Wednesday, August 20, 2025

But the Lord God warned him, “You may freely eat the fruit of every tree in the garden - except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. If you eat its fruit, you are sure to die.” (Genesis 2: 16 -17, New Living Translation)

           Our nearly six-year-old granddaughter, Amelia, is a very smart, independent little soul. Recently, she asked her mother for a snack. She received two cookies. Then she happily went back outside while her mother went off to another part of the house. When Katie came back, a little while later, there was a stool up to the kitchen counter, an empty cookie package on the counter and cookie packaging on the floor. When asked, Amelia readily admitted that she had helped herself to more cookies. How many more?  Maye six or so, she blithely said. We can, perhaps, appreciate her independence at getting her own snacks, but she needs help with her decisions about getting more healthy snacks if she is still hungry – cheese, yogurt, fruit. But who among us is ever really satisfied with just one or two treats and don’t wish for more of the same? Try and eat just one chocolate!

            Maybe, it was the apple core on the ground that first gave Adam away after he ate the forbidden fruit from the tree of good and evil. (I know it wasn’t an apple per se and it was their self-awareness of their nakedness which gave them away, but humour me.) They had a cornucopia of lush, delicious fruits to eat from the bountiful garden but couldn’t resist the temptation to eat the one and only fruit which was forbidden. I have no idea why God would create such a tree of the knowledge of good and evil or put it within easy arm’s reach and then forbid eating from it. It would seem that God was testing Adam and Eve. They failed gloriously and left us, forever more, with humanity’s mess of sin.

            I have always appreciated that tongue-twister of paragraphs in Paul’s letter to the Romans where he admits how hard it is to choose to do the right thing and so easy to do the wrong thing. Perhaps, he had this Garden experience in mind when he wrote, “For as long as we lived that old way of life, doing whatever we felt we could get away with, sin was calling most of the shots…”  (Romans 7:5, The Message Bible) Of course, we are not thinking about an extra cookie or the second or third chocolate out of the box, but behaviour, words and actions, that lead us right down the garden path and eventually out of the garden all together. “I decide to do good, but I don’t really do it; I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway. My decisions, such as they are, don’t result in actions. Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time.” (7: 19-20, TMB)

            More cookies, please? No? That’s OK, I’ll just help myself anyway. When You are not looking.  Sorry about the crumbs!

           Yet, we are not alone with this turmoil of good versus evil within us. “You died to the power of the law when you died with Christ. And now you are united with the one who was raised from the dead. As a result, we can produce a harvest of good deeds for God.” (7: 4 -5, NLT) It is now possible to drop the forbidden fruit and in letting go of the sin that grabs at us, to live in new, abundant ways that are pleasing to God. Using Christ as our guide and template, we turn away from the temptations and affectations of living with our poor and ugly choices and find ourselves with all sorts of healthy, wholesome, life-enhancing opportunities to live freely and abundantly. We find ourselves welcomed back into the Garden. “So now we can rejoice in our wonderful new relationship with God because our Lord Jesus Christ has made us friends of God.” (Romans 5:11, NLT)

            That’s the way the cookie crumbles!

 Dale