Our pastor preached out of Genesis this week. It inspired me to meditate further on the failure of the first humans in Genesis 3:1-7. It says: 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’?”
2 The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 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.’”
4 “You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5 “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
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. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
The Fall
This is a well-known passage to many, referred to as ‘the fall’. According to mainstream theology, at its simplest, this incident corrupted humankind such that a separation between God and man occurred, causing a permanent separation in the relationship.
If we approach the story from a secular perspective, there is still a useful amount to learn. I believe there was a real Adam and Eve. Humanity started with at least two people who moved beyond simple survival. We could take the approach that the story is metaphorical, in that we all know snakes cannot talk. After all, human beings would have been simply about the business of surviving. Relationships were not deep. Eat, sleep, survive, and have a few kids: that was life. At some point, this early couple experienced a change in understanding – there was something beyond just surviving. That something was the awareness of a personal God who wanted to have a relationship with us.
The problem was independence. Here we have a couple that wanted to live life on their own terms. Yet, having an imposed set of rules made the choice for independence more difficult. From the perspective of a person who wants freedom, a rule restricts freedom, and interferes with living. We know that Adam and Eve did not think about the consequences of breaking the rules. We need to discover that independence has been given to us, but imposed rules are not a hindrance. Rules are guardrails. In their desire for independence, ignoring the rules meant ignoring the consequences, which could lead to death.
Invincible?
Original sin is the term used to describe what happened during that original fall. It means we prefer independence, to be separate from God. Even now, the concept of not wanting to be in a relationship with God may seem ‘normal’ to many. Why would a secular person choose a relationship with an invisible God?
As one gets older, the prospect of not being invincible develops. When we have a close encounter with death or a severe illness, we come to the understanding: ‘maybe” we could die. Death is something we start to think about, more. I become interested in avoiding death, and having a relationship with God, can help me avoid death. The very second Adam and Eve decided to act out and respond to her concern, they were committed to the fall, to a separation from God. They were no longer invincible.
As soon as we have separation from God – an independent streak of doing things our own way, we develop the possibility that we will do things in excess. When we follow through on an excess (aka temptation), we have the additional issue of ongoing sin. Our temptations and excesses may not be the same as someone else’s, but they will always damage relationships. We can see that an excessive pursuit of things such as alcohol, deceit, lust, envy, or other deadly sins. will damage any relationship.
We can keep the visual images out of it, and consider only the choice: continue to just get by, or seek knowledge. As a young person, many of us remember a sense of invincibility. A sense that we could do anything.
The idea that the fault was more on Eve for making the first move, or on Adam for not stepping up and saying ‘No’ is not relevant. They both fell through on their commitment to having a relationship with God. I would call this a failure in the garden.
A Remedy for Failure
What is the remedy to the failure? We can acquire lessons learned from Adam and Eve.
- Do not be embarrassed by ‘exposing’ your true self to God. He already knows you (1 Cor. 8:3)
- Do recognize that God knows our suffering and uncertainty, and wants to help (Isa. 53:5)
- Not all of us will die. We will be raised again to new life (Romans 6:3-5)
- We will eventually have new bodies (Romans 8:10-11)
The remedy for the fall, this failure in the garden, is to create a lasting relationship with God. The only way this can be done is through accepting the payment provision that God himself made for us when he sent the only-begotten to do the dying for us. Jesus’ suffering, death, and resurrection fixed the failure in the garden and enabled us to have a relationship with God once again (check out my Faith FAQ for more information on developing a relationship with God).
