Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2900
“And they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the Presence ofthe LORD God among the trees of the garden. And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where are you?” Genesis 3:8,9.
“How will God come to us now that we have rebelled against Him?” That is a question which must have greatly perplexed our first parents. They may have said to one another, “Perhaps God will not come to us at all and then we shall be orphans, indeed. If spared to live on, we must continue to live without God and without hope in the world.” It would have been the worst thing that could have happened to our race if God had left this planet to take its own course and had said, concerning the people upon it, “I will leave them to their own way, for they are given over to idols.”
But if He came to our first parents, in what way would He come? Surely Adam and Eve must have feared that He would be accompanied by the angels of vengeance to destroy them straight away, or, at any rate, to bind them in chains and fetters forever. So they questioned among themselves, “Will He come and if He does, will His coming involve the total destruction of the human race?” Their hearts must have been sorely perplexed within them while they were waiting to see what God would do to them as a punishment for the great sin they had committed. I believe they thought that He would come to them. From their past experience they knew so much of His graciousness that they felt sure that He would come. Yet they also understood so much of His holy anger against sin that they must have been afraid of His coming—so they went and hid themselves among the trees of the garden although every tree must have upbraided them for their disobedience, for everyone of the trees would seem to say, “Why do you come here? You have eaten of the fruit of the tree of which you were forbidden to partake. You have broken your Maker’s command and His sentence of death has already gone out against you. When He comes, He will certainly come to deal with you in judgment according to His faithful word—and when He does, what will become of you?” Every leaf, as it rustled, must have startled and alarmed them. The breath of the evening breeze, as it passed through the garden, must have filled them with fear and dread as to the doom awaiting them.
Now, “in the cool of the day,” or, as the Hebrew has it, “in the wind of the evening,” when the evening breeze was blowing through the garden, God came. It is difficult for us to even imagine how He revealed Himself to our first parents. I suppose He condescended to take upon Himself some visible form. It was “the voice of the Lord God” they heard in the garden and you know that it is the Word of God who has been pleased to make Himself visible to us in human flesh. He may have assumed some form in which they could see Him, otherwise, as a pure Spirit, God could not have been recognized either by their ears or their eyes.
They heard His voice speaking as He walked in the garden in the cool of the day. And when He called to Adam, albeit that there was righteous anger in the tone of His voice, yet His words were very calm and dignified and, as far as they could be, even tender, for, while you may read the words thus, “Adam, where are you?” You may also read them thus, “Where are you, poor Adam, where are you?” You may put a tone of pity into the words and yet not misread them. So the Lord comes thus in gentleness in the cool of the day and calls them to account. He patiently listens to their wicked excuses and then pronounces upon them a sentence, which, heavy though it is towards the serpent and heavy though it is
towards all who are not saved by the woman’s wondrous Seed, yet has much mercy mingled with it in the promise that the Seed of the woman shall bruise the head of the serpent—a promise which must have shone in their sad and sinful souls as some bright particular star shines in the darkness of the night!
I learn from this incident that God will come to sinful men, sooner or later, and we may also learn from the way in which He came to our first parents, how He is likely to come to us. His coming will be different to different men, but we gather, from this incident, that God will certainly come to guilty men even if He waits till the cool of the day. And we are also able to understand a little about the way in which He will ultimately come to all men.
Remember this, Sinner, however far you may get away from God, you will have to come close to Him one of these days! You may go and pluck the fruit that He forbids you to touch and then you may go and hide yourself among the thick trees in the forest and think that you have concealed yourself—but you will have to come face to face with your Maker at some time or other! It may not be today, or tomorrow. It may not be until “the cool of the day” of time. No, it may not be till time, itself, shall be no more—but, at last, you will have to confront your Maker! Like the comet that flies far off from the sun, wandering into space for an altogether inconceivable distance and yet has to come back again, however long the time its circuit takes—so you will have to come back to God, either willingly, repentantly, believingly, or else unwillingly and in chains to receive your sentence of doom from the lips of the Almighty whom you have provoked to anger by your sin! God and you have to meet as surely as you are now living—at some time or other, each one of you must hear the voice of the Lord God saying to you, as He said to Adam, “Where are you?”