The Origin and Consequence of Sin

 Part 5

THE CONSEQUENCE OF SIN

3:6-7 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food, and pleasing to the eyes, and was desirable to make one wise, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband  who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings.

Adam and Eve now had a knowledge of evil that was like the terminal cancer patient’s knowledge of lymphoma. It was not the kind of knowledge Satan had led Eve to believe she would obtain. She and Adam did not become like God, but like the one who deceived them.

This is why we come into this world “children of the devil,” because until God causes us to be born again and makes us His children, we are like our father the devil and under his control.

Even though as God’s adopted children we are no longer under the control of “the evil one” (as the unbelieving world is) (1 John 5:19), Jesus in teaching His disciples how to pray, tells them to daily ask their Holy Father to deliver them from the temptations of “the evil one” (Matthew 6:13).

Even Jesus in John 17:15-17, prays and asks the Father to protect His followers from the “evil one” and “sanctify them in His truth.”

The apostle Paul also encourages believers by telling them that “the Lord is faithful, and He will strengthen and protect you from the evil one” (2 Thessalonians 3:3).

James admonishes believers to “submit themselves to God, resist the devil, and he will flee (James 4:7).

1 Peter 5:6-9 Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you. Be of sober spirit, be on alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that your brothers and sisters in the world are being tested in the same ways you are.

Like Satan, Adam and Eve fell so far that now there was nothing good in them. They were unable to do anything to undo what they had done. They were now spiritually dead to the things of God.

Adam and Eve’s heart was now deceitful and desperately corrupt. Their wills were no longer free but in bondage to their fallen sinful nature. Therefore, of themselves, they would never choose good over evil in the spiritual realm.

Job 15:14-16 What is man, that he could be pure, or one born of woman, that he could be righteous? If God places no trust in his holy ones, if even the heavens are not pure in his eyes, how much less man, who is vile and corrupt, who drinks up evil like water!

Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is deceitfully wicked above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?

Romans 3:10-12 There is none righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.

It would take much more than the Spirit’s assistance to bring Adam and Eve back into fellowship with God. It would take regeneration by which the Spirit would raise them from spiritual death unto life and give them a new nature enabling them to love and obey God.

The ability to believe and obey God would have to be given to them by God as a gift of grace bought and paid for by the blood of a sinless substitute (Jesus Christ, the Seed of the woman). He would die in their place, exchanging His righteousness for their sin and guilt. Only then could God righteously love them and have fellowship with them.

Nothing in life or in the world would ever be the same after Adam and Eve fell in sin. God Himself would curse the earth so that thorns would grow naturally, and fruit trees would have to be cultivated.

A DIVINE CONFRONTATION

3:8a And they heard the voice (or sound) of Yahweh God going forth (or walking) in the garden in the wind (or cool) of the day.

In spite of the translation difficulties of 3:8a, it is still clear that the point of the first sentence of verse 8 is to demonstrate the presence of God in the garden. Adam and Eve had just disobeyed their Creator, Yahweh God, and now they needed to account for their actions.

3:8b And the man and his wife hid themselves from the face of Yahweh God in the middle of the trees of the garden.

Adam and Eve hid themselves among the trees in the middle of the garden. They experienced fear instead of fellowship, and their hiding reflected their guilt. Consequently, they were not only alienated from each other because of the shame of their nakedness, but they were alienated from God because they knew they had disobeyed His command and sinned.

Sinners always despise God’s presence because they know they cannot stand in the face of such holiness. As the writer of Hebrews said by inspiration of the Holy Spirit: It is a terrifying thing for a sinner to fall into the hands of the living God (Hebrews 10:31)

3:9 And Yahweh God called to the man, and he said to him, ‘Where are you?’

The terms “the man”, “to him” and the masculine singular “you”, all point to the fact that Yahweh God directly confronted only Adam at this point.

It is interesting to note that God first questioned the man who is the head whereas the serpent first questioned the woman who is the helper, signifying that he knew the woman was the more susceptible and vulnerable of the two to temptation.

The Lord’s question to Adam was not designed to obtain information; it was designed to probe the conscience of Adam and give him the opportunity to come out of the trees and to openly admit his sin.

3:10 And he said, I heard your voice in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.

The normal Hebrew word order is verb ► subject ► object. In man’s response to God, the object, “your voice” (kolka), appears first in the Hebrew. It is placed there for emphasis to reveal that the cause of Adam’s fear and hiding is God’s voice, rather than his own sin.

As sin separates man from God so it separates man from man.