Genesis 3:8– And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking about in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD Godamong the trees of the garden. 

*{Man was fallen.  He was naked and ashamed.  When they heard the sound of God coming in the garden, they hid themselves.  This is very interesting and instructive.  Fallen mankind goes to great effort to “hide” from God.  To block God out of their thinking, to deny Him, to imagine He doesn’t exist.  Man is not at peace in his conscience, knows he is “naked”, is very self-consciousness, and lives in the fear of death— yet he still hides from the only One who can help him.
* But this section is also very interesting because God apparently came “looking” for the fallen man.  Man was and still is the object of God’s love.  Even fallen man.  Verse 8 & 9 show how God comes to seek man — God, great and high, doesn’t demand that man come up to heaven to find Him and repent — NO, Godcomes down to earth to find man.  This is love.  And this is also the story of the New Testament.  The Son of God, emptied Himself, taking the form of a lowly slave, came to seek man, to live among men and even to die for men (Phil 2:5-11).  Luke’s gospel chapter 7 vs 34 says that Jesus came as a “friend of sinners” — and also in chapter 15 that He came as a Good Shepherd to seek and to find just one lost sheep.  While we hide from God, yet God still comes to seek us and to find us}*
Gen 3:9– And Jehovah God called to the man and said to him, Where are you?*{Did the Omniscient God really not know where man was hiding or what he was doing * I don’t think so.  Why then did He ask that question?  And why does He continue to ask ever man today that same question? — Even each of us reading this email * “Where are you?” — Are we living in fear, in self-consciousness and shame, trying various “fig-leaves” to cover our situation. A little story from my own life might also help might make it clear as to why God might ask man this question:
*STORY* ~ When I was in 3rd or 4th grade at LSU Lab School, I was playing with 2 of my good friends, Guy Cangelosi and Harry Barrow, on a rainy day.  We were outside playing football in a large mud-puddle *  Our “field” was the mud puddle * Our student teacher (a young education co-ed student at LSU) was so distraught when she saw us that she brought her supervisor and the Principal, Dr Garrett, out to deal with us * The principal looked at us covered from head to toe with mud, standing in the large mud puddle, and asked us — “What are you doing?” * The answer to that question was pretty “self-evident” — but I guess Dr Garrett wanted us to “consider and acknowledge” what we were doing and why we were doing it — and we did}*
Gen 3:10– And he said, I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I am naked; so I hid myself.
*{The man answered first.  He said he heard the sound of God and was afraid because he was nakedandhid.  This is man’s condition today, living in fear, self-conscious, and hiding from God}
Gen 3:11– And He said, Who told you that you are naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?
*{God’s reply is very instructive — “Who told you that you are naked?” Where did this knowledge come from?}*
Gen 3:12–And the man said, The womanwhom You gave to be with me, she gave me fruitfrom the tree, and I ate.
*{Classic response — blame someone else.  And notice, the man blames BOTH the woman ANDGod(because it was God who gave her to the man in the first place)}*
Gen 3:13– And the LORD God said to the woman, What is this that you have done? And the woman said, The serpent deceived me, and I ate.
*{After the husband blames his wife, God patiently turns to the woman and asks her “what is this thatyou have done”.  And the guilty blame-game continues — she blames the serpent.*We will consider how God deals with the serpent tomorrow — but it is very different than His dealing with the man or the woman — no questions asked — only an immediate curse.  And then He will also speak to the man and the woman about some of the consequences of their actions}*