Pages of Joy // John Greco

Read Genesis 3:1–7.

The opening chapters of Genesis are a trip. God speaks, and everything from stars to squids take shape. Light shatters darkness, land overtakes unrelenting oceans, and humanity is born of dirt and divine breath. It’s all so beautiful, so magical, so mysterious. And yet many people trip over the talking serpent of Genesis 3.

The chit-chat should be our first clue there’s more to this snake than meets the eye. But here’s another one: Eve didn’t flinch when the serpent approached her to strike up a conversation. She engaged the fork-tongued beast as though nothing unusual were taking place. This should tell us something. Most likely, this wasn’t an unusual event in her eyes.

Take that thinking a step further and we might conclude that the serpent wasn’t an intruder in the garden, as some of us have been taught, but was instead at home in God’s earthly temple, a servant of the Lord in the garden of holiness (see Ezekiel 28:13). That makes what happens next all the more tragic. It’s not just Adam and Eve who fall from glory, but the serpent as well.

Who is this serpent? To know for certain, we have to flip to the back of the Bible, for we’re not told here or anywhere else in the Old Testament precisely who it is. Revelation 12:9 identifies it as “that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray.” And lead the world astray he does.

The devil’s strategy with Eve was to question God’s goodness. He knew that if he could get her to believe God was holding out on her, he could disrupt her trust in Him. And that’s exactly what happened.

Satan began by offering Eve a kernel of doubt: “Did God really say…?” (Genesis 3:1). If he could get Eve to question the Lord’s commands, it would be possible to convince her of absolutely anything.

He pressed further, this time offering a full-blown lie: “You will not certainly die” (v. 4). Adam and Eve would die spiritually the moment they took a bite from the forbidden fruit, and their bodies would begin to die physically as well.

Finally, the serpent offered up a new god—one that would have the Lord’s name but would lack His righteousness: “God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (v. 5). This god of the devil’s making is insecure and schemes to stay one step ahead of his creations. Although the god Satan described was fictitious, there was one kernel of truth in his statement: Adam and Eve’s eyes would be opened—not to wisdom, as the devil implied but to their own shame, to their loss of innocence. And though they had been created to know only good things, they would now experience evil firsthand.

In all the years since Eden, the enemy hasn’t changed his strategy much. Every temptation is an attempt to create a rift between us and our Creator. If the devil can get us to doubt the Lord, we are easy prey. That’s because, fundamentally, sin isn’t about rule-breaking; it’s about failing to worship God as we should.

Think back to the commission God gave to Adam. It was to “work… and take care of” the garden (Genesis 2:15). That’s priestly language in the original Hebrew. Humanity was tasked with keeping the temple of God—that is, the garden of Eden—pure and undefiled; that’s what it means to “take care of” it. Remember, too, God’s command to “rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground” (1:28). The Lord gave Adam and Eve authority over this earth. So, when the slimy serpent began questioning God’s commands and character, they should have recognized that as their moment to rid the garden of sin. Adam should have grabbed that filthy snake by its throat and silenced him for good. That would have been an act of proper worship. Instead, Adam and Eve joined the devil in his sin. In so doing, they handed their authority over to the enemy and made themselves unfit for the temple, unfit to dwell in the presence of a holy God.

Never forget: you were made to worship—with everything you are and through everything you do. When temptation seeks to pull you away, take notice. “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you” (James 4:7).