........But while Adam enjoyed the creation and God rested, a slithering thing wiggled its way into the Garden—a slinking, crawling, creeping thing that the Bible uses as an icon of evil. Understand that the serpent as the icon is not the issue—it is what the serpent is symbolic of—evil—that is significant. When you touch it, it opens up hell's kitchen.
The serpent naturally focused on the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, knowing that it was the key to breaking man's relationship with God. Coming to Eve alone, he said, "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" (Genesis 3:4–5). In essence, the serpent was saying that God was withholding something good from her and would be jealous and envious if she took it, because then she would be like Him. The serpent planted the seed in Eve's mind that God was afraid that if they ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they would know even as He knows, and then they would be like Him. "That's why God made the rule. He's keeping you from becoming gods yourselves!"
Curiosity was aroused by the temptation. Eve stopped and looked. She reflected and talked when she should have fled the scene. Such a beguiling argument! Undoubtedly, Eve had never thought such a thought. The serpent played upon Eve's desire to be like God, twisted it around, and got her to question why the rule was there in the first place. Surely it is a good thing to become like God. It's the same thing we want today—to become like Jesus Christ. But Eve went about a right thing in a wrong way. The oldest trick in the world is to get us to do the right thing in the wrong way.
It's amazing how the enemy still uses the same tricks on us over and over again. He even tried it in the temptation of Jesus during the forty days in the wilderness. In Matthew 4, the Bible states that after Jesus had fasted forty days and forty nights, He was hungry, and it was right for Him to eat. But "when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread" (Matthew 4:3). The fast had ended, and it was not wrong for Jesus to eat, but in this situation it would have been wrong for Jesus to use divine power to accomplish this human need. Satan tempted Jesus to go about doing the right thing in the wrong way. But instead of falling prey to the lie that Eve believed, and that we often believe, Jesus hit the devil with the Word of God and drove him away: "It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God" (v. 4).
All temptations play upon trying to satisfy legitimate needs in illegitimate ways. So we are not wrong to have the need, but we may be wrong with the method we employ to accomplish the need........
Bishop Thomas Dexter Jakes
The serpent naturally focused on the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, knowing that it was the key to breaking man's relationship with God. Coming to Eve alone, he said, "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" (Genesis 3:4–5). In essence, the serpent was saying that God was withholding something good from her and would be jealous and envious if she took it, because then she would be like Him. The serpent planted the seed in Eve's mind that God was afraid that if they ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they would know even as He knows, and then they would be like Him. "That's why God made the rule. He's keeping you from becoming gods yourselves!"
Curiosity was aroused by the temptation. Eve stopped and looked. She reflected and talked when she should have fled the scene. Such a beguiling argument! Undoubtedly, Eve had never thought such a thought. The serpent played upon Eve's desire to be like God, twisted it around, and got her to question why the rule was there in the first place. Surely it is a good thing to become like God. It's the same thing we want today—to become like Jesus Christ. But Eve went about a right thing in a wrong way. The oldest trick in the world is to get us to do the right thing in the wrong way.
It's amazing how the enemy still uses the same tricks on us over and over again. He even tried it in the temptation of Jesus during the forty days in the wilderness. In Matthew 4, the Bible states that after Jesus had fasted forty days and forty nights, He was hungry, and it was right for Him to eat. But "when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread" (Matthew 4:3). The fast had ended, and it was not wrong for Jesus to eat, but in this situation it would have been wrong for Jesus to use divine power to accomplish this human need. Satan tempted Jesus to go about doing the right thing in the wrong way. But instead of falling prey to the lie that Eve believed, and that we often believe, Jesus hit the devil with the Word of God and drove him away: "It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God" (v. 4).
All temptations play upon trying to satisfy legitimate needs in illegitimate ways. So we are not wrong to have the need, but we may be wrong with the method we employ to accomplish the need........
Bishop Thomas Dexter Jakes