Genesis 3:4-5 English Standard Version

4 But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. 5 For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

Much of what is written about mankind’s behaviors are lessons about our natural inclinations.

This is mankind’s first inclination, their first sin, the original mistake that caused the ball to start rolling downhill.

What Adam and Eve were inclined to do is no different than our inclinations right now as we have been born again in Christ.

Adam and Eve walked with God in the cool of the day. Being that close to God made them want to be like God.

Satan knew that, having been in His presence and wanting to be more than just an angel. He fed Eve what she desired, a quick and easy way to be like God.

Now we are in Christ and we are close to Him and just that fact causes that same desire, to be more like Him. That desire about how to be more Christlike is not unlike Satan’s temptation of Eve. We want easy answers and instant results. That is our natural inclination.

The rest of the lesson makes us uncomfortable because at the time of our rebirth we have already lived a life and been influenced by our natural inclinations without realizing we have to return to our pre-fall condition, innocence.

Innocence is a condition of never having done anything wrong. We never made a choice to do wrong until we were given an opportunity to disobey. Being born again is being born into a state of grace in which we already made the one choice that restored our innocence.

In our minds, in our memories, we have a conscience that remembers our past wrongs. It does not allow us to feel innocent because that is a spiritual condition, a right standing with God.

Father God gave us His Son so that by faith we are restored to the pre-fall innocence of walking with Him in the garden.

This is where our natural inclinations once again takes us into the natural realm and away from the gracious state where we walk with God.

“Nothing is given, we have to earn it.” That is grace confounded.

“The more holy a man is, the more humble, self-renouncing, self-abhorring, and the more sensitive to every sin he becomes, and the more closely he clings to Christ. The moral imperfections which cling to him he feels to be sins, which he laments and strives to overcome. Believers find that their life is a constant warfare, and they need to take the kingdom of heaven by storm, and watch while they pray. They are always subject to the constant chastisement of their Father’s loving hand, which can only be designed to correct their imperfections and to confirm their graces. And it has been notoriously the fact that the best Christians have been those who have been the least prone to claim the attainment of perfection for themselves.”, Hodge’s Outlines.

The question for each of us is this; did we achieve kingdom status by ourselves?

Are we careful about our prayers?

The Intercessor is a book that influenced my prayer life intensely, perhaps too much. In it there was one harsh line that cut me to the quick. God is weary of selfish prayer.

The author Norman Grubb knew Rees Howell and one of my church elders knew Norman. At the time it appeared that grace  passed down from Rees, to Norman, to Frank. My hope was that grace would pass down to me.

I was wrong because the example of life was one of how the grace of God works in us independent of self-interest. I had wanted to be like a man rather than Christ because I misunderstood how the grace of God changes the inner man to be more Christlike.

Over the years many learned men have been gifted to study and relate God’s Word in ways that have found followers greatly influenced by those writings. God’s Word, Jesus Christ should be our greatest influence and not talented authors.

I found myself attracted to a writer that had a harsh judgmental style of writing. It took years of being influenced by his writing before the Lord showed me I was attracted to his style of writing because of my own judgmental nature.

Sooner or later God’s Word, the Spirit of Truth, will convict us of those things in us that need correction.

It takes longer to get through to a mind that needs correction when it thinks it is right about everything.

If we are truly His, He will chasten us of our imperfections. He does it in a way that will be lasting and effective.