What is the one basic problem we all face? What is the one issue with which we must all come to grips? To answer those questions, we must go back to the beginning of human history—to our first parents, Adam and Eve. From their story we will establish a basic truth that concerns every one of us.
Why must we go back to this story? Because we are all descended from Adam. Many contemporary Christians may not believe the Genesis account of the beginnings of the human race. But I do. As a philosopher, I had studied many theories about the origin of man and the universe. But when I turned to the Bible and read it with faith, I discovered it did something no other theory had ever done: it explained me to myself.
I discovered what kind of a creature I was, the different elements in my personality, why I behaved the way I did, and why I felt the pressures I did. This understanding all came to me from Genesis and the description of the creation of Adam and Eve. The Genesis account is a very exact, accurate description of the origin of our human race.
The Bible talks about the sons of Adam in many places, even though it is not obvious in the English translations. Always bear in mind that the truth of the Bible and the hope of salvation are all directed toward Adam and his descendants. For some amazing and incredible reason, God has a special concern for Adam and his descendants. I sometimes wonder why God should bother Himself about this particular area of His creation. However, God’s concern is evident. The Bible reveals it, and I believe it.
OUR PROBLEMS BEGIN
In Genesis 3:1-7, we read the description of the fall of Adam and Eve.
Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden?’” (Genesis 3:1)
A friend of mine once commented that all the problems of humanity would have been avoided if Eve had only said to the serpent, “I never talk to strange serpents without my husband.” That would have been the right answer, but Eve didn’t say that—so here we are today.
And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die’” (Genesis 3:2-3).
Can you see how unwilling Eve was to admit that there was something they could not do? She said, “Well, we may eat of all the trees of the garden, but there’s just one exception.” How reluctant we are to acknowledge our own limitations!
Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings (Genesis 3:4-7).
DISCREDITING THE SCRIPTURES
In these brief verses, we have the essence of what we need to know about ourselves, about our problems, and how to avoid them. The serpent, who was an incarnation of Satan, had one supreme objective: to remove Adam and Eve from their foundation in the Word of God. The enemy knew that if he could do that, they were at his mercy.
It is important for us to realize that whoever we are as believers, the supreme objective of Satan is to undermine and discredit the Scripture. When the enemy has brought us to a place where we no longer believe and accept the authority of Scripture, we are sunk. At that point, we have already become casualties.
Satan always proceeds in a very subtle way. The Bible says he was craftier than any of the beasts of the field. He took two approaches. First, he questioned the Word of God: “Has God really said?” As soon as Eve entertained that question, she was already defeated. When she engaged Satan on that topic, he immediately followed up with a denial: “You will not surely die.”
Satan has never changed his tactics. He operates today in precisely the same way because it works and his tactics have brought him endless success. Therefore, take it as a warning for your own life. Never be moved away from your faith in the Scripture as the Word of God.
The deceiver usually will not start by attacking God’s Word directly. He will start by questioning it. Simply questioning the accuracy of the Scriptures is what he did in most of the Protestant European nations in the late 1800s. As a result, today we have professing churches and ministers in those nations, and in America as well, who are total unbelievers. He did not start by denying God’s Word; he started by questioning it. If you and I entertain the enemy’s question about the Word, we will have the same problems as Eve.
A DOWNWARD PROGRESSION
Eve’s response can be summed up in three words, all of which happen to begin in English with the letter “D.” First, she doubted the Word of God. Then, having doubted it, she disbelieved it. Having disbelieved it, she disobeyed it. Those were the three downward steps—to doubt, to disbelieve, and to disobey. When she disobeyed it, she was lost. That was the point where she was totally defeated.
I want to emphasize again that this process is exactly the same with us. No matter who we are and where we have come in the Lord, if we take those three downward steps—to doubt, to disbelieve, and to disobey—we will be just as lost as Eve. If we let that happen, Satan will have won a major victory in our lives.
Satan used a very subtle form of persuasion on Eve. First, he gave her cause to distrust God’s goodness. Then he suggested that she and Adam could be like God. The clincher he delivered was his suggestion they could be like God without depending on God.
INDEPENDENT OF GOD?
What I have just stated is the essential truth we must understand if we wish to progress in our relationship to God. The problem was not that Adam and Eve wanted to be like God. Actually, that is not a bad motivation. However, they wanted to be like God without depending on God.
Satan always begins by discrediting God’s character. He implied God was a tyrant. “He’s put you in this beautiful garden. True, it’s a lovely garden. You have everything you need, and you’re doing wonderfully. But…think what it would be like if you were free—if you could just do whatever you wanted. What if you could find your own answers, without having to depend on God? God is treating you like second-class citizens. He’s not treating you like the important people you are. You deserve more than that.”
So Eve responded, driven by the motivation to be like God but without depending on God. The root error Adam and Eve experienced was their desire to be good on their own—independent of God. Their motivation was not bad, but they could not be like God without depending on God. Adam and Eve are our first parents from whom we inherited our spiritual nature, which is why we must begin with them.
THE ROOT OF OUR PROBLEM
When the Bible talks about “the old man” it is not referring to the old European man, the old African man, the old Jewish man, or the old Gentile man. This reference in Scripture is taking us back beyond all that to our first parents—to the first man, the first Adam (see 1 Cor. 15:45, 47). Adam never had children until he was a rebel—and every descendant of Adam from that day to this has been born with rebellion inside. Always remember, the essence of rebellion is the desire to be independent of God. What’s more, may I suggest to you that this desire to be independent from God is actually the root of all your problems.
This is the reality you and I must face—our desire to be independent of God is the root of humanity’s problem. It is my problem and, likewise, it is yours.
In the course of ministry and counseling, I have met people who have traveled halfway around the world to get away from some problem in their lives. I often end up telling them, “You can’t run from your problem, because you take your basic problem with you wherever you go. It is inside you and you can’t run away from it. You can travel all the way around the world—but you take it with you.”
This basic problem we all face is what the Bible calls “the flesh,” “the carnal nature,” or “the old man.” It is our desire to function independent of God. As you read this, you may suddenly realize you may never have really been confronted with this issue. If you never have, I pray that the Holy Spirit will help you confront it head on as you read on in this book.
INDEPENDENCE THROUGH RELIGION
There are many different ways of being independent of God. One of the most common is religion. Without realizing it, most religious people use their religion to make them independent of God. I believe this is a major issue of Judaism today. Judaism does lip service to the Law of Moses, but in actual fact it uses the Law as a basis for not depending on God.
The same is true of multitudes of Christians as well. Many have a legalistic religion with many different rules. The truth is—they are actually not depending on God; they are depending on their rules. As a result, their hearts become alienated from God. Unfortunately, the more religious they become the worse their problem. Never imagine that religion is a solution to the world’s problems. In truth, I think most of the major problems in the world have been caused by religion.
OUR BASIC SUPPOSITION
The solution to this problem of the sin of independence is really quite logical. Before I was a preacher, I was a logician. One aspect of the Bible I love is that it is the most logical book I have ever encountered. You do not have to feel intellectually inferior for believing the Bible. The most logical treatise I have ever encountered is the Epistle to the Romans.
People think the Bible is illogical because they do not start with the basic presuppositions or fundamental facts. Logic is like a computer. The results given by a computer are no more accurate than the information you feed into it. If you feed error into a computer you will get a well computed error coming out of it! It is very accurate, but it is wrong.
In Part 1 of this book, we are dealing with the basic presuppositions of the Bible concerning the nature of man and the root of his problems. When people start with the supposition that man is basically good and when left to himself he will do what is right and good, it is contrary to the Bible. It is a lie of humanism, and any computed information that comes out of it is a deception.
The good news for you and me is that if we accept the Bible’s basic premises about ourselves and our condition, it also offers us a solution for our basic problems. We will address this solution in our next chapter.