This post is from Moms Take Ten episode 3, “Moms in the Bible–Eve”, which you can listen to wherever you listen to podcasts or at https://sites.libsyn.com/403493/moms-in-the-bible-eve
A couple of years ago, I led a series with my moms group called Moms of the Bible. It was a great opportunity to look at the women in the Bible through the lens of motherhood, which is often quite different from how they are talked about. We looked at their relationships with God, with the father of their children, and with their children. We sought to learn from her in her motherhood. Through the podcast and blog, we are going to revisit that series. Every month, we will look at a different mom in the Bible and what her story can teach us.
We are going to start at the beginning with Eve, the first woman ever created. Her story can be found in Genesis 1-4. Remembering the story of creation, we know that God made Adam first. God said it wasn’t good for man to be alone so he created Eve out of Adam’s rib. Crazy, right? They got to work together, enjoy the garden and the Lord, and have babies. The main part of the story that everyone remembers about Eve is in Genesis 3. She was the one who sinned first. The one who took the apple or whatever fruit it was. My kids say it was the purple fruit because that is the color from a storybook. So purple fruit is bad!
There is a lot I could say about her story, but I want to camp out on verses 5 and 6 of Genesis 3, where the serpent is speaking with Eve.
“‘For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.’ 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,[b] she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.”
Look at this phrase: and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise.
Eve was tempted by wisdom. That is why she chose to take the fruit. Wisdom is a good thing to seek out! I don’t know about you, but I have never felt more of a need for wisdom than as a mother. How do I love them well? How do I discipline and instruct them? They are each so different so how do I meet their individual needs? So much of parenting is outside of my realm of experience and expertise, and outside of the knowledge and wisdom that I have accumulated so far in my life. I often feel lost and think, “I just need to know! I just need wisdom!”
I relate so much to Eve in that she would look at something that has the power to make her wise and to choose to take it. It is not the seeking of wisdom that is wrong. The Bible encourages this pursuit! Proverbs alone is a whole book dedicated to growing in wisdom. The problem is, as we all know, that she was looking to the wrong thing for her wisdom. She was looking to the wrong source for wisdom. Rather than trusting the Lord and his plan, she doubted his goodness and sought her own way.
James 1:5 says, “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.” What an amazing promise!
Proverbs 2:6, “For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding.”
Proverbs also paints the picture of wisdom as a woman standing on the street offering her wisdom. So this isn’t something that the Lord desires to keep hidden from us but is something that he offers to us. He wants to bestow his wisdom on us if we would but seek HIM for it.
Yet, I have found in my journey as a mom, that I am not so quick to turn to the Lord in prayer or to his word for wisdom when I am dealing with the so-called practicals of my day-to-day life. I look to podcasts, to the experts on parenting. Who has written a book on parenting on the specific topic I need information on? I look to specific parenting models in hopes that if I just follow their formula then I will have it all figured out. I look to friends. Who seems to be doing a good job? Who do I want to copy or who can I learn from? These are not bad places to find good knowledge, tips, and advice, but they are not the ultimate source of wisdom.
I forget that there is this book that the Lord has written that can speak to all areas of my life. That doesn’t mean it has the practical step-by-step guidelines for what to do when your child won’t eat their dinner or when your teenager keeps skipping curfew. Rather, the principles in the Bible are what we are to draw from to create our parenting framework. As we come to learn more about who God is and to absorb the wisdom that he offers, we find our parenting decisions a little easier to make, a little clearer in our minds.
“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God who gives generously to all without reproach and it will be given him.”
Am I asking God for wisdom or am I looking elsewhere? Are you asking God for wisdom or are you looking elsewhere? Are we following in Eve’s footsteps or have we learned from her mistake and adjusted to what the Lord is calling us to.
I have thought about Eve a lot in this, especially as a mom because she was the FIRST mom. She didn’t have anybody to turn to when her child had a really weird poop or when her kids were fighting or when her child wouldn’t sleep. Moms of today have so many resources to find answers to those issues, but Eve didn’t. So I have to think that it was the Lord who was instructing her as she fumbled her way through. And we see in her naming of her children her continued trust in the Lord throughout her life. We know she was turning to him, leaning on him. She had to find wisdom in him. And we would do well to remember that. Pursue wisdom in the Lord.
It is interesting to note that Adam and Eve didn’t know everything before the fall. Often we talk about getting to Heaven and finally knowing. We have a list of questions we are going to ask God, explanations we are seeking. But maybe the reality is we will get to Heaven and finally be content not knowing all but letting God teach us as he deems right. We can begin to live that out here and now. Trust him, find peace in that fact that he knows even when we don’t. As we pursue him for wisdom, he will teach and he will direct.
Lyssa Stoyko 