Adam: Too Scared to Pray

Genesis 3:9-19 Adam: Too Scared to Pray

A young pastor had rung the doorbell at the home of one of his parishioners and was waiting to be received but no one came to the door. He sensed that someone was at home, but repeated ringing of the bell brought no response. As a final departing act he wrote Revelation 3:20 on the back of one of his calling cards and stuck it under the door: “Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any one hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in.”

Two days later the pastor received his calling card back in an envelope with a brief note attached that simply contained the text from Genesis 3:10:

“I heard the sound of thee in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.”

There are four questions that God asks in this section:

Where are you? (Adam)
Who told you that you were naked? (Adam)
Have you eaten of the tree that I told you not to eat? (Adam)
What is this that you have done? (Eve)

Why does God ask these questions? The reason is because Adam stopped praying to God.

Let’s start with the first question:

Where are you?

Why does God ask this question. Of course, God knew exactly where Adam and Eve were. So what was the reason? God was really asking: Why are you hiding?

God asked this question because he wants to find the reason why Adam stopped praying. There was a reason that Adam was hiding from God.

Why did Adam stop praying? Because he was scared. Adam came into a new situation and he didn’t know what to do. He should have turned to God and ask for help. Adam should have told God that Adam had sinned and ask for forgiveness. (Adam was talking to God earlier when they both named the animals.) But Adam did not turn to God and ask for help this time. Why? Because Adam was scared.

So he said, “I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself.”
(Genesis 3:10 NKJV)

Adam was scared because he was naked. He was naked because he did not follow God’s instruction. God understood that Adam did not learn this from God. So God asks the second question:

Who told you that you were naked?

God, like a loving father, is trying to find out the reason for the problem. If the son leaves and cannot be found, then it is natural that the father will try to find out where the son is and why he left. In this case, Adam said that he left because he was scared. He was scared because he was naked.

Adam did not answer why he was naked. He just said that he was scared and so he hid himself. Many times, while we know that sin is wrong, we have a hard time learning that sin can be forgiven. We don’t go to God in prayer because we are simply scared. Either we had a bad experience in the past, and this keeps us from coming to God. Or we have a poor view of God. If all I see about God is that He is going to punish sin, then I won’t come to Him like I should. If, however, I view Him and a loving and forgiving Father, then I will come to Him every time. Where did the fear come from?

It came from Satan. Satan puts fear in our minds. It says that Adam said:

So he said, “I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself.”
(Genesis 3:10 NKJV)

How does this fear come to us?

Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings.
(Genesis 3:7 NKJV)

The eyes were opened to the fact that they had sinned. Satan tempted Eve to sin. Eve invited Adam to join in the same sin, and then they both came to realization of their sin. This leads us to the next question that God asks:

Have you eaten of the tree that I told you not to eat?

Who did God tell that they should not eat of a certain tree? God told Adam. In this particular case, there was a miscommunication or possibly an absence of communication between Adam and Eve. Adam knew which fruit to eat. He should have instructed Eve and warn her about the tree that was forbidden. The Bible never says that this conversation occurred.

However, the text does emphasize the importance of men learning to take the spiritual responsibility in the home. God directed three (3) questions to Adam. God directed only one (1) question to Eve. Why was that? Because the responsibility of leading the home falls to the husband.

Perhaps there is a connection between being scared to pray and taking spiritual responsibility in the home. God want to help us in our times of need. We just have to learn to come to Him.

Satan would have you believe that you don’t need God’s help. Satan went to the woman first. Why? Because Satan wanted to mess up the spiritual dependency chain that God designed for the family.

The husbands depend spiritually upon God. The wife depends spiritual upon the husband. This is why God asked the last question. It was directed at the independence of the woman.

Significantly, if there is any blame, it is on Adam, not Eve. Not only does Adam unjustly accuse Eve, but also he refuses to accept proper responsibility for his part in her sin.

Then the man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate.”
(Genesis 3:12 NKJV)

Adam also blames God for the sin. Look at this answer:

Then the man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate.”
(Genesis 3:12 NKJV)

So while many men will say: “Yes, I am the spiritual leader of the home.” This text teaches us that we also need to take the spiritual leadership of the home very seriously. We don’t blame the wife, and we don’t blame God for our sins. We learn to take responsibility. That means that we should learn to come to God in prayer with our problems.

What is this that you have done?

This question is apparently directed at the woman. At the very least, the woman was more truthful with God. She was deceived by the serpent, and she at least admitted that she ate of the forbidden fruit. When we compare answers here, the woman was at least a bit more truthful.

So what does this have to do with prayer. Prayer is simply talking and listening to God. This entire event could have turned out very differently had Adam taken the time to listen and talk to God, even after Satan tempted his family. We should never be too scared to pray to God in any situation.