ContentsChapter 4 of 11

The Fall of Man and Sin

Answers to Your Questions About Man’s Sin

After reading about the creation of the world, some questions arise: If everything was so wonderful in the beginning, why is it no longer so? Where did suffering, sorrow and death come from? Why is there so much hatred, bitterness and misunderstanding in the world? What happened to all the harmony, peace and joy there was before?

The Bible’s answer to all these questions is clear and simple. Everything changed when man fell into sin!

  1. 1.What commandment did God give to the first people He created?

    God told them not to eat from one of the trees of the garden in which they lived.

    The LORD God commanded the man, saying, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but you shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; for in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die.”

    Genesis 2:16-17

  2. 2.Did they obey God’s commandment?

    No. They decided to live their own way instead of living according to God’s will.

    When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took some of its fruit, and ate. Then she gave some to her husband with her, and he ate it, too.

    Genesis 3:6

  3. 3.What happened when they sinned against God?

    They lost fellowship with God and opened the way to suffering, judgment and death.

    To Adam he said, “Because you have listened to your wife’s voice, and have eaten from the tree, about which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ the ground is cursed for your sake. You will eat from it with much labor all the days of your life. It will yield thorns and thistles to you; and you will eat the herb of the field. You will eat bread by the sweat of your face until you return to the ground, for you were taken out of it. For you are dust, and you shall return to dust.”

    Genesis 3:17-19

  4. 4.What connection does their sin have with our sins?

    When sin entered the world, it corrupted mankind and nature and all other living beings.

    Therefore, as sin entered into the world through one man, and death through sin, so death passed to all men because all sinned.

    Romans 5:12

    So then as through one trespass, all men were condemned; even so through one act of righteousness, all men were justified to life.

    Romans 5:18

  5. 5.Are we all sinners and guilty before God?

    Yes, without exception.

    As it is written, “There is no one righteous; no, not one.

    Romans 3:10

    for all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God;

    Romans 3:23

  6. 6.Can’t such a loving God ignore the fact that we are sinners?

    No. Although God is loving and merciful, He is also just. God knows that sin brings anguish, suffering and the destruction of human life — death.

    ‘The LORD is slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, forgiving iniquity and disobedience; and he will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and on the fourth generation.’

    Numbers 14:18