CSI Series: Doubt

Pastor Burcham's Sermon

  Sunday, March 12, 2006

Pastor Burcham's Sermon

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Well, inevitably, you've probably heard of CSI Crime Scene Investigation, even if you're not a fan of the show. There are so many commercials about it, I'm sure you are at least familiar with the premise of the crime scene investigators as they come on and look at all the evidence that's there. CSI is so popular, it's given way now to two more shows, I understand. There's CSI New York and there's CSI Miami. Well, I'd like to welcome you to the premiere of a new CSI. That's right, this morning, we begin CSI Holy Land. Same gripping drama, same edge-of-your-seat suspense, same compelling story lines. The big difference is the stories come straight from the pages of scripture, not from the mind of a Hollywood writer. The characters are not fictional people that don't really exist. They're real people, and the facts are true. In the same way of the TV show of CSI, we are going to look at the evidence and dig deep into the evidence, discover what the evidence is, and then follow the evidence, and discover where does that lead us? And what does that tell us and what conclusions can we draw from the evidence?

This morning, the crime scene? We go back to the beginning of time. We go back to a garden, the most beautiful garden you can ever imagine. And there, in the center of the garden, is a tree. And our crime scene is at the base of the tree. We start our investigation then by looking at the evidence. What is the evidence of this crime scene we have before us? Let's take a look at the physical evidence, if you will. We have here a large tree. It's really a beautiful tree. You look at the fruit on the tree, and it's incredible. It looks like it's so ripe for picking that it would be delicious to eat. In fact, you take a look around and you're surrounded by an orchard of trees. And each one of them in full bloom and each one of them with just ripe, luscious fruit hanging from every branch. It seems like any tree you could go up and just pull one off and it would just be incredibly tasteful. But we're not interested in the other trees. We want to look at this one in the center.

As we approach the crime scene, we sort of want to make sure we're careful we take in all the details. We notice there on the ground is a half-eaten piece of fruit. We go over and pick up the piece of fruit and we notice, on the fruit, there are two sets of teeth marks. Evidently, two people were eating the fruit. They're sharing it with one another, but they didn't finish the fruit. And we look down and we see, by the indentation in the ground, something must have happened here. How did it get on the ground? It didn't just simply fall from the tree and land on the ground. Judging by the indentation, it wasn't thrown on the ground in disgust. You almost get the impression that it was just released from the hand of the person who had it, almost as if they were surprised. Maybe they came to a certain realization. Maybe they decided they shouldn't be eating this fruit.

We look a little bit further around and over here you notice there are some fig leaves and they're all kind of bunched together and they're sort of laid out. It almost gives the impression maybe somebody was trying to attach one leaf to the other, maybe sew them together in some way. But, whatever, you get the distinct idea they were trying to hide something. There was something they didn't want other people to see. Maybe it was something they were ashamed of or something they didn't want anyone ever to find, but it's laid out there. And you wonder, “What is that really all about?”

You have to walk around the perimeter of the crime scene and you find out, over here, back in sort of the undergrowth in the garden work, it's a little bit thicker. If you look down, you can see the imprints where two people have been kneeling down. If you take a look at it, you notice, “Yeah, if they're down here, they'd be hidden from sight. Well, that means somebody was hiding from someone else. But who were they hiding from? Why were they hiding there?”

All the physical facts are here. We have the tree, the half-eaten fruit, the fig leaves, the indentation in the vegetation off to the side but what exactly is going on? Well, the good news is we have more evidence. In fact, we have an eye-witness testimony and it's reliable evidence because it's God Himself who tells us. God Himself describes for us the scene we're looking at right now. It's in Genesis 3. Let's review it again. “Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, ‘Did God really say you must not eat from any tree in the garden?' The woman said to the serpent, ‘We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden but God did say you must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden and you must not touch it or you will die.' ‘You'll not surely die,' the serpent said to the woman, ‘for God knows, when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened and you'll be like God, knowing the difference between good and evil.' When the woman saw the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye and also desirable for gaining knowledge, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband who was with her and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened and they realized they were naked. So they sewed fig leaves together and covered themselves. Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as He walked in the garden in the cool of the day and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, ‘Where are you?' The man said, ‘I heard you in the garden and I was afraid.'”

The explanation of our evidence. We see the tree in the middle of the garden and realize this is the tree of knowledge of good and evil. This is the one tree in all of the garden that mankind was not supposed to touch. The entire orchard was theirs, hundreds of trees I would imagine. Any one of them they could take for food but just this one, in the middle of the garden, God said, “Don't eat from that one.” Adam and Eve find themselves in the middle of the garden. For some reason, the serpent is in the tree. The serpent talks to Adam and Eve, convinces them to eat the forbidden fruit. They do. But the moment they bite into the forbidden fruit, they realize they've crossed the line, that what they've done is wrong. They dropped the fruit and it lands on the ground.

Ashamed of what they have done and ashamed now of who they are, they run over and they start sewing fig leaves together and try to cover themselves up so no one else knows what they're doing. Then they hear the God in the garden, so they run deeper into the garden and they hide from God because now they're afraid of God. They used to walk with God in the garden in the cool of the day, perfect harmony between the two of them. Now they're cowering in fear behind the bushes as God walks through.

Is there even more evidence? More than the physical evidence? More than the written evidence? I would submit to you we have thousands of years of evidence, thousands of years of evidence that point back to this moment in time. We have to dig deeper into the evidence. Let's go back a little bit and find out what did the garden look like before they ate the fruit, before they listened to the serpent. What was the scene like then? We go back to our reliable source. God describes it for us in the first chapter of Genesis. God describes how He created the universe and everything in it and how He created the world and all the vegetation and all the animals and everything that was there. And this is how He concluded it on the sixth day, “God saw all that He had made and it was very good.” Now when scripture says it was very good, it means a little bit more than “it was just peachy keen.” When scripture says it was very good, it means it was perfect. Every star was just where God wanted it to be. Every planet was just how He had designed it and the earth was just how He shaped and formed it. And then, of all of the universe and of all of the planets, God chose this planet, earth. And on earth, He had the crowning achievement of His creation, for He formed it out of the dust of the ground. He breathed into it the breath of life and man and woman walked upon the earth. And then God wanted a special place for them. In Chapter 2, He describes it, “Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east of Eden , and He put there the man He had formed. And the Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the garden, trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food.” So, in this perfect creation, in this perfect universe, God plants this incredible garden, this paradise. And, in paradise, he places mankind. There to live in perfect harmony with God, in perfect harmony with one another, in perfect harmony with nature itself, God has created perfection.

But let's look at the evidence since then, since the time the fruit was eaten. I wouldn't describe our world as perfect. I wouldn't describe our world as being in perfect harmony with one another or with our God. We live in a world that is at war with itself. Natural disasters happen almost on a daily basis. We have tsunamis and hurricanes. We have twisters and volcanoes and earthquakes. We have sin and disease. We have death and we have terrorism. We have wars and we have racial tension. You name it, we have it in this world. It's anything but a perfect world. The evidence is all around us that something happened at that moment in time.

Even look at the evidence of your own lives. Is your life littered with half-eaten pieces of fruit dropped in surprise? It's the argument you were having with your spouse and, just as the words left your mouth, you knew they would cut deep and hurt. But they were already spoken. Were the actions you've done that, immediately upon doing it, you regretted it and knew what you did was wrong but you couldn't take it back? How many fig leaves have you sewn together trying to cover up the shame, the shame of things you've done, that you hoped and prayed no one would ever discover, no one would ever know you are capable of doing such a thing? Have you, at times, even run from God, afraid God might know everything about you and afraid of how He'd react, afraid of the judgment He might pass on you?

The evidence is overwhelming that what happened here at this crime scene at the beginning of time is much more than just a couple of bites out of a piece of fruit, what happened here was of epic proportions. All of history changed at this moment because, at this moment, sin ushered into our world and that sin corrupted every aspect of life. It corrupted every creature and it corrupted even the world and the universe itself. There's much more that's going on here than just a couple of bites out of a piece of fruit. We need to dig deeper. We need to follow the evidence. What could lead Adam and Eve to disobey God? What could lead them to eat from the fruit, just the one tree of all the trees they weren't to eat from? What could lead to that? Follow the evidence and let's find out.

Follow the evidence means we have to go back to the written word of God. Let's take it apart piece by piece. What happened here? What's going on with Adam and Eve? Scripture says, “Now the serpent was more crafty than other wild animals the Lord God had made.” The serpent here is the devil. We know from other places in scripture the devil is referred to as the serpent. He's the beast. He's the snake, the sly one. So the devil comes on to the beast, to the snake, and the snake then talks to Adam and Eve and then the snake, the serpent, lays a trap. He lays a trap for mankind in a simple disarming question and yet the subtleness behind it laid a seed. “So did God really say you can't eat from any of the trees of the garden?” One can almost hear the incredulous tone of his voice. “You mean to tell me God has created this beautiful orchard, all this wonderful food is surrounding you and you can't eat any of it. That almost seems cruel to me at least, to sort of taunt you and sort of tease you with all this fruit. You mean you can't eat any of it?” The seed starts to take root because Eve responds. Eve first off starts out defending God. The woman said, “We may eat fruit from the trees of the garden, but God did say, ‘You must not eat from the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden and you must not touch it or you will die.'” Now is that really what God said? When God gave the prohibition not to eat from the tree in the center of the garden, did God really say all of that? We have to check out the story. So you go back to Chapter 2, “And the Lord God commanded the man, ‘You are free to eat from any tree in the garden,'” so far so good, “‘but you must not eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it, you will surely die.'” Hum. No mention of touching here. Already, the seed has been planted in Eve's mind. The seed is there of doubt. What's God doing here? “Yeah, God said we could eat from it. He said we can't eat from this one right here. I don't know why we can't eat from this one right here. It doesn't look all that much different from all the rest. You know, God said we couldn't even reach out and touch this one right here. Must be something special about this tree.” With the seed planted and starting to take root, the devil pounces right on top of that and then he outright lies to them. Jesus says it's his native tongue. “Oh, you won't die. You see, God knows when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God. You see, God is holding back on you. God hasn't given you everything. God hasn't told you the whole story here. There's more to it. It's not that you're going to die when you eat the tree. No, God's just pulling one over on you. When you eat of this tree, then you will be equal with God. You'll be just like Him.” At that point, the seed is firmly planted, the seed of doubt, in Adam and Eve's mind. So Eve looks at the fruit. It's desirable. It looks good and it has knowledge attached to it. It all centers back to doubt.

Doubt is at the root of this crime. Adam and Eve doubted God. They doubted His provision. They doubted His Word. They doubted His promises to them. God must be holding back. God isn't telling us the whole story. Therefore, she reaches out and eats the fruit and immediately realizes the mistake, immediately realizes the disobedience. Yes, the crime was they disobeyed God and ate the fruit but what led them to that disobedience, it was doubt, doubting God.

Doubt is at the center of so much disobedience in the world. Think about how much doubt has played a role in your life. When your world falls apart and your life falls apart and you've lost your job, maybe you don't have your health anymore, your relationship is on the skids, or maybe all of that is happening and more, and do you remember the promise of God that says He will never give you more than what you can handle, but you wonder. You wonder. Is that really true in your case? If God is such a loving God, if God is such a compassionate God, then why are so many bad things happening? And why are they happening to those who claim to be His followers? If God is caring, if God is concerned, then why doesn't God do something about it? How could God take away the person I love? How could He leave me alone? Doubt. The devil wants to plant seeds of doubt so you doubt God's love for you, you doubt His Word, you doubt the sincerity of His promises for you. It all centers in doubt.

The evidence is overwhelming. It is doubt that led Adam and Eve to disobedience. It is doubt that has led you and me to disobedience more times than we can count. And, because of that, all of us have had to suffer the consequences and the pain and the struggle of that. It is doubt at the center of this crime; but, like most crimes, this crime was committed based on false information. False information that God could not be trusted, God's Word wasn't true. And, once again, we'll let the evidence speak for itself because the evidence here is overwhelming. In fact, the evidence leaves no room for doubt. There is absolutely no cause for us not to believe every word God has spoken to us. There is no room to doubt God's love, His sincerity, and the promises He's given to us. There is no doubt about the love He had for Adam and Eve. Look how He responded to the two of them. Yes, He kicked them out of the Garden of Eden but I would contend to you that was an act of grace and mercy. The world had fallen, which means this world is filled with pain, with sickness, and struggles. God, in His mercy, said, “I will not let mankind live forever in that.” God has in mind for us to live in paradise and that's where He was going to have us live for an eternity, not in a fallen world, not in a world with pain and trials and tribulations. So God takes them out of the garden so they cannot take from the tree of eternal life.

And then what does God do? God gives the promise of deliverance, the first promise ever. It's right there in Chapter 3. He's talking to the serpent, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your offspring and hers.” And here it is, “He,” that is Jesus, “will crush your head and you will strike His heel.” It's the first promise of deliverance. He, Jesus, the Savior, would crush the head of Satan, crush forever the evil that had infected His world, crush forever the sin that has infected us.

But then God goes even beyond that. After they're taken out of the garden, here in Chapter 3 in the end, are some of the most loving words, compassionate words God spoke. Maybe you've missed it or maybe you don't think so. It's in Verse 21, “The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them.” Adam and Eve have just destroyed the world God created. It is no longer the perfect world and universe. Their act of disobedience has wiped all of that out. They're afraid of Him now instead of being His friend and loving Him. And what is God's reaction? Does God stamp them out and say, “I'll try again.” God takes them out of the garden, and He lovingly makes clothes for them and proves He still cares for them and will take care of them.

The evidence is overwhelming of God's love and the truth of His Word to Adam and Eve. And so it is for you and for me. The evidence is overwhelming of God's love for us. No matter how much we've disobeyed Him, no matter how many times we have doubted Him, God's love and God's Word and God's promises are consistently true. John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not die but have life everlasting.” He gave us His Son so we could spend a life in paradise with Him. We could spend it in the place where He wants us to be, free of sin, free of pain, free of all the garbage of this world. St. Paul puts it this way in the letter to the Church at Colossi. He's talking about Jesus, “For God was pleased to have all of His fullness dwell in Him and through Him to reconcile to Himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through His blood shed on the cross. He made peace between us and our Father in heaven by shedding His blood on the cross. Once we were alienated from God over enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior, but now He has reconciled you by Christ's physical body through death to resent you, holy in His sight, without blemish, and free from accusation.” That's what Jesus did for us. When we stand before God, God doesn't see our sinful self. God sees us as holy and righteous because of the blood of Jesus. My favorite passage of the gospel is Romans 5:10, “But God demonstrates His own love for us and, while we were still sinners, Christ Jesus died for us.” That's an act of love. While we were still sinners, while we were still rebelling against God, doubting God, turning our back on God, Jesus Christ died for us, to reconcile us to God.

The evidence is overwhelming. Adam and Eve had to learn the hard way. I suppose you and I have had to learn the hard way. But God leaves no room for doubt. It is guaranteed that His Word is true, that His promises are certain, and His love is never-ending. Amen.