The Gospel Confronts the Fall

Passages

Genesis 3:1-7

Romans 3:9-23

Big Idea

The Gospel is good news because the bad news is real. Sin is not a dysfunction - it is a rebellion against God. Sin is not brokenness - it is treason. Until we understand the depth of the problem, we will never appreciate the magnificence of the solution.

Introduction - When the Mirror Turned

We are in week 3 of our series, “What is the Gospel?” In Week 1, we saw God as the eternal, holy Sun. In Week 2, we saw humanity as the mirror, created to reflect His glory. Our dignity and purpose are derived from the God whose image we bear.

But if you look around the world today, you don’t see a lot of ‘reflection.’ You see war, addiction, and chaos. And if we look inside ourselves, we are not the perfectly polished mirror we proclaim. We see cracks, shame, and a gravitational pull toward a void of selfishness; that is at times, impossible to stop. We feel sorry for ourselves and beat ourselves up to a point that we don’t recognize who we are.

Today, we have to talk about The Fall.

If we want to understand the cure, we have to accept the diagnosis. My wife went to the ER shortly after our son was born with severe back pain. The first doctor told her to just take Tylenol and deal with it. The pain worsened, and days later, a second doctor ran scans and discovered she had gallstones and pancreatitis. The world is like that first doctor—it tells you to just take some aspirin and deal with your brokenness. But the Gospel is the second doctor. It goes deeper to give you the correct diagnosis: we have a rebellious nature. And only when you have the correct diagnosis can the recovery process begin.

The Anatomy of Temptation

Turn to Genesis 3 (have Bible opened up to Genesis 3). In this moment everything changes in the Garden of Eden. This is the moment life on earth is about to change. The Serpent enters the garden and offers a counter-gospel. The Gospel from God says, “You are mirrors. Face me, and you will shine.” The Serpent counter-gospel says, “Did God really say that? If you eat this, you won’t just reflect God. You will be like God.”

Notice the tactic by the Serpent. He began with a simple question: “Did God actually say…” He doesn’t attack God directly; he plants doubt regarding God’s Word, Eve bravely answers, “We may eat of the fruit…but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit…neither shall you touch it, lest you die.” He is questioning whether or not Adam and Eve heard it correctly.

But is that true? Let's look back at Genesis 2:16-17.

Genesis 2:15-17

15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eatof it you shall surely die.”

God said nothing about touching it. Eve gave God’s word an extra step. We might think this is an innocent, but who else in Scripture gave God’s command an extra step? The Pharisees! Now, I’m not saying Eve was a Pharisee. But she demonstrates the root of the Pharisaical spirit: trying to improve on God’s perfection with human rules. They added walls to what God had already built. But what happened? The Serpent pounced on the Pharisees. And so, the Serpent pounced on Adam and Eve, as well. And while Eve in her attempt to be righteous and obey the Father gave an opening to the Serpent… (and men, Adam was right behind her the whole time and did nothing).

The Serpent pounces: “You will not surely die…God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened…” He is saying: “God is holding out on you! God is threatened by you! If you take what He forbids, you won’t die…you will become like Him.”

But this is the lie we accept for the truth. That God is holding out on us, that God is less than. We choose this lie every time we sin. We tell God, I know better, and you don’t. We tell God that you are not good enough.

Look at the progression of the Fall though. What we see is the outlier of the human condition:

Good for food: Physical appetite.

Delight to the eyes: Aesthetic desire.

To make one wise: Intellectual ambition.

Body, beauty, and brains.  The human condition can be seen in all three of those: body, beauty, and brains. This isn’t about some fruit; this is about autonomy. This is about self-determination. This is about rejecting God’s authority and replacing with personal preference.

Imagine a mirror that decides it doesn’t want to reflect the sun anymore; it wants to be the star of the show. So, it curls in on itself. What happens? It becomes a black hole. It becomes dark. This is what sin does to us.

The Nature of Sin

What exactly is sin? It is not just breaking rules. Yes, it involves disobedience, but it is deeper. Sin is not primarily about actions – it is about allegiance.

Martin Luther called the sinful human nature incurvatus in se—a heart "curved inward on itself.” Instead of being oriented outward to glorify God, we curve inward to glorify ourselves. We take the gifts God gives us – rationality, creativity, authority, relationships – and instead of using them to glorify Him, we use them to glorify ourselves.

Sex becomes for self-gratification, not covenant love between husband and wife.

Money is for security, not generosity.

Power is for control, not service.

Man has curved inward on itself. We have become so self-focused that we lost sight of what is truth, what truly matters. Our opinions, preferences, and desirables have become what matters most! “I want this, and I want that. If you don’t do either, then I don’t want you.”

Luther is saying that sin is the human will turning inward. Instead of being oriented outward toward God and others, we curve inward. Everything becomes about us. Our glory, our comfort, our preferences, our rights.

Adam and Eve saw the fruit, and instead of asking, “What does God want?” they asked, “What do I want?” and that is what we do every single day…We are broken, but not by accident…We are broken like a mirror that twisted itself into a knot trying to become the sun.

R.C. Sproul viewed the rebellion of sin in three categories: Sin as a debt, sin as enmity and sin as a crime.

Sin as a Debt: We have a moral indebtedness to God that we are unable to repay.

Romans 3:20

20 For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.

Sin as Enmity: Humans are, by nature, enemies of God. We have become a hostile towards God. We went from people who can walk with God to people who fight God.

James 4:4

4 You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

Sin as a Crime: It is a transgression of divine law, akin to committing a crime against God’s kingdom.

1 John 3:4

4 Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness.

Last week we said that humanity was created to reflect God – to image Him, to glorify Him, to steward His creation under His authority. But in Genesis 3, we said, “No. We don’t want to reflect you, we want to replace you. We don’t want to be the mirror; we want to be the Sun.”

That is rebellion. That is treason.

That places us in a position of enmity toward God and now we have to pay a price, a pardon, that we cannot pay…

The Wreckage of Rebellion

Because of this treason, the mirror didn’t just turn away; it shattered. Shattered…

The Bible outlines three devastating consequences of sin: Guilt Before God, Corruption of Nature, and Alienation.

Guilt Before God: Immediately upon eating a bite of the fruit, Adam and Eve sewed fig leaves and hid (Genesis 3:7). Romans 3:19 declares that the law stops every mouth, holding “the whole world accountable to God.” No excuses. Just guilt.

Romans 3:19

19 Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God.

Corruption of Nature: We are not just sick puppies wandering the earth; we are spiritually dead. We don’t just need self-improvement; we need resurrection.

Ephesians 2:1-3

1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the flesh and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.

Alienation: Sin separates us on every level, in every way possible. We are alienated from God, hiding in the garden… but we are also alienated in that we can no longer return to the garden. We are alienated from each other – Adam instantly blames Eve (which probably led to some really awkward moments. She probably reminded him daily of this; rightfully so might I add). And we are alienated from creation as the ground is cursed.

Colossians 1:21

21 And you who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds

This is what sin does. This is what happens when we sin. We become shattered: we become guilty, corrupt and alienated. Hostile in our mind and doing evil deeds. Sin alienates from God; sin separates us from God because the root of sin is a hatred for God; it speaks that we would rather be God than God be God.

The Universal Verdict

You might ask, “What does this have to do with me? I wasn’t in nor near the garden when that happened?!

Paul answers this question in Romans 3:9-23, but more specifically Romans 3:10-12

Romans 3:10-12

10 as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; 11no one understands; no one seeks for God. 12 All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.”

We sin because we are sinners by nature. We fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). God is infinitely glorious, holy, and righteous…and we are not. Therefore, the wage of sin is death…

WHERE MODERN RELIGION DIES

This is why we have to state this. We can’t get this diagnosis wrong, or we get the cure wrong too!

Most of our culture in America operates on this “Moralistic Therapeutic Deism” – where the belief that God just wants us to be nice, happy, and feel really good about ourselves…This idea that God exists primarily to help us feel good about ourselves without any commitment or involvement from us; His sole, purpose is to make you simply happy on this Earth, with no actual commitment on our level. Now how do you think that works in a relationship with your spouse, family or friends? How would that go over?

Now take a look how a proper biblical diagnosis destroys that:

If sin is just ignorance, we need education.

If sin is just brokenness, we need therapy.

If sin is just bad behavior, we need moralism.

(pause) Is that right?

It is not, right? We don’t just need a counselor or better habits; while those are good but can they pay the pardon? Can they pay the price that is necessary for sinning against King of kings? This is why we need a savior. We are rebels in need of a pardon by God. This. Is where Moralistic Therapeutic Deism falls apart, because Scripture tells us that we are not basically good but that our earthly nature is quite the opposite, we often choose selfishness over righteousness. We are curved inward on ourselves. We need a Messiah

Colossians 3:5-9

5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. 6 On account of these the wrath of God is coming. 7 In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. 8 But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices.

CONCLUSION: THE ONLY HOPE

We have spent our time today sitting in the doctor’s office, looking at the scan. And the diagnosis is harder than we wanted to hear. The world—that "first doctor"—told you it was just a headache. Just take some aspirin, think positive thoughts, and try to be a better person. But the Gospel—the "Better Physician"—has told us the truth. It’s not a headache. It’s a heart condition. It is rebellion. We cannot atone for our rebellion. We have a debt that we cannot pay, an enmity we cannot dissolve, and a crime we cannot reverse.

Now, if a doctor gave you a scary diagnosis and then just walked out of the room, that would be cruel. That would leave you hopeless. But God is not a cruel doctor. He doesn’t give you the diagnosis to hurt you; He gives it to you so He can save you. He didn't leave us alone in the garden. He didn't leave us alone in our rebellion.

But God! There is not a much better phrase in the New Testament, “But God.” But God does not leave rebels in their rebellion…

Ephesians 2:4-5

4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—

Notice that it doesn’t say, “But God, waiting for you to fix yourself…” It says, “Even when we were dead.” While you were still “curved inward,” God was moving toward you.

So, do not leave here today feeling heavy. Leave here feeling held by the Father. Because the same text that tells us the bad news – Romans 6:23 / Romans 3:23-24 – immediately gives us the best news, gives us the cure.

Romans 3:23-24

23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,

Romans 6:23

23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

You don’t have to wait until next week to receive the gift. You don’t have to wait until you “clean up your act.” The cure is not a program; the cure is a person, and He is here.

2 Corinthians 5:21

21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

The one who knew no sin was Jesus Christ…There is hope. And in Him there is hope.

If you feel that tug in your heart – that conviction that says, “I am the rebel” – don’t run from it. That is the holy Spirit waking you up.

Run to the Physician. He has already paid the bill. He has already taken the treatment for you on the cross. All you have to do is stop hiding, step out of the bushes, and let Him love you.

If that is you, I will be standing here in the front. I would love to pray with you; I would love to introduce you to your new family.

If you are here today and you just need prayer, I also am here to pray with you.

If you want to know more about First Baptist Church Tehachapi, I again am here and would love to tell you more about this wonderful place that we get to call home. [Let’s Pray].