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The Story of Redemption
the power of eating the forbidden fruit. He left them as free moral
agents to believe His word, obey His commandments, and live, or
believe the tempter, disobey, and perish. They both ate, and the
great wisdom they obtained was the knowledge of sin and a sense of
guilt. The covering of light about them soon disappeared, and under
a sense of guilt and loss of their divine covering, a shivering seized
them, and they tried to cover their exposed forms.
Our first parents chose to believe the words, as they thought,
of a serpent; yet he had given them no tokens of his love. He
had done nothing for their happiness and benefit, while God had
given them everything that was good for food and pleasant to the
sight. Everywhere the eye might rest was abundance and beauty; yet
Eve was deceived by the serpent, to think that there was something
withheld which would make them wise, even as God. Instead of
believing and confiding in God, she basely distrusted His goodness
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and cherished the words of Satan.
After Adam’s transgression he at first imagined that he felt the
rising to a new and higher existence. But soon the thought of his
transgression terrified him. The air, that had been of a mild and even
temperature, seemed to chill them. The guilty pair had a sense of
sin. They felt a dread of the future, a sense of want, a nakedness of
soul. The sweet love and peace and happy contented bliss seemed
removed from them, and in its place a want of something came over
them that they had never experienced before. They then for the first
time turned their attention to the external. They had not been clothed
but were draped in light as were the heavenly angels. This light
which had enshrouded them had departed. To relieve their sense of
lack and nakedness which they realized, their attention was directed
to seek a covering for their forms, for how could they meet the eye
of God and angels unclothed?
Their crime is now before them in its true light. Their transgres-
sion of God’s express command assumes a clearer character. Adam
censured Eve’s folly in leaving his side and being deceived by the
serpent. They both flattered themselves that God, who had given
them everything to make them happy, might yet excuse their disobe-
dience because of His great love to them and that their punishment
would not be so dreadful after all.