Does the First Sin Undermine Christian Hedonism?
00:00:00.000 | [Music]
00:00:05.000 | Richard from Manhasset, New York writes in to ask this.
00:00:08.000 | "Pastor John, since Christian hedonists believe humans are joy seekers
00:00:13.000 | and will always make decisions based upon what brings them the most pleasure,
00:00:17.000 | how did Adam and Eve sin when they experienced perfect, unbroken communion with God,
00:00:23.000 | the greatest pleasure?
00:00:25.000 | Doesn't the first human sin in fact reveal that perfect delight in God
00:00:30.000 | is not strong enough to overpower the allurement of temptations?"
00:00:36.000 | I would say no, I don't think that's what it reveals.
00:00:40.000 | What the first human sin reveals is that God did not preserve in the hearts of Adam and Eve
00:00:50.000 | perfect delight in Him.
00:00:53.000 | He let them be lured away from that perfect delight in Himself,
00:01:00.000 | and that is precisely why they found the tree more compelling than God.
00:01:07.000 | In the moment that they chose the forbidden fruit,
00:01:12.000 | they were not delighting in God more than in the fruit.
00:01:17.000 | They had been tricked.
00:01:19.000 | That's the point of Genesis 3, 1 to 6.
00:01:22.000 | Let's just read it and watch how Moses, the writer,
00:01:27.000 | is helping us understand why it is that they cave.
00:01:32.000 | So here's what he says.
00:01:34.000 | "The serpent is more crafty," that's a key word,
00:01:38.000 | "than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made.
00:01:41.000 | He said to the woman, 'Did God actually say?'"
00:01:44.000 | So he is trying to get her to stop being satisfied in the trustworthiness of God.
00:01:50.000 | "Did God actually say, 'You shall not eat of any tree in the garden?'
00:01:54.000 | And the woman said to the serpent, 'We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden,
00:01:59.000 | but God said, 'You shall not eat of the tree that is in the midst of the garden,'"
00:02:04.000 | and we have no record that he said it was in the middle.
00:02:07.000 | "Neither shall you touch it."
00:02:09.000 | We have no record that he said you should not touch it.
00:02:12.000 | So what we get here is a little clue that Eve is starting to feel like
00:02:18.000 | maybe God is holding out on her.
00:02:20.000 | The tree's in the middle, and we can't even touch it,
00:02:23.000 | which he had not evidently said.
00:02:26.000 | At least there's no record of it.
00:02:28.000 | "But the serpent said to the woman, 'You will not surely die.'"
00:02:32.000 | Blatant assault on God's trustworthiness and character.
00:02:36.000 | But God knows when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened,
00:02:40.000 | and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.
00:02:42.000 | In other words, he's holding out on you.
00:02:45.000 | Stop finding your full delight in God, because he's holding out on you.
00:02:49.000 | He's not really giving you what's best for you.
00:02:52.000 | "So"--very important words here--"so when the woman saw that the tree was good for food
00:03:00.000 | and that it was a delight to the eyes, and the tree was to be desired to make one wise,"
00:03:05.000 | in other words, when she was persuaded in the moment that God was not all-satisfying,
00:03:11.000 | she took of the fruit and ate and gave some to her husband, and he ate.
00:03:14.000 | So I don't think there's anything there that contradicts Christian hedonism.
00:03:20.000 | If we find our fullest pleasure in God, we will in that moment not choose what is sinful.
00:03:28.000 | But if that satisfaction in God wavers, then we become vulnerable, and that's where sin comes from.
00:03:38.000 | Sin is the preference of anything that God has forbidden.
00:03:44.000 | We will never prefer that.
00:03:46.000 | We will never prefer what God has forbidden, as long as God himself is our supreme satisfaction.
00:03:53.000 | One of the differences--this is something that they didn't ask, but I think is so crucial--
00:03:59.000 | one of the differences between Adam and Eve, on the one hand, and the children of God in Christ today,
00:04:07.000 | on the other hand, is that God has committed himself in the new covenant never to let his children fall away utterly.
00:04:18.000 | They can backslide, but he convicts them and brings them back.
00:04:23.000 | Jeremiah 32, 40, "I will make with them an everlasting covenant that I will not turn away from doing good to them,
00:04:30.000 | and I will put the fear of me in their hearts that they may not turn from me."
00:04:38.000 | Ooh, I love that promise.
00:04:41.000 | God commits himself to holding on to us.
00:04:45.000 | We just sang last Sunday. I love that song. "He Will Hold Me Fast." Beautiful song.
00:04:50.000 | This is a great improvement over the arrangements in the Garden of Eden,
00:04:54.000 | and we owe it to the blood of Christ, the blood of the new covenant.
00:05:00.000 | That is a beautiful song and a beautiful promise. Thank you, Pastor John.
00:05:03.000 | And thank you, Richard, for the question.
00:05:05.000 | If you have a question for Pastor John, you can now submit those questions to us through the website,
00:05:10.000 | through the new Ask Pastor John podcast landing page.
00:05:13.000 | Go to DesiringGod.org, and at the top of the page, click on the tab that says "More," and then click on "Ask Pastor John."
00:05:21.000 | On the landing page, you can ask Pastor John a question.
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00:05:34.000 | It's our way of continually trying to tweak the website to make it as user-friendly and intuitive as possible.
00:05:41.000 | Well, it's a common question that we get.
00:05:43.000 | "If everything is about finding joy in God, what do I do when God feels distant from me?"
00:05:50.000 | I'll ask Pastor John tomorrow.
00:05:52.000 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Thanks for listening to the podcast.
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