What makes something you can’t have always look so good? Did Satan polish a big red juicy apple moments before Eve laid eyes on it? In the Bible it says, ” . . . your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.
The end result is knowledge of what is good and evil. I want to cheat and the temptation is great. I know the ramifications of cheating and where it can possibly end, but why the intense urge to go through with it.
This is not a Bible study or a lecture or condemnation of sin. It ‘s an article on pensive thoughts on why the desire to cheat. Let’s look at the verse in its entirety.
“For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
It does not say when you eat of it, God will find out. He knew. God must have placed a recessive gene in our DNA to cheat. We as humans can’t help it therefore we must cheat.
But, if Eve did not know good from evil, and God placed a do not touch sign on the tree of knowledge. Why did she do it anyway? In another verse; “Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted with evil (yet knows good and evil) and he himself tempts no one; but each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire.”
If God tempts no one, who had the brilliant idea to put desire as an instinctual feeling inside of us? Each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed is that to say put a nice, shiny red apple in front of me, I will eat it? Lured and enticed by his own desire (DNA?) does that mean Eve was possessed of evil before she committed sin for entire mankind?
In another Biblical passage; “The great temptations which thine eyes have seen, the signs, and those great miracles: Yet the LORD hath not given you an heart to perceive, and eyes to see, and ears to hear, unto this day.” Now, the question is why did God not give Moses and the people wandering around in the desert for forty years a heart to feel eyes to not see, and ears not to hear? Why did he allow Satan to deceive Adam and Eve and have their eyes opened?
I think it has to do with book sales. How many times has the Bible gone into print, in how many languages?
There is a fine line between temptation and cheating, both are the act of deception, except cheating involves more than two people. Who are you cheating with? Who are you cheating on?
In my own temptation to sin, I am tempted to go with the scripture given by Mae West instead of following the Bible. “I generally avoid temptation unless I can’t resist it.”
Bible passages used: Genesis 3:5; James 1:13 – 14; Deuteronomy 29:3 – 4
Special thanks to Country Super Star, Merle Haggard for his song, “Because You Can’t Be Mine” and giving me the inspiration for this article; to Mae West for her scriptures on life and living.
Copyright © 2008, Vincent Parker. All rights reserved.
Tags: Adam, apple, Bible, cheating, Eve, evil, God, good, lecture, Satan, Sin, temptation, urge, verse
