26. What are the consequences of the fall and disobedience of the first man?
Mankindlost their fellowship with God and thus became subject to spiritual death. Death always means separation. Immediately after the fall, there was spiritual death, that is, separation from God.
Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die. (Genesis 2:17)
Mankindbecame subject to the rule of Satan and sin.
Whoever commits sin is a slave of sin. (John 8:34)
Sin has corrupted our whole being so that we hate what is good and love evil. Sin darkens the mind, pollutes the soul, weakens the will, and harms the body. We all sin without exception. We are all born sinners. We inherited a selfish nature from our first parents. That is why we pursue what God has forbidden, and we sin even against our own will and wishes. The extent of our inclination to evil is visible from the fact that doing good requires great effort, while doing evil is easy.
Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? No one! (Job 14:4)
For there is no one who does not sin. (1 Kings 8:46)
For there is no difference; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Romans 3:22-23)
Who can understand his errors? Cleanse me from secret faults. (Psalm 19:12)
Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me. (Psalm 51:5)
To will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. (Romans 7:18-19)
But he who sins against me wrongs his own soul; all those who hate me love death. (Proverbs 8:36)
The most terrible consequence of sin is death. Sin is a poison that is deadly. We see the death’s rule in the “struggle for survival” in all creatures on Earth, and in the weakness and frailty of our lives.
For the wages of sin is death. (Romans 6:23)
Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned. (Romans 5:12)
Sin is a reproach to any people. (Proverbs 14:34)
Through the fall of man, all creation has been subjected to suffering and awaits redemption.
Then to Adam He said, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’: Cursed is the ground for your sake.” (Genesis 3:17)
For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope; because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. (Romans 8:20-21)
