FROM THE PULPIT
What was the first recorded sin?
What was the first RECORDED SIN? Most people will say when Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit in The Garden of Eden. But actually it wasn’t! True enough it was the first sin committed by human beings but it wasn’t the first recorded sin. In Genesis 3 we find that God had placed Adam in a beautiful garden—this garden was probably truly heaven on earth (beautiful trees and plants, peaceful animals, no insects, no thorns, crab grass, etc.). God had given Adam and Eve one commandment—imagine having only one commandment to follow! That commandment was not to eat of a certain tree located in the middle of the garden… The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. They had the run of the place—the best fruit imaginable and only one commandment to keep. I’ve often wondered how long Adam and Eve had the run of this garden before they finally ate of the one forbidden tree: was it a week, a month or thousands of years. [Isaiah 14:12ff gives an event that seems to have occurred before Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit. We find a short statement about a being that is cast out from the presence of God. Many Bible scholars believe these verses are actually talking about the downfall of Satan or Lucifer. If so, this sin was committed before the Garden of Eden.]
What follows next is the first recorded sin— the serpent was craftier than any other animal (this leads me to believe that man and animals could communicate with each other and understand each other because Eve wasn’t upset at a talking snake (most people I know do not care to tarry around a snake (serpent)… period!). This brings us to the first recorded Sin—when Satan (disguised as a serpent) LIED to Eve and said, “You won’t die….” (Genesis 3:4 NLT). [Satan inserted one little word to what God had said that turned the statement into a LIE!
Perhaps this is why God hates lies so much. Satan deceived the crown of God’s creation with a LIE which in turn brought down the whole human race. When I was in college I worked in a dry cleaning shop. My co-worker, a lady, had a favorite expression when she caught someone lying to her. She would say, “I hate lies and God don’t love them.” It’s a shame we live in a world where it seems that it is more and more difficult to tell truth from a LIE. I suppose that is why there is such an onslaught against God and “His Ten Rules For Living” better known as the Ten Commandments. State Capitols, court houses and even schools have been forced to remove them from their premises with the cry of “Separation of Church and State.” Destroy those ten simple rules and you destroy the groundwork of real freedom and you create a world where anything goes and TRUTH is whatever you want it to be… believe anything you want as long as you are sincere about it… even a LIE!
Jesus summed it up this way when talking about Satan in John 8:44 “You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desire. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.” [NIV]. When people accept lies for truth, they are becoming the children of the devil just as Jesus said they would. In so doing they “carry out your father’s (Satan) desire… murder, adultery, dishonoring your parents, stealing, etc. all of which are rampant in the world in which we live.