THE SINS OF ADAM AND EVE
When God put Adam and Eve in the Garden, He did not warn them about the devil. He never said danger lurked and to be careful. No. He gave them one commandment: "From any tree of the garden you may freely eat; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for on the day that you eat from it you will certainly die." They could eat any other fruit from any other tree. It was that simple. Eat from many. Avoid only one.
Satan cleverly came looking like a reptile. The pair were already used to seeing reptiles in the Garden God had instructed them to tend. To our knowledge, none had ever talked with them before, but they were used to seeing one like this particular fellow---except he could talk. And talk he did!
Satan could not force the pair to sin. He still is powerless to force people to sin. But he can use argument, reasoning, lying, to deceive and ply people to do his bidding. That's exactly what he did to Adam and Eve.
He chose to talk to Eve. She was more vulnerable. God had spoken directly to her husband. And probably the devil had listened in. In turn, it was Adam who had passed along God's instruction to his lady. Adam was Eve's source of information, while Adam received his directly from the mouth of God.
As stated above, satan could not force the pair to sin, but he could use all his wiles to prey on their minds and thinking. So, he posed questions, not statements of fact. Carefully crafted words were intended to create doubt and discontent in their minds to take their attention away from what God had commanded: "From any tree of the garden you may freely eat; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for on the day that you eat from it you will certainly die."
So, satan queried: "Has God really said, 'You shall not eat from any tree of the garden?'
Understand that Adam and Eve were created as sinless, authentic human beings. They were created as adults, whose only parents were God Himself. They had no knowledge or experience of sin. Their righteousness was bestowed on them by God Himself, a righteousness they had to make their own by intentional choice. Eat of any tree but that of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. That intentional choice is called OBEDIENCE. Satan tried to get them to disobey God.
To do that, he had to first raise question in their own minds about the correctness of God's commandment. Did He really say what you think He said? And, if He really said it, does He mean it?
Thus satan inveigled Eve to state God's command in her own words, audible to her own ears. She had to consider God's commandment against the devil's question. That was her first mistake and the devil's first inroad! She paid attention to the wrong source!
To this day, the mind is the devil's playhouse. It is where he raises doubt, more questions, anger and vindictiveness. Then his subject reacts against the deception placed in their thinking by the devil himself and becomes the instrument of evil, pliable in his hands to incite hatred, trouble, murder and the list goes on and on. It all begins with thoughts placed subtly in the mind by the master of deception, Satan himself!
As Eve recited the details of God's commandment, she embellished His words by adding, "You shall not eat from it or touch it, or you will die."
Having caught Eve's attention and engaging her mind in rethinking what God had said, the devil now used a tactic that is his hallmark: he lied! He challenged what God had said by stating an outright lie: "You certainly will not die! For God knows that on the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will become like God, knowing good and evil!"
Satan's fall from the angelic realm where he had served God as His most beautiful, endowed seraph came because he wanted to be elevated to a position equal to or above God Himself. He was jealous of his Creator. Though he had been God's highest creation to that point in time, he thought himself better than God and was cast from heaven for his rebellion! But pride still ruled his very being, manifesting itself as hatred of God against whom he had no control.
In his fallen state, the devil would come against God by attacking all God had made through His eternal genius! This human pair now claimed the position in God's heart once held by Lucifer in his previous glorified status. He would reclaim the power once his and now theirs by deceiving them and turning them against God!
Eve considered what the devil had just said to her. Instead of remembering what God had commanded and obeying Him, her attention turned inward. She looked at that forbidden fruit and saw that is was not bad. She became the one giving undue attention to herself. God was far from her thinking. The fruit was tempting, so tempting that she picked and ate it.
Satan had succeeded thus far! But worse was to come. Adam must have been standing there with Eve. He was an eye-witness to the discourse his wife had with the devil-reptile and never interjected a word of denouncement or comtempt. Instead, God's word says that after Eve took a bite, "she also gave some to her husband with her, and he ate."
Complete failure ensued."Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked...and sewed fig leaves together and made themselves waist coverings." Immediately the pair knew the inherent righteousness with which they had been created was gone. They had died spiritually and from that moment on, needed redemption they could not provide for themselves. They were naked physically, but far worse, spiritually.
The prophet Ezekiel cotains the description of thorough contaminaton brought to the soul by disobedience. In chapter 22, he illusrates the guilt we incur on ourselves by shedding blood of other human beings. Not murder, but the mistreatment of other people. Guilt by committing sin against members of morthe human race is thus the first result of the pair's disobedience. God says everyone born is unrighteous. That means we are born with the bent to sinning. Sin is anything that goes against the law of God. Guilt requires forgiveness possible only by the shedding of a vicarious animal. In the Old Testament that animal might be a bull, lamb or a dove. In the New Testament that sacrifice was Jesus, the Perfect Lamb of God, once for all.
But there is something more just as serious. Adam and Eve lost their purity of nature given to them at their creation. Ezekiel says that pollution of our nature comes through idolatry. The first four Commandments given to Moses on Mount Sinai point to our relationship with God. There He warns against idolatry. An idol is anything or anyone we worship and prefer over God.
In the case of Eve, she considered food, pleasantness or pleasure, and knowledge comparable to being a god. She put herself above God! She became her own idol. To this day SELF is a person's own worst enemy. We call it selfishness. Self-centeredness. Pride. All is idolatry and a tool in the devil's hand.
It is this idolatry of one's self, when 'stepped on,' that causes divorce, wars, arguments and murder! The list of manifestations is endless and so is eternity in hell if self is not dealt with.
The ancients say by tradition that Adam was so ashamed of himself for incurring the wickedness of sin and depravity of human nature on all his progeny that he hid in caves most of the rest of his long, long life. No matter his sorrow. He had missed his one opportunity to obey God fully and failed.
As a result, he and all the rest of us down through the ages have needed a substitute, a savior who is perfect. Because we are born sinners with a depraved nature, God sent His Messiah son to die in our stead. If we claim His death to wipe out our sin guilt and live for Him accordingly, it still boils down to one word: OBEDIENCE! And obedience now means we must dethrone our self and put Jesus there instead. It is a step many deny or ignore, because it means death to our own wishes and desire.
Nothing we do on our own, no matter how good it seems, can redeem our soul from spiritual death. Only the death and resurrection of Jesus on our behalf, when we claimit as ours, is pure enough to absolve our guilt and restore our nature.
There is something the devil hates about Jesus' death, too. It defeated him and the hold called death that the devil held over us. Satan thought he killed the pair spiritually so that they would perish in hell with him. Wrong! Those who believe in Jesus as their sustitute for sin's forgiveness and pollution have heaven and eternal life as their promise and hope---all based on OBEDIENCE! Obedience that goes against our self-idol. Obedience that makes us subservient to the God who created us!
Most people find the cost too high and are unwilling to take that position. A few do. The choice remains ours. It always has been. It's a matter of to whom we are willing to listen...and to be obedient.