Speaker 1: they're meant to be, because sin broke it and, at its core, sinning is making the same decision that those students made with that duck.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna do things my way, I'm gonna make my own rules, and the thing is just like them cooking that duck, it never ends how you want it to, and a lot of you guys here tonight are experiencing that very same thing, whether you realize it or not.
Speaker 1: To do it your own way, you've been trying to prove your worth through popularity, grades, sports, but all that's done is leave you anxious and insecure because you're never quite good enough.
Speaker 1: There's always somebody faster, somebody just a little bit funnier tells a better joke, someone a little prettier has the shape and the image that you wish you had, and so you hear hey, follow your heart, do what feels right.
Speaker 1: But the problem is, every week your heart wants something else, and the thing that it wanted last week just left you feeling emptier than before, and so you run to distraction, addiction, self-destruction, that same old habit that you know doesn't work.
Speaker 1: But you don't know how to stop.
Speaker 1: And what we're gonna see in God's word tonight, in Genesis two and three, is one that it's not meant to be that way, but also that it doesn't have to be that way and specifically what we're gonna see this is a sermon in a sentence.
Speaker 1: We were created to live connected to God as our source of life.
Speaker 1: But we were created to live connected to God as our source of life but, just like Adam and Eve, we've all chosen to unplug and go our own way and it always leads to shame, separation and death.
Speaker 1: Yet in Jesus, god offers to reconnect us to himself as the true source of life.
Speaker 1: So we're going to unpack that, the rest of this sermon.
Speaker 1: So if you have your Bible, please go ahead and flip open to Genesis, chapter two.
Speaker 1: We're going to start in verse seven, genesis two.
Speaker 1: In verse seven.
Speaker 1: It's going to be right up front, probably like first page still, depending on how your Bible is printed, but Genesis, chapter two, verse seven.
Speaker 1: So verse seven says this Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.
Speaker 1: And the verses are gonna be up here Now.
Speaker 1: The Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden, and there he put the man he had formed.
Speaker 1: The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food.
Speaker 1: In the middle of the garden there was a tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and then we're going to go down to verse 15.
Speaker 1: Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.
Speaker 1: And the Lord God commanded the man you are free to eat from any tree in the garden, but you must not eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.
Speaker 1: Will you pray with me, lord?
Speaker 1: God, we love you so much and we pray that tonight we would come to your word with open hearts and ears and minds to the truth found in scripture, the capital T truth, lord, that we would be able to understand the sin that is in all of us, lord, but we would be able to see and respond positively to the solution you've given us.
Speaker 1: So, father, we love you and praise you and praise things in Jesus' name.
Speaker 1: And everybody said amen.
Speaker 1: So one thing that has probably confused all of us at some point is what in the world is going on with the trees, right.
Speaker 1: Like why are there two trees?
Speaker 1: Why does one seem to be good, why does one seem to be bad?
Speaker 1: Like why are they even there?
Speaker 1: Well, here's the thing the tree of life is symbolic of God's own life and power.
Speaker 1: The tree of life was symbolic of God's own life and power.
Speaker 1: It was the source of life for everything in the garden.
Speaker 1: That's why it's in the middle right.
Speaker 1: Because here's the thing that'll blow your mind, because I didn't understand this until I really we're not immortal in and of themselves.
Speaker 1: Like they were not created to have inherent internal eternal life.
Speaker 1: They had eternal life because they were meant to come to an outer source that provided them that life.
Speaker 1: Their life came from eating the fruit of the tree and living forever, and God was the source of the life that they would gain through that tree.
Speaker 1: Basically, the idea is this that if you are connected to God's source of life, you'll live forever.
Speaker 1: Think about it this way.
Speaker 1: Think of your phone, right?
Speaker 1: This phone does not last forever on its own.
Speaker 1: You have to charge it.
Speaker 1: The tree of life was kind of like that charger and God's life was the electricity, in a way, like the tree was the mode or the method that they gained life from God.
Speaker 1: They would come to the tree and eat and they would live.
Speaker 1: But if you unplug the charger from your phone, your battery might run for a little while, but eventually it'll die.
Speaker 1: In the same way, we stay connected to God's life.
Speaker 1: We live, we unplug, we die.
Speaker 1: But what about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil?
Speaker 1: Why is that there?
Speaker 1: God said they'd die if they eat.
Speaker 1: It doesn't really seem like it's a good part of God's creation.
Speaker 1: It actually had a deeper meaning.
Speaker 1: It stood for something bigger, and this tree represents taking the authority to do what is right in your own eyes.
Speaker 1: To put it another way, eating from this tree was kind of like saying I want to decide for myself what's right and wrong.
Speaker 1: I don't need God and I really don't want him telling me what to do.
Speaker 1: It's saying God, hey, I think I know better than you and I'm gonna make my own rules.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna do it my way.
Speaker 1: That's really what it is.
Speaker 1: It's the tree of I'm gonna do it my own way.
Speaker 1: And that's why it led to death, because choosing this tree over the other tree was to decide to unplug yourself from the source of life and look, it might work for a little while, but in the end you're always gonna crash and burn.
Speaker 1: Think, you're always going to crash and burn.
Speaker 1: Think about it this way.
Speaker 1: It's kind of like driving right, when you drive, there is a set standard of rules to make driving safe and fun, even enjoyable and just a good thing.
Speaker 1: But if you go outside of those rules, things don't usually go very well, right?
Speaker 1: Imagine you wake up one day and you go.
Speaker 1: You know what?
Speaker 1: I'm going to make my own rules about driving Oil change every 5,000 miles.
Speaker 1: Nah, I think it sounds like 50,000 miles.
Speaker 1: I'm going to make my own rules about driving Oil change every 5,000 miles.
Speaker 1: Nah, I think it sounds like 50,000 miles.
Speaker 1: I'm going to change my oil every 50,000 miles, right, emmy, 50,000 sounds like a good number.
Speaker 1: 20 mile per hour speed limit no, I'm thinking 120 mile per hour speed limit, like that sounds like, and some of you drive like that, but that sounds like my rules.
Speaker 1: Or hey, red light means stop.
Speaker 1: No, red light means punch it and pray, baby.
Speaker 1: Like that's go time, like that's your time to speed up.
Speaker 1: You got to make it through that thing.
Speaker 1: Stop sign.
Speaker 1: Stop sign stands for optional suggestion from the government.
Speaker 1: There might as well be a question mark on the end of that.
Speaker 1: Stop Question mark Right.
Speaker 1: Or hey, school zone, that's NASCAR with backpacks.
Speaker 1: Baby Shake and bake Like we're going to go for it.
Speaker 1: We're going to speed.
Speaker 1: Baby Shake and bake Like we're going to go for it.
Speaker 1: We're going to speed.
Speaker 1: Making your own rules might feel good for a little while, you might feel free, have some fun, but very quickly it is going to lead to disaster, like you are going to kill someone, and it works the same way in our everyday life.
Speaker 1: But maybe you're like me and you want to ask like, why was the tree of knowledge of good and the evil there in the the first place?
Speaker 1: Like, if it had the potential to do this much damage, why did God put it there?
Speaker 1: Was he just trying to, like, trick them or torture them?
Speaker 1: No, here's the thing, and listen closely here, because this will change how you understand this whole story.
Speaker 1: The tree was there to give them a choice, because real love cannot exist without a real choice.
Speaker 1: That's why God didn't make robots.
Speaker 1: He gave us free will, the ability to choose, and we should be thankful for that.
Speaker 1: That's one of his gifts of grace, and so having this tree in the garden was like God saying stay with me.
Speaker 1: I am the source of good, I am this tree of life.
Speaker 1: I'm going to put my life in the center of this garden.
Speaker 1: I'm going to put it there so that you actually have to go to it of life, because I don't want you to unplug yourself, but I'm not going to force you.
Speaker 1: You are free to choose your own way, even if it leads to death.
Speaker 1: And without that tree, adam and Eve couldn't choose to truly love, trust and obey God, because there'd be nothing else to choose.
Speaker 1: That tree was their chance to say God.
Speaker 1: I believe that you know what's best for me, even if I don't see the whole picture.
Speaker 1: Ultimately, that tree was an opportunity for them to worship God, and for a while that's what they did, right up until Genesis 3.
Speaker 1: Genesis 3, verse 1.
Speaker 1: Now, the serpent was more crafty than any of the other wild animals.
Speaker 1: The Lord God had made Genesis, chapter 3, verse 1.
Speaker 1: And you must not touch it or you will die.
Speaker 1: You will not certainly die, the serpent said to the woman, for God knows that when you eat from it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.
Speaker 1: And when the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it.
Speaker 1: And she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate it.
Speaker 1: And then the eyes of both of them were opened and they realized they were naked, and so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
Speaker 1: And so maybe you've read this before and been super confused as well.
Speaker 1: Right, like talking snake fruit, like on here, and it's hard to tell what is symbolic and what's literal.
Speaker 1: And so our focus here is going to be what we can be very for sure on, what the Bible is trying to say, like the point it is trying to make, and one of those things is this is that the way that the serpent tempts Eve is the same way he tempts us today?
Speaker 1: And the serpent is Satan, right, the accuser.
Speaker 1: He begins with a question hey, did God really say that you shouldn't do that?
Speaker 1: Did God really say not to eat from that tree?
Speaker 1: And the answer was yes, like that's exactly what he said.
Speaker 1: And Eve tells the serpent that.
Speaker 1: But you see that she's kind of starting to get a little bit shaky because she says yeah, in fact you know, he said don't even touch it or you're going to die.
Speaker 1: Now did God say that no?
Speaker 1: So she adds to it right, she's buying into this, this thing that Satan's trying to sell her.
Speaker 1: And so Satan comes back and outright contradicts God.
Speaker 1: He says thing that Satan's trying to sell her, and so Satan comes back and outright contradicts God.
Speaker 1: He says you're not going to die.
Speaker 1: God's lying to you.
Speaker 1: He doesn't want you to know what he knows.
Speaker 1: He knows that if you eat from it, then you're going to be like him.
Speaker 1: And the tricky thing is they already were we just talked about.
Speaker 1: They were made in God's image.
Speaker 1: But see, here's the point At its core, the temptation was not so much about the fruit as it was about not trusting God.
Speaker 1: Satan was trying to convince Eve that, hey, god is not good, that God is holding out on you, that he doesn't want you to live your best life, that he's keeping something from you, that he's just some cosmic grandpa buzzkill and it's the same lie we hear day in and day out from the enemy.
Speaker 1: And she buys the lie.
Speaker 1: She buys the lie that she can't trust God and she eats and she gives some to Adam.
Speaker 1: And in that moment they make the decision to turn from the tree of life and eat from the tree of I'll do it my own way, I'll make my own rules.
Speaker 1: And in that moment, what they were doing, whether they realized it or not, was putting themselves in the place of God, trying to take the crown, declare themselves to be God.
Speaker 1: And the problem is we make really bad gods.
Speaker 1: And we know this right.
Speaker 1: Like think about it, girls, let's be honest here for a second.
Speaker 1: And we know this right, like think about it, girls, let's be honest here for a second.
Speaker 1: If we don't eat by 12 pm on the dot, we get like full-on rage, monster levels of anger.
Speaker 1: Will anybody admit to that today, please?
Speaker 1: I have a wife and a daughter and anger is real, it happens, right.
Speaker 1: But don't worry, it's okay because guys, boys, let's level here.
Speaker 1: Look, if we get even the slightest stummy ache, it's like playing the funeral, like put me in a box, float me down the river, take me out behind the barn, shoot me Like I'm done.
Speaker 1: Stomach ache might as well be fatal.
Speaker 1: Or think about it this way we are so dependent.
Speaker 1: Right, when that phone ban went into effect, my friends.
Speaker 1: Some of y'all walked around like junkies for a week.
Speaker 1: Like some of y'all, I thought you were going to spontaneously combust for a solid three hours when you first got here that first wind way.
Speaker 1: The sun is millions of miles away, but if my white self goes outside and stands under it for 15 minutes without white paint slathered all over my body, I will look as red as Dallas's shirt.
Speaker 1: Like that is what happens every single time.
Speaker 1: It's very red.
Speaker 1: You don't have to turn around, just trust me.
Speaker 1: Or I'm to the point in life where if I sleep the wrong way, my back files for retirement Like it's just over, like I cannot walk straight for a week, or like the truth is, guys, I really cannot form sentences in the morning if I don't have coffee.
Speaker 1: Like I do not interact with human beings at all if I don't have some form of caffeine.
Speaker 1: And we can go on and joke and joke.
Speaker 1: But the point is we are finite, fragile, breakable people who make really bad gods.
Speaker 1: And it's easy to look at Adam and Eve and think how dumb, like they should have known better.
Speaker 1: But here's the reality.
Speaker 1: Lock in.
Speaker 1: If I've lost you, come back to me for this.
Speaker 1: We have all decided to eat from the wrong tree.
Speaker 1: Every single one of us have decided to try and do things our own way, to be our own God.
Speaker 1: When you know that God calls you to love your neighbor, but you choose to tear them down, gossip about them, spread rumors intentionally, not invite them to the things, send pictures and messages and group chats that tear them down honest, but you lie to your parents to get your way cheat in school because it's easier.
Speaker 1: Or when you care more about being popular than doing what's right.
Speaker 1: Or when you act one way at church in a totally different way at school.
Speaker 1: When you know you shouldn't watch that certain kind of video or look at that certain kind of stuff on social media, but you do anyway and then just clear the history.
Speaker 1: Or when you know you shouldn't send those kinds of texts and memes in the group chat, but you do because you want the attention.
Speaker 1: When you know that you shouldn't be crossing those lines with your boyfriend or girlfriend, but you do anyways.
Speaker 1: Every single one of us has eaten the fruit, myself included.
Speaker 1: We've said I wanna decide for myself what's right and wrong and the Bible calls that sin and, whether we realize it or not, when we make that decision, we take the crown and we say I'm going to be my own God, and it leads to death because we unplug ourselves from the source of life.
Speaker 1: And that's what we see right after in verse seven of chapter three.
Speaker 1: And then the eyes of both of them were opened and they realized they were naked.
Speaker 1: And so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
Speaker 1: So they realized that they were naked and they hid, and it's more than meets the eye.
Speaker 1: It's not like they were just standing around and they felt a breeze and like, ah, and then realized they were naked.
Speaker 1: But what it's standing for is this idea of shame that they had something to hide Before they had perfect innocence.
Speaker 1: Can you imagine that?
Speaker 1: Like, think about that Before they had perfect innocence?
Speaker 1: Can you imagine that, like, think about that Hiding absolutely nothing, nothing to hide, nothing to be afraid of, right, if somebody were to send you a letter in the mail that says I knew what you did, you could just tear that thing up, because you know that everybody knows like perfect innocence.
Speaker 1: None of us know that.
Speaker 1: We all have skeletons in our closet.
Speaker 1: We all have things, nights, memories, decisions we don't know that type of innocence.
Speaker 1: All we know is the guilt and the shame that they did.
Speaker 1: They realized they were naked and they hid in shame.
Speaker 1: They ran from God.
Speaker 1: And then in verse eight then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden.
Speaker 1: But the Lord God called to the man where are you?
Speaker 1: Adam and Eve ran and hid from God.
Speaker 1: They used to walk with God like the presence of God in the garden.
Speaker 1: Can you imagine what that's like?
Speaker 1: And then they hide.
Speaker 1: Why?
Speaker 1: Because they knew they messed up, they knew they disobeyed and they knew they deserved the consequence.
Speaker 1: God is perfect, he's just, he punishes sin and we want God to punish evil.
Speaker 1: But what happens when we're the evil ones?
Speaker 1: What happens when we're on that side of the fence?
Speaker 1: We have a reason to want to go hide.
Speaker 1: Then verse 10, he answered and said I heard you in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid.
Speaker 1: And he said who told you that you were naked?
Speaker 1: Have you eaten from the tree that I've commanded you not to eat from the man, said the woman you put here with me.
Speaker 1: She gave me.
Speaker 1: Then the Lord God said to the woman what is this you have done?
Speaker 1: The woman said the serpent deceived me and I ate.
Speaker 1: God asks Adam what happened?
Speaker 1: And he immediately actually I had written in my notes that he blames Eve, but that's not who he blames first, he blames God.
Speaker 1: He says God, the woman you gave me tempted me.
Speaker 1: You notice how he forgets her name all of a sudden, right Like he was just singing like a love song, basically after God creates her and brings her to him.
Speaker 1: And now it's just that woman.
Speaker 1: Because that's what sin does.
Speaker 1: Because, think about it, if sin is trying to be your own God, what happens when a bunch of people who all think they're little gods start running into each other?
Speaker 1: Right, if I think I'm God, what happens when I run into Owen, who thinks he's God and we both want the same thing?
Speaker 1: That's why you fight.
Speaker 1: That's what leads to gossip.
Speaker 1: That damages and destroys friend groups.
Speaker 1: That's why jealousy makes you bitter when your friend gets something that you really wanted.
Speaker 1: That's why you lie to your parents and try to just get your way, and it breaks their trust.
Speaker 1: That's why comparing yourself to others online makes you just hate how you look, or why fights start and friendships end just because somebody had to be right.
Speaker 1: And what I'm trying to get you to see here is that we have all sinned, we've all chosen to eat that fruit, and it always leads to bad things.
Speaker 1: In fact, scripture says that sin has infected all of us.
Speaker 1: It's all we know.
Speaker 1: All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and the wages of sin are death, and that's a hard pill to swallow.
Speaker 1: But the beauty is even in the end of this, one of the darkest chapters in all of scripture, there is hope at the end of the story, and so, in God's mercy, he lets Adam and Eve live.
Speaker 1: But he deals out these consequences.
Speaker 1: He makes childbearing hard for Eve, he makes work hard for Adam.
Speaker 1: Like these are thankful and give them dignity, but now they're a strain and it would ultimately point them back to God.
Speaker 1: But this is what God says to the serpent.
Speaker 1: I know we're, you know, lock in.
Speaker 1: It's been a long day, but everybody listen here for this.
Speaker 1: This is the most important part of the sermon.
Speaker 1: If you heard nothing else, this is what you need to hear all right, cursed are you above all livestock and all wild animals.
Speaker 1: You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life, and I will put enm.
Speaker 1: And so what's being said here is much more than just an explanation about why snakes slither.
Speaker 1: God is promising that one day there would be a descendant of Eve who would come and destroy the serpent and the power that he has over man, and that, even though that descendant would be wounded, that that descendant, through that wound, would gain the ultimate victory.
Speaker 1: And that descendant's name is Jesus.
Speaker 1: And thousands of years later, a man named Jesus would be born in a manger in Bethlehem.
Speaker 1: He'd grow up, live a perfect life and at the end of his life he died.
Speaker 1: But not just he suffocated to death, naked, beaten, beyond human recognition, tortured on the side of a road, hung on a cross.
Speaker 1: The Bible says that was not an accident.
Speaker 1: He didn't just run in with the wrong crowd, but rather that on that cross Jesus became our sin.
Speaker 1: God is perfect and just, and we've all chosen to eat from the wrong tree and because of that we deserve the consequence of death, because we chose to unplug ourself from the source of life.
Speaker 1: But Jesus took that death.
Speaker 1: He took what we chose so that we would have the opportunity to choose what he earned freedom, eternal life.
Speaker 1: And that's the message of the gospel.
Speaker 1: He faced death so that you could be reconnected to the true eternal source of life, and that's god, and that if you would believe in your heart and confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, you would be saved.
Speaker 1: And you know what that means.
Speaker 1: That means you got to make him king.
Speaker 1: That means that crown that you've tried to take for yourself so many times that you said I'm going to be God, I'm going to do things my way.
Speaker 1: You got to give it back my way.
Speaker 1: You got to give it back.
Speaker 1: See, a lot of you guys walked in here tonight thinking that Christianity is believing that a God exists.
Speaker 1: Believe George Washington was real.
Speaker 1: That's not really the picture you get here.
Speaker 1: The demons, satan they all believe God exists.
Speaker 1: The demons, satan.
Speaker 1: They all believe God exists.
Speaker 1: They believe more than you do.
Speaker 1: But true faith that saves that you get access to what Jesus did for you on the cross is a posture of the heart.
Speaker 1: It is not just saying I believe he was real, but it's saying I am declaring him Lord.
Speaker 1: I'm doing the opposite of what Adam did in that garden where he chose to eat the tree of I'll do it myself, man.
Speaker 1: Faith in Jesus is you taking that fruit and saying I'm done, and throwing it at his feet?
Speaker 1: I'm tired of choosing my own way, I'm tired of trying to do it on my own.
Speaker 1: I can't, and all I bring to you, jesus, is a bunch of reasons why I can't, and I'll lay them at your feet.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna ask you to save me because you are the source of life and I'm tired of trying to act like I can find it in a girl or a guy or a number on social media or a number on a scale or anything else that I've looked to.
Speaker 1: It's all run dry.
Speaker 1: So, jesus, I'm laying it at your feet and I'm turning to you.
Speaker 1: Will you save me?
Speaker 1: And scripture says you'll be saved.
Speaker 1: Not only that, that you will be adopted back into the family of God, that you'll receive the Holy Spirit and through the Holy Spirit, you'll be conformed back into that image of God that we were created to bear, that you'd be forgiven, set free, a child redeemed, that forevermore, your worth and your value and identity is fixed in what Jesus did for you, not your grades, not what team you're on, not your highlight reel, not what school you get into, not how many friends you have, not what friend group you're in, none of that matters did for you on the cross when it comes to eternity, that's all that matters.
Speaker 1: And so some of you guys here tonight I mean there's a group of you here that you've been checked out this entire time my challenge would be this is the most important thing you've heard all week.
Speaker 1: This is the most important thing you've ever heard in your life, and not because I have anything fancy to say, but it's the message of life, and outside of this there is no life.
Speaker 1: And so my challenge would be to you come back next week, ready to hear, ready to listen.
Speaker 1: And some of you've come here and you're honest, you're like man.
Speaker 1: I've just kind of been playing the game.
Speaker 1: I've been checking the box.
Speaker 1: I'm here because my friend invited me.
Speaker 1: I'm here because my parents want me to be.
Speaker 1: They go to some Bible study up there and make me go to dinner.
Speaker 1: But as you've been listening tonight, you felt the Lord kind of prick and poke and prod and say, and I think that's me, man, I'm eating from the wrong tree.
Speaker 1: Ask yourself tonight, what tree have you been eating from?
Speaker 1: Where are you with God?
Speaker 1: And if you find that, hey, I have guts and I know I am not with the source of life, well, maybe tonight is the first time you may need to make that decision to throw that fruit down.
Speaker 1: To look at Jesus, say you are King, you are Lord.
Speaker 1: I'm going to follow you because I believe that you are life.