Fall
Pastor Stephen Cheung continues this compelling series on The Story, an overview of the Bible’s narrative. While universally well known as The Fall, the recorded event of Eve eating the fruit at the coercion of the snake, for many, seems too much like a child’s tale, and not something to be taken seriously. But could it be that assuming a very literal interpretive grid is actually a distraction? The real narrative significance is, perhaps, that when people seek power and existence apart from God, they act contrary to their intended vocation to bear God’s image, and instead, detract from their own humanity.
Scripture: Genesis 3: 1-6
Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”2 The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden,3 but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’”4 “You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5 “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.
