This is a lightly edited transcript of what I actually said when I taught this session at Spring Creek Bible Church on November 15, 2015, as Part 6 of The Doctrines of Man and Sin class. It differs from what I planned to say; for the prepared text, see the manuscript.
Let’s open in prayer and ask the Lord’s blessing on our time. Father, we thank you for this opportunity to gather, to be refreshed by your Word, by fellowship, by sitting under your preaching, and by worshiping you. Bless us today, strengthen us, pour out your grace, and as we look at your Word, give us focused minds and receptive hearts to learn what you have for us this morning. In Jesus’ name, amen.
We’re in part six of our study, and today we turn to the fall of man. Our first five parts covered the doctrine of man; this is where we transition to the doctrine of sin. We’ll begin by asking where sin came from, looking especially at the fall as recorded in the early chapters of Genesis. After this we’ll take up original sin, then the nature of sin, and finally the application of these doctrines to modern-day issues. Today we’ll cover three things: the fall of Satan, the fall of man, and some thoughts on the relationship between God and sin.
Genesis 3 is our key text, but let’s set the stage with Genesis 1–2. God created man in his own image, male and female, blessed them, and told them to be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over every living thing; he gave them the plants and trees for food, and saw everything he had made as “very good” (1:27–31). He planted a garden in Eden and put the man there, with “the tree of life…in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil” (2:8–9). He put the man in the garden “to work it and keep it,” and commanded, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die” (2:15–17). Genesis 3 then recounts the serpent’s temptation, Adam and Eve’s disobedience, their shame and hiding, God’s questioning and judgment on the serpent, the woman, and the man, and their being driven from the garden, with cherubim and a flaming sword guarding the way to the tree of life.
The Fall of Satan
At the start of Genesis 3 we meet the serpent, which raises several questions: Who was he? What kind of being was he? When was he created, and when—and why—did he become evil? First, this was no ordinary animal, and we know it right away because he speaks; there’s no indication any other animal in the garden could (we see a speaking animal later, Balaam’s donkey, but rarely). The New Testament removes all doubt and identifies the serpent as Satan. Paul fears that “as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning,” the Corinthians’ thoughts would be led astray (2 Corinthians 11:3). Revelation 12:9–10 strings the names together—“the great dragon…that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world,” and “the accuser of our brothers.” First Thessalonians 3:5 calls him “the tempter.” The identification is reinforced by how the New Testament speaks of his offspring: Genesis 3:15 sets enmity between the serpent’s offspring and the woman’s (the woman’s offspring, singular, being Jesus), and Jesus calls the scribes and Pharisees a “brood of vipers” and tells unbelieving Jews, “You are of your father the devil…a murderer from the beginning…a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44). First John 3:12 warns us not to be like Cain, “who was of the evil one” and murdered his brother. So the serpent in the garden was Satan.
What kind of being was he? Since the serpent was Satan, we can look at what the Bible teaches about Satan. He was an angel. Ezekiel 28:14, 16 may refer to him as “an anointed guardian cherub”—the cherubim being a class of winged angelic beings. He often appears among angels: in Job 1–2 he reports to God along with the other angels (“the sons of God”); Matthew 25:41 speaks of “the devil and his angels,” suggesting he leads others of his kind; and Revelation 12:7–9 parallels Michael leading his angels with Satan leading his. Michael was an archangel (Jude 9; Daniel), and Satan was probably in a similarly elevated position. He disguises himself as “an angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14), which may suggest he is an angel of darkness wanting to appear on the good team. And of the beings capable of the intelligence and communication we see from him, by process of elimination he is neither God nor a mere man—so he was an angel.
When was Satan created? We don’t know exactly, but it seems likely he was created before the six days of Genesis 1–2. Didn’t God do all his creating there? Exodus 20:11 says, “In six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them.” It might look as though all creation happened in that window, but I don’t think that’s a necessary conclusion; the text’s focus is the physical universe. Job 38:4–7 tells us the “sons of God” (the angels) “shouted for joy” when God laid the earth’s foundation—so as God begins creating, he’s already surrounded by his angelic host rejoicing at his work. It’s possible he made them at the very start of the first day and they immediately rejoiced, but it seems likely they’d existed a bit longer. Since Genesis 1–2 details what God made in the six days and never mentions the angels, it would be a strange omission if such an important class of beings had been created then. And God clearly does create outside the six days: regeneration is described in the language of creation (“God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts,” 2 Corinthians 4:6); he most likely creates each soul at conception; and he will create the new heavens and new earth (Isaiah 65; 2 Peter 3; Revelation 21). So creation happens outside that window—and if afterward, then possibly beforehand as well. It seems best to take Exodus 20:11 as referring to the physical universe recorded in Genesis 1–2, which leaves room for God to have created the angels prior to it.
When did Satan become evil? Before the fall—because in tempting Eve to disbelieve and disobey God, he was already acting in evil, and he knew it. Jesus says he was “a murderer from the beginning” (John 8:44), and 1 John 3:8 says “the devil has been sinning from the beginning.” That “beginning” can’t mean the moment of his creation—God doesn’t create evil beings; Satan was created good and fell sometime afterward. It most likely refers to the period between the creation of the world and the fall of Adam and Eve. If the “sons of God” rejoicing in Job 38:7 included Satan, we’d push his fall later, perhaps closer to the creation of man—though Job 1–2 lists “the sons of God” and then Satan separately, so he may not be included. Some speculate that Satan grew jealous of the relationship God had with man and so targeted Eve to destroy it; we don’t have clear indication of that, but it fits some of what we see. In the end we can only say his fall preceded man’s and probably came after God began creating the world.
Why did Satan fall? Four main passages give us a glimpse. Ezekiel 28 is a message to the prince, and then the king, of Tyre, yet it seems to allude beyond him to Satan—it’s hard to tell where the description of Tyre ends and the description of Satan begins, so we shouldn’t press every detail. To the prince: “Your heart is proud, and you have said, ‘I am a god’…yet you are but a man, and no god” (28:2). To the king: “You were the signet of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden, the garden of God” (which was never true of Tyre’s king—a key sign of the double meaning); “You were an anointed guardian cherub…blameless in your ways from the day you were created, till unrighteousness was found in you….Your heart was proud because of your beauty; you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor” (28:12–17). Isaiah 14 is a similar taunt against the king of Babylon: “How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn!…You said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God I will set my throne on high…I will make myself like the Most High’” (14:12–14). Interpreters see, to a lesser degree, parallels to Satan there too. And though not inspired Scripture, the intertestamental Wisdom of Solomon (2:23–24) is interesting: “God created us for incorruption…but through the devil’s envy death entered the world.” The New Testament comments on his fall in 1 Timothy 3:6, warning that a new convert made an elder might “become puffed up with conceit and fall into the condemnation of the devil.” The event itself isn’t directly recorded as Adam and Eve’s is, but taken together these passages give a picture of pride—pride in his beauty, a desire to be like God or to be God—along with covetousness and perhaps envy.
The Fall of Man
God created the heavens and earth in six days, and on the final day made man as the pinnacle of his creation. Everything was “very good” and given for their enjoyment—even the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was good, though forbidden. God gave them authority over everything and fellowshiped with them in Eden (in Genesis 3:8 they hear him “walking in the garden,” probably a normal thing). He gave Adam and Eve one positive command—be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it, and exercise dominion—and one prohibition: do not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, “for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”
How much time passed between the sixth day and the fall? The Bible doesn’t say—it wasn’t hundreds of years (we know Adam’s age when he began having children), but some period could have passed. I lean toward it being relatively short. Their first command was to be fruitful and multiply, and as God’s perfect, obedient image-bearers they would have begun to obey; with nothing to obstruct the natural process, they’d likely have conceived fairly quickly, yet Scripture gives no indication of any children before the fall. Eve is called “the mother of all living” in 3:20, right after the judgment, but that may simply be a forward-looking title, and Genesis 4:1 seems to imply Cain was her first child. A longer interval has a hard time explaining why they didn’t conceive, or how to square that with 4:1. No doctrine hangs on this, but the little evidence we have points toward a relatively short time.
Now the temptation (Genesis 3:1–6). The serpent begins by getting Eve to doubt or be confused about what God actually said—“Did God actually say…?”—and at first she defends the truth. Then he flatly contradicts God: God said, “You will die”; he says, “You will not surely die,” and adds a lure—“you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” Notice that Satan was, in a twisted way, telling the truth: they did become “like God, knowing good and evil” (3:22), and they didn’t immediately die physically. Satan is a master of distorting the truth—mixing a little falsehood in with it, getting us attached to “well, technically that’s true.” His technique isn’t always the bold-faced lie we can spot; he loves to take the truth and play with it, and we do well to know his tactics. Eve was drawn to possess something God hadn’t given her: the knowledge of good and evil sounded good—God had it, the angels had it, why couldn’t she? She began justifying her desire. She “saw that the tree was good for food” (maybe she was hungry; maybe Satan offered a taste), “a delight to the eyes,” and “to be desired to make one wise.” It’s worth noting that the very sin Satan himself presumably committed he now tempts Eve to commit—to take what wasn’t hers, to be dissatisfied with all God had provided, to think she deserved more, and ultimately to rebel against God’s authority.
The fall itself is recorded in one of the most devastating verses in the Bible: “So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food…she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate” (3:6). Adam was either right beside her or nearby—“with her”—and instead of leading and protecting his wife, he followed and helped destroy her. Together they plunged the entire human race, billions upon billions, into sin, condemnation, and death.
Several other passages speak of the fall. “Like Adam they transgressed the covenant” (Hosea 6:7). Romans 5 is the most extensive: “Just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin…so death spread to all men”; “by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous” (5:12–19)—Adam “a type of the one who was to come.” First Corinthians 15:21–22: “As by a man came death…as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.” Second Corinthians 11:3 recalls the serpent deceiving Eve. And 1 Timothy 2:13–14: “Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor.”
Pulling Genesis together with these texts: Eve was deceived and became a transgressor; Adam was not deceived, yet was a transgressor and disobedient. God’s judgment on Adam in 3:17 notes that he “listened to” his wife—not that it’s always sinful to listen to your wife (it’s usually wise!), but in this instance it was sin because of what she was leading him to do. Death came by Adam, and we all die in him—a recurring theme. Strikingly, it’s Adam’s one trespass, not Eve’s, that’s tied to the condemnation; Adam’s sin made us sinners.
Two questions arise: Who plunged humanity into depravity, and what was the essence of the sin? Eve technically sinned first—deceived, yet a transgressor—but Scripture makes clear it was Adam who brought guilt, death, and corruption on the race. Sin is complicated and messy, and a host of sins are wrapped up in the fall, so it’s hard to pinpoint the exact moment. Before Eve even took the fruit, she was already doubting God and siding with the serpent; her heart coveted the forbidden knowledge—and sin is a matter of the heart, not just the act (acting on it is worse, but sin begins within). She set herself up as her own god. Adam, meanwhile, stood by—whether at a distance or at her side, we don’t know, only that he was “with her”—and sinned by failing to lead, protect, and intervene. He too must have disbelieved God, or he’d have leapt to act; in pride he rejected God’s authority, coveted what God prohibited, and desired to be like God in ways God had not granted.
The Effects of the Fall
What happened as a result? God had promised death “in the day” they ate—and though they didn’t drop dead physically, they died spiritually, their bodies began to die, and death entered the world at that moment. According to the passage, they lost their innocence (their eyes were opened; they knew they were naked and knew good and evil); they felt shame and wanted to cover themselves; they felt guilt and fled and hid from God; they lost their intimate fellowship with him and wanted to flee his presence rather than walk with him; they became fearful (“I was afraid…and I hid”); and they began shifting blame—“it wasn’t me, it was her”; “it wasn’t me, it was the serpent.” Eve’s pain in childbearing would be multiplied; she would struggle under Adam’s leadership; Adam’s work would become painful and hard; his body would return to the dust (and Eve’s as well); and they were driven out of the garden—the beautiful place where God dwelt with them—because of their sin.
The New Testament expands on the effects. The image of God in us has been distorted. Spiritual death and blindness have set in. Physical death is the destiny of every man, woman, and child. Depravity spreads through our whole being—no part untouched by sin. Our minds have become irrational, so good at justifying what makes no sense; our emotions no longer function properly; we’ve lost our freedom and are enslaved to sin (until Christ begins to undo it in redemption). The lost person lives in enmity toward God, under his wrath and condemnation. Fellowship with God is broken, and our relationships with one another are broken. Our whole orientation turns inward: before the fall we were oriented toward God in worship, toward others in love, and over creation in stewardship—and now all three relationships are distorted and made all about us, which ruins everything. We live in rebellion against God’s authority and the authorities he sets over us—government, parents, employers—in fear of death, empty, and, apart from repentance, facing eternal punishment. All of that from the sin recorded in Genesis 3.
Glimpses of Grace
Yet even in Genesis 3 we begin to see God’s grace and the redemption he planned from before the foundation of the world. First, in 3:15 God promises that the woman’s offspring—singular, one individual—would crush the serpent’s head. We call this the protoevangelium, the first announcement of the gospel, the seed of good news planted right in the midst of God’s judgment on sin. God doesn’t wait; even as he pronounces the curse, he reveals his gracious heart. Then God kills an animal—most likely for the skins to clothe Adam and Eve—and while we shouldn’t be too dogmatic, it’s possible a sacrifice was involved, God showing them the shedding of blood needed for the remission of sins, a foreshadowing of what the woman’s offspring would accomplish.
About four thousand years later, God began to fulfill that promise. Both Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15 parallel Adam and Christ—Romans 5:14 calls Adam “a type” of Christ, and 1 Corinthians 15:45 calls Jesus “the last Adam.” As the last Adam, Jesus was sent into testing just as Adam was: in the wilderness Satan tempted him to prove his deity, to use his power for himself, to test God, and to worship him rather than God—and by the power of the Spirit he resisted, beginning to reverse what Adam had done. By his perfect life and substitutionary death he began to crush the serpent’s head. “Since the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery” (Hebrews 2:14–15). “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8). The whole New Testament unfolds how God in Christ, by the Spirit, defeats Satan and reverses the effects of the fall—and at the end of Revelation we see the garden restored, more beautiful than ever, when God makes all things new.
Let’s close in prayer. Father, we thank you for what you’ve revealed in your Word about our willful sinfulness and about your grace. Thank you that in the midst of our sin your gracious character shows itself, and you were already unfolding your work of redeeming us and bringing us to yourself. Our hearts are so corrupt, God; help us to realize the sinfulness of our hearts, that we might delight all the more in your grace, in the gospel, and in the forgiveness you have provided—throwing ourselves on your mercy and living in the power of your grace every day. We look forward to the day when you will completely eradicate sin and make all things new. Bless our time now as we go to fellowship, sing, worship you, and sit under the preaching of your Word. May you be glorified and our hearts encouraged. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.