Advent Tree, 3

 I was unprepared. Once again, my disappointment that things weren’t going according to MY plan hid the possibility that things were going exactly according to HIS. We gathered and they were… excited. Excited! Thrilled to be reading and discussing and learning! How could I have worried that they had to wait a day or two? Isn’t the lesson all about the waiting? I was humbled before I even began.

 This lesson was about the Fall of Man. “We’re only two chapters in. And the whole story falls apart.” Have you ever thought about that? Two Chapters. Only one generation from God. And still in the presence of God. God walked with them in the “breezy part of the day”. God WALKED with them. They were In His Presence! Regularly! How could anyone turn from that? How could anyone be tempted? 

 But they were. They made their choice and all of Man has paid the price for their Pride. Paid the price for the desire to be bigger, better. Paid for the need to KNOW, and the need to say “See, I know too.” God is swift in His justice. Elizabeth looks at me, eyes wide and whispers “How devastating.”

But God breathes hope to Eve. Hope that one day a distant descendant will crush the head of that tempting serpent. Do we see now that His plan is from the beginning? That from the moment of our Fall He has arranged our redemption? Do we appreciate that Christ knew at that moment the price he would have to pay to save us?

We hung a big red apple on our tree. It’s good for food and pleasing to the eye, but it weighs down the branch almost to breaking. Weighs it down heavy, like the sins of the world.