During Lent we looked at the lives of several of the women
who followed Jesus. In the Easter season we’ll meet some Old Testament women
who are the matriarchs of our faith. As the Sound of Music says, “Let’s start
at the very beginning”, with Eve.
I think most of the time when we think of Eve, we stop with
her interaction with the Snake and the ‘forbidden fruit’. We forget that she
was also a mother who had to endure the grief of having one son kill another.
She also endured the loss of the Garden and being exiled from the initial
relationship with God. Her life was filled with a question common to all of
us…”What if”.
Let’s pick up the story in Genesis from her point of view:
‘What If?’ I think
that as I look back on my life that is the question I most often ask myself.
What if I had not picked
the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge? I have asked myself that question every day
since it happened. I could try to pass the blame, and I have. I told Adam and
the Lord God that ‘the Serpent tricked me’. The truth is, I was feeling
rebellious and I was hungry and so I picked it and took a bite.
Nothing bad happened,
right away. I didn’t die like Adam had said we would. Indeed, I felt a clarity
and excitement that I hadn’t ever experienced. I told Adam and he took a bite,
too. We danced around, filled with this new feeling of power.
“I can do anything!” I
remember whirling in ecstasy until I fell to the ground tired. Adam, too, ran
around leaping over rocks and logs, shouting with delight.
It was only later,
when we were resting that a different feeling descended. I felt exposed and
vulnerable and afraid. Adam glanced at me and then looked away. I pulled my
legs up to my chest and turned my back to the man.
“What have we done?”
The man’s question came through gritted teeth. “We dare not face the Lord God.
We must hide. The Lord God will be coming to the Garden soon.”
Together we scrambled
to find a place to hide. I began tying leaves together to cover myself, as if I
thought I could hide behind them.
My greatest regret is
the sorrow with which the Lord God addressed us when we finally emerged. “My
children.” At first that is all the Lord God said. He repeated it sadly several
times. There was such grief in his voice when he continued, “Because you have
eaten of the Fruit, you can no longer live in the Garden. I will clothe you.
You, Adam, shall work to eat of the food of the earth. You, Eve, will bear
children, but you and they will not see my face.”
After we left the
Garden, I did bear children. My firstborn was Cain, and a year later his
brother Abel was born. They were different from the moment of birth. Cain liked
to grow things and spent lots of time with me. Abel preferred to tend the
animals and so he was with Adam more.
I often wonder What If I had treated the two boys more
equally. I admit that perhaps I related more to Cain. He came to expect my
approval for everything he did. Then came the day when the boys presented their
first offering to the Lord God.
Cain gathered up some
of the harvest, and Abel chose a young lamb for the offering. Later Cain told
me with tears that the Lord God had not accepted his offering.
Cain raged, “The Lord
God asked, ‘Why are you angry, and why has your countenance fallen? If you do
well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is lurking at
the door; its desire is for you, but you must master it.’ It is not fair!”
I wanted to comfort my
son. I had never seen him so enraged.
“My grain was just as
good as Abel’s stupid sheep,” he pouted. “I worked a lot harder to grow it,
too.”
Probably my response
was wrong. I assured him that he had the best wheat ever, and that the Lord God
surely had a good reason for preferring the lamb. The young man stomped away.
He was sullen all the next day. I saw him staring at his brother over the fire
that evening. His eyes were narrow slits. He stomped away into the darkness.
What If I had followed
him and spoken to my son. I could never have anticipated what happened next,
though. I saw the brothers head for the field together in the morning. “Surely
Cain has forgiven Abel,” I thought.
How wrong I was. Adam
was the first to learn the awful truth. I saw him walking from the field,
carrying something. As he drew nearer I realized it was a body. Then I
recognized the clothing. Screaming, I ran toward my husband.
“Abel is dead.” The
man’s broken statement was unnecessary. The dried blood told its own story.
Gently he laid the body down. I fell to my knees beside my son.
“What happened?” Even
then I expected to hear of a wild beast attack.
“Cain has killed his
brother and has fled to the east.”
“NO!” I would not
believe it. “It cannot be true!”
“Wife, I saw Cain
myself running from the field. I hear him shouting defiantly, ‘Today you have
driven me away from the soil, and I shall be hidden from your face; I shall be
a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and anyone who meets me may kill me.’”
“Who was there?” I
looked up from smoothing the dark hair away from Abel’s face.
“Surely it was the
Lord God he addressed.” Adam stood up, gathering the body to his chest. “We
must bury my son before the sun sets.”
Numbly I followed
wondering What If I had not let the
two men go alone to the field that morning.
Both Adam and I
mourned the sons who were taken from us. Abel was dead and Cain exiled to the
Land of Nod. We heard that he found a wife and fathered sons. We never saw
them.
I am troubled by the
mistakes I made throughout my life. What
If I had been a better wife and mother? Always I remind myself that despite
my failing, the Lord God has been faithful. We have been protected and provided
for, even when circumstances seemed dire.
Even after Abel was
killed, the Lord God was merciful. I conceived again. My third son we named
Seth.
“The Lord God gave me
another child.” I told Adam. “It is proof of his never-ending love.”
The loving care didn’t
end there. I bore other children-boys and girls. It was Seth who was most
interested in learning about the Lord God, though. When Seth was a man, we
found him a wife and their son was named Enosh. Adam and I were blessed to hold
our grandson in our arms.
What Ifs can take
on a life of their own. Eve was able to see God’s love even in the darkest of
times.
Are there ‘what ifs’ in your life that keep you from seeing
that God loves you? Have there been times in your life that you knew you were
loved even if you wondered ‘what if’ you had done something differently?
(Image of Adam and Eve from the Saint John's Bible, the first illuminated Bible since the Middle Ages)
Content (c) Cynthia Davis 2017
