3. Then the serpent came ...... - پھر سانپ آیا

This story is told to children by Grandma Ida.

This story really happened. It was written in the Bible by Moses.

How wonderful it was for Adam and Eve to live in that beautiful garden!
The garden was called the Garden of Eden. People also call it Paradise.
The happiest thing of all was this: God Himself walked with them. When they went for a walk, God simply talked with the man and the woman. They knew deep inside: God loves us, and we love God and each other.

There were so many beautiful flowers, and all kinds of trees with delicious fruit. They could pick the fruit whenever they wanted. God had created all of this on the third day.

In the middle of the garden stood two very special trees.
One was called the Tree of Life.
The other was actually a tree of death — the tree through which Satan deceives the world.

The trees looked beautiful, and their fruit looked delicious too. God told Adam and Eve that they could eat from every tree in the garden except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
“If you eat from that tree,” God said, “death will enter your life. You will learn evil.”
So God warned them: Do not eat from that tree.

The Serpent Speaks

One day, Eve was walking near that tree when she heard a voice.
A serpent was sitting there, and it began to speak to her. Eve thought it was strange. Why was a snake talking to her?

The serpent asked, “Did God really say you may not eat from any tree in the garden?”

Eve answered, “No, that’s not true. We may eat from all the trees — except this one. We must not even touch it. If we do, we will die, and of course we don’t want that.”

“That is not true at all!” the serpent said. “You will not die if you eat from this tree.”
The serpent — in which Satan was speaking — was actually saying that God was lying.
That was the first lie on earth.

Eve became confused. God always tells the truth. She didn’t even know what lying was.
But the serpent continued:
“If you eat from this tree, you will not die. This tree will make you wise. God doesn’t want you to eat from it because then you will know good and evil — you will become like God.”

The First Sin

Eve didn’t know what to do. She looked again at the tree.
What a beautiful tree, she thought.
Could this tree really make someone wise? Imagine being as wise as God…

She looked at the fruit again. It looked so beautiful and tasty.
She no longer thought about what God had said —

........or maybe she didn’t want to think about it.

She reached out her hand, picked a fruit, and took a bite.

Would she die now?
Nothing happened.
And the fruit tasted so good!

She went to Adam and told him how delicious it was.
“Take a bite too, Adam!”
And Adam did.

He also ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Everything Changes

Suddenly everything changed.
They understood that what they had done was wrong.
The joy of the garden disappeared.
They had fallen into the serpent’s lie.

They noticed they were naked and felt ashamed. They had been naked before, but they had never noticed it.

Perhaps God’s glory had covered them like a shining robe.

They quickly picked large fig leaves and tried to make clothes.

Then they heard the voice of the LORD, who always walked with them in the evening.

But now… they were afraid.
They had never felt fear before.
They hid among the trees.

God called, “Adam, where are you?”
God knew where Adam was, but Adam needed to come out.

Adam said, “I heard Your voice and I was afraid, because I was naked. So I hid.”

God asked, “Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat from the tree I commanded you not to eat from?”

Adam gave a very sad answer.
He should have said, “Yes, God, I ate from the tree.”
But instead he said, “The woman You gave me — she gave me the fruit, and I ate it.”
So Adam blamed Eve… and even blamed God for giving him Eve.

Do we sometimes do that too?
Admitting guilt is hard, but it is honest.
Let us pray that God helps us to confess our wrongs — to Him and to each other.

Eve also blamed someone else.
“The serpent deceived me, and I ate,” she said.

”She, too, blamed the serpent. The serpent was indeed guilty, but Adam and Eve should have said to the serpent: “No, we won't do that. God forbids it.”

God gave the following punishment to the serpent:

God’s Judgment

God said to the serpent:

You are cursed.
You will crawl on your belly and eat dust.
There will always be war between you and the woman.
Between your seed and her Seed.
Her Seed (Yeshua) will crush your head.
And you will strike His heel.

This promise is what Yeshua/Jesus fulfilled on the cross.

The seed of the serpent causes harm to humanity and to believers. Because of this, Yeshua was despised, persecuted, and crucified. Because of this, there is always strife, war, poverty, sickness, and death in this world. That is why things are so bad between fathers and mothers and within families. That is why there are so many divorces. This is due to what happened in the Garden of Eden with 'the Tree of knowledge of good and evil'. Even now, most people make use of “the Tree of knowledge of good and evil.” But, if we give our heart and life to Yeshua/Jesus, love Him, and follow Him, a different, better life is promised.

God said to Adam:

The ground is cursed because of your sin.
You will work hard all your life to grow food.
Thorns and weeds will grow.
You will eat what the fields produce.
You will earn your bread by the sweat of your face.
And one day you will return to dust — for you were made from dust.

God said to Eve:

Giving birth will be painful.
Your husband will rule over you.

The punishment for Adam and all his descendants is:

• The ground, the soil, is cursed because of your sin
• You will have to work hard all your life to grow food
• Thorns, thistles, and all kinds of weeds will grow
• You will eat of what grows in the field
• You will have to earn your bread with sweat on your face
• Until you are dust again – when you have died – I would have made you out of dust too!

Hope for the Future

God made clothes for Adam and Eve from animal skins.
Then they had to leave the beautiful garden.
The Tree of Life was still there — and if they ate from it, they would live forever. But now that they had sinned, they could not stay.

An angel with a flaming sword guarded the way to the Tree of Life.

One day, those who obey God and are cleansed from sin through the blood of the Seed — Yeshua, God who became man — will eat from the Tree of Life and live forever.