I.  The Word: Genesis 3:1-13

1Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?”

2The woman said to the serpent, “From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat;

3but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat from it or touch it, or you will die.’ ”

4The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die!

5“For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

6When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate.

7Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings.

8They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

9Then the Lord God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?”

10He said, “I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself.”

11And He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?”

12The man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate.”

13Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” And the woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”

II.  Reflection Questions:

1. What is guilt evidence of?

2. Are humans merely “mistakers” or sinners?

3. If we are all sinners, what do we all need?

Adam and Eve disobeyed God, and they felt guilty. Then they ran and hid from God because they felt guilty.

Man has not fundamentally changed since Adam and Eve. We still feel guilty when we do something we know we should not do, whether it is violating our conscience in our personal conduct, or intentionally doing or saying something to hurt someone else. Guilt is what follows. It’s what remains after we’ve done what we know we should not do. Guilt is the residue of sin.

I am an employment lawyer. In an employment discrimination case, a plaintiff has to prove is “pretext,” i.e. that the reason offered by the employer for terminating the plaintiff is not the real reason. It makes sense. When employers discriminate against employees, they don’t say, “I am terminating you because of your race.” They have to make up a reason. Therefore, when a plaintiff proves an employer has given a false reason for termination, that is evidence of a discriminatory decision. Pretext is the residue of a discriminatory termination. In the same way, pretext follows a discriminatory termination decision guilt follows sin.

There is such a thing as false guilt, and there are psychopaths who have no conscience, but these are merely the exceptions that prove the rule. People feel guilty when they do what they know they should not do, and we should ask why that is. If we are the products of an evolutionary process driven by natural selection (or survival of the fittest), we should not feel guilty about conduct that elevates us and injures our neighbor, but we do.

“Okay,” one might say, “but all this means is that we are not perfect. We all make mistakes” Actually, it is much more than that. As Andy Stanley says, we are not merely “mistakers.” Mistakes don’t produce guilt. The other day I mistakenly sent an email to one client that I intended for another. I didn’t feel guilty. I had not sinned. I merely made a mistake. There is a difference.

We are sinners. We hold others to standards about how they should act toward us, then we violate the very same standards when we deal with others. We hold up standards for our own personal conduct that we don’t even keep. And we violate those standards not negligently but intentionally. These are not mere mistakes. And they are what separate us from God, all of us.

“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23). And because all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, all need a Savior.