Bad Girls of the Bible Part 2

"The truth is, your sainted father knows something you don't."

She raised her eyebrows, still speechless. What could Devin possibly be talking about? Her father loved her, utterly and completely. There was nothing she needed to know that he hadn't revealed to her, nothing she desired that he hadn't provided.

A beautiful home. A perfect husband-to-be. A lovely garden.

Granted, that garden had a mysterious gazebo she couldn't explore no matter how much she might want to. But she didn't want to, did she? Well...did she?

"The minute you step inside that gazebo, dear girl, you'll make an eye-opening discovery-something your father knows all about, but you do not. Not yet."

She found her voice at last and rose to her feet. "No! I mean...he does? Oh! I don't? I...uh, that is..." It came out in one long, nonsensical phrase. What sort of man was this Devin, who could turn her thoughts inside out and tie her words up in knots she hadn't a prayer of ever untangling?

He stood as well, waiting patiently for her to gather her wits about her, it seemed. His smile didn't alter one inch. The fingers on her back returned, more insistent than ever, as if invisibly propelling her forward. Had she and Devin moved? It appeared they had, but in which direction? Her beloved garden was looking less familiar by the minute as the last rays of the sun cast long shadows across the lawn.

He hadn't taken his black eyes off her for a single moment since they'd met. Those eyes were full of knowing-a knowledge that made her pulse quicken. It was the only logical explanation for the strange sensations she was feeling in the pit of her stomach.

Perhaps if Devin shared this knowledge with her she could tell Adam as well. It would mean a special bond between them, a secret between husband and wife. Yes! That would please her father, wouldn't it? For her and for Adam to know everything that he knew?

She simply had to ask. "Wh-what will I discover in the gazebo?"

"Something delicious."

Delicious! Well, she was hungry. Adam had gone to find something healthy for her to nibble on. Now this Devin said he had something for her, waiting in the gazebo. Perhaps he'd gone to a great deal of trouble to prepare it. Devin didn't strike her as a man who did anything on a whim. She couldn't risk appearing impolite or unappreciative, not tonight of all nights.

"Something delicious, you say, in the gazebo? Is it fruit?"

He smiled his tiger smile. "It's every bit as sweet as fruit."

Ah, sweet! Yes, she'd enjoy that. How nice. But sweet things were usually fattening. "Does it have many calories?"

His voice was magnolia-petal smooth. "No calories at all."

Perfect! "But...how can something be good for me if my father says it's not to be touched?"

"That's exactly what we've come to the gazebo to find out, Evie."

They were there!

She hadn't realized they'd been walking in slow, deliberate steps toward the heart of the garden. A host of unfamiliar emotions, without names or adequate descriptions, surged through her. There wasn't time to sort it all out, not now when she was so close to making the discovery that Devin had promised. Only a curtain of Spanish moss separated her from the gazebo. She could almost touch the wooden supports, nestled in the arms of the live oaks that surrounded the ancient gazebo with an eternal embrace.

Why had it seemed so frightening from a distance? Close up it appeared cozy and inviting. Devin brushed aside the veil of moss, giving her an even better view of the verdant bower that awaited her mere inches away.

Her first surprise: It wasn't an elevated gazebo at all. It was sunken! And looked as if it had resided there since time began. How enchanting! Devin went down the three steps first, leading to the patterned brick floor of the gazebo. The bricks appeared slippery under his feet, and she wondered for a fleeting moment if they might soil her white silk shoes.

"Take my hand, Evie." He offered it with a gallant flourish. "You're quite safe with me."

She was grateful for her long, white gloves because his hand felt hot, almost feverish. "Don't let me fall!" she cautioned. "Daddy will skin me alive if I tear this dress." Daddy. Something tugged at the edge of her conscience, a feeling she'd never experienced in her lifetime and hoped she never would again.

Before she could stop him, Devin had captured both her gloved hands in his. They were standing face to face, making it difficult to get a proper look at the gazebo itself, the very thing she'd come to explore. There was no sign of food, of that she was certain. Not a table or chair, only lichen-covered wooden benches skirting the dim interior.

In a word, it was disappointing.

She noticed the fetid air around her growing darker as the shadowy corners of the gazebo faded to black. Oddly, the temperature was creeping up. Savannah flirted with temperatures near the eighties in April, but this felt even warmer than that, almost subtropical.

In the gloomy interior the only thing she could see clearly was Devin's face. For a reason she couldn't begin to grasp, he was looking more handsome by the second.

One of her many first-time sensations had a name: apprehension. A desire to go forward, all the while longing to pull back.

She should not be there.

She wanted to be there.

She was there.

This newfound apprehension tickled the hairs on the back of her neck. "What exactly did you want to show me, Devin?"

Expectancy hung heavily in the air. She sensed the weight of it pressing her down, down through the bricks, through the ground, to the darkest center of the earth.

She held her breath. Everything in the garden did too; she was sure of it.

Devin bent toward her, his eyelids slowly falling until his black eyes became beguiling slits that filled her senses to the brim.

She gasped when his lips touched hers.

It lasted only a second, whatever it was, but it tasted as sweet as the nectar from an acre of honeysuckle on a hot summer night. Every one of her senses blossomed with possibilities. So warm! So tender! So sweet!

He watched her as she struggled to put a name to it all. "That was a kiss, Evelyn. Aren't you glad you listened to me and stepped inside the gazebo?"

The gazebo! Oh, she'd truly done it, the one thing her father had asked her never to do. Still...nothing had happened, had it? She was alive and breathing; in fact, she felt wonderful, from the top of her blond head to her silk-covered toes. Although a quick glance down confirmed her earlier worry: Her once-pristine shoes were a muddy brown.

Oh, but a kiss, he'd called it. It was delicious, much better than plain old fruit. It was over so fast though. Would she remember enough to share her luscious discovery with Adam?

Adam! She really hadn't considered what he might think of her exploring the gazebo. That emotion she'd never wanted to feel again washed over her a second time. If she were inventing words, she would call it guilt. As if on cue, Adam's voice called out to her from the garden.

"Evie!" He sounded far away yet very close. "Evie!" The mossy curtain was swept aside to reveal her fiance, dressed in pure white and utter shock. "Evie! You know you're not supposed to be here!"

She blinked, speechless for a moment, glancing around her in a daze. Devin was gone. Wait. Perhaps that was Devin lurking in the shadows. It didn't matter. Adam was there. Dear Adam. She had so much to show him.

With a peculiar sense of urgency, she stretched out a gloved arm to her betrothed. "Come! See what I've discovered, darling man. It's quite...ah, delectable."

He was beside her in a heartbeat, concern creasing his forehead. "Delectable? What are you talking about?"

"Taste and see for yourself." She half closed her eyes, just as Devin had, and pressed her lips against Adam's mouth, still agape. When she opened her eyes fully again, Evelyn gazed deep into Adam's wide, blue ones and spied something she'd never seen before. Love, yes, and trust, but more than that: She caught a wary look of vulnerability.

He seemed unable to speak, unable to breathe.

Ohhh! She realized in an instant he would never be able to resist her. The power she had over him overwhelmed her. She kissed him again, longer this time. A boldness seared through her veins, making her tingle to the tips of her soiled toes. She slipped one slim finger under Adam's neat bow tie, undoing it in seconds, then began unb.u.t.toning his dress s.h.i.+rt, amazed that the tiny b.u.t.tons gave way so easily.

After only three b.u.t.tons she had to stop and catch her breath. What was happening to her? She and Adam had gone swimming all last summer in their bathing suits and thought nothing of it. Suddenly his bare neck was the most dazzling thing she'd ever laid eyes on! It was all she could do to keep from pressing her lips there. When she gazed up into his darkening eyes, she realized that Devin's "knowing" was starting to grow in Adam, clearly matching her own.

The faintest of breezes stirred the moss hanging over the gazebo entrance when a deep voice rang through the garden.

It was her father!

"Adam!" He was looking for them. "Where are you, Adam?"

Oh, Daddy.

Panic-had she ever felt that before?-had her fumbling with the b.u.t.tons on Adam's s.h.i.+rt. The same ones that, moments earlier, had opened so quickly, now refused to respond to her trembling fingers.

"Where are you?" Her father was mere steps away from them.

The trembling in her hands turned to shaking all over. Her face was on fire. Was she ill? Had she caught whatever fever Devin had, with just one kiss? Her stomach felt queasy. When Adam stared down at her, she noticed his face was a startling red. The guilt she'd sensed for the first time only moments ago was now mirrored in her fiance's own tear-tinged eyes.

"Oh, Evie..." Adam's whispered words seemed to stick in his throat. "When your father finds us, beloved, there'll be h.e.l.l to pay. Are you ready?"

She swallowed hard and tasted something like fear. "Y-yes."

Reluctance written all over his face, Adam turned toward the steps that led back to the garden. "Down here, sir..."

High Noon in the Garden of Good and Evil: Eve.

The LORD G.o.d took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. Genesis 2:15 Thirty years ago Joni Mitch.e.l.l wrote, "We've got to get ourselves back to the garden." Quite right, woman, but Woodstock isn't back far enough. Not thirty years but thirty centuries is more like it. Forty. Fifty. Waaaay back, all the way back to the Garden of Eden.

Eden is often translated as "delight" or, by way of a Persian word, "paradise." This wasn't some haphazard wildflower garden; it was a carefully designed and beautifully executed park of trees featuring cedars, cypresses, and figs, "the kind only planned by great kings."1 Such gardens don't maintain themselves; that was Adam's job. Even before the Fall, he was given the task of caring for the garden. It was far from hard labor though-remember, no weeds, no thistles, no thorns, no frost, no floods, no irrigation, no grub worms, and no "wascally wabbit" eating Adam's best carrots.

Adam was called to work, but it was a cushy gig.

The first man had everything a human needed to be happy in this garden of G.o.d's: water, food, warmth, shelter, and all-natural-fiber clothing...well, that came later. When G.o.d created Adam, he surrounded him with beauty that engaged all his given senses: shapes and colors for his eyes, fragrant flowers for his nose, a thousand textures for his hands to examine, the music of rus.h.i.+ng streams to fill his ears, and endless tastes to try, all over the garden.

Okay...almost all over.

And the LORD G.o.d commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die." Genesis 2:16-17 There you are. A simple commandment. Not ten of them, just one: "Thou shalt not eat." (Personally I wish the very first edict from G.o.d hadn't involved dieting, don't you? If only he'd said, "You must not eat anything with less than four hundred calories." Now there is a commandment I could live with.) Knowledge is good, but it was the intimate "knowing" of evil that was dangerous. Like any good parent, our heavenly Father built a hedge around his child in order to protect the young man's innocence and to keep him from learning things he didn't need to know.

Adam was obedient, but he was also lonely. Ask an only child, and he'll tell you it's mighty quiet in the playroom all by yourself.

The LORD G.o.d said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him." Genesis 2:18 Immediately after giving Adam his look-but-don't-touch edict, the Lord announced that his charge needed company. To keep Adam's mind off the forbidden tree? To help with the gardening? Or simply in response to Adam's very human longing for companions.h.i.+p?

One commentator voted for that last option: "Solitude is not good; man is created for sociability."2 Even those of us who cherish our quiet moments alone get stir-crazy eventually. When I'm holed up in my writing loft, I last about six hours before I wander downstairs or hit the Internet to check my e-mail. It's a G.o.d-given drive, this need to connect with other humans. People who have only a little of that drive are called "loners." People with even less are labeled "hermits." People with none are put in straitjackets.

"People who need people" have G.o.d to thank for it.

First, though, G.o.d tried pets. Not just cats, dogs, and yellow canaries but a whole beastly bunch of animals. Adam named them all, antelope to zebra, yet no matter how he tried to fellows.h.i.+p with G.o.d's furry and feathered creatures, there were too many of those basic irreconcilable differences.

But for Adam no suitable helper was found. Genesis 2:20 "Suitable" is elsewhere translated "comparable" (NKJV) and "right for him" (ICB). G.o.d was looking not for a good fit but rather a perfect fit. This wasn't The Dating Game; it was The Match Game, with one and only one correct answer. And "helper" by no means suggested a lowly servant. It meant an equal, a colaborer, a "suitable partner" (CEV).3 This partner had to be as valuable as Adam, as worthy of living in G.o.d's glorious Garden of Eden, as equally created in G.o.d's image, and yet...different. Adam was made from the dust of the earth. His partner (truth be told) was made of finer stuff.

So the LORD G.o.d caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man's ribs and closed up the place with flesh. Genesis 2:21 (Say, two favorite movie t.i.tles in one verse: While You Were Sleeping and Adam's Rib!) Why a "deep sleep"? So that Adam wouldn't feel the pain of the Lord's amazing-but-anesthetic-free operation, and so Adam wouldn't see the mystery of creation.

Why the man's rib? Perhaps because when it comes to the human skeletal structure, one rib isn't exactly a load-bearing wall. Plus, from an emotional standpoint, G.o.d wisely chose the bone nearest the man's heart as a gentle reminder to keep his helpmate close by his side-physically, emotionally, spiritually.

Then the LORD G.o.d made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. Genesis 2:22 Oh the majesty of that moment when G.o.d brought the crown of his creation to the one for whom she was designed!

Girls, you know she was a dish. She skipped childhood completely, so no chickenpox scars. No adolescence meant no blemishes marred her lovely face either. No genetic anomalies from weird Aunt Jane, nor did she inherit her mother's flat feet. G.o.d did everything perfectly, including carving a woman out of bone (a real hard-body look) with ideal proportions.

She was also sinless. Her personality would have been utterly delightful. In Paradise Lost Milton wrote of her, "Grace was in all her steps, heaven in her eye, / In every gesture dignity and love."4 Other writers in other centuries have called her "the best flower of the garden" and "Heaven's best, last gift."

Since she was the premiere edition and the only woman around, she didn't need to worry about compet.i.tion from supermodels or centerfolds or the woman sitting next to her in church four sizes smaller than she. The first female was the very definition of womanly beauty. No one was taller, thinner, younger, or prettier. She was it!

I know what you're thinking: Why did she blow this? How could a woman with all this going for her ruin her life so completely?

Women do it every day. Men do too. We all throw away perfectly wonderful lives because our foolish, sinful appet.i.tes take us places we should not go.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Things were still rosy in Eden.

The man said, "This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called 'woman,'

for she was taken out of man." Genesis 2:23 One look at G.o.d's gift to man and Adam got positively poetic. "There is no doubt but Adam is saying, 'This woman, first, last, and always!'"5 In other words, "Ooh, baby. You got it right this time, Lord."

By no means was she to be Adam's "girl toy." She was created to be his partner for life.

For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. Genesis 2:24 Marriage was inst.i.tuted on the spot and ordained by G.o.d, "not as a civil contract but as a divine inst.i.tution."6 One man, one woman, one flesh. We need never doubt what G.o.d's perfect will is on this issue. One mate for life. How it behooves us to choose wisely!

The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame. Genesis 2:25 I don't know any practicing nudists, but I suspect more than one has pointed to this verse as justification for throwing caution and their clothes to the wind. Sorry, but that bird won't fly. This is a BF scene-Before the Fall. And there were only the two people, and they were married. When they rejoined their bones and flesh in s.e.xual union, it was wholesome and natural, utterly enjoyable, and without embarra.s.sment, shame, or hiding anything from each other.

Ah, but paradise was about to be lost.

Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD G.o.d had made. Genesis 3:1 Make no mistake, it was a snake. A real, live, cold-bellied serpent-one of the animals G.o.d had created as part of his "Let's Find Adam a Friend" project. Satan isn't mentioned by name in this pa.s.sage, but his slimy style was all over this snake-skinned charmer.

Various translations call the wild creature "subtle" (AMP), "cunning" (NKJV), the "shrewdest" (NLT), the "most clever" (ICB), and the "sliest" (TAB).7 An animal ready-made for Satan's uses then. No doubt attractive to look at, with some colorful pattern on his sleek skin. He chose his words with care and saved his venom for later, showing the woman only his lightning-fast tongue but not his lethal fangs. As Shakespeare reminded us in King Lear, "The prince of darkness is a gentleman."

One word of comfort, sisters: The snake was a he, not an it, and definitely not a she.

He said to the woman, "Did G.o.d really say, 'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?" Genesis 3:1 Why Eve and not Adam? I wonder. Was she in the wrong place at the wrong time, or did the serpent go looking for her? And why, oh, why didn't she realize that if none of the other animals talked, this one shouldn't have either?

How I long for more information! Ah well. As Christopher Guest said in The Princess Bride, "Let's just start with what we have." What we have is one gullible gal and one sly serpent. When the devil comes a-tempting, he seldom goes in for group conversions. He waits until we're alone, then spins his web of deceit.

The only question I don't have is, "Why didn't she go find Adam and discuss all this with him first?" Get a grip. She knew he'd talk her out of it. A married woman knows better than to ask her husband a question like, "Shall I buy this outrageously expensive linen suit from Lord & Taylor?" She can bank on a negative response. It's the same reason women order stuff from catalogs and hope the UPS truck pulls up on a safe day.

Besides, we don't know where Adam was at this point. We left him back at the close of the last chapter, naked and not ashamed. Maybe he was taking a shower. In any case, the serpent was bending the woman's ear. She who will be called Eve by story's end makes (at my count) not just one colossal blooper but a plethora of mistakes, beginning with one that every child is cautioned against from the cradle: Don't talk to strangers!

Satan isn't called the Father of Lies for nothing. He opened his cozy chat with the woman using a deliberate lie-misquoting G.o.d, even putting words in the Lord's mouth. Satan has been doing that for millennia, sisters, and he's devilishly good at it. For that reason, whenever I hear a line of Scripture used to make a point-even by a well-meaning speaker or teacher-I go back to the Bible and see what the verse actually says in context.

By twisting the Lord's decree, Satan also tossed out one of the big stumbling blocks he still uses with great success today-making G.o.d look less than fair, kind, or loving. When tragedy strikes-a precious child is killed in an accident or a young mother dies of cancer-Satan tempts our faith with the same sort of opening line: "Would a good G.o.d allow that?"