European Bible Study Meeting, 2002We Know Our IniquitiesApril 2nd, 2002 Afternoon Lecture Part 1Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.  1 John 2:15-17Does Not the Ear Test Words as the Palate Tastes Food?Many of you will be well familiar with the content of Genesis chapter 3 since we refer to it so often. It seems quite possible that Genesis chapters 1 through 4 could be the most read part of the Bible by anyone in the world.Previously, we examined Genesis chapters 1 and 2 and Ecclesiastes. God created the heavens and the earth through His word of life, but an incident occurred in that beautiful world. In the realms of eternity before time began, a certain angel fell from grace and was cut down to the ground: “How you are cut down to the ground” (Isaiah 14:12). As a result of this, the earth became a chaos of confusion, emptiness, and darkness. Yet, there God said, “Let there be light,” (Genesis 1:3) and there was light. After that, the waters began to move by the word of God, the dry land appeared, and from the land there sprung up vegetation, plants yielding seed, and all kinds of fruit-bearing trees. God made all the living creatures in the sea, the birds that fly in the sky, the land animals, the cattle, and all the creatures that crawl along the ground. Then, after He had made all these things, He made man of the dust of the ground, breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being. As we have been studying this order of events of the creation, we have seen how the secret of God’s life is hidden within all this and how these events are related to Jesus Christ, the central figure in the Bible.Let’s turn to Job chapter 12 and read from verse 7. But ask the beasts, and they will teach you; the birds of the heavens, and they will tell you; or the bushes of the earth, and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you. Who among all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this? In his hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of all mankind.  verses 7-10Previously, we examined Genesis chapters 1 and 2 in light of the verse that says, “For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse” (Romans 1:20), and we considered the fact that this exalted God exists. The order of all things could not have been established through the wisdom of man. There is nothing in this world that has the power to establish and maintain such order. The only One who upholds all these things is God.In this passage from the book of Job, we find that all things under the heavens know they have been created by God and they continue in an orderly fashion in obedience and submission to Him, and yet what about man, who prides himself in being the supreme creature in all creation? Does he submit in obedience to God? It says, “the life of every living thing.” What kind of life is this? Then it says, “the breath of all mankind.” “Breath” is used here to express “the spirit”; it is a reference to the life that man alone has, as expressed in the verse that says, “the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature” (Genesis 2:7).Does not the ear test words as the palate tastes food? Wisdom is with the aged, and understanding in length of days.  Job 12:11-12God formed Adam, the first person, and said, “I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food” (Genesis 1:29). The food God gave him was every plant yielding seed and every tree with seed in its fruit. Yet, to the animals He gave every green plant for food (see Genesis 1:30); there is no mention of the seeds being their food.Today we eat a wide variety of foods, but let’s think about God’s words when He said He gave for man’s food every plant yielding seed and every tree with seed in its fruit. We live our lives eating what God has told us to eat: the vegetation that yields seed and fruits with seeds in them. Yet, when we eat foods with seeds in them, we usually spit out the seeds. When we eat fruits like watermelon and apples, we do not eat the seeds; we do not like the taste of the seeds, they are difficult to chew, and they are annoying. The soft flesh of the fruit surrounding the seed is sweet and tasty, and stimulates the taste buds, but we separate out the seeds with our tongue and spit them out. But what does it mean when the Bible says, “Does not the ear test words as the palate tastes food?”? I wonder if our bodies are testifying of the fact that our spirits are also like this.In Luke chapter 8, Jesus said, “The seed is the word of God” (verse 11). When we consider the parable of the sower, it is clear that man is definitely intended to receive and eat this seed in the course of his life. God told the first man, Adam, to eat the plants yielding seed and fruits with seeds in them. Similarly, in the Bible we find the law that God has ordained that everyone is to accept and eat the seed of God’s word as food for their hearts to live and maintain their lives. Therefore, as we read verses like this in the book of Job, and as we eat food and fruits in the course of our daily lives, it is good for us all to ask ourselves, “Why am I like this? What is the reason that I do these things?”Before studying the Bible before God, you need to consider what kind of person you are and what you do from the moment you open your eyes in the morning, starting with the foods that you eat. Think about what all these things are teaching you. And now, let’s turn to Genesis chapter 3.The Serpent’s Crafty Temptation of the WomanLet’s begin with the last verse of chapter 2. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.  verse 25Do you have any idea of the state of heart of a person who is not ashamed even when naked? There is no way that anyone born after Adam sinned can possibly understand this verse. If Adam were still alive, he would be able to tell us, “Before I ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, I was not ashamed, but something happened when I ate the forbidden fruit.” But Adam has already passed away, and now many of his descendants have been born and are living on this earth, and none of us can understand how this would be. We cannot understand this no matter how hard we may try.As we read on in Genesis chapter 3, however, we find passages that we are able to understand; matters that we can relate to in our hearts. Up to the end of chapter 2 of Genesis, we cannot really understand what it would have been like, but chapter 3 contains matters to which we can relate. Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made.  Genesis 3:1Here it says, “beast of the field.” God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind (see Genesis 1:25), and the serpent was one of these animals.Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’” But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when y

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