My running partner and I ran the Flying Pirate Half Marathon a few months ago and we enjoyed reading the homemade signs that people held up along the route. People and local businesses really go out of their way to create fun and encouraging signs for the runners. Of all the great race signs I have read, the one that was outside the Kitty Hawk Police Department one year was the best. It read: You can run, but you can’t hide. Best of luck from the Kitty Hawk Police! Well played, officers! It is not only funny, it is biblical.

Today we go back to the beginning of everything and learn what happened when man tried to hide. This very familiar story of the “fall of man” takes us to the cool of the evening when fellowship with God in the garden was a regular thing. But right away we know that something is very wrong, as God called to the man and his wife and asked, “Where are you?” Surely God knew where they were and even what they had done. But the question was more theological than geographical. Where is your head? Where is your heart? What were you thinking?

Genesis 3 (Common English Bible)

⁸ During that day’s cool evening breeze, they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden; and the man and his wife hid themselves from the Lord God in the middle of the garden’s trees.⁹ The Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?”

¹⁰ The man replied, “I heard your sound in the garden; I was afraid because I was naked, and I hid myself.”

A classic definition of the word sin is “separation from God.” They had eaten the fruit that had been forbidden and now they had to face the consequences of their actions, so they separated themselves from the Lord by trying to hide. But notice that the man compounded his sin with blame-casting. Not only does he blame the woman, he blames God for giving him the woman.

How often do we do this as well? Do you ever try to cover up your sins by blaming someone else? We spend a lot of time trying to teach our children to resist peer pressure, but many of us succumb to it. It is so easy to slip into backbiting, gossiping, name-calling, and hate speech when we see our friends and neighbors engaging in that kind of behavior. We live in a world where finger pointing has the favorite exercise of the day.

¹¹ He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat from the tree, which I commanded you not to eat?”

¹² The man said, “The woman you gave me, she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate.”

¹³ The Lord God said to the woman, “What have you done?!”

And the woman said, “The snake tricked me, and I ate.”

God’s gentle question, “Where are you?” is an effort to show the man how lost he had suddenly become. God is hoping to hear his confession so that he can offer repentance. We can almost sense God’s sorrow over the broken fellowship; no longer will the three of them walk in the garden together. This passage shows us that God will always pursue us, no matter what we have done. And we will always be found, thanks be to God! Yes, we all have to answer to God, but when we come clean, we are forgiven. God acted with patience and caring as he personally came along side of the man and woman to speak the truth in love to them.

The snake did not fare as well. It is the perfect image of Christ’s defeat over Satan. Look at verse 15. God puts enmity between Satan and the “woman’s offspring,” a prophecy of the virgin birth. Many regard this as the first Gospel preaching in the Bible, calling this verse the proto evangelium. But bearing those offspring would bring great hardship to women and men would now have to till the land. And while the land would be filled with thorns (NIV) and thistles, Christ would come in due time and wear those thorns as a crown on his head when he took the sins of the world upon him. All of the earth was redeemed by his death and resurrection.

¹⁴ The Lord God said to the snake,

“Because you did this,
    you are the one cursed
        out of all the farm animals,
        out of all the wild animals.
    On your belly you will crawl,
        and dust you will eat
        every day of your life.

¹⁵ I will put contempt between you and the woman,
    between your offspring and hers.
They will strike your head,
        but you will strike at their heels.”

¹⁶ To the woman he said,

“I will make your pregnancy very painful;
            in pain you will bear children.
You will desire your husband,
        but he will rule over you.”

¹⁷ To the man he said, “Because you listened to your wife’s voice and you ate from the tree that I commanded, ‘Don’t eat from it,’

cursed is the fertile land because of you;
        in pain you will eat from it
        every day of your life.
¹⁸ Weeds and thistles will grow for you,
        even as you eat the field’s plants;
¹⁹     by the sweat of your face you will eat bread—
        until you return to the fertile land,
            since from it you were taken;
            you are soil,
                to the soil you will return.”

So the question remains. Where are you? Where is your heart? What are you thinking? Remember, you can run, but you cannot hide. Maybe it’s time to be found.

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