Life Lessons: Eve

  What better place to start than at the beginning?

 Right off the bat we learn something about the value God placed on women from the moment we were created. The reaction of the first man to walk the earth upon seeing the very first woman was immediate love and honor.

There are so many angry women… angry because they think they have to fight to be treated equally. Angry because they think somebody somewhere has labeled them as “less than” or assigned them an inferior role and, in some cases, even blamed it on the Bible. The idea of women being in any way “less than” came from someone but it certainly wasn’t from God. In fact, throughout history we see example after example of the people of God treating women with a respect uncommon for the time and culture.

In a time when women truly were considered second class citizens, not allowed to study, assigned very restricted roles, and subjected to the whims of whatever masculine authority they lived under, Jesus came along with radical behavior and teachings about how to treat everyone…. without regard to gender, age, economic or social status.

In a world where men controlled politics, religion and everything else, among the followers of Christ, women were included and recognized as disciples ( Luke 8:1-3). In a culture where “sitting at the feet of the teacher” was for men and where the living room of the house (where teaching often took place) was a place for men, we see women welcomed and encouraged to study. (Luke 10:38-42)

Even at the end, we see that the first witnesses to Jesus’ resurrection were….yes, you guessed it… women.

So yes, somebody came up with some bad ideas about women, but it wasn’t God. What a tragic misunderstanding, twisting and abuse of something so beautiful, so basic, so holy as the creation of two genders.

A word about women - We aren’t men! We are created uniquely, specially, wonderfully. Gender differences are not statuses; they are biology. God created male and female, not to compete but rather to complement each other. Our differences in no way demean but rather distinguish us. And gender is not a competition. No one is more valuable…or more valued. How wonderful would it be if we could all embrace the uniqueness of our creation rather than being defensive about it? This goes for everything that makes us uniquely and personally who we are… gender yes, but also body types, talents, interests, personalities etc.

Be thankful for and embrace every distinguishing factor that makes you the one of a kind, uniquely created by God person that you are .

Women From

A-Z

I’m not even sure where this came from but thought it was clever. It’s missing a few letters and I’d love any suggestions you might have to help complete it!

Lesson two, courtesy of Eve, is about wanting what we can’t have. If you’re a parent or teacher, you probably discovered early on that it was good to have a few straightforward rules rather than a big long list of them. You learned to keep it simple, pick your battles and focus on what is most important.

God is the ultimate example of every good thing we need to learn, be it parenting skills, leadership, friendship…. you name it and God provides us the perfect example. In this instance, He gives Adam and Eve one command and one command only. There was one tree in the whole garden from which they couldn’t eat. In fact, God said don’t even touch it. And He warns them of the consequence of breaking the rule: “If you eat from the tree you will die.”

Clear rule. Clear consequence. With a whole gorgeous garden to enjoy, it seems easy enough to steer clear of ONE tree, but what happens? It’s amazing!

I promise if you set a child loose in a toy store and gave him free rein to play with anything except the toys on Isle 5. …“Don’t go on isle 5.” … which isle is he going for the moment your back is turned? You know it! And it’s no different with adults. With us, the forbidden food on our new diet is the one we most crave. From the beginning, it has always been human nature to want what we cannot have.

 About Temptation It’s easy to tempt someone who is open to at least entertain the idea. Have you ever been called by a salesperson intent on delivering their pitch? They were going to keep you on the line no mater if you said you weren’t interested, you were having dinner, or even that your house was on fire….haha! They were determined to finish their speech. Why? Because getting someone to hear you out is half the battle. If a person listens long enough to become curious, that curiosity can lead to desire. It is a process.

James says it’s like that with sin:

Isn’t that what happened to Eve?

From the beginning, curiosity has been a part of human nature. That curiosity can be a great thing; it can also lead to our demise.

At any point along the way, a different decision could have stopped this train wreck but it all started with Eve’s willingness to “hear out” the wrong voice. Her curiosity was sparked, igniting an ember of desire. I don’t even want to count the number of times I’ve been at this very spot and reasoned “It’s just one ember and it seems so harmless.”

And that’s all Satan needs. If unchecked at some point, he will help us take that ember right through from being imagined and desired to being considered, dwelt upon, rationalized, and finally accepted. That’s how a “harmless ember” becomes a consuming flame of dangerous desire.

It’s good to be open but we have to be wise about what we’re open to and careful that the voice we hear is the one that’s telling the truth….the whole truth. The most effective lies have an element of truth, and that’s how we are deceived. Eve heard what she wanted to hear to justify doing what she wanted to do.

 Satan did lie to Eve, but it wasn’t all a lie. This much was true: they did “see what’s really going on.” They saw themselves naked. They saw the ugly reality. Hit home? How many times have we bitten off  a piece of a pretty lie and found the reality that came back to bite us was anything but? One of the truest things I’ve ever heard about the tragedy of sin:

Every. Single. Time. Everything was perfect for Eve. Then just one little bite destroyed that perfection. How many times have we felt like our sin has destroyed a life that had so much beauty and so much potential? Things got a little out of hand then spiraled out of control until, ashamed and guilty we were left wondering, “Can I make it back to You, God? Is there enough of me left to salvage? And if not, can we just start over and make a new me?”

The good news is that the answer to all three questions is a resounding Yes, Yes, YES!

What a merciful God we serve and how grateful I am that he gave us, from the very beginning… hope. From the beginning of time, we see that we are not the first to struggle and not the worst… that human nature is as it always has been and that His love won’t fail now, as it didn’t fail then.

We’ll pick up here next time… Eve and her boys have a few more things in store for us before we move on.

Remember that you are created uniquely, beautifully, and more valued by God than you could ever imagine.

Until next time!