Genesis 3:1-7
Last Fall, we changed banks. One might think that banks are pretty much the same, and in many ways they are. But banks have some differences about check cashing, types of accounts, interest rates and such. We had a lot of questions to ask when we changed over. Even after we had set things up, we realized that we still had some questions to be answered. We needed more information. We just hadn’t asked all the right questions.
Sometimes in our moral and spiritual dealings we have the same problem. We don’t ask all the right questions, or we ask the wrong questions. It was that way back in Eden, too.
When the serpent came slithering into the garden, he knew what buttons to push to get Eve to ask the wrong questions. (He’s really good at that.) One of the subtleties of the devil’s temptation was to shift the focus of the situation from God to Eve. (He still does this today.) He began by asking about what God had said concerning eating the fruit of the trees of the garden., but then he brought the discussion around to Eve. He said that she would not die if she ate of the forbidden tree, but that she would become “like God, knowing good and evil.”
You can almost hear the “wheels turning” in Eve’s head as you read v 6. She is looking at and considering the forbidden fruit. “Well, it looks good for food. And it is lovely to look at. And if it will make me wise...Hmmm?” In a very short time, Eve had gone from believing what Gad had said regarding the tree to what she thought about the tree. And then it was that she transgressed.
Let’s learn from Eve. Consult the word of God and don’t simply rely on what we think or have heard somewhere. Often we ask the wrong questions because we’re already looking for a certain answer. The right questions center on God and His truth. The wrong ones almost always focus on our own desires, expectations and preconceived ideas. Learn to ask the right questions.