Deceived & Defiant: The Day Trust Broke

RECAP

The Bible is the primary thing that can explain/diagnose the human condition - it explains where we come from, why we are here, why we are the way that we are, what we need, and where we are going.

Genesis 1-3 shows us the history of ALL of humanity (God creates; humans live in flourish environmnet with relationship and purpose).

Genesis 3 shows us how that relationship was broken, and sin entered the world.

Genesis 3 doesn’t show us only what happened but what ALWAYS happens in the hearts of humans.

GENESIS CONTEXT

The Bible tells us that we have an enemy - and the enemy makes his way into paradise where Adam and Eve were. We looked at Eve’s account and learnt that:

The enemy causes: Doubt, Deception and Distrust in our lives.

Eve’s story also showed us how the enemy will use our human reasoning to lead us to sin - through the lusts of the flesh, the eyes and the pride of life.

And we asked the question, WHO WILL YOU TRUST?

TRANSITION: THIS WEEK WE CONTINUE WITH OUR TEXT AND LEARN FROM ADAM

SCRIPTURE:

Genesis 3:6–7 “So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.”

MAIN POINT & SUB-POINTS

When humanity rejected God, sin entered, shame followed, and only Christ can restore what was lost.

We will unpack this by looking at:

Sin Enters When We Reject God’s Ways.

Sin Leaves Us Broken and Exposed

Humanity Tries to Cover What Only God Can Heal

Jesus Restores What Sin Destroyed

PART 1: Sin Enters When We Reject God’s Ways

EVE WAS DECEIVED INTO SIN

The Devil and her human reasoning is what led her into sin.

It was the long discussions, entertaining the devil, the doubts, the deception, and the distrust that made her sin.

And then she gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.

ADAM’S ROAD TO SIN WAS DIFFERENT: He was defiant

Adam is not depicted to be deceived in the same way. He never even had a conversation with the devil.

His Silence and participation show a different posture: not confusion, but passivity, and might I say walking knowingly and willingly into sin.

ILLUSTRATION: PHISHING VS CREDIT CARD DEBT

Phishing is a scam where someone pretends to be a trusted person or company to trick you into giving sensitive information — like passwords, bank details, OTPs, or login credentials.

Common examples: Fake bank emails, “Your account is locked” messages, Fake login pages, WhatsApp or SMS links asking you to “verify” something

Eve got Phished!!!

Adam, on the other hand, had read the Credit Card Debt contract, saw that it was a ridiculous 40% interest rate, and he willingly signed it. No questions asked.

Reflect: What if the biggest problem isn't that you've been fooled, but that you've become comfortable saying yes to what God has clearly said no to?

KEY THOUGHT: SOME OF US ARE BEING DECEIVED, SOME OF US ARE WALKING INTO SIN AND THE KINGDOM OF DARKNESS WITH OUR EYES WIDE OPEN.

STEPPING OUTSIDE OF THE ROLE:

The scripture tells us that Eve was with her husband. We see the marriage model that God designed here, but something has gone terribly wrong.

In this marriage, Adam is the husband. The narrative of Genesis 3 shows us disorder:

Adam’s leadership is silent. He was tasked with leading, protecting, and ruling over the animals and creation.

Eve engages the serpent directly.

The roles that God intended for order and protection are inverted.

It was Adam’s responsibility to deal with the snake from the beginning, but from what we see in Scripture, he watched the whole thing happen and said and did nothing.

There are a few lessons for us to learn from Eve and Adam:

Regarding Eve, Michael Eaton writes:

How should Eve have resisted Satan? She should not have stepped out of her calling and her role. She should have

passed the snake on for Adam to deal with. He was there (‘her husband, who was with her’, 3:6)!

We fall when we try to exercise an authority we do not have.

Or in Adam’s case, we fall when we don’t exercise the authority or responsibility that we have been given.

Adam was supposed to deal with the snake directly.

Interject when He saw even talking to the snake.

Or at least say something when Eve handed her the fruit from the forbidden tree.

He watched the whole thing happen and said nothing. But he was quiet.

Friends, this is what one author calls the moment when a Crucial Conversation needs to take place. The stakes are high, emotions will be charged, and there are conflicting opinions or values. A crucial conversation needs to take place. Adam doesn’t do it. We don’t know why. Many people in the same situation don’t - and the author of the books sites the following possible reasons:

Fear of Conflict - This might become a fight / I will make things worse.

We tell ourselves stories - internal narratives of others’ motives “They don’t care”, “She’s just disrespecting me again”) which fuels emotions before the conversation starts

Wanting to keep the peace / Confuse honesty with brutality

Hoping the problem will disappear on its own

People-pleasing tendencies / Fear of Man / Need for approval / Rejection

KEY POINT: Adam stood in the presence of evil, watched compromise unfold, and chose silence over courage. This would lead to devastating outcomes.

Application:

Married Couples: Have you created space for you to have honest conversations, esp when the enemy tries to cause disunity between you?

Parents: Are there things that you are seeing in your children that you need to have a crucial conversation about? Friends? Attitude? Sin?

Friends/Family: Is there someone that you care about but something is not sitting right that you are seeing? Friend, will you speak?

Manager/Employee: Is there something in your scope of responsibility, or those in your care, and you see something not right - culture, passivity, people coming late to meetings, dishonesty, competition - will you speak?

SIN ENTERS

Adam eats the fruit. It is at this moment that sin enters the world. Adam wasn’t just anyone- we call him the federal head. He was representing all of humanity.

He is the federal head, representing all of humanity.

He has authority, the key to creation, and now he gave it away.

Everything under him was affected and infected:

Brokenness of creation: disease, decay, aging, and death enter the world.

Personal sin: humanity inherits the sinful nature of Adam, and we are now in a default state of unrighteousness to God

KEY: WHEN ADAM FELL, WE ALL FELL. Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,”

TRANSITION: What does it actually feel like to live in a fallen world? Genesis 3:7 gives us the answer.

Point 2: Sin Leaves Us Broken and Exposed

Genesis 3:7 “Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.”

After they sinned, the Bible says that their eyes were opened and they knew they were naked.

a) SIN BRINGS KNOWLEDGE - ILLEGITIMATE KNOWLEDGE

The Devil promised them that they would know good from evil. And he was right. That is exactly what happened.

The tree of the knowledge of good and evil was supposed to bring Adam and Eve into a knowledge of good and evil.

The problem is how they obtained this knowledge:

They now know about evil because they committed it and are guilty of it.

They gained knowledge, but lost their innocence. They became aware but are no longer clean.

This was not God’s intention.

KEY: GOD’S INTENTION WAS FOR HUMANITY TO KNOW OF GOOD & EVIL BY BEING HOLY.

STORY: THE CLIFF “CALL OF THE VOID”

Some of us enjoy hiking, and as school, it’s something we often do.

There will be times we climb to high places like in the Drakensberg, and you find yourself at the edge of a cliff, and you look over.

In that moment, there is an awareness of the danger that I shouldn’t get too close or else it will be catastrophic.

POINT: Like standing at the edge of a cliff, humans can become aware of evil without the need to participate in it. In Eden, Adam and Eve were not meant to experience evil/sin to understand it, but to trust God’s definition of good and remain holy (set apart) in His boundaries.

b) SIN BRINGS LOSS, GUILT AND SHAME

When Adam and Eve had sinned, they became aware that something was missing, something was different; they felt exposed and vulnerable - they were naked. They had lost something.

Is this not true for all of us when we sin or do something wrong? Deep in our souls we can feel that there has been a loss.

Dr Martyn Lloyd Jones comments on this moment in the garden and says humanity was built for righteousness and right standing with God. The moment they sinned, Adam and Eve lost their robes of righteousness - and were now exposed, guilty and ashamed.

POINT: Sin will always overpromise and underdeliver. You experience more loss than you gain.

c) SIN BRINGS DEATH

Genesis 2:17 “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.”

God told them in Genesis 2:17 that if they ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, they would surely die.

This happened immediately.

They wanted independence from God, and now they had gotten it.

Full independence from God, not in right standing with Him anymore, disconnected from His life-giving personal presence. (Spiritual Death/ Physical Death)

TRANSITION: Humanity, once they lost God’s covering, they don't run back to Him - they manufacture their own.

Point 3: Humanity Tries to Cover What Only God Can Heal

Genesis 3:7 “ And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.”

After they sin, the Bible says that their eyes were opened and they knew they were naked; they grabbed a few leaves and tried to cover their nakedness, having lost the covering God had given them.

Dr Martyn Lloyd Jones comments, saying that all of humanity lives with this lingering internal memory that we created for something more, something eternal (we don’t think we can die), and all of humanity is restless, constantly seeking glory - a glory we used to have. We try our best to regain this glory through:

Seeking Knowledge / Wisdom / Philosophy - the more we know, maybe this sense of loss will disappear.

We try to create - We build, arts, music, we write - believing that that will fill the loss and complete us again.

We try Politics - We believe that the right legislation and human leadership will somehow put things right again.

But then above that, we even try to cover ourselves by means of religion - constantly thinking the more we do the right things, it will appease God and fill the gap.

Some try to work things out logically - educate yourself, but have found that that doesn’t remedy the loss.

We have invented incredible technology - but still live with a sense of loss, loneliness and purposelessness. We are even trying to find another planet and start over.

Others have gone the opposite way towards mysticism and the unseen - that man is not just a brain/interlect; he is a spirit with feelings and emotions, and he is crying out for the unseen.

But all of these attempts are just fig leaves. It is man trying to cover himself, but he constantly lives with the same resounding sense of loss in the depths of his soul.

QUESTION: What are you still using to cover what only God can heal?

Every Fig leaf is an attempt to heal separation without returning to God.

TRANSITION: And this is where the story takes a turn. What humanity cannot cover, God Himself steps in to restore

POINT 4: Jesus Restores What God Destroyed

My friends, we will never be able to restore ourselves. There is only one person who could restore us - his name is Jesus Christ:

He trusted God when He was tempted: Unlike Eve, Jesus trusted God and the Scriptures when the devil tried to tempt Him. He didn’t debate, bind, fight, or whatever the enemy tried to scheme. He rested on the Word, “It is written”.

Jesus humbled Himself into our brokenness: As God the Son, Jesus willingly stepped into our story. He humbled Himself, becoming a servant unto death, death on a cross.

Jesus reversed Adam’s choice: Unlike Adam, who went willingly into sin, Jesus went willingly to the cross to die for our sins. Adam’s “yes” to rebellion brought ruin. Jesus’ “yes” to the Father opened the door for us to be saved and redeemed.

Jesus is not distant or passive, and He is active today: He is not a passive Saviour looking from afar - no! Through His Spirit, He pursues hearts, confronts sins, breaks bondages and restores what is broken. He still saves, still heals and transforms.

Jesus restores what humanity ruined - Where Adam and Eve tried to grasp for godlikeness - the true God and true man - Jesus - lived in perfect dependence on the Father, so that You and I can be brought back into what we were created for: communion with God, worship and a life in His presence.

Jesus defeated Sin, Guilt, Shame, and Death - Through His death on the cross and resurrection, he defeated death, and therefore takes away your guilt, shame, and the power of death. All who are in Christ will not be separated from God but have eternal life - forever!!!.

CONCLUSION: THE GOSPEL INVITATION:

I don’t know what fig leaves you might be wearing this morning to try and fill the gap that we all live with, but may I encourage you to let God and allow the life-giving Jesus to come in and restore you into relationship with the God you created to know.

This morning is not about trying harder, fixing yourself better, but it's deeper. There is an invitation to return to God. Whether you are deceived or being defiant, will you return to God? Consider:

What would it look like for you to cover and start coming home to Jesus?

Are you willing to lay down any fig leaves that cannot save you and receive a righteousness that you could never earn?

Because in the end, any fig leaf, any attempt at self-salvation, is temporary - but Christ is eternal.

Every covering hides a problem - Christ can heal it.

Every attempt at self-restoration fails - but Christ finished the work on the cross.

So come back. Not religion, effort, shame.

Come back to Jesus - the One who restores what sin destroyed.

END