When Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, it opened up doors to the rest of us, which wouldn’t have opened before. We would have remained in a state of innocence, no different in wisdom than the beasts that God told Adam to rule over. Think of it…God creates Adam, who names the beasts, and like beasts, procreates with Eve, having children, and then what? At that point, like the beasts, their only concern is looking for food and searching out a safe shelter.
And it would be that way for generations to come. War? With whom? Commerce? Nothing that would extend beyond the symbiotic relationship between animals that we studied in high school biology. Pollution? With what? Entertainment? People like Jerry Seinfeld would be no different than orangutans, except that like Adam, they rule over the beasts of the earth.
But such was not to be. Adam and Eve did eat the forbidden fruit, and they thus acquired the abstract knowledge of good and evil for its own sake, knowledge which no beasts have. And with that knowledge came the knowledge to deceive, to exploit, to murder, to perform other acts of evil and thus become a threat to God, who commanded man to be fruitful and multiply so that God’s Creation would live on for thousands of generations.
God did not take back man’s knowledge of good and evil, even though He could have, just as surely as he hardened the heart of a pharaoh much later.
Be as it may, though, we have been empowered with knowledge. But throughout the generations, up to the Hebrews being enslaved in Egypt, man had evil in the heart. It wasn’t until the Hebrews appealed to God for help that God made a deal with them…having freed them from bondage, he made an offer to protect them and make them fruitful if they obey the Laws He gave to Moses, which were later condensed and given to the rest of the world by Jesus and his disciples in the form of the first and second great commandments.
But to abide by what God wants, knowing we are capable of evil, requires knowledge and wisdom. So, Proverbs 1:7 says “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.” We were told in the Old Testament to love God with all our heart, soul and mind, but if we should be tempted to doing evil, we have much to fear from God as we have seen the things he did in the Old Testament. We thus need the knowledge and wisdom to know when we would invoke God’s wrath, and when God would be pleased by each of us.
The acquisition of knowledge and wisdom is an individual effort. We cannot rely on others without cause to tell us what is good and what is evil. There are others, not walking on the path of God, who will tell us that things that are evil in the sight of Lord are good, and things that are good in the sight of the Lord are evil.
And then, when it’s time to move on, we wonder why our souls are not at the gate of Heaven, waiting for them to open for us. We wonder why we are still in our flesh six feet under, or why we stand in front of Satan who directs us to the Lake of Fire. We might ask Satan, ‘Why are we here? Have we not done things which others have told us are good things?’ The devil will answer, ‘You fools! You were tricked! Come on in! The more, the merrier!’
Our one defense against being tricked by others in this way, are the Scriptures. 2 Timothy 3:16-17 says, “ALL [, not just some,] Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.”
What do the Scriptures say? Romans 12:1-3 says, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. DO NOT BE CONFORMED TO THIS WORLD, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” So whatever someone tells you, be they a politician or a clergyman, a brother, a neighbor, a stranger, a teacher, an entertainer, you should evaluate in terms of your understanding od the Scriptures to see if what you are being told is good toward showing your love for God and pleasing Him.
And in so doing, as the Scriptures bring to light, we should beware of those whose self-fulfilling ambitions for their own sake seem to burn brighter than their understanding of, and our love for God. 2 Peter 3:15-18 says, “And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.”
Because we each have the capacity for knowledge and wisdom, we who love God would use these toward pleasing Him, so that we need not be the object of His wrath.
And it would be that way for generations to come. War? With whom? Commerce? Nothing that would extend beyond the symbiotic relationship between animals that we studied in high school biology. Pollution? With what? Entertainment? People like Jerry Seinfeld would be no different than orangutans, except that like Adam, they rule over the beasts of the earth.
But such was not to be. Adam and Eve did eat the forbidden fruit, and they thus acquired the abstract knowledge of good and evil for its own sake, knowledge which no beasts have. And with that knowledge came the knowledge to deceive, to exploit, to murder, to perform other acts of evil and thus become a threat to God, who commanded man to be fruitful and multiply so that God’s Creation would live on for thousands of generations.
God did not take back man’s knowledge of good and evil, even though He could have, just as surely as he hardened the heart of a pharaoh much later.
Be as it may, though, we have been empowered with knowledge. But throughout the generations, up to the Hebrews being enslaved in Egypt, man had evil in the heart. It wasn’t until the Hebrews appealed to God for help that God made a deal with them…having freed them from bondage, he made an offer to protect them and make them fruitful if they obey the Laws He gave to Moses, which were later condensed and given to the rest of the world by Jesus and his disciples in the form of the first and second great commandments.
But to abide by what God wants, knowing we are capable of evil, requires knowledge and wisdom. So, Proverbs 1:7 says “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.” We were told in the Old Testament to love God with all our heart, soul and mind, but if we should be tempted to doing evil, we have much to fear from God as we have seen the things he did in the Old Testament. We thus need the knowledge and wisdom to know when we would invoke God’s wrath, and when God would be pleased by each of us.
The acquisition of knowledge and wisdom is an individual effort. We cannot rely on others without cause to tell us what is good and what is evil. There are others, not walking on the path of God, who will tell us that things that are evil in the sight of Lord are good, and things that are good in the sight of the Lord are evil.
And then, when it’s time to move on, we wonder why our souls are not at the gate of Heaven, waiting for them to open for us. We wonder why we are still in our flesh six feet under, or why we stand in front of Satan who directs us to the Lake of Fire. We might ask Satan, ‘Why are we here? Have we not done things which others have told us are good things?’ The devil will answer, ‘You fools! You were tricked! Come on in! The more, the merrier!’
Our one defense against being tricked by others in this way, are the Scriptures. 2 Timothy 3:16-17 says, “ALL [, not just some,] Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.”
What do the Scriptures say? Romans 12:1-3 says, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. DO NOT BE CONFORMED TO THIS WORLD, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” So whatever someone tells you, be they a politician or a clergyman, a brother, a neighbor, a stranger, a teacher, an entertainer, you should evaluate in terms of your understanding od the Scriptures to see if what you are being told is good toward showing your love for God and pleasing Him.
And in so doing, as the Scriptures bring to light, we should beware of those whose self-fulfilling ambitions for their own sake seem to burn brighter than their understanding of, and our love for God. 2 Peter 3:15-18 says, “And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.”
Because we each have the capacity for knowledge and wisdom, we who love God would use these toward pleasing Him, so that we need not be the object of His wrath.
