1. Definition.
By the term "The Fall" Christians mean the original act of disobedience Adam and Eve committed in the Garden of Eden whereby they lost their innocence and sinlessness, and became sinners.
The term “the Fall” indicates that man fell from a position of relationship and favour with God into a state that can only be described as “Lost”, due to the fact that so much was lost as a result of the Fall.
2. Process of the Fall.
(a) God created man perfect, but he was morally immature in that he had not learnt to make choices for himself. To become mature man had to be given moral choices if he was to become fully "the image of God", which was God's will for him. There was also a promise of greater things that had not yet been fully experienced. He was made in the image of God.
The opportunity to choose was necessary for man to grow and become mature, but he would still have reached maturity had he chosen God. It is in the learning to make choices that real maturity comes.
Because of this need for choice God arranged a test situation, giving a simple command requiring obedience. There was nothing magical in the "tree of knowledge of good and evil", it could have been any of the fruit trees in the garden, it could have been an apple tree! But making it a matter of obedient choice is what gave it the power to bring knowledge of good and evil. The power was not in the tree, but in the choice.
Genesis 2:7-9,15-17.
“The LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being. Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground - trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil…
…The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.
And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."
We can clearly see that the issue behind the command is one of will choice in the area of knowledge. Will man remain totally dependent on God for all knowledge? Or will he choose the other source of knowledge that which comes by his own efforts, and is always corrupted by Satan? If he chooses the latter he will find that such "scientific" knowledge always brings good and evil.
As I outlined in Chapter 5 man was made by God as a tripartite being made up of spirit, soul and body. The soul requires knowledge on which to base its decisions. It was God’s intention that man would get that knowledge in their spirit, directly from God in their intuition. The test in the garden was to see if man would choose to remain dependent on God for knowledge or if he would choose some other source, independent of God.
The fact is there were two special trees in the garden – the forbidden “tree of knowledge of good and evil” and the “tree of life”. The second tree was not forbidden. Man could eat of the tree of life whenever he wanted.
The "tree of life" represents the availability of the life of God for mankind. It symbolises Christ, the word and wisdom of God.
(i) Christ is the Word and Wisdom of God, who was with God before all creation.
John 1:1-3.
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.”
1 Corinthians 1:30.
“It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God - that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption.”
Proverbs 8:1,22-31.
“Does not wisdom call out? Does not understanding raise her voice?…
…The LORD brought me (wisdom) forth as the first of his works, before his deeds of old; I was appointed from eternity, from the beginning, before the world began. When there were no oceans, I was given birth, when there were no springs abounding with water; before the mountains were settled in place, before the hills, I was given birth, before he made the earth or its fields or any of the dust of the world. I was there when he set the heavens in place, when he marked out the horizon on the face of the deep, when he established the clouds above and fixed securely the fountains of the deep, when he gave the sea its boundary so the waters would not overstep his command, and when he marked out the foundations of the earth. Then I was the craftsman at his side. I was filled with delight day after day, rejoicing always in his presence, rejoicing in his whole world and delighting in mankind.
(ii) Wisdom is a Tree of Life.
Proverbs 3:13,18.
“Blessed is the man who finds wisdom, the man who gains understanding,…
…She is a tree of life to those who embrace her; those who lay hold of her will be blessed.”
(iii) This Word brings God’s life and light (knowledge) to us.
John 1:4.
“In him was life, and that life was the light of men.”
Proverbs 8:32-36 .
"Now then, my sons, listen to me; blessed are those who keep my ways. Listen to my instruction and be wise; do not ignore it. Blessed is the man who listens to me, watching daily at my doors, waiting at my doorway. For whoever finds me finds life and receives favor from the LORD. But whoever fails to find me harms himself; all who hate me love death."
(iv) In the New Creation Christ will still be our source of Life.
Revelation 22:2.
“…On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding
its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.”
Man could draw on the tree of life at any time in their life in the garden of Eden. By partaking of the tree of life they could grow to be “like God”, as partaking of the life of God always transforms us into the likeness of God. But it is a process, not an event. The temptation of Satan was strong because the desire to be “like God” was created in man by God and he had provided a way to attain that. Satan simply promised a short-cut, but it was a lie.
Principle:
Satan always offers us a short cut into God’s will. But there are no short cuts. Such short cuts are actually diversions and always end up in pain and death.
THE TEST SITUATION:
Genesis 3:1-6.
“Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made.
He said to the woman, "Did God really say, `You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?"
The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, `You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.'"
"You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.”
(1) The Wi\thdrawl of God.
Having set up the situation, given the command and warning, God then withdrew from the situation. This is always the way, because God wants us to be independent morally of him, choosing with our will to do his will simply because of the Word and the warning and not because he is putting pressure on us.
Principle:
In the test God’s presence is not usually real to us. He withdraws leaving only his Word, quickened at the point of crisis by the Holy Spirit. The sense of his presence is withdrawn, though not the fact of it. If we choose rightly then the sense immediately returns and strengthens us.
This dependence entirely on the Word shows us how important it is for us to know God's Word if we are to stand in temptation.
(2) Satan's tactics: The Temptation.
Next we see the Satan, the Tester, appear.
1. Satan Casts doubt on God's word.
Firstly, he asks a question which casts doubt on the word of God.
Genesis 3:1 "Did God really say..."
The stress is on the "really", indicating an incredulous attitude. How could God be so unreasonable to say such a thing! Notice that he also misquotes the command of God implying:
* Firstly, that man should not eat ANY of the trees of the garden and
* Secondly, conveniently omitting the reasons for the command.
The Fact is this, Lucifer knew perfectly well what God had said – if the scenario I have painted in this book is correct. As God’s appointed cherub over all the affairs of earth he could not be unaware of God’s command. He had access to all of God’s wisdom, the most wise of all the angels. Satan does not question God’s word because he doesn’t know it, or because he is unsure of it. He questions it out of rebellion. Entertaining Satan's question will plant the seeds of rebellion in your heart.
Principle:
Satan always begins by attacking, questioning God's word. Entertaining the question will plant seeds of rebellion in your heart and will lead to you sinning.
Satan does not begin by denying God's word, as that would enable us to see through his attack immediately. What he does is raise a question about God's word. His methodology is still the same today. Speculation is his first tool. Once you begin to question the Bible there is no stopping place until you destroy all of its life and authority.
The point is this - once we entertain the question we are lost and his victory is almost certainly assured.
Eve was defeated the moment she entertained the question. She allowed God to be contradicted by a creature simply because his word had lost its proper authority over her heart, her conscience and her understanding. Her first step down was actually listening to the question.
Eve's response to Satan shows that she is a little unclear about the situation. The command had been given to Adam, so she knew it only second hand. She hadn't seen the importance of the word so hadn't bothered to listen carefully to Adam. She should not have listened to Satan's doubts, as in doing so she was already faltering. The addition of the words, "neither shall you touch it" showed she was not operating out of clear understanding of the word; rather she was obeying through fear based in half-truth. Satan always has the advantage if we don't really know what God has said.
Principle:
God's word normally comes to us second hand - God rarely speaks directly to us, rather he has given us his word, the Bible, and he speaks to us in a "second hand" way through it. Our attitude to the Bible and its authority will determine our ability to withstand temptation.
It is not sufficient to THINK we know what God has said, we must KNOW if we are to defeat Satan.
The process of the Fall has a direct relationship to the word of God, as does sin in our lives. There are three steps:
(i) Doubt.
(ii) Disbelief.
(iii) Disobedience.
One inevitably leads to another. The lie of the Devil is to tell you, "It doesn't matter what you believe!" It does, what you believe you will do.
2. Satan denies the truth of God's word.
Genesis 3:4 “You shall not die”.
Satan knows he has her - she doesn't really know what she is talking about, so he outright denies God's word. First Satan had challenged the stipulations of covenant law, now he contradicts its sanctions. He challenged God's norm for the present, now also God's interpretation of the future. Temptation always blinds our minds to the penalty.
Principle:
Satan will always deny the consequences of wrong actions with a lie.
Such lies include:
* “No one will ever know” – a lie because God knows.
* “It’s a matter of free choice whether you do this or not” – a lie because it denies there is an absolute moral code.
* “It doesn’t affect anyone else so its OK” - a lie because every action we have has outcomes that affect other people.
* And so on.
3. Satan Misrepresent God's character.
Genesis 3:5 “For God knows…”
The serpent charges God with malicious falsehood, “This tree might have been a supreme blessing to man, and God had not only withheld it, but had told man lies.”
The serpent explains the prohibition as being due to God's jealousy of man--a familiar idea in primitive religion.
He casts doubt on the motives of God implying that God is just an old meany keeping the goodies from mankind. He has perpetuated this myth in the fairy tales based on this story, wherein dragons (“the cherubim” of Genesis 3:24) keep people from the goodies.
4. Satan keeps back part of the truth.
He did not tell Eve that she would know good without the power to do it, and evil without the power to resist it. He let her find that out by bitter experience.
5. Satan attempts to have us you God's standards as unreasonable restrictions.
Eve also shows by her response the human tendency to not like any form of limitation.
We fall for this if we focus on the restriction not on the gracious provision. The limitations always have a reason that is for our good.
For example let’s have a look at some Satanic lies:
1. God says, “Thou shalt not kill”. But the lie of abortion is that, “It is a woman’s right to choose.” But surely if it is a woman’s right to choose she should should exercise her choice BEFORE there is another human life involved. In any other situation in human society where people have to choose concerning the life of another person it is illegal.
2. God says, “Thou shalt not commit adultery”, i.e. have sex outside of the marriage vow. The lie is, “It’s OK between consenting adults, it’s their right to choose.” But if sex is more than just a physical action for pleasure and there are other physical, spiritual and emotional consequences to it that are destructive in the long run (and there are) then the lie isn’t valid. Drinking excess alcohol and then driving a car may feel good to the drinker. But most civilised countries realise it is foolish and have laws against it. Because something “feels good” and the person consents to it does not make it right. Other examples could be drug taking, solvent sniffing, petrol sniffing. They “feel good” at the time but have long term bad results.
6. Satan asserts we will not reap what we sow.
Genesis 3:4. "You shall not die."
There are two lies to sin:
1. It will do you no harm.
2. You are cheating yourself out of good by not doing it.
These are only true if one looks at the short term results. In the long term sin is always destructive.
Note:
The warning God gave "you shall surely die" must have had some meaning to Adam and Eve. They must have had some idea of what "die" would mean for this to be a deterrent. That it had deterrent value is shown by the fact that Eve adds to the command out of fear "neither shall you touch it". These words indicate a strong deterrent feeling.
Many Christians believe that death was unknown - even in the animal kingdom - until the fall of man. This is based on
Romans 5:12.
Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned-..."
(i) This passage in Romans is talking about the consequences of sin in man's world not in the world of nature.
(ii) Death must have existed in the world of nature before the Fall. It is hard to imagine it otherwise. Would every insect that was born have continued to live on forever? Was that part of God's plan? No God designed nature with different life forms with different lifespans - some of only days, others of decades. Adam and Eve would have seen dead insects, dead birds, dead animals. They knew what "die" meant.
(iii) Even with man in the garden before the Fall it is clear that he was not immortal in himself. Only the tree of life gave immortality. This is not to say man would have died if the Fall had not happened and he did not eat of the tree of life. Probably the experiences of Enoch and Elijah depict what would have happened in old age if sin had not entered the world.
What The Apostle Paul is saying is something greater than just physical death. I like to explain it this way:
Man knew about death before the Fall, and possibly may have been able to die physically before the Fall (not that anyone did, but the possibility is there).
But after the Fall death became DEATH. An greater horror was added to it. Death is fearsome to us now because of sin, death has become DEATH. It is amazing how those godly old people who are closest to death often don't fear it. The "sting of death" has been removed for them - it is no longer DEATH, it is only death. And beyond death is being in the Lord's presence.
The horror of DEATH is that it is not in the Lord's presence - it is in a place of eternal fire.
7. Satan encourages dissatisfaction with our God appointed role. False ambition.
Genesis 3:5.
"For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God (gods), knowing good and evil."
"Your eyes will be opened"
To see in things qualities which you cannot now see.
"As God".
Or "As the gods"--taking elohim in its general sense of supernatural beings. Thus it would mean, "You shall have supernatural knowledge."
"Good and evil".
A formal way of saying "Everything". It is intentionally mysterious. It implies the possibility of an extension of human existence beyond the limits sent by God at creation--not only of pure intellectual enrichment, but also familiarity with and over mysteries that lie beyond man.
Here he appeals to her human nature with a temptation to better herself, i.e. pride: "You shall be as God...” God did want to make man wise, knowing good from evil, but this way was the wrong way to do it.
Pride is the root of all sin, it was with Lucifer and with Eve, and it is with us. It is intertwined with the desire to be independent of God.
Genesis 3:6.
“When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.”
The serpent disappears from view; the woman is now alone in her thoughts. She is silent before the assertion that to transgress the prohibition will not bring her into death but rather into God's likeness. She lets himself be persuaded of this thesis.
Eve begins to think on what has been said by Satan. What you think you will become. She began to seek knowledge through her senses, she looked (Genesis 3:6) and so quickened the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life did the rest. She let external evidence divert her from God's command.
1 John 2:16. Three elements to Temptation:
“For everything in the world- the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does- comes not from the Father but from the world.”
(i) The lust of the Flesh -"it was good for food".
(ii) The lust of the Eyes - it looked good, "a delight to the eyes.".
(iii) The pride of Life - offering her a shortcut into what was in fact the will of God. "to be desired to make one wise."
"Saw."
Already she saw in a new light. Accepting the temptation meant that the sin was already done even though the fruit was still on the tree.
"Her Husband".
The process was no doubt the same, only the woman taking the place of the serpent.
Eve was deceived, but Adam was not.
1 Timothy 2:13,14.
“For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner.”
Adam knew that to eat the fruit was wrong, but he still "took of the tree and ate".
Question: Why did he do this?
Answer: We can only guess, but it is likely that the long period I have inferred of when he was alone, without Eve, and the strong desire for companionship he had then overwhelmed him again. He was not deceived but he openly rebelled against God because of his love for Eve. The thought of the possibility of being alone again was too great for him to bear.
Principle:
Often we are led to sin not because we do not know it is wrong, but because of human love for others. It is never right to do that which is wrong because of the desire to not offend others, or because of human love.
The story of Adam and Eve eating the forbidden fruit is a clear example that the approach of "Situation Ethics" is wrong. Situation Ethics says we should do the most loving thing in any situation even if it is morally wrong. But "wrong" is never "right" - how can the wrong thing to do ever be the most loving? Adam ate of the fruit - and he could justify it as being the most loving thing to do. But what a result of evil came from it. Who knows what God would have done to redeem Eve if Adam had not followed her into sin?
Notice throughout the whole temptation Adam “was with her”. We often blame Eve for the Fall, but we have to ask, “Why did Adam not intervene before Eve went so far?”
THE BREAKING OF THE COVENANT.
As I have outlined in Chapter 6 the relationship of Adam to God was defined by a covenant, and in a covenant there were stipulations, requirements, that the covenant parties had to abide by.
One of the covenant stipulations, as I have listed them, was that they were not to eat of the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.
In the act of eating the fruit of this tree, then, the covenant was broken from man’s side. The relationship with God lost its legal standing. The correct, technical way of saying this is to say: Man had “fallen” from covenant relationship. Thus the term, “the Fall”.
Covenants had included in them provision for blessing, if the covenant was adhered to, but also curses (or punishments) if the covenant was broken.
As a result of breaking the covenant, covenant “punishments”, or “curses” came on mankind.
The Curse: The Effects of the Broken Covenant.
We are probably not to understand this as God cursing things. God is a God of blessing and has no curse. Rather God created the physical universe to operate according to certain laws. There was an harmonious interaction between the physical and the spiritual realms. One of the key laws God instituted was the law of Sowing and Reaping, which applies to planting crops, but also to moral actions. This law was set in place to multiply blessing to mankind, and in the context of a sinless world this is what it did. But the downside is that in a world of sin the law still works. Like covenant and redemption, the law of sowing and reaping is a law of God which is written into the fabric of the universe.
Galatians 6:7-9.
“Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”
Sowing sin will lead to a harvest of destruction – always.
What we see here, then, is not God cursing things but God describing the inevitable consequences of man’s sinful actions – which is a curse. Because man has sinned the earth is cursed, but this does not mean God cursed it. The curse is the consequences of man’s sinful actions in a world where the law of sowing and reaping control the outcomes. I.e. God is not proclaiming a curse here in the sense that he is speaking it into being, rather he is describing the inevitable consequences of the law of sowing and reaping when applied to sin. He is describing a curse, not proclaiming a curse.
The Law of Sowing and Reaping works a bit like an amplifier:
Input signal -> Amplifier -> OUTPUT.
An amplifier is impersonal - it has no choice over what gets fed into it and makes no judgement about the input. It simply enlarges what is put in. It operates on what goes in - good or bad.
The law of sowing and reaping is just like that. It operates on what goes in, good or bad. It makes no moral judgement on what goes in - it simply enlarges it and pushes it out the other end.
God set the law of sowing and reaping in the universe to bless us. If we do good then we see this:
Good input -> Law of S&R -> BLESSING (i.e. greater good)
But the law is impartial, if we feed bad into it it still works:
Bad input (sin) -> Law of S&R -> CURSE (i.e. greater evil and suffering).
The apostle Paul summarises this in another way in:
Romans. 8:1,2 “The Law of Sin and Death.”
“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death.”
A new principle entered into man's existence, the Law of Sin and Death. It works on the principle of sowing and reaping. Basically the law is this: If we sin, we reap death. It began its work in man and on the earth, producing sin, sickness and death. The longer it works, the greater its harvest becomes.
Our problem is that we often can’t see the connection between events – between our acts of sin and the destruction that later comes our way. The fact that this is a law of sowing and reaping tells us three things:
(i) Just as when we plant a tomato seed it takes time for that to grow into a plant and then bear fruit, so when we plant a seed of sin it will take time to grow and bear fruit.
(ii) Just as when we plant a tomato seed it looks nothing like the plant and fruit that grows from it, so too the harvest of destruction that comes from our acts of sin often look nothing like the sin we committed.
(iii) Just as the tomato seed is incredibly small compared with the tomato plant and the harvest of fruit it produces, so too the harvest of destruction we reap from sin is vastly out of proportion in size to the act of sin that seeded it.
Because of these three factors we find it difficult to recognise the connection between our sin and the destruction and death we experience. But that does not mean there is no connection! That is why Paul says, in the strongest possible words, ”Do not be deceived”. Because we cannot see the connection we deceive ourselves that there is no connection. But there is a harvest when we sin – always. In the next chapter we shall look at some of the results of the Fall – the harvest that Adam and Eve’s sin brought on the world, and on us.
What we are about to see is not the judgement of God, nor is it some curse God put on man because of sin. What we are about to see is the outcome of the Law of Sowing and Reaping operating on mankind's sin - impartially, impersonally, but inevitably.
