Genesis 3 (Original Sin-Part II)

The Bible describes Satan in a number of ways: prince of demons; the evil one; a murderer; a deceiver; an accuser; the father of lies; a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour. These are apt illustrations, for Satan will use any trick and all his wiles to tempt us to fall and turn from God. As we read in Part I, Satan will distort God’s Word, lie to us, make us doubt God’s promises and love, and appeal to our egos and sinful natures to tempt us to sin. But while it certainly easy to lay the blame for our troubles on Satan, we must not forget Adam and Eve’s role--or ours--in the hardships and misery that befall us.

Where do you place your trust?

Perhaps Eve’s biggest mistake (aside from actually taking the fruit and eating it) was placing her trust in the serpent, and not God. Instead of reaching out to God and asking Him to verify or deny the serpent’s claims, she simply accepted Satan’s lies as truth and ate the fruit. Although God no longer walks among us as He did in the Garden of Eden, He still offers counsel and advice through the words of the Bible and through the Holy Spirit. I have often made poor choices because I relied on my own wisdom (and Satan‘s lies) rather than turning to God. Just as Adam and Eve suffered consequences for trusting the serpent, I too have suffered consequences for not relying on God.

Tempting others to sin

Eve’s second biggest mistake (again, aside from her disobedience in eating the fruit) was encouraging Adam to eat the fruit as well. A number of passages within the Bible warn us that tempting others to sin is a sin against Jesus (Matthew 18:6, 1 Corinthians 8:12-13). Before I accepted Jesus into my life, I was often guilty of tempting others to sin. In fact, a good friend of mine used to call me “Jezebel” because I would often encourage my friends to go out every night and stay out late, even if we had to work the following morning. I was terribly lonely at the time, and instead of looking to God to provide all the comfort and companionship I needed, I made it a point to surround myself with people for as many hours in the day as I could manage. And sadly, their welfare was the last thing on my mind. I didn’t consider the consequences they might face for staying out late every night--I was only concerned about my own needs. Likewise, Eve never thought about Adam's welfare when she gave him the fruit; she never considered the eternal repercussions of that sin.

The blame game

One of the most horrible aspects of sin is that it always escalates. When the Lord discovered what Adam and Eve had done and confronted them, Adam’s first response was to blame those around him instead of admitting his disobedience. “It was the woman you gave me who gave me the fruit, and I ate it,” he told the Lord. So he not only blamed Eve, he also blamed God! Eve also put the blame elsewhere: “The serpent deceived me. That’s why I ate it.”

Here’s the truth about Satan: he can use every bit of his power to deceive us, tempt us and destroy everything around us, but he can’t force us to do anything. When we choose to sin, we have only ourselves to blame. We often think we are too weak to resist sin, but the Lord gives us endless amounts of strength. “The temptations in your life are no different from what others experience. And God is faithful. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. When you are tempted, He will show you a way out so that you can endure" (1 Corinthians 10:13). And we should certainly never blame God for our own misfortunes! Jesus is our savior from temptation, not the tempter!

The consequences

The man and woman suffered consequences for their disobedience, for God--in His perfect wisdom--can never allow sin to go unpunished. The Lord ruled that the woman should have pain in childbirth and a “desire to control [her] husband, but he will rule over [her].” Although many women would love to have equal status with their husbands, Eve assured us--with her disobedience, lack of trust in the Lord and her decision to tempt her husband into sin--that we will never have that equality.

The man did not escape punishment either: The Lord cursed the ground, banished him from the Garden of Eden and took away his immortality (along with Eve's, as well). “The ground is cursed because of you,” the Lord told Adam. “All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it. [Only] by the sweat of your brow will you have food to eat until you return to the ground from which you were made. For you were made from dust, and to dust you will return.”

When Adam and Eve chose to trust the serpent and disobey the Lord, they also brought darkness to the perfect world the Lord had created. Satan's role became that of ruler and god of this world (John 12:31, 2 Corinthians 4:4). Furthermore, humans became children of the devil who love to do evil things (John 8:44), for we inherited their sinful natures.

So the next time you read a CNN headline and become discouraged, remember that we can’t blame God or accuse Him of being heartless or cruel. Terrible things happen--not because of God--but because we turned our backs on Him. We turned the world over to Satan and proved that our natures are inherently sinful.

And it is only through Jesus that we can be saved from this world and our own weaknesses and failures.

Genesis 3 (Original Sin - Part I)

As I was browsing the CNN headlines this morning, I was overcome with sadness. Reading about natural disasters and monsters masquerading as humans reminded me--yet again--how cruel the world really is.

Another reason for my sadness was the knowledge that atheists and agnostics often use such reports to question the existence of God. If He were truly a loving God, they argue, He wouldn’t allow such tragedies to occur. What kind of God permits these atrocities?

What they don’t understand, however, is that humans allowed and permitted these horrors to occur--not God. God created a beautiful, perfect existence for us. He gave us shelter in the Garden of Eden, an endless supply of delicious food and a life without pain or hardship. And He asked only one thing in return for our eternal happiness: our obedience. And truly, obeying Him could not have been much of a hardship, for He only prohibited us from eating the fruit of one tree. He even stressed that we could “feely eat the fruit of any [other] tree in the garden.” The Bible doesn’t say how many other trees existed in the Garden, but I imagine they would have numbered in the hundreds--if not thousands.

But we failed to heed that one, tiny command. We chose to disobey our Father and place our trust in something much darker. Sadly, that darkness still exists today and still reigns over this Earth. And Satan still uses the same tactics he used to deceive Eve.

Satan's tactics

1) Satan distorted God’s Words. When he first confronted Eve, Satan asked, “Did God really say you must not eat the fruit from any of the trees in the Garden?”

2) Satan lied to make Eve doubt God’s Word. Although the Lord warned Adam that they would “surely die” if they ate the fruit, Satan told her, “You won’t die!”

3) Satan appealed to Eve’s pride and ego and tricked her into believing there were benefits to eating the fruit. “Your eyes will be opened as soon as you eat it, and you will be like God, knowing both good and evil,” he told her.

Distortions

Satan still uses these tactics today. He still finds ways to distort God’s Word…sometimes to make them appear harsher than they are, and sometimes to water them down or change their meaning. New Age thinkers often quote the Bible to support their pantheistic views, for example. They distort Jesus’ words--"My Father and I are one" (John 10:30)--to indicate that we are all one with God. There could be nothing farther from the truth, for our sin further separated us from God--it certainly didn't make us one with Him! And distorting that verse also denies the divinity of Jesus, the very basis of the Christian faith.

Lies

Satan still lies to us, as well. Sometimes he lies to us by convincing us that we’re too evil to ever get into heaven. Of course we can, if we only look to our Savior, Jesus. God gave us that promise. He gave His own life so that we could enter heaven, regardless of how “bad” we are.

But Satan doesn't only deceive us by making us doubt God's love; sometimes he makes us believe that God wants us to have those things which He clearly opposes! Too often I hear televangelists tell people that God wants us to be wealthy. They say God wants to bless us with big houses, fancy cars and millions of dollars. Not according to Scripture, He doesn’t: "Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." (Matthew 19:24) So it's clear that Satan deceives even the most devout.

Appeals to our sinful natures

He also deceives us by making sinful things seem attractive. Who wouldn’t want riches, beauty or popularity, for example? It all seems so wonderful, but those are the exact things that God warns us against, for they turn our focus from the Lord. And Jesus warns us that we will be persecuted--not popular--for our faith. But the Lord asuures us: “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 5:10) So even though we might desire that which goes against God's Word, we must always remember that "sin is crouching at the door, eager to control you. You must subdue it and be its master." (Genesis 4:7)