Lesson #22
SIN AND ITS CONSEQUENCES
(Part 1)

Reading: Genesis2 and 3
Click here to return to the Main Bible StudyPage.

The world is in a mess! Wars, famine, disease, death, crime,violenceÖ God created a beautiful world. Man has spoilt it. Man's sinfulnature with his greed, selfishness, jealousy and disobedience have ruinedsociety and this earth.

Where did it all start going wrong?

In the beginning God created the first man, Adam. He wasformed from the dust of the ground, and we read that:

"The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul" (Genesis 2:7)

God provided a beautiful garden for Adam to live in andthen provided him with his wife, Eve.

At this point, Adam and Eve had not shown whether theywould obey God or not. They had not been tried. God gave them a simple command:

"Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die" (Genesis 2: 16-17)

 

Adam and Eve had a choice

Either they could obey God or they could disobey Him andeat of the fruit of the forbidden tree. They had free will. God had notmade "puppets" who had no choice as to whether they obeyed ornot. God wanted men and women who would choose His way because they lovedand respected Him.

The serpent came along and lied to Adam and Eve. The serpentsaid they would not die if they ate the forbidden fruit, and that insteadthey would become like gods, knowing good and evil. Adam and Eve wantedto be more like the angels. They chose to eat of the fruit. Theysinned and they disobeyed God.

The Punishment

God had said they would die if they disobeyed. So Adamand Eve were condemned to death and driven out of the Garden of Eden.

Although they lived a long time after this, they becamedying creaturesóand just like you and me, they would become tiredand sick, grow old, and finally die.

What is death?

Death was a punishment for sin. God had said:

"Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return" (Genesis 3: 19)

So Adam's body decayed when he died and returned to thedust from which it was made.

Remember, God made Adam from the dust of the earth andthen God breathed the breath of life into him before he became a "livingsoul".

DUST plus BREATH = A LIVING SOUL

So when Adam died,

LIVING SOUL minus BREATH = DEAD SOUL

that is, the LIVING SOUL without BREATH becameDUST

Adam's death was no different from ours. We all sin, sowe all die.

"Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned" (Romans 5: 12)

Part of Adam did not go on living in heaven. Of coursenot! His death was Godís punishment for sin, and death means theend of all the life processes.

None of us will go to heaven when we die. There is nosuch thing as an "immortal soul". The bible does not mentionimmortal souls. There is nothing that carries on living after a person dies.There is no "immortal" or "divine" spark in man.

"Soul" means life, person, livingcreature

Below is a list of some of the passages in the Bible wherethis word ësoulí is used. (The passages are taken from the Authorisedor King James Version. Other translations may vary but the meaning is stillthe same.) Look them up for yourself and see if you agree with the comments.

Reference	Comments
Genesis 46: 15	Jacob's (living) children are called "souls"in this verse.
Genesis 46: 26	"All the souls" clearly means "all thepeople".
Leviticus 5: 2, 17	Souls can sin (in other words people can sin).
Leviticus 17: 12	No soul was to eat blood - no person was to eat blood.
Joshua 10: 28, 30,	All the souls (people were utterly destroyed. (Note ësoulsícan
32, 35, 37	be destroyed!)
Joshua 11: 11	They killed all the souls so there was none left thatbreathed.
Ezekiel 18: 4, 20	"The soul that sinneth, it shall die." Soulsdie! (This simply means that if we sin, we die.)
Acts 27: 37	There were 276 souls in the ship. "Soul" hereclearly means "people".

There are many more examples we could give to show thatthe word ësoulí means person or being. (In fact the word translatedësoulí is also used of animals; see Genesis 1: 21, 24; 2: 19;9: 10. In these cases it is translated ëcreatureí.)

This all supports what Ecclesiastes 3: 19-20 says:

"For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them: as the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; so that a man hath no preeminence above a beast; for all is vanity. All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again."

There is no difference in death between a man and an animal.An animal does not have a part which goes to heaven when it dies any morethan a man does. Both have lifeless bodies when they stop breathing.

"SOUL" means LIFE, PERSON, CREATUREor BEING

Look at these passages which show us what happens whenwe die. (Look them up so you can read them in full.)

Psalm 146: 4 "Manís breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth, in that very day his thoughts perish."

Ecclesiastes 9: 5 "the dead know not any thing"

Psalm 6: 5 "In death there is no remembrance of thee: in the grave who shall give thee thanks?"

Psalm 39: 13 " O spare me, that I may recover strength, before I go hence, and be no more."

Psalm 115: 17 "The dead praise not the Lord, neitherany that go down into silence."

These passages all show that dead people cannot think.

When King Hezekiah was told that he was going to die hewas devastated. He wanted to stay alive because he knew that there was nothingin death. He said:

"For the grave cannot praise thee, death can not celebrate thee: they that go down into the pit cannot hope for thy truth" (Isaiah 38: 18)

He also said, "The living, the living he shallpraise thee" (Isaiah 38:19), knowing that if he was dead he couldnot praise God.

What about King David? We are told that he did not go toheaven (Acts 2: 34)even though he is called a man after God's own heart.

All men are condemned to death because of sin. They donot live on in another form after death.

If we do not understand this we will never appreciate theway in which the Lord Jesus suffered and died to set us free. If we hadimmortal souls there would have been no need for Jesus to die for us.

But the Bible tells us we have no hope of life apart fromChrist.

Summary

1. God made Adam out of the dust of the ground.

2. He caused him to live, by breathing into his nostrils the breath of life.

3. God gave Adam a commandment. He told him that if he disobeyed this commandment, the punishment would be death.

4. Adam and Eve disobeyed God and broke His commandment. They became dying creatures.

5. All men are descended from Adam, and inherit his sinful nature. All men sin, and die.

6. The word "soul" means life or being, and usually refers to a person.

7. The phrase "immortal soul" is not found in the Bible.

8. Death is a punishment for sin.

9. Death is a state of unconsciousness. There is no part of us which goes on living when we die.

A chapter to read: Ecclesiates9

A good verse to memorise: Psalm146: 4

"His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish."