Living East of Eden
A Sermon
from Genesis 3 and 4 from Lyndon Perry
One of the most disturbing lines from scripture, for me at least, is from
Genesis 4.7, when God says to Cain, right before Cain kills his brother Abel, “Sin
is crouching at your door; it desires to have you.”
That’s a scary bit of dialog, don’t you think?
The image that comes to my mind is of a rabid dog, hiding, crouching,
growling behind a door, ready to pounce, ready to bite, ready to devour the
next person who walks through.
It’s scary because this bit of dialog is also directed at each one of us –
at me, at you. Sin is crouching and its desire is for us. From the time of Adam
and Eve, sin has been waiting at the door and has not given up its post.
In the garden, sin took the form of a serpent.
The serpent knew of the two trees at the center of the garden – both
representative of a good and right relationship with God. The tree of life
symbolized humanity’s life-giving walk with God; the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil symbolized the path of obedience that led to the good life with
God verses the evil that would result from trying to live a life apart from
God.
Simple parameters – walk with God and live, depart from God and die.
