Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The text is the verses prior to our Old Testament lesson for today, Genesis 3:1-7.
“Did God really say?” The devil loves that question, doesn’t
he? He used it with terrible and deadly effectiveness against Eve and Adam in the
Garden of Eden. “Did God really say?” It was such a little question, four
little words, innocuous it seemed, at first, but also slightly suggestive:
“Maybe God is holding something back from you, Eve, or perhaps you
misunderstood Him.” “Did God really say?” It opens the door for suggestion,
deliberation and interpretation of what He had said. “Did God really say?” It
puts the question into Eve’s mind…a question that had never been there
before…and it causes her to wonder, to think, to imagine, “Well…did God say
that?”
God’s instruction was simple and clear: Adam and Eve could
eat anything and everything in the Garden of Eden except for fruit from the
tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The devil turned God’s instruction into
a question: “Did God really say you can’t eat from any tree in the garden?” Do
you hear the implication, the inuendo behind that simple question? It’s as if
he is telling Eve, “God must not love you! What kind of unreasonable God is He,
expecting you to not eat anything. And, besides, it’s part of His creation –
it’s all supposed to be “good,” right? “Did God really say?”
Eve, to her credit, tries to answer with God’s own Word, but
she makes a fatal mistake: you don’t argue or debate with the devil. You walk,
run, get away any way you can, but you don’t debate the devil because when you
do, you get in trouble. It opens the door for further temptation. When the
devil sees that one, he jumps in, “Did God really say you’re going to die? Oh,
come on…God is love! He’s not going to make you die. Oh…what’s it mean ‘to
die’?” You mean, you don’t know? He didn’t tell you? And you don’t know what
‘evil’ is, either? Oh, my…there is so much God isn’t telling you about. You
should really be more like God, know. Look at it…doesn’t it look tasty? Just a
nibble, just a taste and you’ll know all of these things God isn’t telling you
about. Why…you’ll practically be like God!”
Even now, we can see in our imagination what Eve is doing.
You can see it in her face, can’t you, looking at the fruit – by the way, the
text does NOT say “apple” – looking at the fruit, seeing that it is beautiful,
and believing that it was desirable for such wisdom, and balancing that against
the question, “Did God really say?” You see the picture, don’t you?
You can see that picture in your mind because, if you look
closely, it is the picture of you, regardless of whether you are of Adam’s
gender or Eve’s gender. You see yourself in that picture. You’re not staring at
a piece of fruit. You staring at something else as the devil whispers in your
ear:
“Did God really say ‘you shall not steal’ when it applies to
the company you work for? After all, they are worth millions of dollars. It’s no
big deal if you spend the morning playing on Facebook, updating your Instagram,
and checking the ballgame scores last
night. Leaving early and having your friend clock you out for a “full day?”
Everyone does that – especially on Fridays, or Tuesdays, or Mondays for that
matter. Work slow; pad the overtime. You’re underpaid and under-appreciated –
get your pound of flesh any way you can.”
“Did God really say, ‘Honor your father and mother’? Come on…that doesn’t apply to you. You
heard the things they said to you the other night…making you clean your room
and put away your own stack of clothes; forcing you to eat good, healthy food,
not letting you go watch the movie every other kid in town gets to see with
it’s gratuitous sex and violence. Don’t they understand that’s the way the
world is? You had every right to blow up Twitter with your rant and those ugly
names.”
“Did God really say you can’t have other things you fear,
love and trust as much as him, or that you can’t have an intimate relationship
with someone other than your spouse, or that you can’t skim on your taxes, or
that you can’t hate that so & so who treated you that way, or that you
can’t spread those stories about your neighbors on Facebook and your
mother-in-law at church? Boy, is he ever old fashioned. The Bible is
so…restrictive of your freedom. You ought to ditch the whole thing and do what
you want to do, anyway.”
Yes…we see ourselves standing right next to our first
parents, taking a nibble of those deliciously tempting things that are before
us as well.
It is worth remembering that being tempted is not the same
thing as committing the sin. We know this because the Bible tells us that Jesus
was tempted in every way as we are, yet remained without sin. The reason that
is important is that the devil loves to tempt us to think that, having been
tempted, we have already given into sin so we might as well go for broke, so to
speak, and just do it. But, at the same time, don’t think you can always
clearly define that moment within us when temptation becomes a sin, as if there
is a visible line in the sand. As long as you keep your toes on this side of
the line, you can play safely with temptation. But where is that line? Is it
the moment we begin to debate the temptation, or when we make a decision and a
plan to go along with the temptation?
Actually, determining the point when we commit sin isn’t
that important. It’s not as if by resisting the temptation we somehow are
guiltless, innocent, and holy people. The devil would love us to believe that,
wouldn’t he, that somehow we can do this without Jesus. No… Never forget: We
are sinners by virtue of who we are as sons and daughters of Adam and Eve.
We’re not sinners because we sin; we sin because we are sinners.
Instead of trying to parse the moment of sin, instead stand
before Jesus and confess your sins. Repent of the times you listened to the
devil’s temptations and doubted God’s Word. Repent of the times we willingly
subjected ourselves to the temptations. Repent of the times when we
unwillingly, in a moment of weakness, surrendered without even realizing it
until it was too late. Repent of all of the times we debated, “Did God really
say,” and chose to ignore the truth of the Word of God for the sake of
convenience, personal pleasure, someone else’s pain, or popularity.
Repent, but do not despair. In the Gospel lesson today,
Jesus plainly said, “Truly, I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the
children of man, and whatever blasphemies they utter, but whoever blasphemes
against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness but is guilty of an eternal sin.”
All sins that are confessed in faith are forgiven. Jesus died and shed His
blood for all of your sins – all of them! – and His death was the full payment
price, that God no longer holds those sins accountable to the Christian. Christ
really did say, “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Jesus
really did say, “Father into your hands, I commit my spirit.” Your Lord really
did say, “It is finished,” and the full debt of sin was paid in full, the redemption
price His life, the receipt signed in blood, the gift delivered with His dying “This
is most certainly true.”
When you confess your
sins to Christ, you are saying, in effect, “God really did say that I am a
sinner, and I know and confess it. But I also know, believe, trust and rely
that I have an even greater Savior who took my place.” Confession is the
Christian releasing ownership of the sin and commending it to the cross where
it was already crucified with Him. That’s all Jesus wants - He wants your sins.
Confess them and give ‘em to Him – all of them. Great and small, confess them
in faith, believing that they are already forgiven of you even before you ask!
There are some sins, though, that we commit that are so
great and so grievous that our Christian conscience is troubled and burdened
even after absolution. Make no mistake about it, friends: this is the devil’s
greatest temptation. Having lured you into sin with his question, “Did God
really say?” he throws it back at you one more time, doubling down, hoping for
equal success: “Did God really say…did He say he forgives you?”
All of the temptations we face are serious, but this one is,
truly, eternally deadly. This temptation leads us to despair. Despair, fueled
by satan feeding our sense of shame and guilt, turns faith into denial that He
cannot or will not forgive me. Despair like this turns the Christian against
Christ Himself and all of His promises. This denial of faith, or death of
faith, of Jesus as Lord and Savior is what is meant by the sin against the Holy
Spirit. It is the only unforgivable sin because it literally refuses to let
Jesus’s forgiveness be yours; it refuses to release the sins; it refuses to
believe Jesus can forgive you. In a worst case scenario, satan can cause a
Christian such pain that he or she thinks the only resolution is to take their
own life. Please remember, he is the father of lies. He doesn’t care what you
do, but your family, friends, and this family of faith does care. If you ever
wonder if you have committed this sin, let me assure you that you haven’t. The
proof is in the question itself – if you did not have faith in Christ, if you
lived as if Jesus wasn’t your savior, you wouldn’t care whether you sinned
against Him or not!
So, if this is you, here is the cure: Repent. Confess your
sins and leave them with Jesus. Refuse to pull them down from the cross. Trust
Him as your Savior and His all-sufficing death and resurrection. Then, live the
forgiven life as a child of God.
What does it look like to live as a forgiven child of God?
Rejoice – you are forgiven. Be confident – Jesus died for you. Remember your
baptism. Live in hope – this is the Amen of the daily life. And, don’t discount
the power of prayer. In the Lord’s prayer, we pray, “Lead us not into
temptation and deliver us from evil.” What greater evil, what greater
temptation do we face than to deny the gifts of God in Christ? And, when your
conscience is burdened, repent again. Ask your pastor for private confession
and absolution. There’s not much I haven’t heard, and I’ll walk with you, in
the name of Jesus.
The next time you hear the devil whisper, “Did God really
say?” look to the cross and say, “Yep. He said I’m forgiven in the name of the
Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
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