Choices, choices, choices. So many choices; how do we know which to pick? That’s just the dilemma the Madison Avenue ad executives have to deal with each time they confront you with a magazine or TV advertisement. How, in the face of so many choices, can they snare you into purchasing their particular product? Clever minds are constantly at work seeking to convince your mind that their product is something you just can’t live without. This is nothing new. The method goes all the way back to a conversation in the Garden of Eden between an innocent, unsuspecting woman and an ingenious ad promoter with a whispering campaign. Satan well knew the power of choice when he subtly called to Eve with his query. He certainly made his question sound innocuous. He just wanted to clarify something which was not quite clear in his mind. Had God really said ...?
Adam and Eve had, from their creation, always had free choice about that tree in the middle of the Garden. They had always been free to eat from it if they chose to do so. But with the eating would come consequences, which were clearly defined beforehand (Gen. 2:17). Now, as the serpent discussed it with Eve, that tree and the choice regarding that tree suddenly took on other dimensions. Now it was not just a choice, but “something to be desired.” Satan’s deceptive campaign in heaven confused all the angels causing one third of them to rebel against their Creator. That same campaign, with slight modifications suited to the human mind, worked to convince Eve that God was a tyrant withholding the best choices from her. It is amazing how quickly Satan had turned the forbidden thing into something so desirable that Eve decided she could not resist it. In an instant of time she changed her choice (and with it, her allegiance) and fell into sin. Entering into league with Satan she placed herself in slavery to Satan’s devious mind. Her freedom of choice was thrown away.
The predefined consequences had their immediate effect, but it was not Adam and Eve who were struck with the fatal blow. “As soon as there was sin, there was a Saviour. Christ knew what He would have to suffer, yet He became man’s substitute. As soon as Adam sinned, the Son of God presented Himself as surety for the human race, with just as much power to avert the doom pronounced upon the guilty as when He died upon the cross of Calvary” (Review and Herald, March 12, 1901). The moment sin entered into their hearts, the human pair’s next breath and heartbeat were by the grace and mercy of God. Legal justification returned unto them their freedom of choice, placing them on a second probation. The sentence of death was averted, but there were other consequences which would plague them throughout their generations.