P.O. Box 640109

El Paso, TX 79904

30 July, 2000

Dear Children,

Well glory be to God! Have we ever been digging in the books for this one! I mean I almost feel like I’ve been back to school. Because you see in order to prepare for this week’s message, we’ve had to do a pretty in-depth study of God’s perfectly designed human body... in order to figure out how Satan managed to get his dirty rotten sin into it. Understand? But anyway, not wanting to waste any more of our valuable time with the small talk, let’s give God the credit for what we’re about to receive (Thank You Jesus!) and just get-it-on-down with the program.

Now just in case you missed the kick-off sermonet for this series, you might want to start off at the beginning by reading How Do You Want Your Fire... Now Or Later? Because for this week we’re going to continue right on into part II of this "water and fire baptismal message" with Once Upon A Time, God’s People Were Perfect!

So where in the world do we start this one? Well how about in the beginning! Because you see "once upon a time", something like 6000 years ago to be exact, God Almighty spent six (6) whole days doing a whole lota creating. In fact it was actually on the very last day (#6), of God’s very intense work schedule, that He did everything documented in Genesis 1:24-31: "And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so. And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them."

Wow! What a Mighty God we serve! I mean just in case you didn’t catch on to it, the way God created everything (which included the man and woman) was by speaking it all into existence. In fact if you’ll start with the very first verse of Genesis chapter 1, and count up how many times you read "and God said" throughout the chapter, you’ll see that God "spoke it" a total of nine (9) different times throughout the six (6) days of creation before it was all "said and done". And even though this unimaginable difficult job of creating an entire perfect universe (and everything in it) was only six (6) days of effortless work for God Almighty, were going to eventually see how man’s "one little old sin" required God to work for thousands of years and sacrifice the life of His very own Perfect Son in order to correct for it.

But let’s not get ahead of the story. Because up until now, we only know that day six (6) of God’s creation produced a pair of "squeaky clean" (sinless) human beings who were created for a very special purpose. And by reading on just a little further into the Word of God we’ll get a few more of the details of their very perfect lifestyles: "And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree in the which is the fruit of a tree yeilding seed; to you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so. And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day."

Now even though the man, the woman, and the animals were all perfectly created living breathing creatures, designed to eat nothing but fruits, nuts, and herbs, that’s about as far as their created similarities went. Because when you take it on down to the bottom line basics, it was only the man (and later on the woman too) who actually had the benefit of being created through a very special design process called "made in the image of God". You see the humans got it but the animals didn’t! So just how much difference do you figure this "image" thing can make when it comes to God’s living breathing creatures?

Well I’m so very glad you asked, because the answer to that one kinda like takes us on into a full-blown discussion of the Holy Trinity of God. You see even though Almighty God is only One God, He is in the form of Three Persons; The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit. And the best way I know to describe it is that The Father is the "Soul" of God’s Three-In-One Body (the One Who makes all the decisions and gives all the commands), with The Son being the "Flesh And Bone Body" of God’s Three-In-One Body (the One Who sees to it that the commands of His Soul get carried out), and of course The Holy Spirit being the Invisible Power Source of God’s Three-In-One Body (His Spirit) Who provides the Energy to get it all done.

And seeing how us humans are all made in the image of God, that means we have a soul, a body, and a spirit too. But even though God the Father has considered us worthy enough to be made "in His image", we are by no means what you could consider gods. Because in His ultimate wisdom, God the Father kinda like "overlooked on purpose" one little minor detail in His perfect design of us humans. You see God is "All Good" and He can likewise "do no wrong". In fact just to put it in the plain and simple, God Almighty cannot sin! That’s the way He is but that’s not the way we are! Because when the Almighty God made Adam, He created him with the ability to do either right or wrong. Adam had what you call a "free choice" in the matter when it came down to picking and choosing what he wanted to do!

So now that we’ve seen the big picture of God’s wonderful and perfect design of man, this is as good a place as any to pick up on a few of the nitty gritty details of just how it was all done. Because by reading on into Genesis 2:7-17, we find: "And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. And the LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil... And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die."

OK, now it’s right about here that the story get’s extremely complex. Because you see, as we have just read, what came about from the "dust of the ground" and God’s "breath of life" was a full-grown fully-developed man called Adam. This was God’s perfect man, made sinlessly perfect in the image of God with a body, a soul, and a spirit. And in order to understand how the sin of Satan eventually messed up this perfect man of God, we’ve got to first of all understand how it was designed to "work perfectly" in the first place.

So what do you say we start it all off by looking at Adam’s body?... biologically speaking! Well from the hairs on his head to the toenails on his feet (and everything in-between), Adam consisted of nothing less than 75,000,000,000 itty bitty little things called cells. He was a bunch of microscopic living organisms (cells) that were all fit together to make one more perfect body. And even though there were over 200 different types of these cells in Adam’s body, they all worked together very nicely to do exactly as God had instructed them to do (through design). Because you see while the cells in the skin were working to keep the water in his body and the bugs and viruses out (60% of Adam’s body weight was water), the cells in the muscles and bones were allowing his body to move about at the same time they were protecting his internal organs from damage.

Those were the cells that gave Adam his basic shape and outward appearance. But what about the ones that were more concerned with his insides? Well his respiratory system cells (lungs and breathing passage) allowed him to breath in oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide, while the cells of his digestive system (mouth, esophagus, stomach, and intestines) turned food and drink into useful energy. And after bringing all this great life giving stuff into Adam’s body (the oxygen from the respiratory cells and the energy from the digestive cells), it was up to the circulatory system cells (heart, blood vessels, and blood) to make sure all the other cells got their fare share of the loot. So by means of a very special liquid called blood, the life-giving oxygen and energy was circulated throughout the entire body.

Now even though the blood cells were very busy delivering oxygen and energy to the rest of Adam’s cells, that ain’t even all they were doing on their round trip journey through his body. You see right about the time those blood cells were turning loose of "the good stuff", they were also picking up a load of "the bad stuff". It was kinda like having the pizza delivery man take out the trash after he’s handed over the food. But anyway, after Adam’s blood cells handed over the food and picked up the trash, it was the excretory system cells (the kidneys and their components) that kinda like took the trash on out to the dumpster.

So now what do you think about Adam’s "dust of the ground" and "breath of life" body? Pretty amazing huh? Well catch your breath because we’re only just getting started. You see the cells that we’ve just covered are nothing in comparison to the one’s coming up next. Because the truth of the matter is that Adam’s nervous system cells were what made all the rest of his cells do what they did in the first place. I mean Adam’s nerve cells were what you might want to consider the "master control computer system" of his body. They were awesome! And not only did they make up the majority of the cells in his brain and spinal chord, but they also made a pretty good showing in his skin, muscles, and internal organs too. They were everywhere! And even though all of Adam’s nervous system cells played a very important part in the critical operations of his body, what we’re going to see very shortly is how the ones responsible for his smelling, hearing, seeing, tasting, and touching were of a really super critical nature.

But anyway, right along with the cells of Adam’s nervous system were the cells of his endocrine system. Now even though the name’s just a little bit tough to remember, in the plain and simple it means the cells in Adam’s body that produced his hormones. And just in case you haven’t had the opportunity of studying up on what hormones can do, well, let me warn you in advance they are some pretty powerful little critters. I mean the best way I know how to describe them is by comparing them to the nerve cells we’ve just discussed. You see the "master control computer system" in Adam’s body actually used two different methods to tell the other cells what to do. In one method the nerve cells acted very much like the wires used to connect up our telephones (the command message could only be sent where there was a wire [nerve cell]), whereas in the other method the hormones acted more like our modern wireless telephones (the message could be sent anywhere in the body). And even though these hormones were chemically sent out through Adam’s blood supply, it was this same blood that actually went out to each and every cell within his body. So because of this very elaborate communications system, Adam’s master control computer system was able to have total control over all the cells in his body.

And last but not least on our list are the cells of Adam’s reproductive system. Now these cells ought to be pretty easy to understand, because they were the ones that helped Adam (and Eve) to do what God had command them to do back in chapter 1, verse 28: "And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth..." You see it was these reproductive cells that not only gave Adam his male sex organs, but it also gave Eve her female ones too. And likewise, it was only a little while later that Adam and Eve, through this "God designed" male-female relationship, did exactly as they were commanded to do by producing more little Adams and Eves... in the form of babies.

So that in a nutshell was what Adam’s body was all about. That was the first part of the three part Adam, with the second part being his soul. And the one drawback to looking at Adam’s soul is that it’s not "seen" quite as easily as his body was. Because you see Adam’s soul was the "invisible" part of him that not only made the decisions, but also commanded his body to carry them out. It was Adam’s soul that kinda like took everything he thought, everything he felt (emotionally and physically), and put them all together to produce the thing that he wanted to do (his will). That’s what his soul did!

And that takes us to the third and final part of Adam, his spirit. Now this one’s easy enough to understand once you’ve got a proper understanding of part two. Because seeing how Adam’s soul processed all his thoughts and feelings to produce the thing that he eventually did (his will), it was his spirit that actually allowed him to be plugged into the spirit world and receive "a little help from his Friend" in making those decisions. You see the decision making process that Adam’s soul had to perform was a tough one to say the least. And because of it, God the Father was kind enough to include a "spirit option" in Adam’s design that allowed him to be personally plugged into God’s Spirit (the Holy Spirit) at all times. So you see whenever it came time to make the decisions, Adam would always have the right information to make the right choice.

Almost sounds a little too easy doesn’t it? Well come to think of it, there was just one other little catch to this "spirit option" thing. You see not only did it have the capability of receiving Good information from God’s Holy Spirit, but, given the wrong type of circumstances, it could also receive the bad stuff too. But not wanting to get too deep into the negative side of things quite yet, what do you say we pick-it-back-up where we left off with: "And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die."

Because you see after God took the dust of the ground and formed the body of Adam, He then gave him a perfect living soul by breathing into his nose the Perfect Breath of Life (God’s Breath). That was the beginning of the perfectly sinless man called Adam. But it was immediately thereafter that God programmed into Adam’s control unit (the brain) the one and only thing that he must remember not to do in order to remain the perfectly sinless man that God had just created. It wasn’t very complicated, it wasn’t very hard, the one and only thing that his body was programmed not to do was to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil!

Now wouldn’t that have been nice? I mean can you even imagine a time when it was only possible to do one bad thing in life? Adam could have done absolutely anything he wanted to do in the Garden of Eden, with the exception of taking a bite out of the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and it would have all been well and good in the eyes of God. So Adam had it made in the shade with pink lemonade... until he got just a little bit lonely. Well even though Adam was lonely, God had already planned it out in advance the way that it was going to be, and it looked as though this was the perfect time to make it all happen.

Because what followed next was: "And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him. And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof. And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him. And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh. And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed." (Genesis 2:18-25)

Alright, so Adam got himself a wife! And if you’ll take a careful look at the way God did it, you’ll see that Eve didn’t even get the same kind of attention that Adam got during his "first of a kind" creation. I mean the way Eve came into existence was what you might call a "slice-it and dice-it" type of operation. And even though some women libbers will probably call "foul" on God because of His favoritism to Adam, the truth of the matter is that God Almighty doesn’t waste His time recreating something that’s already been made perfect the first time. So instead of starting it all over from the get-go, God simply took one of Adam’s perfectly sinless ribs and made Eve. And even though we wont get into the human genetics quite yet, the reason that God Almighty was able to do what He did was because of the fact that He had already programmed Eve into Adam’s cells. God made the very first perfectly sinless woman by taking cells from the very first perfectly sinless man. "And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed."

So just what in the world do you figure that last statement was all about? I mean how did this thing about being "naked" just all of the sudden pop into the picture? Well it’s what you might want to call one more piece of the puzzle in understanding sin. But seeing how we’re not ready to discuss that one quite yet, let’s continue on along with: "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 you 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." (Genesis 3:1-6)

Now as I hope you were able to see from those Scriptures, what took place in the Garden of Eden, in the presence of one more good-looking fast-talking snake, was that Adam and Eve, somehow, someway, both managed to do the one and only thing in the world that God had said they must not do. They sinned!!! That was the exact moment in time when God’s "very good" perfectly sinless creations just all of the sudden became "very bad". So the question is, how do you figure it all happen?

Well I’m so very glad that you asked, because this is that moment in time we’ve all been waiting for. We’re now going to see how Satan’s sin entered God’s "once perfect" creations called Adam and Eve. And probably the best place to start off this discussion is with the part about the snake (serpent). Because without getting into a whole lotta details, the snake was really only a living breathing animal that took on the job of being a go-between (mediator) for Satan. He kinda like helped Satan do the dirty deed on God’s very own perfect couple. But before continuing on with that train of thought, we really need to go back to the beginning for just a few more of the missing pieces.

You see in the beginning, Satan was the "top dog" angel in the army of God. His name was Lucifer, and he was the number one angel among the ranks... that is until he started his uprising to overthrow God Almighty. Now if you really stop and think about it, that was what you call one more dumb and stupid move. I mean can you even imagine a created being thinking they have more power than the One Who created them? Well Lucifer did, and he even managed to convince one-third of God’s angels to think the same thoughts. So because of that very unnatural uprising against God, Lucifer’s name (God’s light-bearer) was promptly changed to Satan (God’s enemy), and he, along with the rest of his rebellious crew, were very quickly deported out of Heaven and down to earth.

So just what in the world do you figure a bunch of rebellious angels would find to do down here on earth? I mean after all, angels are only spirit beings created by God to deliver His messages to us earthly humans. And if these spirit messengers weren’t going to deliver God’s messages, just what do you figure they were going to do with all their spare time? Would you believe exactly what Satan had just finished doing through the aid of that super slick serpent?

Satan wanted to be God, and without a doubt that’s what this simple little "fruit eating episode" was all about. Because you see the minute God’s perfect couple decided to obey Satan instead of Father God, he became their god. One minute Adam and Eve were saved, but the next minute they were as lost as a white goose in a snow storm. It’s as simple as that! In fact while we’re on the subject of "once saved but not always saved", this is as good a place as any to toss in the Scripture from John 10:27-30: "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand. I and my Father are one."

Now according to today’s Christian interpretation of that Scripture, Adam and Eve should still be living in the Garden of Eden today. But they ain’t! And seeing how God’s Word is The Truth for all eternity (yesterday, today, and forever), wouldn’t you think this same Scripture should have applied to the "newly wed couple" too? Because without a doubt, Adam and Eve were made perfect in the image of God to live forever (they were saved), they wanted nothing more than to obey God’s one and only command in their lives (they were following God), and they were never actually "plucked" out of the hand of God. That’s the way it was, but yet they still blew it all after getting tricked into doing what they had been told not to do. So seeing how they were once saved only to become lost, we should be able to conclude (based on the Scripture) that this dastardly deed done by Satan can not be classified as "plucking".

Because you see in order for something to be plucked, it has to be grabbed and pulled with a violent snatching force. And since it was only a few soft spoken words that enticed the "perfect couple" to give up their promise of everlasting life, that’s the very good reason why this "eternal security" Scripture doesn’t even apply. It’s what you call one of those legal technicalities. Satan got what he wanted, through a few soft spoken words, and according to the law of God it was all within his legal rights to do so. There was absolutely no plucking involved when Satan got the sinless couple to sin. In fact the deception that Satan played on God’s "perfect couple" (through the serpent) can best be described as "bewitching" to say the least. Satan, through his angelic God-given spiritual powers, was able to miraculously help Eve "see" something to be good that she actually knew to be bad. It’s what you call Basic Witchcraft #101. In fact Eve was so overwhelmingly convinced that the bad was good that she convinced her husband to try it too.

So just how do you figure Satan’s "bewitching power" was ever able to override Adam and Eve’s sinlessly perfect "master control computer system"? How was he able to get them to sin? Well seeing how this is such a very complex issue, what do you say we chase down a few more of the facts from Matthew 5:27-30, "Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery: But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell."

Now even though Jesus was dealing specifically with the sin of adultery, this Scripture really applies to each and every sin in Satan’s little black book. Because you see regardless of whatever sin it might be, Satan still uses the same "bewitching power" to convince his victim to commit the sin in the first place. And the one very important fact that Jesus brought out in this Scripture is that once the "act of sin" has seriously been considered in the mind, then that "thought of sin" is considered to be sin. In other words once a person allows their mind to dwell on the thought of sin, then it’s at that point in time when God Almighty considers it a sin. So how in the world do you figure it all works? What do you figure goes on inside the human body that all of the sudden makes the thought of sin actually sin?

Well the answer to that one is coming up pretty soon. But, in the meantime, what do you say we return to the scene of the crime and dig-up a few more cold hard facts? Because you see as well as I can remember, it was when we last saw the serpent that he was doing one more fine job of starting up a friendly little chit-chat session with Adam’s little woman. In fact to be perfectly honest with you, it was his introductory "one liner" of "Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?" that kinda reminded me of the proverbial "Nice weather we’re having today!" I mean what a despicable way to start off a conversation... but by Jobe it worked!

You see in order for Satan’s "bewitching powers" to work, he’s first of all got to get his victim to focus in on the potential sin without setting off any alarms. Now even though that might sound easy enough to do, the bewitching truth of the matter is that it’s gotta be done very very carefully. Because if you’ll think back in your past, back to the "days of innocence" when bad was really bad, you should be able to remember how it only took a miniscule thought of "the bad thing" in order to make your body go into one more crazy fearful fit. I mean can you even remember the feeling of your heart pounding all the way up in your head? How about those sweaty palms, or maybe the ice water running through your veins? And of course by no means could we leave out the cotton mouth, dilated pupils, and ringing in the ears. These are all a part of God’s "emergency warning system" for the human body which Satan must overcome in order to score a sin.

So do you figure Satan’s first question to Eve might have set off any alarms? Well even though we don’t have very much detailed information to go by, the fact is that Satan never even mentioned the subject of the "bad tree" in his initial question. He kinda like came in the back door by directing Eve’s attention to all the "good trees" in the garden first. Ain’t he sneaky! And of course it was Eve’s reply back to the "talking snake" that went something like this: "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 you die."

Now over the years, there’s been a few questions thrown out as to why "Eve said" that "God said" that by her just "touching" the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden she would die. Because it was back when God first gave the order for Adam "not to eat of the fruit" that nothing was ever mentioned about touching. The only word used in the account of Genesis chapter 2, verse 17, was most often translated as "eat". However, seeing how each Hebrew word used in the Old Testament writings most often had many different and varied meanings for the same word, who are we to say that God didn’t intend for it to mean "anything involved in the process of eating"?

You see what I’m getting at is that by taking a closer look at the Hebrew word for "touch", we can see that it’s within the existing translations to mean "the process of reaching out and touching". So by careful analysis it becomes pretty obvious that the first part of the "eating process" consist of "telling the mind to extend the arm to touch the fruit". And once you get to the touching part, it’s only a matter of grabbing, pulling, exerting into mouth, biting, chewing, and swallowing before the eating process is all complete! So for anybody who knows anything about sin, it’s pretty common knowledge that you don’t want to get close to Satan’s temptation if you intend on not sinning.

And based on those interesting additions to the King James translation, it is my belief that even though the Word of God was only translated to mean "eating", Adam and Eve’s bodies were fully programmed by God to recognize and understand Satan’s bewitching step by step process of sin ("...whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery..."). And assuming that this was the case (I mean why wouldn’t God give them the whole Truth?), then it only makes sense that God’s emergency warning system did one of those last minute previews of what not-to-do just as Eve started thinking about doing it.

In fact to sorta like reinforce my stand on the matter, I believe Matthew 15:10-20 does a very nice job of explaining it further: "And he called unto the multitude, and said unto them, Hear, and understand: Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man... Do not ye yet understand, that whatsoever entereth in at the mouth goeth into the belly, and is cast out into the draught? But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies: These are the things which defile a man: but to eat with unwashen hands defileth not a man."

You see even though Jesus was only concerned about "ceremonial hand washing" in this Scripture, the basic idea of not being able to actually "eat" sin (what defileth) still holds true with the "fruit of sin" too. The sin ain’t in what you eat, but it is in what you do (the complete process of disobeying God, which even includes the thought of doing it). So Adam and Eve’s perfect bodies were completely programmed with "all the skinny" on this life threatening sin, and therefore Eve knew exactly what not to do when it came to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But, seeing how Satan was (is) one more persistent little devil, he kept right on pushing his hypnotically bewitching wares with the following overflowing crock of lies: "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."

Now as we’ve already seen in the previews, those were Satan’s magically bewitching words that convinced Eve to consider his very honest proposal just one more time. And of course the thing that happened next was the following real life earthshaking disaster: "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,..."

You see what had just happened was everything that Satan needed in order to complete his bewitching process on Eve. Because by going back to the Hebrew once again, we find that the word for "saw" ("And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food...") could mean "to experience something intimately by touch". So Eve took just one little questionable look at the fruit, which led to just one little questionable touch of the fruit, which led to the following horrifying conclusion of their story: "she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat."

In the blink of an eye it all became a thing of the past. Satan got his way, while the newly wed couple lost theirs. What a terrible way to begin a honeymoon, and what an even more terrible way to start off life! But that’s the way it was, and that’s the reason Romans 5:12 become a reality: "Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned..."

So because of Adam’s "one little old sin", we are all sinners. And now that you’ve got the bottom line on how it all happened, do you really understand how it all happened? I mean how can the act of picking and eating some forbidden fruit just all of the sudden make those perfect human cells imperfect? How in the world do you figure this sin thing works?

Well I’m afraid you’ll have to wait just a little bit longer to get the answer to that one. Because you see this is as good a place as any to shut-it-on-down until the next time. But until then, please keep in mind that the Power to resist Satan’s alluring temptations to sin can only be found by Keeping The Faith In Jesus!!!

Love,

Dad (Bruce Hallman)