer years. Death is squeezing life out of us.

At the end of the list is a woman who is infertile. She has no life in her to pass on to another generation. It seems as if the enemy has won!

Consequences of the Great Rejection

Consequences of the Great Rejection

The Bible paints a picture of us leaving God’s presence where life is found and moving toward death.

• Can the move toward death be reversed?

• What will God do to lure us back to his side of life?