The Long Journey Home: Created for more, seduced by less

It is the story that plays itself out over and over again in our lives. Our eye is drawn to something that at first only piques our curiosity. But what was only something fleeting becomes something that holds our attention and then becomes an obsession. The garden narrative found in the opening pages of the Bible describes a world of unimaginable harmony. Man and woman living as they were designed and created to live: in relationship with God, each other and creation. Living as it was meant to be, as we were meant to be.
But there was something that crept in, that drew the eye, something that captured the imagination.
So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. (Genesis 3:6-7)
What seduced humanity was more than a juicy delicious piece of fruit; it was the lie that there was something more, something better, something more satisfying than what God had planned and given to them. Without putting it into words, that first bite was an accusation against the One who created them. An accusation that He was not good and not good enough. An accusation that somehow, somewhere there were greater things than the infinite God of the universe. In that bite, the glory of God was challenged and humanity, who was created to give God glory, tried to rob Him of some of His glory.
As that first bite was savored and swallowed, we are told they suddenly saw clearly. The satisfaction of the seduction wasn’t even momentarily to be enjoyed. Believing less was more, they had made the trade, and it revealed them as they were. They were vulnerable, insufficient in themselves, alone and in desperate need of the one who gave them life, who had given Himself. But they had made their choice. They’d traded the more for less … they’d traded relationship with an infinite God for a pursuit of what they thought promised more, as if more could even exist.
From that moment on, humanity has lived disconnected and dissatisfied, in constant search of the one thing that will answer the deepest longings of their heart, longing for a return to the garden … a return home. It’s what we all want even if we don’t realize it. We want to go home … we long for home … the world we were created for. In his book “Mere Christianity,” CS Lewis wrote, “If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.”
A world we had and lost. A world your heart and my heart long for … a world we are on a journey to recover.
(Aaron Gesch is pastor of Basin First Baptist Church.)