Naturally in the weeks leading up to Christmas, some of my devotional reading of the Bible has been from Genesis. Sometimes you can read familiar stories, but it's also at times surprising that you can dig up new nuggets.
To say the least, the Genesis 3 account of the fall of humanity is not very uplifting reading. In the garden of Eden, the serpent deceives Adam and Eve into disobeying God by eating fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, bringing upon themselves and all of creation the curse of sin.
Through some creative exegesis, some persuasions of Christians have attempted to blame Eve for the fall, since she was the one who led Adam astray. Never mind that we can deduce from the text that Adam passively observed as the serpent talked to Eve, and failed to intervene to protect her. When God confronts them about their actions, Eve blamed the serpent, and Adam blamed Eve, but there's more to it than that.
This is the aspect of the story that I overlooked until the writer of the devotional book I'm reading commented on it; Adam became defensive and blamed Eve, but he also tried to blame God for putting Eve with him. He failed to take responsibility for his actions.
Human nature hasn't changed since then. Following Adam and Eve's example, Christian people still often try to run away from God or seek to blame others or external circumstances for their sin. For the Christian, how much better would it be to come before God and deal with it honestly?
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