The Fall of Mankind

[Servant Boy]

http://wp.me/pHJ5y-fD

Genesis 3:1-7 Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the
field which the LORD God had made. And he said to the woman, “Indeed,
has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?” The
woman said to the serpent, “From the fruit of the trees of the garden
we may eat; but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of
the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat from it or touch it, or
you will die.’” The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not
die! “For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be
opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” When the
woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight
to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she
took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with
her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they
knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made
themselves loin coverings.

The fall of man or the sin that every man is born with is the result
of this conversation between the serpent and Eve and the direction of
our lives was changed forever because of their act of eating the
forbidden fruit. This is something most 'rational' human beings find
impossible to believe because we know serpents don't talk and
accepting Adam and Eve as the start to humankind is impossible because
we are different races, cultures and live in different locations that
makes drawing our lineage from this one couple seems over the top.

What is God speaking to us through this incident and is there anything
for us to understand from this fall of man?

As hard as it is to accept this conversation between Adam and Eve and
our lineage, it is harder to accept that we are all but a product of
chance, a chance so great that we must be the luckiest things alive
because we live on the only inhabitable planet in the billions of
galaxies around us, traveling at just the right speed at a perfect
distance from the Sun, with the perfect mix of gases that makes
breathing possible, having more than sufficient natural resources to
live from, filled with intelligence beyond that of anything we have
met, etc.

This fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that the
serpent tricked us into eating seems so much like the choices that
surround us. Wealth is not bad but the pursuit of it beyond all else
is, desire is not bad but the desire that draws us away from what we
have to start coveting what does not belong to us is, people are not
bad but the motivation that drives them to do things that cause harm
makes them bad, etc.

We are all built with a moral system in our minds that help us
determine what is right from wrong. We know that lying is not right
and when we speak a lie, it might not hurt that same moment but it has
a lasting impact for the rest of our lives. Yet we lie and deceive and
this is something that can be passed off as insignificant but it is
significant because there is little or no difference between a small
lie and a big lie for it is all filthy before a holy and pure God.

Today we are reminded that if we continue to operate in our own wisdom
deciding what is right from wrong, we will continue to walk in the
path the deceiver has set out for us that leads to death. However,
this great God who created us from dust calls out to us to eat of the
fruit of the Tree of Life, His son Jesus Christ, who died for our
salvation and who lives to give us hope beyond this broken world.

I pray today that we will make the choice of eating of the fruit of
the tree of life and be saved from our hopelessness and the vice grip
of Satan in our lives.

In His Loving Service,
ServantBoy

2 Corinthians 11:3 But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve
by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity
and purity of devotion to Christ.