Eve’s Fall

Genesis 2 ~ The Real Lie Eve Fell For  

Good and evil.  Yes, I’d heard those two words used before.  Two little words used far back in the very beginning.  They first appear at the start of man’s existence…all the way back in the Garden of Eden.  I wasn’t sure what I’d find in this first account of history that would be relevant to my history, but I headed to Genesis to find out.

Beginning to read the account of creation recorded in Genesis 1, I noticed something interesting that again related to my story.  God speaks His Word and creates the heavens and the earth and all that is in them.  Finally God crowns His work with the most marvelous of all, the creation of man.  Then God speaks again, but this time He speaks to His man.  These are, and forever will be, the very first words spoken by God to man.  And what does He say?  Be fruitful!  Two other words I had become quite familiar with.  I might be onto something…so I continued in Genesis 2.

The LORD God planted a garden toward the east, in Eden; and there He placed the man whom He had formed.  Out of the ground the LORD God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing to the sight and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  Genesis 2:8-9 NASB

There they were…those two little words that had led me here.  The same words I’d heard Paul use again and again in Romans 7 as he described the battle that I myself was all too familiar with.  I continued to read.

Then the LORD God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it.  The LORD God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”  Genesis 2:15-17 NASB

From the very beginning the “good and evil” that caused me (and Paul) so much trouble was showing itself a deadly thing to deal with.

The story continues in Genesis 3 as we witness the enemy of God and man coming to deceive Eve into partaking of the forbidden tree.  As we know, Eve and Adam’s disobedience to God’s command had an immeasurable effect.  I was suspicious though about Eve falling for the lie.  The Bible describes the serpent as cunning, crafty, and shrewd.  I wonder if what made his strategy so shrewd was that He tempted Eve with something that appeared to be good.  He told her she would be like God.

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.”  Genesis 3:4-5 NASB

To be like God.  Isn’t that what I was looking for?  I wanted to be as He was.  Be holy for I am holy.  I Peter 1:16  Be imitators of God…. Ephesians 5:1

Yes, Eve thought partaking of the knowledge of good and evil would accomplish that.  And then I realized… so did I.  I was doing the same thing.  I was falling for the same lie.  I thought that I would be able to be like God by knowing the good and the evil in me.  Watching myself and my behavior ever so closely was surely the way to be like Him.  But I had to admit, that knowledge was producing in me the same thing it did in them.

What was true for man then is true for us now.  Partaking of the knowledge of good and evil produces no life.  That knowledge only brings death, just as God said it would.   Let’s not allow Eve’s fall to be ours.   Eve thought it would make her like God.  We’ve thought the same thing, and we’ve gotten the same result.  Now, as then, the result is a curse…but you might be surprised to realize the distinct nature of that curse.

….My Story continues here