Genesis 3:9 And the Lord God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou?

Years ago I cute a finger badly. The doctor stitched it up and it healed but a nerve was severed. I lost feeling in that finger. Blood flowed, the finger moved, the nail grew, but I did not feel it. I lost sensitivity to touch.

This example is why God asked Adam where are you. Adam was still there, God could see Adam, but the spirit died within Adam, just like the severed nerve. Adam still had the blood flowing, the natural life continued to grow, like my finger. But God lost Adam’s sensitivity to the spirit.

Eventually the nerves grew back together. They found a way to find each other and restore feeling, gradually. So it is with those who are quickened in the spirit, made alive in Christ. Since the finger was alive and moved all that time before the nerve was reunited, it did not know that it was lost to the body. My brain knew what was lost, not my finger. God knows if you are lost, but until you become born again, you will not know you were lost to God.

“Where art thou?” God is seeking the lost to hear His voice and to become reunited in the spirit. Walking around and doing things doesn’t make you alive. Mending that severed connection is what makes us alive.

John 1:12-13 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

Restored sonship, now that is living.