When God created the universe, He created all things
good. Every time He saw His creation, He felt happy because there was nothing
wrong or bad with them (Genesis 1:4,10, 12c,18b2,21b,25b which repeated the
same phrase, ‘And God saw that it was good’ more than six times). Even when He created man
that was in His own image, He was happy with man. He placed them in a beautiful
garden and told them to tend and take care of it (Genesis 2:15) well and
multiply and subdue the earth. (Genesis 1:26-30) and on the last day God
evaluated His creation and saw that all that He made was good, Gen 1:31
Genesis 1:28, 29..., 28, God blessed them and said to them, ‘Be fruitful and increase in number,
fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the seas and the birds in
the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground’. 29, Then God
said, ‘I give you every seed bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and
every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food’. ….. And
it was so. Man was by nature given
authority to rule and care for all creations, this made man to live happily in
harmony with other creatures like the animals and insects. Their relationships
were beautiful until one day when man started doubting his authority and felt
preyed to the cunning vile of Satan.
As the woman (later called Eve) was having a tour (I
believe some few meters where it was possible to talk to her ) alone in the day,
trying to admire and looking for some ways of how to enjoy or understand the
nature of God and His creation, Satan who had been planning all the past days
of how to overturn the deity of God and make man rebel against Him, got hold of
the woman through the snake, convinced her beyond doubt to eat the forbidden
fruits in the middle of the garden who later on lured her husband Adam into
falsified reality eventually sinning. Man didn’t know what sin was like until
they saw their nakedness and automatically felt guilty.
In this story, we identify the sin of personal
desires, the desire to become wise and know things like God. Man in his own
mind and or understanding thought Satan was right and therefore felt that God
was unfair by stopping them from eating such fruits that could give them
knowledge of bad and good. Man personal desires to be wise like God led him to
regrettable living.
When I talk of Personal desires, I mean those things
that develop within your own self which demands satisfactions using both
tangible and intangible goods.
Let me take you back to Eve incident, she was asked
by the serpent to tell the truth about God instructions to them, he said to the
woman, ‘Did God really say, you must not
eat from any tree in the garden’? Genesis 3:1. This was a very tricky
question the serpent asked, he knew all fruits of all trees were allowed for
consumption except the one in the middle of the garden. He asked this question
to arouse more interest in the particular tree that he wanted Eve to eat. Let
hear what the woman said, the woman said to the serpent, ‘we may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, You
must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you
must not touch it, or you will die.’ Genesis 3:2. Just look at the response
of the woman carefully; she admitted being instructed not to eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, she
did not only stop here but added, you
must not touch it. Where did Eve get this statement from? She was
developing the desires for the fruits; she was looking to find out the detail
of the fruit why God did not want them to eat. God never said, ‘you
must not touch it,’ God said
in Gene 2:17, ‘but you must not eat from
the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it, you will
certainly die.’
However the serpent was quick to give out the reason
God didn’t want them to eat, in fact the reason was not genuine, but what the
fruit does was reality. The serpent said in Genesis 3Vs4, ‘You will not certainly die’ 5. ‘For God knows that when you eat from it
your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil’ As
I said, the truth about the fruit of the tree is a reality, it gives knowledge
of good and evil (Genesis 2:17, 3:7) but to reject the fact that man (Adam and
Eve) would die was a myth. Eve being weak in nature developed high personal
desires which the Bible said in Genesis
3:6, ‘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. She also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate it.
Now what has taken place here, the woman saw the
fruit and felt its sweet aroma, the eyes were covered with desires and there
was an urge for being wise-Personal desires overruled Eve. She forgot that
death awaits her, what she was filled up with was only desires to be like
God-the impossible dream. There was no option but to surrender to her desires.
The story didn’t end there but even the husband, Adam because of the demand and
love for the wife (his desires to please the wife), succumbed to and ate the
forbidden fruit. What happened next is the truth about the hidden mystery of
death which follows the result of the satisfaction of personal desires of man.
(Genesis 3:7-24). Adam and the wife now realized that they had failed the glory
of God and decided to live in hiding. The truth of what the fruit does is
exposed, Adam and the wife became knowledgeable of what they did was evil not
good
The desire to know what is good and evil came to
pass surely when those of Adam witnessed their nakedness and confirmed that it
is evil to be naked and hence sew fig leaves to cover themselves which was good
but to be like God, didn’t. Even if man
now know what is good and evil, still man knowledge needs to be update like
software applications, that is why to date, man have to go through many
academic experiences in order to be called
wise or knowledgeable. Instead of remaining in the sin of Personal Desire and
asking for forgiveness, more sins cropped up during the time i.e. Sin of
blames, Sin of Fear etc. in the next teachings we will look at some of these sin
one by one
Following the above outlook, to day man is suffering
because of one’s personal desires, the difficulties in fulfilling desires
breaded conflicts within and without.
In the New Testament, James put it this way, ‘What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t
they come from your desires that battle within you? You covet but you cannot
get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not
ask God. When you ask you do not receive because you ask with wrong motives
that you may spent what you get on your pleasures.’4:1-3. I don’t need to
explain much here, if there are fights or quarrels, they are simply due to
human desires that are within; they (desires) need to be satisfied hence
leading man to sin. It (personal desire) is therefore itself a sin if not
filtered well.
James said, it battles within one self, it requires
decision which I call it filtering, you choose to rule it or it rules you. In
advance, Cain was warned by God before he committed murder, God said, ‘…..sin
is crouching at your door, it desires to have you, but you must rule it.’
In other words, man is given the opportunity to rule over everything including
sin in fact PERSONAL DESIRES. It is therefore our responsibilities to see that
we control our desires that battle within us.
Eve, who was called the woman, earlier on, was
unable to control her desires leading the entire creation to enmity with the
Creator. Likewise, James clearly stated that if there is any fight or quarrel
is because of our inner feelings and bad intentions towards the other. The desire
to satisfy owns pleasures are our own problems.
Look around yourself, have you ever question your
mind of why things are the way they are today? What is that, that you see
different from the past stories? Have you ever seen a person hanging himself on
a tree, what could be the reason (s)? Why is it very difficult to solve a small
issue today? Why do you always fail to beat or meet a certain goal in your
life? The answer is YOUR PERSONAL DESIRES TO FULFIL PERSONAL PLEASURES
Sometimes we know that it is wrong to involve in a
certain business, but because we want to meet our personal desires, we find
ourselves engaging in it. God warned man in the Garden of Eden, He even warned
Cain earlier on. Today, we are warned by the Holy Spirit that lives in us, but
because of weak conscience or judgment, we fall victim of sin simply to fulfill
our Pleasures.
Do you need wisdom? Ask God. Are you still behind? Are the questions above
affecting you?
Let us pray together
Dear
Lord JESUS,
Deliver
me today from all those desires that battle within me, make my heart rejoice
through the presence of your Holy Ghost so that I live to please You ONLY and
make me an instrument of your testimonies to others. Amen
 |
| Ev. John Bosco |
Reach me at abunerry700.v@gmail.com
