Sept. 16, 2001

The Three R's, #2 - Relationships

Gen. 2:21-25

Last Sunday we started a series on the basics of Christianity, the ABC's, of Christianity, the Three R's of the faith; Redemption, Restoration, and Relationships. People need redemption because they are enslaved to sin and unless there is a redeemer, unless they receive redemption through a Savior, there is no remedy.
People need restoration because we were created to worship God and enjoy Him forever, but sin has separated us from God, we have lost our way, and we need to get back to what we were created for. And we have a relationship problem. Our relationship with God is messed up, our relationship to other people is messed up, and our relationship to the creation we live in is messed up. The only way that our relationship to God, other people and the created world around us can be healed is by redemption and restoration through Jesus Christ.

That means these three R's overlap and interact. They also come under the broader heading of a fourth R: Reconciliation. People desperately need to be reconciled to God, to other men, and to the world around us. Because we live in a sinful world, because of terrible evil things like what happened this last Tuesday, there are some areas of life where reconciliation will never take place, there will only be strife and bloodshed. There are other areas in our lives where there can be a lot of reconciliation. Reconciliation to God and to each other, a good and healthy relationship to God and to certain other people. Because I only have a limited amount of time, what I want us to focus on today is our relationship to God, and to our spouse.

Do we have a close, intimate relationship to God, or do we keep Him at arms length? Are we comfortable with God at all times, under all situations, or do we sometimes feel nervous about having Him around?
How about your relationship with your spouse? Are you best friends and lovers? Are you comfortably married strangers? Are you unhappily married individuals? What does God intend, and how can we get there?

Last week we talked about patterns. God uses patterns throughout the Bible to teach us the lessons He wants us to learn. Redemption is one of the most important lessons we need to learn, so God repeats that pattern a lot. Abraham and Isaac on Mount Moriah, and the substitute of a ram instead of Isaac. The Passover Lamb, and the need for the Israelites in Egypt to apply the blood of a sinless substitute to their house and then hide behind it. The Old Testament sacrificial system. Isaiah 53, Psalm 22, we see the pattern of redemption repeated over and over, pointing us to Jesus Christ, and His fulfillment of that pattern on Mount Calvary.

There is another pattern that is very important in God's plan of things, and that is the pattern of the bridegroom and bride. What the Bible calls two persons becoming one person, the closest relationship possible. If you have your Bibles with you today, and I hope you do; turn to Genesis 2:18, the first Bride and Groom. " And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him." Skip down to verse 21;
"And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;
Gen 2:22 And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.
Gen 2:23 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
Gen 2:24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
Gen 2:25 And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed."

Something that might be helpful to any new Christians, and also those of you might have never heard this before; anytime something important is first mentioned in the Bible, whatever the Bible says about it at that point is very significant. Anytime a major topic is first mentioned in the Bible, it sets the stage or gives important clues about what that topic means from then on, and this is also a consistent sort of pattern.
For instance, one of our verses that we looked at last week, Genesis 22:2, contains the first mention of love in the Bible. God told Abraham: "Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of."

The pattern of a father giving his son as a sacrifice, the son that he loves. It is fitting that the first time we hear the word love used, it is the sacrificial love of a father giving up his son. God is showing us the pattern of His love for His Son, and teaching us - that is what real love is. A willingness to sacrifice the things we love for a higher good.

Here in Genesis 2, we see God's pattern for relationships. Adam and Eve were God's first picture of a bridegroom and a bride, and from here on out, the Bible is full of patterns of our relationship with Jesus, like a bride with her bridegroom. Because that is what Christians are. The Bible refers to the church as a bride and Jesus is called the Bridegroom. When we look at Adam and Eve, we see a pattern, an illustration of Jesus' relationship with us, His bride, the church, so we can learn a lot about our relationship to God as we look at Adam and Eve. Eve came from Adam's side, the church came as a result of the wound in the side of Jesus. The church came about as a result of the death of Jesus, Eve came about as the result of Adam's deep sleep.

There are a couple other examples but you get the idea. Adam and Eve were the first marriage relation- ship, Jesus Christ and His church, saved believers are the ultimate marriage relationship. That first marriage was a lot more intimate and spiritual than most marriages today. Adam and Eve walked in close fellowship with God and with a unique closeness to each other. Verse 25 tells us: "And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and they were not ashamed," and chapter three and verses 8 & 10 tell us that Adam and Eve were accustomed to spending the late afternoons walking and having fellowship with God together in the garden.

Obviously things in Eden were very different than they are today. We live in a world that is turned upside down by sin. God created human sexuality to be a blessing but sin has turned it into something that can be either a blessing or a perversion. But this was prior to sin. God created us the way we are and called us good, and He is not ashamed of us. He is not ashamed of what we are or how we look. He wasn't then and He's still not. Human beings are the ones that feel shame. Shame is the result of sin. People with no concept of sin have no shame. One of the reasons I say that is because of having watched how little kids behave, and little children have no sense of shame or embarrassment. When did you ever see a little kid get embarrassed when mommy or daddy changed them? Or give them a bath? Or do anything for them that any child needs? Is the child ever embarrassed or ashamed? Is the parent ever embarrassed or ashamed by anything they need to do for that child? A good parent meets every need that the child has, and loves to do it. The child is glad to have the parent meet all it's needs, and if some of those needs involve mommy or daddy getting a little personal, neither the parent or the child gives it a second thought.

There are some major parallels between how a parent cares for their child, and how God cared for Adam and Eve in the garden. God provided for every need of his human children and they were glad to have Him there doing it. A wonderful relationship. A relationship uncorrupted by sin. And where there was no sin, shame was impossible.

That was God's original setting for mankind. That was His ideal. He intended that we should have the same relationship with Him that our little children have with us. But the relationship was broken, damaged, marred by sin. Our relationship with God was ruined.

Isn't it a great feeling to come upon your child doing the little things that children do, and then they look up and see you, and they smile? They are glad to see you. They have nothing to hide, nothing to be ashamed of, they are just glad to see you. That's so neat. On the other hand... Did you ever walk in on your child while they were into the lipstick, or the shoe polish, or picking all the blooms off the rosebush that you had nursed along for years..., and immediately they had a look flash across their face that you are not welcome, they have something to hide, something to be ashamed of? Sad, isn't it? It is sad for you as a parent, sad for the child as well, because the relationship is broken, and it needs to be put back right.
Living a normal Christian life is to keep that relationship as unbroken as possible, to live out our lives in such a way that every time we look up and see God, we can smile at knowing He is there.

In Matthew 18:1, there is a very revealing passage of Scripture, let me read it for you: "At the same time came the disciples unto Jesus, saying, Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?
Mat 18:2 And Jesus called a little child unto him, and set him in the midst of them,
Mat 18:3 And said, Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Mat 18:4 Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven."
It seems to me that true repentance and conversion will produce in us at least some of the attributes of child like intimacy in our relationship to God. To at least some extent, we will lose our fear of God, our shame before God, our comfort level with God will go way up, we will live in a manner that we are glad to see Him, and we have nothing to hide when He appears. Is that our situation? Or are we full of our selves, are we self conscious to the point that we are the only thing we think about? Are we eat up with thinking about what we want, how we look, our desires, our likes and dislikes?

Do you look forward to a life of intimacy with God, content to let Him feed you, burp you, change your dirty britches, and just love on you, and you are always glad to see Him? Nothing to hide, nothing to be ashamed of, nothing to regret? It sure beats any alternative that you or I could think of.

When mankind fell from innocence in the garden, it was more than just their relationship to God that was ruined, it was also their relationship to each other and to the world. In the last part of Genesis chapter 3 God details the curse that He puts on the earth. Man's sin turned an Eden into a place of toil and sickness and hardship. The earth and all of creation is under the curse, man's relationship to his environment was also ruined.

As bad as that is, I think sometimes the damage to the relationship between husbands and wives is almost worse. Turn to chapter 3 and verse 7. The first six verses detail the temptation and the fall of man, and then verse 7 tells us the immediate results of that fall: "And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons."
Question: did they do that because they were worried about hiding from God, or because of the disruption of their relationship with each other? Or maybe a lot of one and some of the other? Verse 8 has some insights: "And they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God amongst the trees of the garden.
Gen 3:9 And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou?
Gen 3:10 And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself."

I used to think that Adam and Eve made themselves aprons of fig leaves primarily because of a desire to hide from God, but I no longer think so. I suspect that Adam and Eve were a lot more spiritually aware than we are, and they might have known intuitively what Paul tells us in Hebrews 4:13: "Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do."

When God came around, Adam and Eve had their fig leaf clothes, but they still went and hid behind trees and admitted to God that even with their fig leaves on, they were still naked. I think the fig leaves were put on initially because of something else. I think they put their fig leaves on initially and primarily because of a breakdown in their relationship with each other, and God was a secondary consideration. When they got to the garden, that changed, but initially the fig leaves were a response to being alienated from each other. I think the fig leaves came about primarily because the relationship that they had enjoyed with each other was terribly damaged.

Look at verse 12: "And the man said, The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat.
Gen 3:13 And the LORD God said unto the woman, What is this that thou hast done? And the woman said, The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat."
The blame game. Pointing fingers and attacking the spouse. Up to this point, Adam and Eve had been the perfect couple, in a perfect world. They were in a relationship that pleased God, and God was their close friend and companion, and He met all their needs. That's why it was paradise. Nothing was out of balance. Everything was in it's rightful place, and in it's rightful relationship to God.

Did you ever get close enough to God to taste a little of that in your life? If you are a married person, did you ever try and encourage your mate to join you in seeking that kind of a life, living that close to God? That is what they had, and that is what God wants each of us to have every day, all week long. But when sin came into the picture, they hid behind a tree to get away from God, and they made fig leaves to hide themselves from each other. Why? Why did a breakdown in their relationship cause them to make fig leaves? Let's talk a bit about fig leaves.

Man is the only creature on the planet that feels the need to wear clothes, and God has somehow constructed our minds and emotions in such a way, that when we don't have our clothes, we are uncomfortable being around other people, unless that other person is someone that we can be intimate with. Someone who does not threaten us. This is especially true for women. I believe that God has programmed this into our minds and emotions for us to behave this way, as an object lesson for what He wants us to learn about our relationship to Him, and our relationship to others.

Let me point our that when I say intimacy here, I don't want to try and distinguish between sexual and non sexual intimacy, because in a normal married relationship, there is usually an overlap. And it's different for every couple. Some couples might have the liberty to know a broad spectrum of intimacy with each other and with God, and even be able to thank God and rejoice and praise Him as a part of their intimacy. Others might be more bashful and timid. It takes some people a while to get used to the idea that God knows all about their intimacy and approves of it. It takes some people a while to get comfortable with that idea. That's OK too. We need to remember that our relationship with Jesus should teach us how to love our spouse, and the way we love our spouse ought to teach us how to love Jesus.

How does sexuality fit in? I'm not always sure, but since God created us as sexual creatures, use your sexuality for His glory and praise, as He intended, and not for immorality, and don't worry about it.

When Adam and Eve sinned against God, the intimacy that they had with God was broken, God became a threat to them. The intimacy that they had with each other was gone, because they had become a threat to each other. When God questioned them concerning why they had done this thing, Adam accused Eve, he became a threat to her. Intimacy cannot exist between two people when one of them is a threat to the other.

Genesis 3 verse 7 says that "the eyes of both of them were opened." I believe that this is where God caused humans to acquire self consciousness. They became aware of themselves in a way that they never had before, and self consciousness is an excellent way to manifest our sin nature. When mankind learned to be self conscious, that opened the door to learning how to be selfish, how to be proud, how to want our own way more than the good of others. How to love ourselves more than we love others, or love God.
I think what we see in these few words is the replacement of intimacy with self consciousness.

I believe that to the extent that we are self conscious, conscious of our self, conscious of what we are thinking, what we are feeling, what we look like, what we need, what we would like to have, and what we would like others to think of us; to that extent, we make intimacy with others difficult. We make it unfulfilling for them or us. Others become a threat to us, because they might stand in the way of us getting what we want. They might not approve of us, they might not want us to have what we want. We become a threat to others, because they might not be able to live up to our expectations. They might not be able to satisfy our desires, or please us they way we want, and they know it. That is threatening. What if you want something, and your spouse doesn't want you to have it? What if your spouse doesn't approve of you? What if your spouse doesn't approve of what you want? Intimacy is the first casualty, isn't it?

And what is true of our human relationships is also true of our relationship with God. What if God doesn't approve of me? Or of what I want? Intimacy with God is cut off. How can we be intimate and close to a God that sees our shame and our shortcomings? How can we be intimate with another person when we are afraid they will not be satisfied with what they see in us? How do we lose our self consciousness around those we love, and in front of God?

God didn't originally set out for it to be like this. Is it possible to restore an ideal relationship with another person? Is it possible to restore an ideal relationship with God? God has made a way. Turn to Genesis 3:21 "Unto Adam also and to his wife did the LORD God make coats of skins, and clothed them." God knows that the pathetic fig leaves of our own self righteousness are not able to meet our needs, either emotional or spiritual. So He points us to Jesus Christ as the one who brings us back into a close, intimate relationship with Himself.

For God to clothe Adam and his wife with skins, an innocent creature had to die, and probably it was a lamb. Up until this time in their short existence, Adam and Eve had never seen death. God had told them about death, and that if they sinned, then they would die, but it didn't really mean anything. Death was unknown in Eden. And then they saw their first death. Imagine living in a world that the only thing you had ever known was perfection, and then you had to stand next to your spouse, both of you ashamed, naked and fearful, and watch another creature die because of your sin. There before your eyes, the Angel of the Lord would kill that lamb, take the skin off it's body and make it suitable for a garment, and then you would put it on to cover your body, as a reminder of what it takes to cover sin, a perfect innocent lamb, a pattern pointing toward the Lamb of God. Imagine wearing that skin as a reminder of the intimacy that was gone, the love that was lost, and that it took the death of an innocent substitute to cover your shame. The pattern of relationship and the pattern of redemption had become woven together, and now one could not be had without the other. Until there was redemption, there could be no restoration of the relationship. Until there was a covering provided by the shed blood of an innocent sacrifice, there could be no relationship with God.

But God has provided a Lamb. Isaiah 61:10 tells us: "I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, he hath covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels." Just as God covered Adam and Eve, He provides for us a robe of righteousness and garments of salvation in Jesus Christ. He restores us to intimacy with Himself, He makes us acceptable to Himself in the person and work of His Son.

How about our intimacy and relationship with our spouse? Did Adam and Eve ever get back to the relationship and intimacy that they used to have? Can we and our spouses ever get anywhere close to God's ideal relationship like those two had back in the garden? Adam and Eve are an unknown quantity, the Bible doesn't say. But the last book in the Bible mentions Jesus and His bride several times, and it is obvious that they are close together forever. They even speak the same things. That tells me that God keeps the pattern of the bride and groom into eternity and that it is a pattern of intimacy and being like minded.

That means that it is still God's plan today for husbands and wives to be intimate and like minded, to have a close relationship. How do we do it? Do we just imitate Adam and Eve? Do we all just need to go find a big grassy pasture field to live in, and give the mosquitos a really big target to shoot for? No, the world has changed since the days of Eden, but I think a lot of the principles of intimacy in relationship are still the same.

Adam and Eve probably spent a lot of time together. They probably did the same things together. They probably did not have a lot of the hangups that we have. Since there was no one else to talk to but God, and He left them alone for the greatest part of the day, they had to develop the art of conversation with each other. In short, they spent a lot of their lives focused on each other.

How many of you have spouses that are just an addition to the rest of your busy life? How many of you have spouses and for what ever reason, there are whole sections of your life where you keep them at arms length? Are there whole sections of your life that are off limits? Don't ask, don't tell? I have my life, you have yours, and I'll see you for a few minutes a day if the mood strikes me? Or unless something more interesting comes along? Brethern and Sistern, such things ought not to be.

For example: in Bible times, even the honeymoon was not like it is today. It was very different. In our society today, after the wedding, the bridegroom and bride normally have to travel for hours to get to their honeymoon spot, it has been a long day, and they are worn out. What a great time to consummate a marriage! With any luck at all, they will both have a headache, right? And then they spend the next several days spending all their money in restaurants, or seeing Gatlinburg, or Myrtle Beach, or whatever, and when they get home, they are worn out, their money's gone, and their honeymoon was just the logical extension and conclusion of their dating life.

Back then, in Biblical times, it was not like that. When the bridegroom took the bride into the wedding chamber, that room that the bridegroom had prepared for the two of them, they stayed in there for seven days. Their friends from the wedding party would keep them supplied with food and meet whatever needs they had, and they didn't come out for seven days. And right now some of you are thinking; "That sounds awful", and others might be thinking; "That sounds wonderful", but one thing's for sure: after the novelty of having sexual relations wore off, or they got tired, which ever came first, the newlyweds had a dandy opportunity to develop real intimacy in their relationship. Really get to know each other.

Wives, how is your relationship with your husband today? Husbands, how is your relationship with your wife? Is it as intimate as you would like it to be? Is it anywhere close to this Biblical role model of God's ideal couple in the ideal environment? If not, why not? Is it because of fear? Are there old memories of some previous bad experience that have got you hung up? Fear of rejection? Shame because of something?

Or is it self consciousness? Something about your self that is more important to you than that intimate relationship with another person? If there is, then you are missing out on God's best for you, you have bought into a fig leaf mentality, a fig leaf value system.

How about your relationship with God? Are you still hiding behind the tree, or are you willing to put that relationship back to where it needs to be?

If you have never come to Jesus Christ for salvation because you thought you could hide behind your fig leaves of good works, moral behavior, or whatever, give it up. It didn't work for our first parents back in the garden, they ended up hiding from God behind a tree. And that didn't work either. When you stand before God on that great day of Judgement, there will be neither trees or fig leaves. The only thing that will count is whether you have received Jesus Christ as your Savior.

If you are in Christ, then you are in righteousness. His righteousness will cover you completely as with a garment. He will be to you just as that coat of skins was to Adam and Eve in the garden, an acceptable covering from God.

If you have received Jesus Christ as your Savior, but you are still living a life from God that is kind of at arms length, ask Him to show you how to become that little child to Him in your relationship. Ask Him to teach you how to get rid of your self consciousness, your pride, your self sufficiency, and all the rest of your fig leaves, and just let Him be a loving father to you. He would like that. You would like that. The Holy Spirit would love to teach you how. Why would you want to wait?