While reading John Milton’s Paradise Lost, the greatest epic in English literature according to many, I discovered this truly simple yet profound connection between man’s eternal struggle to justify his disobedience with “wisdom”.
Listen to this account of Eve’s temptation by the serpent in the garden…
Serpent:
“Queen of this universe, do not believe those rigid threats of death; ye shall not die; How should ye? By the fruit? It gives you life to knowledge; by the Threat’ner? Look on me, me who have touched and tasted, yet both live, and life more perfect have attained than fate…God therefore cannot hurt ye, and be just;”
Eve:
“In the day we eat of this fair fruit, our doom is, we shall die. How dies the Serpent? He hath eat’n and lives. And knows, and speaks, and reasons, and discerns. Irrational till then. For us alone was death invented? Or to us denied this intellectual food, for beasts reserved…”
Do you see this? Look from a human perspective. God said “eat this fruit and you will die”. The serpent said, “look, I ate it, and I didn’t die…logically speaking, God is a liar”.
Eve reasoned, and from a HUMAN standpoint, the logic was there; so she took a bite, and guess what? She DIDN’T die! And how easy, then, it was to convince Adam that God’s words were incorrect, and that their wisdom seemed, for the moment, to outwit His.
This dreadful, innacurate perception of truth set the whole course of mankind on a downward spiral to death; and Adam and Eve, in their short-sightedness, didn’t even know it.
God works that way. We would do well to comprehend it. He wasn’t a liar, and we know that now. When He said “you will surely die”, He didn’t specify the time.
Just because we disobey and don’t reap immediate consequences (or obey and don’t reap immediate rewards) doesn’t mean God is a liar.
Eve had no business reasoning about anything concerning that tree. There are some things God has said, and that’s that; there is nothing to question or to “apply wisdom” to.
Where God has spoken, leave logic alone. Don’t trust your human wisdom. Don’t trust the immediate consequences. Trust Him and obey.
8 comments
Excellent observation.
I was reading in Malachi a few days ago and this post reminded me of:
3:14-17 You have said, ‘It is vain to serve God. What is the good of our keeping his charge or of walking as in mourning before the LORD of hosts?
Henceforth we deem the arrogant blessed; evildoers not only prosper but when they put God to the test they escape.'”
Then those who feared the LORD spoke with one another; the LORD heeded and heard them, and a book of remembrance was written before him of those who feared the LORD and thought on his name.
“They shall be mine, says the LORD of hosts, my special possession on the day when I act, and I will spare them as a man spares his son who serves him. (RSV)
Specifically, the part about counting unpunished evildoers as actually being blessed was brought to mind.
That is really sobering to me and has caused me to weigh much more carefully my actions and motives. I don’t want to mistake God’s patience with my disobedience as actually being His approval.
This is what I love about you Kelly you challenge me to keep my eyes on God and his ways not my own.
“There are some things God has said, and that’s that; there is nothing to question or to “apply wisdom” to.”
Right on. Right on, Kelly.
My Grandmother used the phrase “that’s not an item for your consideration” – I love the deeper meaning of it, the protective nature, the invitation to not delve into temptation, freeing the heart and the mind for a more worthwhile pursuit.
Isn’t it funny how we think everything is our business? We just HAVE to know the burdensome details, and then complain about how hard it is to know them. (I say we, I mean me, of course 🙂 )
This is so true. Unfortunately we tend to be infected with pragmatism instead of Biblical thinking.
It is definitely NOT a new thing.
“Do not be fooled. For whatsoever a man sows, that He will also reap.” We recently went to a prayer meeting in a home where the husband killed himself in exchange for a shootout with police. The wife and kids love the Lord. During that time, my daughter, Nikki, felt led to tell the little girl what she felt God was telling her to say: that He was proud of how the little girl was doing and that she is God’s princess. The little girl buried her face in her dad’s pillow and cried. The adult in the room gave my daughter a look and remarked that that was what her deceased dad called her. Nikki told me she felt bad that maybe she did something wrong because of the adult’s reaction. We had to go over that it is ALWAYS better to be obedient to the Lord and to face the scorn of man, than to be a people pleaser and to face the scorn of God. I was glad she learned that God is God. Obedience to Him is worth more than life. That rationalization to not be obedient will lead to destruction.
Good Post!
Lucy,
Thank you 🙂
“Oh sweet revelation that has come to me…the love of sudden epiphany!
If you start reading a bunch of poetry don’t be surprised when your speech mysteriously starts to rhyme”
You mean that line is yours? Oh, lovely!