Adam and Eve Chose Death Instead of Life
Day 13
by Gini Crawford, MSW
Choosing death
Adam and Eve chose death even though God commanded them not to.
And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die." Genesis 2:16-17 ESV®
We have all dealt with the horror of death, so definitely we have every right to be angry at Adam and Eve. I have dealt with death from my mother dying when I was five, and from other family and friends dying. On my Instagram feed, it is full of people struggling with the certainty of death. Death is always a hard situation to go through, isn't it? God knows how hard death is for us. One of the times we know Jesus Christ cried was when He saw how hard death was on us (John 11:32-38).
Sin brings death
God created Adam and Eve to live in a world that was without death. He made them to have eternal life, but they chose eternal death. God wants us to have eternal life as well, but we choose death too. Did you know you choose death every time you sin, because the result of sin is death? 1 Corinthians 15:56a says, “…the sting of death is sin.” A world with no sin is a world without death. I know it doesn’t make any sense to me why Adam and Eve chose death over life, but when we choose to sin, we are going down the same path that Adam and Eve followed. As it is stated in Romans 6:23a, "For the wages of sin is death..."
Are you are feeling weary, discouraged or even guilt ridden as a Christian because sin seems to control you? Remember God didn't abandon Adam and Eve after their sin but was very much there for them. Take heart, God is there wanting to empower you to follow Him and not sin. Pour out your heart to God. He loves you and will help you triumph over sin. He died for that.
Death described
Death doesn't signify extinction, as is often assumed, but a separation (Isaiah 59:1-2; 2 Thessalonians 1:8-9). This separation refers to spiritual death, which is a separation from God. This spiritual death was immediately apparent in the actions of Adam and Eve, who hid from God after their sin (Genesis 3:6-13). Alongside spiritual death, their physical bodies began the process of aging, ultimately leading to physical death, which is the separation of the soul and spirit from the physical body.
Many common beliefs surrounding death include the idea of just decaying in a box, becoming part of a good universal force or transforming into an angel-like being. However, the Jewish and Christian Scriptures (the Bible) teach the opposite. They teach that death is not the cessation of a person's existence. Physical death is viewed as a temporary separation of the soul and spirit from the body, not the annihilation of the self. This separation is temporary because, in the future, the soul and spirit will be reunited with a new, resurrected body (Psalm 16:9-11; Acts 24:15; 1 Corinthians 15:20-58). Because humans are considered eternal beings from birth, death is often described as "being asleep" (John 11:11-14). What does all this mean? To put it simply, a person will either experience eternal life with God in heaven, or they will exist eternally separated from God in hell.
Did you know you were created to be an eternal being?
Life Application
God is the God of life, not death. Jesus is the source of all life. He is our Creator. Jesus created everything so we could have life, and live life to its fullest. Read Genesis 1:1; John 1:1-4, Colossians 1:15-17. How do these passages enlighten you about Jesus being the Source of life.
God never wanted our destiny to be death. Read Ezekiel 18:23, 32. Does God like death?
A journey form death to eternal life: My uncle Ott would say, "I am just going to a pine box in the ground when I die, so why be in a hurry." He would say this quite often, and the looks he got were priceless as you can imagine. Yet as reality is, he got old and developed Parkinson's disease. Several months before he died, the certainty of death hit him hard, which made him very afraid. He was entirely serious when he started screaming for Jesus to forgive his sins as he rode to the hospital in the ambulance. What happens to us after death (as my uncle Ott realized) is something we do need to take very seriously.
If you are thinking, and it is normal to, "How can I know there is really a god who cares about my death?" God's Word tells the epic account, from Genesis to Revelation, of the loving God Who delivered us from death by His death. (Isaiah 53:4-6; Luke 24:13-32; Revelation 1:5b). Believe in the God Who is the source of life and you will have your sins forgiven and eternal life will be your destiny. What love! Read John 3:16-18 Acts 10:43; 1 Peter 3:18.
Reflect on John 3:16-18.