It seems as if everybody knows the story of Adam, Eve, and the Garden.

But few people have actually read it.

Which is why I love teaching it to a group of people.

Such was the case last night in our First Step class for people considering church membership.

We realized that the heart of the story comes in the reaction of the man and the woman to getting caught:

11 And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?”

12 The man said, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.”

13 Then the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?”

The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”

If you went to commercial at the close of that particular scene, you'd be left the image that is supposed to stay with us.

Confronted with the reality of sin, the man and the woman stand, naked and exposed, with their fingers pointed firmly at someone else.

The man blames God -- "the woman YOU PUT HERE WITH ME" -- while the woman points to the crafy snake -- "the serpent deceived me."

Sin's first consequence, then, is what we call today passing the buck.

And it is a consequence that we in 21st Century America have made into an art form.

In the wake of your deceptions, transgressions, and failures . . . where are you pointing fingers?

What a day that will be when we break the cycle of buck passing and start new patterns of acknowledging guilt and accepting responsibility.