After Adam and Eve broke God’s law* by eating of the fruit of the tree, everything changed. God came into the garden as he always did. But this time, Adam and Eve ran to hide from him. Now they were ashamed. They did not want God to see them. They were also ashamed to be seen by each other. So, they tried to cover themselves with leaves from the plants in the garden.

 

When they told God what they had done, God was not pleased with them. That was the first time they knew anything other than God’s pleasure. They broke the one law God gave them. Now, they knew what it was like to feel guilt.* They felt shame. And they felt fear.[1]

 

Before they ate the fruit, they had all the food they needed. God gave them trees that he had planted. In the garden, the plants grew. There were no weeds or plants with sharp branches. Adam and Eve cared for the garden, and the work gave them joy. But God was not pleased with what they had done. So, after they ate the fruit, God cursed the soil. Now the soil would not give fruit so easily. Plants with sharp branches would grow. Weeds would grow among the good plants. And Adam would have to work very hard to grow food for his family.

 

Then God spoke a curse upon the snake. He said that the snake would crawl through the dust from that time on. The snake (Satan) and people would no longer be at peace* with each other.

 

God also spoke to the woman. He told her that she would still have many children. But now she would have pain when she had a child. Before, Eve and Adam were at peace with each other. Now they would struggle to see who would be in control. They would now blame one another for problems. And they would try to please themselves rather than please one another.

 

Then God put our first parents out of the garden. They would never be able to go back. And neither would anyone else.

 

Outside of the garden, their bodies would begin to grow old. Now their bodies could become sick. For the first time, they would know what it is to suffer. They would not live on and on. They would begin to die. Their bodies would grow tired. One day, they would die, and their bodies would return to the dust.

 

Now Adam and Eve knew about good and evil* in a new way. But it did not make them like God, as the snake had promised. Adam and Eve had done an evil thing. They had sinned against God. And sin* changed them. They were no longer able to hear God as they did before. Adam and Eve no longer wanted to love and obey God. They no longer thought the way God wanted them to think. They did not want to bow before God and honor* him as the one who created them. They did not care about what God wanted. They only wanted their own way.

 

Adam and Eve sinned. When they sinned, they changed. Because they sinned, they became sinners.* And they would pass this problem on to their children. From now on, people would do sinful things. They would do those sinful things because they were born as sinful people. They would be born with a desire to sin.

 

Soon, Adam and Eve began to have children. And, when they did, their children were born with a desire to do wrong. They were just like their parents. Their first son even hated his brother and killed him. All of Adam and Eve’s children would be born as sinners. And every child born after that would be a sinner too, just like Adam and Eve. As the years went by, the world would be filled with people. And every one of those people would do sinful things, just as Adam and Eve had done. The world did not work the way God had made it to work. The people who lived in the world did not think or act the way God had made them to act. They did not honor God. They became selfish. They did not want God to be in control of their lives. They did not love their neighbors* as much as they loved themselves.

 

So, because of what Adam did, the whole world became a broken place. Before people sinned, they knew God and understood him. After they sinned, they could not understand God in the same way. And they did not want to know God the way they once did. In fact, they no longer wanted to be close to God. Instead, they began to change the way they remembered God. Their minds and hearts* turned against him. They began to do evil instead of good. They even began to make other gods for themselves. They began to worship* the things God made instead of the God who made all things.

 

And the same is true of us. We (and everyone else) were born into a broken world. We are sinners. Like everyone else in the world, we follow our own sinful desires. We do the things that we want to do instead of what God wants us to do.[2] This is true of us and all of the children of Adam. The Scriptures* say it this way:

 

‘There is not one person who is right with God, no one at all. There is no one who understands. There is not one who tries to find God. Everyone has turned away from God. They have all done wrong. Not one of them does what is good. No, not even one.’[3]

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[1] Genesis 3:7-11
[2] Ephesians 2:3
[3] Romans 3:10-13