What did God know and when did He know it? He knew what would happen to His creation from the foundation of the world in all its awful detail, far more than we can know or fathom and yet He still is the God for us. He knows what we have done. He is more fully aware of our sins than even we ourselves can be, because we lie to ourselves about our own sin. God neither lies to us, nor to Himself about us, not even before the world was founded. He knew what the final score was, before we even started the game. He knew that we would be murderers, have hearts perverted by sexual impurity, desire to possess the things that are not and should not be ours, despise our parents and other authorities, misuse God's name, abuse His precious Word, and even despise God Himself. He knew we would hate Him precisely for His unending love for us, yet He still loved us with an unending love. The apostle Paul says: "For one will scarcely die for a righteous person - though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die - but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God" (Rm 5:7-9). Christ died not for the good people but for sinners and He knew before we were created that that would be the deal. What a mystery this great love for us sinners is.

God often hides Himself in the humility of His self-revelation. He discloses Himself to us in ways that are helpful to us. God knows everything about us, He often is looking for us to recognize it about ourselves and to recognize the miracle of His grace to us, and so He keeps reaching out to us by His Word, seeking us, calling us, agonizing and waiting like the father looking for His prodigal son to return home. He calls for Adam and Eve in the Garden: "Adam, where are you?" even though He knows very well where Adam is. He asks, "What have you done?" even though He knows what Adam has done. He wants Adam to recognize what he has done and confess His horrible transgression so that His heavenly Father can begin to tell Him about the Seed of the woman who would come to redeem sinners.

What did God know and when did He know it? He always did, the whole sordid tale and yet still offered Himself in Christ to us. God knows us in Christ and always has.

"The words 'Where are you?' are words of the Law. God directs them to the conscience. Although all things are clear and are known before God (Heb 4:13), He is speaking according to our way of thinking; for He sees us considering how we may withdraw from His sight. Therefore when He says: 'Where are you?' it is the same as if He were saying: 'Do you think I do not see you?' He wants to show Adam that though he had hidden, he was not hidden from God, and that when he avoided God, he did not escape God. It happens naturally in the case of every sin that we stupidly try to escape God's wrath and yet we cannot escape it. It is the utmost stupidity for us to imagine that our cure lies in flight from God rather than in our return to God, and yet our sinful nature cannot return to God. In what frame of mind, therefore, shall we suppose Adam to have been when he heard this voice? He had stupidly hoped to be able to hide; and, see, he stands before God's judgment seat and is now called in for his punishment."

Martin Luther, Lectures on Genesis, 3.9