Fall reversed
Readings: John 18.1 – 19.42 & Genesis 3. 1-24
At Calvary we see both the sheer cost of our sin and the vastness of God’s love as Genesis is inverted and our fall transformed into our redemption.
We can trace the tale of our sin and rebellion against God all the way back to Genesis 3 and the fall. I don’t want to get into a debate about whether we take these early chapters of Genesis literally or figuratively partly because I don’t have time but mainly because that misses the point of them. It’s a paradigm, a picture of us, how we all choose independence from God, how we distrust him, how we all too often focus on the short list of what God forbids and overlook the vast fields of what God allows, even encourages.
But what do we see in Genesis 3, Adam and Eve go to their tree and take from it that which was forbidden, and as a result they are thrown out of the garden. Seems a tad harsh perhaps but the reason is threefold.
Firstly they are thrown out because that has been their choice anyway. That fruit we are told is about knowledge of good and evil. So at that point they don’t know about good and evil for themselves, they have to trust God to show them. In choosing to eat they, and we, are saying we can choose for ourselves without God, we can be the arbiters of right and wrong. That fruit of course is also the way they can say they want to opt out of life with God, and they go for it almost immediately.
Does that sound familiar? We’re given a boundary and not only do we instantly want to know why, why this boundary, justify it to me. But we also find that thing just a tad more attractive as a result. So we’re thrown out of the garden away from God’s presence because that’s what we’ve chosen, in many ways God honours that decision.
Secondly our sin cannot come into the presence of God’s holiness, our darkness would be obliterated by God’s radiant light, and us with it. Throughout Scripture we are told that no-one can look upon God and live, to do so was to risk death as the radiant light and holiness of God shines through all darkness and sin. So firstly it seems they are thrown out for their own protection.
Thirdly we’re cast out so that our sin cannot spread any further. We’re now dysfunctional, we damage one another, damage what’s around us. We’re cast out to stop the spread of the disease of our sin from consuming everything. As God says, “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.” Left there we could grasp for eternal life on our terms, and what a disaster that would be.
And because of all of this, death and suffering have entered the world. Particularly suffering, God outlines how it will affect both the woman and the man. And in many ways suffering comes to be viewed not just as part of the fall but a sign of God’s absence. Suffering means to be far from God.
This is a picture of all of us. A picture of humanity. We actively choose what is wrong, we want life on our terms, we want freedom from God, and we want control, and because of all of this coming into God’s presence is now dangerous for us, a dangerous place to be. And we need this picture in our minds, the reality of our current situation, particularly as outlined in Genesis 3 because on Good Friday this is all flipped on its head.
Firstly God throws us out of the garden away from his presence so that our sin cannot spread further, so that instead we bear it away from him into the wilderness. And yet today God is thrown out of the city, it spits him out, and as he bears the heavy beam of the cross on his shoulder he is bearing our sin away from our presence carrying it away from us so that it will spread no more, so that it will not destroy us. Jesus Christ is bearing our sins away from us, out into the wilderness to take them as far from us as East is from West. As we watch Jesus carry the cross out of the city we’re to see echoes of Genesis 3 as our sin is carried away, yet no longer by us away from God, but by God away from us.
Secondly whilst once looking upon God would mean certain death for us, now looking upon the Christ crucified means life for us. The way to life, the way to restoration is no longer to hide our faces from God but to look upon Christ and him crucified. When we are tempted to cast out eyes down in shame or despair we find that in the gaze of Christ looking down at us from the Cross our eyes are lifted up. As we look upon him we find our faith strengthened, our hope renewed, our love for him increasing. As we look upon the one that we have pierced we find not dread or foreboding, but the peace of God which passes all understanding. Whereas once to look upon God meant certain death, now as we look upon the Crucified we find that in his death is our life.
And thirdly whilst once we chose life on our own terms, rejected God and wanted nothing to do with him, we find here that God has not rejected us, that he still wants us, longs for us to come home. We find that as we trudged East of Eden God was already planning our rescue, planning our redemption, indeed he had planned it from the beginning. Adam, and we in turn, went to his tree and took, and we take and we take and we take. Christ goes to his tree and gives, and he gives and he gives and he gives. What should have been our ultimate and final rejection of God has become for us the way back, the gateway by which we may come home.
And the cross has changed suffering. You can actually see the trajectory in Scripture as you work through the Old Testament but here at the cross suffering is well and truly transformed. No longer can suffering be seen as God’s absence, as being far from God. Now in our suffering we know God’s nearness, our suffering draws us closer to Christ, places us beside the cross where we see the God who suffers for our sake. God knows our pain, our struggle our suffering from the inside, and so in it we find ourselves nearer to him, not further. On the cross Christ has changed even our suffering into something hopeful. No longer a punishment for sin, it has become the furnace of our salvation, where our faith is refined and we grow like Christ, ready for the day when all suffering will cease eternally.
I think God is a poet, in the embers of our fall lie the seeds of our redemption. As Christ dies upon the cross he fulfils the words spoken by God as we fall, the serpent that tempts us has struck his heel, and yet Christ has crushed his head.
Adam reached for the fruit meaning it for good, thinking only good could come from it, and brought evil into the world. As we crucify Christ we meant it for evil, to cast him from us completely, but God meant it for good.
My brothers and sisters, do not shy away from the cross, it is the lynchpin of history, the hinge upon which our redemption moves. As we gaze upon Christ crucified we see the sheer cost of our sin, but also the vastness of God’s love. Whilst once we carried our sin, hid from God and did life on our own terms, through him we find our sins upon his shoulders, our faces raised to look upon him and life in his name.
Amen.