Everyone knows the fall of mankind began with Adam and Eve. What happened? We know God instructed Adam to tend the Garden, and HE would walk with Adam in the cool of the evening. Adam being full of questions, had God, Himself to answer all his questions and give him council. God was his friend and mentor.  Adam had complete freedom with one exception; God instructed him not to eat from the tree of “The Knowledge of Good and Evil because on that day he would surly die!  The Great Deceiver told Eve, “they would not surly die and they would be like God”. He was able to create a temptation. He made it sound like God was holding something back from them, this created mistrust in God. The truth was they were already like God, created in God’s image and designed to live forever; with dominion over the earth. Adam was supposed to represent God on earth; giving the animals in his care and the future generations a physical image of God’s nature. When they were deceived into disobeying eating the fruit from the tree. They were expelled from the garden, with a whole list of consequences. Have you ever thought that the consequences seem a bit extreme? God gave Adam and Eve free will and God is a forgiving God. Couldn’t God just forgive them and move on?                                             

     God has nothing to hide, like any true friend and mentor when God tells us to do or not to do something, it’s for our benefit not His. Adam let Eve give in to the temptation probably thinking “if she dies it’s not my fault, if she doesn’t, I’ll eat the fruit. They were deceived into using their free will to transfer the authority to determine “good and evil” from God to themselves. They opened a pandora’s box that God has been closing one person’s hart at a time. God is righteous. Adam and Eve became self-righteous and self-justifying. They were now able to reinvent good and evil in a way that would be beneficial to themselves but dangerous to others. Righteousness means “right relationship and equality regardless of social status”. Righteousness went down with the fall and gave rise to the sin nature. Fear and shame entered the world immediately, there were only 2 of them yet they made clothes showing mistrust for each other. Their first born brought selfishness, jealousy, envy and murder into the world by killing his brother. Their grandson killed anyone who opposed him. Bringing pride, violence, oppression, slavery, even sex trafficking as he was the first to have a harem.                                                                    

     Without righteousness the sin nature spiraled out of control. Pride rules, superiority complexes, and the desire to control others, brought wars and conquerors. Everyday we get to choose whether to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or the tree of life! Will we believe our circumstances,  what people say about us or what God says about us?