"I was afraid"

8 And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” 10 And he said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” 11 He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” (Genesis 3)
The first emotion expressed in a fallen world was fear. But that does not mean it was the first emotion. It is the first expressed negative emotion in scripture, but it came from a deeper emotion: guilt.  Adam and Eve knew they had done wrong, and that their sin had ruined everything.  We live in a fear-driven world - not because everyone and everything is scary, but because everywhere there is sin.  And, like Adam and Eve, a lot of our fear has to do with "being found out." We do not want others to know the evil we have done, said, thought. So fear can lead to lots of other negative emotions, thoughts and actions.  This statement "I was afraid" speaks volumes.  Fear.  What do we do with it? Like all emotional responses, it is a call to action. A right response is to do something to correct the situation.  Like with Adam and Eve it sometimes seems irreversible, but that does not mean there is nothing we can do constructive. What did God want from them? What does He want from us? To not hide our fears, but admit them to Him. He wants us to have Him help us discover why we are afraid and what we can do about it. He has a plan. He has the solution. Let us bring every fear to Him, even if we are afraid He will find out what we have done. He already knows!