Lent 1, Genesis - Tilling and Keeping

Lent 1-Genesis
Genesis 2.15-17; 3.1-7

Dear God,
It’s me, Eve. Remember?

It sounded like such a good idea, especially when the snake put it the way he did. Knowledge is a good thing, right? What could be the harm? And the snake….he was so attractive and his words made me feel powerful. Tilling and keeping….it’s all so boring, and the snake was offering me something more—to really make something of my life.

But it hasn’t turned out so well, has it?—thinking I had the wisdom to rule the world has only brought us starvation, enslavement, pollution and war exploding all over the planet.

Look at what is happening in your part of the world today—it hasn’t turned out so good. Guns and tanks everywhere, bulldozers destroying people’s homes.

In Al-Walaja, near Bethlehem where your son was born, people are standing in front of the bulldozers building a 25-foot-high wall around their village. The Israeli government says the wall will protect the settlers who have built their town on Al-Walaja’s farmlands. And now the bulldozers are destroying more of their olive groves to make way for the wall. The soldiers are trying to keep the villagers away from the construction, throwing teargas grenades at the protesters, who are refusing to give up. All our knowledge is not working. Photo: Al-Walaja—Israeli soldiers tear-gas Sheering and arrest her.

That sweet-tasting and beautiful-looking fruit Adam and I ate has rotted and turned poisonous. All our knowledge has not made us happy; it’s just given us a false sense of our own power; and now we are ashamed. We build walls to protect ourselves and they end up imprisoning us; we make bigger weapons and they end up killing our children; we send our armies all over the world to keep us safe and we are in more danger now than ever.

Now we are trying to decide whether to help the rebels in Libya and all our knowledge will not end the suffering.

Looking back, I’m sorry I didn’t just stick with the job you gave us—to till and keep the garden, to serve you and protect what you created. It turns out all you wanted was our happiness—if we had only listened.

Maybe that’s why you gave us Lent.

Love,
Eve

Gracious God, you have given your creatures abundance beyond anything we could dream of. But we have not paid attention to your generous desires for our happiness and have followed our own desires for power instead. Accept our heartfelt remorse and turn our hearts to the tilling and keeping of your beautiful creation. Amen.