Then the man said, “The woman whom You gave

.....to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate.” And the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?”  The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate” (Genesis 3:12, 13). The Lord had asked Adam if he had eaten of the forbidden tree, verse 12 was his reply.   'It was the woman's fault, and actually God it was Your fault too, You're the One who gave her to me!' Adam was playing the blame game. And when Eve is confronted with her part, she blames the serpent. How well this book knows us!  Typically in and argument and in the break up of a marriage both parties blame the other100% for what went wrong. In the breakup of my first marriage I did,  that is until Holy Spirit convicted me of my part in it all (John 16:8).  It lead to my repentance and salvation.

The wrong we do, our sin, is never in a vacuum, one way or another it affects others. Eve's disobedience had affected Adam, he had a choice,  and whatever he chose there would be consequences. So yes, our sin affects others, and others' sin affects us. Too often we give a wrong response to wrong done to us. If we respond in bitterness,  that bitterness will defile (Hebrews 12:15). And whether we feel it's justified or not, it is  infectious. Perhaps it was bitterness that was passed on to their son Cain,  and was part of what motivated him to murder his brother (4:8). We do know sin is infectious and spreads like cancer. As mentioned earlier, we saw  great wickedness in the last century, and seeing that,  it's not hard to understand that wickedness became so great the Lord sent the flood as judgment on mankind (6:11, 12).

We can of course sit in judgment on the rest of the World but we, you and I, are part of the problem.  And as we saw with Adam and Eve sowing fig leaves together for coverings and hiding  from God  Lord (3: 7,8),  sin sabotages intimacy with each other and with God. Blame, confessing and often condemning the other person, makes it worse. In recovery we talk about taking care of our side of the street. It starts with examining our ways, testing them and returning to the Lord  (Lamentations 3:40).  We need to  humble ourselves, come to the foot of the cross where we see clearly that we have all sinned (Romans 3:23). We are then in a position in humility,  to obey the command to confess our faults to one another, and pray for one another. In this way we are promised healing (Romans 3:23; James 5:16).  It is the start of doing our part in bringing the Kingdom to earth as it is in heaven,  and as it was previously in paradise!

Lord Jesus, You call believers the light of the World. We are intended to be the yeast that changes  society. You tell us to be in the world,  but not of the world. And I come before You this morning confessing my own part,  and the part of Your called out ones, Your  ecclesia, Your body the Church,  in our being of the World but, in our isolation,  not in it. So we humble ourselves this morning Lord, we turn from out wicked ways, seek Your face and claim Your promise to heal our land,  in Your precious Name we pray Amen