James 1:22-25 (NIV), “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom and continues in it—not forgetting what they have heard but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do.”
The mirror metaphor in the text above suggests that anyone who reads the word (Bible) should see himself or herself in it. It means that the Bible as a collection of 66 books (library) is also about us human beings, both corporately and individually. It is the story of our lives within the Story of God’s revelation to the world. The same metaphor also suggests that God’s word (Bible) is meant for our blessing(s): Forgetting what the Bible says, i.e., what we have heard, is costly in that it denies us the blessing of doing what it says….
The Fall as the story of our lives
From the account of the Fall in Genesis 3 we are reminded that the act of sin is not at the moment of consummation/action by rather conception/perception. Simply put, sin is spiritual first (thought) before materialising in the physical (act). Accordingly, Eve sinned before she took the fruit off the tree and ate it. She was able to eat the fruit because her soul had already sinned.
Interestingly, Ezekiel 19:4 (NKJV) states God’s perspective: “Behold, all souls are Mine; The soul of the father as well as the soul of the son is Mine; The soul who sins shall die.” -The NIV translation of this passage fails to capture the revelation by omitting the word soul. We need to understand that the soul of a human being sins first before the one is seen to be sinning in actual fact.
Let’s consider two more passages:
◦ (1) Matthew 5:28 (NIV), “But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”
◦ (2) Mark 7:20-23 (NIV), “He went on: “What comes out of a person is what defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come—sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and defile a person.”
Clearly, a human being can sin without posing the sinful act (adultery in the heart, for example). Hence, a human being can become unclean without physically doing something to make him so.
See, Eve sinned when “she saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye , and also desirable for gaining wisdom,…,” (Genesis 3:6a). This is significant especially when we consider that “the fruit” here refers to the forbidden fruit, forbidden by God.
Simply put, Eve saw the forbidden fruit as “good, pleasing, and desirable”. We’re talking about the same fruit that God said would induce death if eaten, thus making it bad for Mankind. No wonder that “she took some and ate it.” Eve’s sin consisted in seeing the fruit differently, that is, not as forbidden but rather something to have. Here we learn that anyone who think of what is forbidden as something good to have is very likely to go for it….
Simply put, basically, Eve’s soul disagreed with God regarding the fruit and there lies her sin.
Seeing the fruit as “good, pleasing, and desirable” describes her rationale or justification (self-talk) for taking the fruit to eat. Or, to use James’ language, Eve ignored, as if she had forgotten, what the word of God said, she failed to continue in it.
Eve’s story is also the story of our lives within the Story (the Fall). Here we learn that our defeats and losses stem from disagreeing with God’s word in the first place. We can tell that we disagree with God as soon as we begin to justify/rationalise seeing things differently…. Think of the kind of debates in our parliament that are often based exclusively on humanistic principles rather than God’s word! However, convincing ourselves that right is wrong and vice versa does not make it so. The darkness doesn’t become light simply because the whole world decides so by unanimous voting….
Reading the story of our lives both corporately and individually within the story of the Fall in Genesis 3 indicates the same pattern when it comes to sin (missing the mark or falling short of God’s will) with the same outcome(s).
Someone rightly remarked that the real battle for our lives, even the survival as the human race, is the battle of the mind (soul). Isn’t true that repentance is essentially the soul of a human being returning back to agreeing with God’s word? Hence, it is impossible for someone with a repentant soul to live in sin.
May God help us all!
