Eva – Longing for Happiness

Eve was tempt­ed by the ser­pent in the Gar­den of Eden on three levels: Greed, ava­ri­ce and osten­ta­ti­on. The­se are the same tempt­a­ti­ons we still encoun­ter today and seem to be the apt respon­se to our lon­ging for hap­pi­ness. The result is ulti­m­ate­ly shame and defi­cit. Peo­p­le do not beco­me hap­py through exter­nal things, but in love for God and in being for other people.

Hans had ser­ved his boss faithful­ly for seven years and recei­ved a lump of gold as big as his head as a reward. On the way home he exch­an­ged the gold for a hor­se, then the hor­se for a cow, the cow for a pig, then the pig for a goo­se and the goo­se for a whe­ts­tone. After the whe­ts­tone acci­den­tal­ly sank in a well, he than­ked God: «I am the hap­piest per­son in the world«he cried, and with a light heart and free of all bur­dens, he wan­de­red home to his mother. Alt­hough Hans had less and less, he beca­me hap­pier and hap­pier. To what ext­ent does this para­ble have a ker­nel of truth?

Sweet temptation

Many peo­p­le are con­cer­ned with being hap­py, fee­ling an inner peace, being ser­e­ne and cheerful. But no less many belie­ve that they have to defi­ne their hap­pi­ness extern­al­ly. They think that if they were suc­cessful, they would also be hap­py. Equip­ped with this mind­set, Eve stood befo­re the for­bidden tree at the very begin­ning of human histo­ry: «The woman saw: the fruits were so fresh, deli­cious and temp­ting – and they would make her wise! So she took a fruit, bit into it and gave it to her hus­band too. Then he also ate of the fruit»(Gene­sis 3:6 NL). Ever­y­thing beg­ins with the eyes. Eve sees some­thing that is aes­the­ti­cal­ly beau­tiful, tas­tes deli­cious and makes her smart. All things that pro­mi­se hap­pi­ness: Delight of the pala­te, sen­su­al plea­su­re and sta­tus. Here we encoun­ter a prin­ci­ple that still works today.

A few thousand years later, John would wri­te: «For the world knows only the desi­re for phy­si­cal gra­ti­fi­ca­ti­on, the greed for ever­y­thing our eyes see, and the pri­de in our pos­ses­si­ons. All this is not from the Father, but comes from the world»(1 John 2:16 NL).

• Desi­re for phy­si­cal gra­ti­fi­ca­ti­on (greed): This is about the desi­re to satis­fy phy­si­cal needs, the desi­re for sen­su­al plea­su­re. Such desi­re also cha­rac­te­ri­ses sexua­li­ty, but is not limi­t­ed to it. It is about a desi­re to have and enjoy, which is direc­ted towards ones­elf. The Mil­ka com­mer­cial «The swee­test tempt­a­ti­on sin­ce cho­co­la­te was inven­ted» fits this area.
• The greed for ever­y­thing our eyes see (ava­ri­ce): This means the desi­re to pos­sess and accu­mu­la­te mate­ri­al goods. We see the beau­tiful clo­thes in the cata­lo­gue, the neighbour’s e‑bike, the beau­tiful house or the much more soulful hus­band of the colleague.
• The pri­de of our pos­ses­si­ons (osten­ta­ti­on)We are preoc­cu­p­ied with our own sta­tus and want to be more. Insta­gram is insti­tu­tio­na­li­sing this tempt­a­ti­on. Ever­yo­ne pres­ents them­sel­ves in the best light and shows off their pos­ses­si­ons and skills.

When the ser­pent tempt­ed Eve, he did it in the­se three are­as. When the devil tempt­ed Jesus in the desert, his attacks were also aimed at the­se three areas.

As ear­ly as the 5th cen­tu­ry BC, the­re was a mino­ri­ty among the phi­lo­so­phers, the so-cal­led hedo­nists. She belie­ved that a good life con­sis­ted of con­sum­ing as many imme­dia­te plea­su­res as pos­si­ble. The word hedo­ni­stic means joy, plea­su­re, delight, sen­su­al desi­re. Most phi­lo­so­phers held that imme­dia­te plea­su­res were base, deca­dent, even ani­mal. What con­sti­tu­tes a good life are abo­ve all the so-cal­led hig­her plea­su­res. Only an hono­ura­ble or vir­tuous life is a good life.

Bitter disappointment

Eva, at any rate, expec­ted a lot from the enjoy­ment of the fruit. Like you and me. But things tur­ned out dif­fer­ent­ly: «At that moment, the eyes of the two were ope­ned and they sud­den­ly rea­li­sed that they were naked. So they wove fig lea­ves tog­e­ther and made them­sel­ves loin­cloths.»(Gene­sis 3:7 NL). Exci­ting! The tempt­a­ti­on work­ed through the eyes («The woman saw»). But it was only here that Adam and Eve’s eyes were ope­ned. And what they saw was frus­t­ra­ting: shame, defi­cit and effort. Ins­tead of hap­pier, their lives beca­me har­der and more tedious.

In an artic­le on hap­pi­ness rese­arch I read that start­ing with the hap­pi­ness level of the blood, the sero­to­nin level, the­re are few exter­nal events that can redu­ce or rai­se the level over a long peri­od of time. You can lose a foot, get the news that you are infer­ti­le, or watch your house burn down. The sero­to­nin level drops spon­ta­neous­ly due to such strokes of fate, but six months later you are as hap­py or unhap­py as befo­re. It is simi­lar when you buy an even big­ger house or a more expen­si­ve car. Dan Gil­bert calls this the Psy­cho­lo­gi­cal immu­ne sys­tem.

True happiness

Rese­ar­chers had found out that it is other things that are decisi­ve for the fee­ling of hap­pi­ness. One of the most important cau­ses is said to be a good mar­ria­ge. Spea­king of mar­ria­ge; the Bible says some­thing very simi­lar, even though it does not refer to mar­ria­ge as the com­mu­ni­ty of a man and a woman. But here too it is about a sta­ble, las­ting rela­ti­onship: «Hap­py are tho­se who are invi­ted to the mar­ria­ge sup­per of the Lamb»(Reve­la­ti­on 19:9 NL). Who then is invi­ted to this wed­ding feast? In the con­ti­nua­tion of the pas­sa­ge from John quo­ted abo­ve, it says: «But this world is pas­sing away with all its tempt­a­ti­ons. But whoe­ver does the will of God will live for eter­ni­ty»(1 John 2:17 NL). Being invi­ted to the mar­ria­ge sup­per of the Lamb and live in eter­ni­ty are syn­onyms. The con­di­ti­on is that we do the will of God, which is ulti­m­ate­ly about living in a per­so­nal rela­ti­onship with Jesus, the Lamb of God.

This tog­e­ther­ness with God makes for las­ting hap­pi­ness. God and man – they fit tog­e­ther like a ves­sel and its lid. Blai­se Pas­cal spo­ke of a God-shaped vacu­um in man, a lon­ging, a desi­re that can only be fil­led by God. Any­thing that can also be taken away from you is not a fac­tor of hap­pi­ness. Good Hans in Luck had reco­g­nis­ed this cor­rect­ly. Hap­pi­ness can­not be achie­ved through depen­den­ci­es on exter­nal things. Hap­pi­ness means an inner sta­te. When I am in harm­o­ny with God and – as a con­se­quence – with mys­elf, then I am hap­py. And when my life beco­mes a bles­sing for others, I feel hap­py. It is not in revol­ving around mys­elf and my needs that I beco­me hap­py, but when I ser­ve others and awa­ken life in them.

This is exact­ly what Paul is tal­king about when you say the fol­lo­wing in a text whe­re he talks about all his hard­ships: «Our heart is full of sor­row, yet we con­stant­ly expe­ri­ence new joy. We are poor, but we make others rich. We own not­hing and yet have ever­y­thing» (2 Corin­thi­ans 6:10 NL). That sounds absurd: How can someone who has a heart full of sor­row and pos­s­es­ses not­hing, yet con­stant­ly have new joy – that is, be hap­py? By making others rich! David also talks about this: «Hap­py is he who stands by others in need!»(Psalm 41:2 NGÜ).

How enjoya­ble are the fol­lo­wing acti­vi­ties for you? Give values bet­ween 0 (no enjoy­ment) and 10 (hig­hest enjoy­ment): your favou­ri­te cho­co­la­te, fight­ing for your coun­try in war, accom­pany­ing a per­son in need, indul­ging in your hob­by, rai­sing child­ren, tel­ling unchurched peo­p­le about Jesus, stop­ping glo­bal warm­ing, sex, wat­ching the World Cup, visi­ting a per­son in a risk group, a well­ness holi­day in the Carib­be­an. Most peo­p­le rate sex, cho­co­la­te, the World Cup and well­ness at 9 or 10, while rai­sing child­ren is found at 2 or 3. Fol­low-up ques­ti­on: How meaningful do you think the abo­ve acti­vi­ties are? Again, give values bet­ween 0 and 10. For most peo­p­le, the order now looks quite dif­fe­rent. Hmmm. What real­ly counts now? Which acti­vi­ties make for a hap­py life – the «plea­sura­ble» ones or the «meaningful» ones? A Har­vard psy­cho­lo­gist gives an ans­wer in a remar­kab­ly crass way: «The Nazi war cri­mi­nal bathing in the sun on the Argen­ti­nean beach is not real­ly hap­py, while the pious mis­sio­na­ry who has just been eaten ali­ve by can­ni­bals is hap­py.»

Bles­sed to be a bles­sing. A per­son who has fil­led his vacu­um with God has found the mea­ning of life. From this he can lead a meaningful life and beco­me a bles­sing to others. Which per­son in need could you stand by in the coming week? Don’t do it for sel­fi­sh reasons, becau­se you are loo­king for hap­pi­ness. Do it out of love and hap­pi­ness will find you!

James aptly sum­ma­ri­ses today’s ser­mon in his let­ter: «Hap­py is he who pati­ent­ly endu­res the tri­als of faith. When he has pro­ved hims­elf, he will recei­ve the eter­nal life that God has pro­mi­sed to tho­se who love him.»(James 1:12 NL). Like Eve, we will face many tempt­a­ti­ons. Let us never belie­ve when we are led to belie­ve in gre­at hap­pi­ness through exter­nal things or pres­ti­ge. Ins­tead, you can say, «Lie, you are expo­sed!» Every per­son beco­mes hap­py in the love for God and in being the­re for other peo­p­le. It is wort­hwhile to focus on this!

Possible questions for the small groups

Rea­ding the Bible text: Gene­sis 3:1–7

1. The ser­pent tempt­ed Eve in the are­as of aes­the­tic beau­ty, deli­ca­te tas­te and hig­her sta­tus through cle­ver­ness. Whe­re do you expe­ri­ence cor­re­spon­ding temptations?
2. What truths are hid­den in the sto­ry of Hans in Luck?
3. Do you belie­ve that «meaningful» things cau­se more hap­pi­ness than «plea­sura­ble» things? What does that mean?
4. Will you be invi­ted to the «mar­ria­ge sup­per of the Lamb» (Reve­la­ti­on 19:9)? What is the basis of your answer?
5. Which per­son in need could you stand by in the coming week?