The Original Sin - Day 7
“But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear.” Isaiah 59:2
In Genesis 2:16-17 God gave Adam a command and told him of the consequences of disobeying that command. The command was two-fold, a permission and a prohibition. “And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat (the Permission): But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it (the Prohibition): for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. (the Consequence)” Sin corrupts everything and always leads to death. God warned Adam of this because He loved Adam and wanted what was best for him. And what was best would be for Adam to always go to God for His wisdom and direction. That is the relationship of love and trust God wants with all people. If Adam chose to be independent of God and chose to eat what God told him not to, he would die.
What does it mean that Adam would die? The first aspect of death as described in the verse from Isaiah above, is separation from God. Up to this point, Adam had only known fellowship with God. But when Adam sinned, that fellowship was broken. It is spiritual death, the ending of the kind of relationship Adam had with God before he disobeyed. There was nothing Adam could do to repair the damage. The cure could only come from God.
The second aspect of death is physical death, or the death of the physical form of mankind. God said that Adam would be under the penalty of physical death. Ezekiel 18:20 says, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” The penalty for sin is death, the death of the sinner. Upon the death of the body, the soul/spirit would be separated from the body.
But our existence does not end with physical death. When the body dies while in a state of spiritual death, we will experience the third aspect of death, eternal separation from God. That is the final judgement of God, the lake of fire forever. To avoid this and be forever with God, we must be connected to our only life source, God Himself, in the fellowship of that love relationship. For Adam, that will mean that he obeys the command of God, which starts with a love for God.
“Thank you, Father, for your warning to us of the consequences of sin. Keep me far from the temptation to ever turn from You. Amen.”
