It may be the most overlooked moment of deep horror in all of the Bible. Not the eating of the fruit itself. Plenty of horror there, but it’s not overlooked. Rather it was the response of our first parents to the drawing near of their Father. Adam and Eve hear God coming to them, and they flee. We’re not in paradise any more. The God who crafted them both, who blessed them with paradise, His love, love one for another comes to them and… they run away.
The horror of sin isn’t merely the immediate destruction that comes from it. It is instead it propensity to separate us from our Father. We sin. We feel shame. The Holy One approaches, and we seek escape. It doesn’t, however, even require sin itself. It is sufficient that we are sinners.
Consider the encounter Peter had with Jesus in Luke 5. Like Adam and Eve, Peter was profoundly blessed with an astonishing haul of fish due to Jesus’ intervention. Rather than thanking Him however, the manifestation of Jesus’ power, and the knowledge of his own nature led Peter to cry out, “Depart from me for I am a sinful man, O Lord” (Luke 5:8).
True enough that Peter was a sinful man. But there is no immediate sin recounted in the story. Still, Peter wanted to get away. Peter would go on, of course, to commit multiple egregious sins against His Lord. None more horrific than denying Jesus three times through the night of His arrest. Here too Peter sought to distance himself from the Holy One of Israel, but this time to save his skin.
The solution to this problem, however, is not that we would not sin. That avenue is not available to us on this side of death. Rather, the difference between running from Him and running to Him is found in repentance. After the betrayal, when Peter is once again fishing, and Jesus stands on the shore, Peter doesn’t so much run as swim to Him. He does all that he can to get close quickly.
And Jesus, like our heavenly Father, welcomed him. Such reflects the father in the parable of the prodigal son. When the son comes to himself the first thing he does is go toward his father. His father, however, does not merely wait for his son, but runs to him. He doesn’t merely forgive him, but rejoices over him. His arms are always open wide for those who acknowledge the reality of sin in our lives.
The difference between sheep and goats isn’t the sheep are good and goats bad. The difference is that goats always seek to get away, while His sheep know His voice and follow. We all fall short. Goats think the problem is His holiness. Sheep know the solution is His grace. He does not wait for us to get it together, to clean ourselves up. He waits for us to be changed by His Spirit such that we know both how dirty we are and that He is the one solution.
This is tremendous encouragement. Thank you.