How Did Sin Effect Relationships?
Before the tempter entered Eden, the social relationships were as God had intended for them to be. Not only were Adam and Eve perfect, but they were living in perfect adjustment with God; and between each other. Godliness and holiness were followed by righteousness and peace.
Sin deadened the human spirit and broke its relationship with the divine Spirit. Immediately Man was thrown out of adjustment with God, and the result was ungodliness.
Sin entered the human personality and ruled over every part of it. Because of sin, the whole being of Man was thrown into perplexity and discord. The result of Man being thrown out of adjustment with himself was unholiness.
Sin also entered the human relationship God had established between Adam and Eve that produced tension. They were also thrown out of adjustment with each other, and unrighteousness was the result.
Both Adam and Eve had eaten the forbidden fruit, and therefore they both sinned. But when questioned by God, neither one was unwilling to bear the blame for it. Yes, Eve had tempted Adam, but Adam had of his own free will listened to Eve and disobeyed God’s command. When questioned concerning his sin, Adam cowardly blamed God and Eve for his disobedience.
Genesis 3:11-12
11. . . Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you that you should not eat?” 12 And the man said, The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat.”
Sin had introduced chaos into Man’s relationship with God and his own personality, which has now introduced it into the relationship of the first man and woman. The friction between man and man began initially in God’s social order.
“The break upward brought the break crosswise. That is the tragic Eden crisis. It touches us all most intimately today. The gloom and blight of the Eden crisis has cast its inky shadow over all the race, and over all life, ever since” (S. D. Gordon, Quiet Talks on the Crises and After, p. 56)
Adam and Eve’s sin was visited upon their children when Cain killed his brother Abel. Friction between the parents produced the fruit of murder between brothers.
“The maladjustment in God’s social order that begun in Eden has continued and grown apace into personal, family, civic, national and international frictions until the whole world today is one seething, struggling mass of discontent, envy, greed, suspicion, jealousy, hatred and revenge.” (Ruth Paxson, Life on the Highest Plane, p. 45)
In addition, the material universe also felt the damaging effect of sin. Even the earth was cursed because of the sin of Adam.
17 Then to Adam He said, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’: “Cursed is the ground for your sake; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life. 18 Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, and you shall eat the herb of the field. 19 In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for dust you are, and to dust you shall return.”
The ground would now be relatively barren, and man would have to take from it by the sweat of his face and much suffering, the essentials of life.
Source: “Life on the Highest Plane” by Ruth Paxson
Dear Lord, thank You that not only do You know the full effects of sin on Your creation, but through Your death and resurrection You have dealt with every effect. Praise God.
In Him,
Marion