The Question

It is the question of the broken heart.  It is the question of the greatest anguish.  The anguish within the question surely matches the anguish in the one Jesus cried out to the heavens when He was about to die on the cross.  "My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?"  (Matthew 27:46)  The anguish expressed in  that day so close to the beginning was greater than any human anguish ever known for it was divine anguish which was ripping open the very heart of God.  It is a question that will not leave us even though we leave it as we turn the page of the story. 

 

In the midst of that walk in the Garden at the time of the evening breeze, the Lord God encountered the two He had so wonderfully made, but on this occasion something was terribly wrong.  They were afraid.  They were trying to hide from him.  They knew the reality of making the choice of disobedience.  Instead of the Garden being filled with the joy of relationship, it was filled with the heaviness of separation.  Something never before experienced by God or humankind was the new reality. 

 

The divine question of the broken heart now overcome with terrible anguish was, "What is this that you have done?"  (Genesis 3:13)  The worst of all possible things had been done.  What had been done not only changed the nature of the relationship between Creator and created, but it also threw unavoidable consequences into the future which would forever be like an un-healable plague to men and women.  Sin had been chosen.  It would forever taint the heart of those the Lord God loved.  "What is this that you have done?" is the anguished cry of a broken hearted loving Father God who desired only the very best for those in whom He had breathed His own life.