The Original Sin

Well this will be a short message, first because I don’t have much time, and secondly because it doesn’t take much to say what needs to be said on this topic. The first sin is the same as modern sin, and has really been the only sin throughout history. All other ‘sins’ are really just the symptoms of the big one. Let’s look at what happened, and that will tell the story: “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" (Gen. 3:1-6). So what happened here? Had God told them not to eat of that tree, and that they would die if they did? Of course he did. Eve knew that but the serpent simply called God a liar, and she found a reason to believe his words instead of God’s. That is obviously what happened, and that is all that happened; except of course that she acted on what she chose to believe, and convinced Adam to act with her. She believed a lie, and disbelieved God, and that was the original sin. That is still the sin that underlies all sins - unbelief.

Now let’s note that Eve did not believe that God wasn’t real. She still believed in God, but she did not believe God. We know that the serpent was influenced by Satan, and we can be sure that Satan is still feverishly working to keep the whole world in unbelief, and to get God’s people to disbelieve God even as Eve did. Once someone receives the Spirit of God into their life there is no guesswork about whether God is real or not, but the spirits of this world will do all they can to get you to disbelieve something that is true about God. And you cannot disbelieve something true about God, without accepting a lie from the devil in exchange. That’s just the way it is. That’s why it is so important that we learn the Bible and seek God to know his Spirit. Jesus said, "He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith…" (Rev. 2:7). Whatever the Spirit is saying, that is the word of God; and the word of God can always be confirmed and explained through the scriptures. When we believe God’s truth, and act on it, then we will bear the fruit of his Spirit (Gal. 5:22,23). Even as Eve believed the serpent’s lie, and acted on it, and brought forth the fruit of sin. Satan has authored and ministered so much confusion to God’s people today, that all we see is division, weakness, suspicion, fear, and all manner of disorder. He has indeed fulfilled the apostle Paul’s concern that he expressed to the Corinthians: "But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ" (II Cor. 11:3). We need to get back to believing the simplicity of God’s love, power, peace, and holiness; the things we received when we received his Spirit (Rom. 1:16; Rom. 5:5; Rom. 14:17,18). Anything apart from these things is confusion, and is not of the "faith that was once delivered to the saints;” and can only constitute a lie (Jude 1:3). My friend, forsake complicated religious intellectualism, that only distorts the beauty and pureness of God’s divine truth, which is his Spirit of love and holiness (Jn. 16:13; Rom. 1:4; Rom. 5:5). Amen.