Have you ever wondered why the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was such a bad tree? Didn’t the tree give you the knowledge of good? Can’t you take what is good and throw away the evil? As the saying goes, “Why throw the baby out with the bathwater?”
Genesis 2: 8-9 “The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground the Lord God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.”
Verses 15-17 “Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend it and keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; but 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.”
The tree of the knowledge of good and evil is a great analogy to many situations of life that we will face as people. We will need to discern the right action in those situations by examining God’s word & His heart. The scripture is very clear that when sin enters the life of a believer, or in the life of a congregation it must be dealt with radically. Jesus declared that one lusting with eyes is committing adultery.
He said, “If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you; And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body be cast into hell.” Matthew 5:29
It is better to remove the eye than the person go to hell. There are times when falseness is so much part of the fabric and structure of something that the entire thing needs to be avoided. False doctrine and false teachers were some of the examples in the New Testament. Jesus said to His disciples,
“Take heed and Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees & Sadducees”. (Matthew 16:6)
The leaven does not stay contained, but it will eventually contaminate every part of the good teaching and good people. Evil is very similar to cancer cells. Cancer doesn’t need or require much action help to grow rapidly, to take over an organ, and destroy the body. That’s why it must be dealt with swiftly and radically. In the case of Adam and Eve, the knowledge of good and evil were part of every fabric of this tree, and could not be separated. The good has been contaminated by evil, and it does not exist separately. That’s the reason the Lord didn’t want them to eat any fruit from that tree. The good was spoiled by evil!!
When we are born again, at times we may think now that I have salvation, I can just go back to my old way of life and live happily ever after. That is not true. If you have been walking with God for a period of time, but your old ways, patterns of thinking, feeling, or actions have not changed, it is time to examine them before the Lord.
In Matthew 9:16-17 “No one puts a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; for the patch pulls away from the garment, and the tear is made worse. Nor do they put new wine into old wineskins, or else the wineskins break, the wine is spilled, and the wineskins are ruined.” The old has to be put away or there will be a mixture of the old life and the new life. God is not pleased with mixture, and certainly growth will not be possible with mixture because the old life cannot handle the growth of the new life. The old must be done away with and allow the new life to take root and get established.
Is there a part of old life you been resistant in giving up? Meditate on the above scriptures and allow the Lord to put His finger on those areas that are a mixture of good and evil in your life.
Determine in your heart that you do not desire a mixture in your life. Ask Him to forgive you, and pray that His grace would give you the courage and the faith to follow through with your decision today.