What Have You Done?

             In Genesis 3:13 we find the first question God ever asked a woman. “And the LORD God said unto the woman, What is this that thou hast done? And the woman said, The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat.” This question took place after Eve had eaten of the forbidden fruit and after she had shared her sin with Adam. The question that God asked Eve was a “searching question.”

            First, it was a question about life’s most serious subject! The subject is sin. God told them twice that if they eat of “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil” that they would die. Genesis 2:17; 3:3. However, the “serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die.” Genesis 3:4. One needs to stop and think about what happened. Sin came when Adam and Eve were in a perfect environment. Sin came when Adam and Eve were enjoying perfect fellowship with God. It should be noted that everything else in the garden was for them. Today, we have testimonies to the truth of God’s warning. Every time, we hear a siren, when we visit the hospital, a funeral and every cemetery, every sign of advancing age, and every crime and act of violence we the truth of God’s warning. Eve needed to know the seriousness of her act. God’s question drives His point home!

            Second, it was a question calls for repentance. “What is this that thou hast done?” It is a precise question. It is a piercing question. It is a severe question. It is a question that demands Eve’s investigation. When God asked a question, it was not to condemn but to convict the one to whom He is questioning. Eve had already tried “passing the buck.” Adam was not deceived. However, we are told in 1 Timothy 2:14 that “the woman being deceived was in the transgression.”  Eve confesses, “I did eat.” She had disobeyed what God had said. When one is convicted of their sin, it brings repentance. Our repentance begins with the awareness of the sin that we have committed. Repentance is a change of heart (mind) that results in a change of action. How would you and I answer God’s question to Eve? “What have you done?” Peter said, “The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” 2 Peter 3:9. What brings conviction to our heart? What is it that we need to confess and forsake?  “If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” 1 John 1:6-10.

            Third, it is a question that precedes the promise of redemption. In Genesis 3:15, “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” The bruising of the serpent’s head is the first promise of redemption. Christ bruised the serpent’s head at the cross. “Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world: But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.” Galatians 4;3-5.  Redemption was made possible for us at the cross. “And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.” Colossians 1:20. “In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace…” Ephesians 1:7.

            Like Eve, we have sinned. “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God…” Romans 3:23. We have all done things that we wished we had not. We have broken the commandments that God has given us. Paul wrote, “As it is written, There is none righteous, no not one…” Romans 3:10. We are told, “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Romans 6:23. God offers forgiveness and eternal life to those who will obey His will. Whatever sin or sins we have committed, God still loves us.

            “What is this that thou hast done?” It is a question that makes us look at sin in our life. It is a question that calls for us to repent. Finally, it is a question of our redemption, which is in Christ. Bobby D. Gayton