When
God created the world He intended it to be without sin. “God
saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good” (Gen. 1:31 NRSV). God created Adam and Eve without sin. They did not even know what sin was. These first people spent their days working
in His Garden and walked with Him in the evenings. A sinful world was as unimaginable to Adam
and Eve then as a sinless world is to us now.
What
would it be like right now if there were no sin in the world?
Try
to imagine it:
- No jealousy
- No adultery
- No lying
- No witchcraft
- No hatred
- No murder, etc.
It
is very hard to imagine – isn’t it?
That
is because we have been so exposed to sin it has warped our lives in ways that
make sin seem natural and inevitable.
The evidence of this can be seen in our churches today as they are full
of broken people who live with the consequences of sins every day, from sins
they commit out in the open to those sins they hope to hide from view forever.
Genesis
2:15-17 KJV
“And
the Lord God took the
man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. And the Lord
God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely
eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest
thereof thou shalt surely die.”
Genesis
3:1-6 KJV
Now
the serpent was more subtil
I like how
the AMP bible puts it: more crafty and skilled in deceit
“Now
the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the Lord
God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat
of every tree of the garden? And the
woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the
garden: But of the fruit of the tree
which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it,
neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.
And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: For God doth know that in the day ye eat
thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good
and evil. And when the woman saw that
the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to
be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and
gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.”
When
Adam and Eve disobeyed God they introduced evil into our world. Now
– lest you think you would never have eaten the apple let me ask you this:
Have
you ever lied? (Even just a little lie?)
Yes.
What does that make you?
A liar (Gen. 20:16; Mat. 15:18-20;
John 8:44; Rev. 21:23-27)
Have
you ever used God’s Name in vain?
Yes.
What does that make you?
A blasphemer (Gen. 20:7; Mat. 15:18-20;
Mark 7:22)
Have
you ever hated someone?
Yes.
What does that make you?
A murderer (Gen. 20:13; Mat. 15:18-20;
Mark 7:21)
How
do you think you would stand against the seven other commandments?
Romans
3:20 TLB
“Now
do you see it? No one can ever be made right in God’s sight by doing what the
law commands. For the more we know of God’s laws, the clearer it becomes that
we aren’t obeying them; his laws serve only to make us see that we are
sinners.”
In the US justice system
right now, if you are tried and convicted of a crime you will receive a punishment
that is already pre-set. For instance,
in states without a death penalty, you would have to go to prison for 25 years
to life depending on what the jury recommends and what the judge decides. You could try to throw yourself on the mercy
of the court, “Judge, I know you are good and I feel terrible about what I
did. Could you find it in your heart to
let me go free? I will never do it
again.” Is the judge going to set the
man free?
It is an example of the Judge
of heaven. It is written in the law that
the penalty of sin is death (“The penalty of sin is death…”). Being just our heavenly Judge must follow
through with that punishment. The
difference between the natural judge and our spiritual Judge is that He will
accept any death to pay the penalty. God sent a Savior to deliver us from sin
and its penalty of death (John 3:13-21).
Jesus paid the penalty of our sin and set us free from death (eternal
separation from God and spending forever in hell). All we have to do is recognize our sin is
enough to send us to hell and receive Jesus as Lord and Master of our lives
because He paid the penalty for us.
When Jesus comes again will
He find in you a “false convert”? Are
you ready to face a Holy God on the Day of Judgment? Do you think you are going to heaven? Just ONE sin is enough to send you to
hell. Right now is the time to,”test and
evaluate yourselves to see
whether you are in the faith and
living your lives as [committed] believers. Examine yourselves [not me]! Or do you not recognize this about
yourselves [by an ongoing experience] that Jesus Christ is in you—unless indeed
you fail the test and are
rejected as counterfeit?” -2 Cor. 3:15
Is
Christ in you? Does your lifestyle show
it? Here is a thought written by A. W.
Pink I will leave you to consider: “The first time
[Christ] came to slay sin in men. The second time He will come to slay men in
sin.”
