BASIC BIBLE STUDIES
# 008
Humanity's History of Persistent Disobedience to God
(Part 1)
Our first seven Studies were devoted to getting acquainted with the Bible,
understanding why it is composed of two testaments, seeing the value of each
of the testaments, and coming to an appreciation of the truth that Christ
and His new testament is the standard of religious authority for all
mankind. We are now ready to begin an examination of humanity's sad history
of disobedience to God and the tragic consequences of such disobedience.
It is an established Biblical fact that from the dawn of time people
have chosen to disregard God's rightful authority over them and to
disobey His will. Consider these examples out of the Old Testament. (Just
here it will be well to remember one of the values of the Old Testament
which we pointed out in Study # 004 -- namely, that "all these things
happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition..."
-- I Corinthians 10:11).
1. In Genesis 2 we read of the creation of Adam and Eve, but in the very
next chapter we read of their violating God's commandment. Eve well
understood God's prohibition. She said: "We may eat the fruit of the trees
of the garden; but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the
garden, God has said, 'You shall not eat of it, nor shall you touch it, lest
you die' " (Genesis 3:2-3). However, the serpent, acting as Satan's agent,
said: "You shall not surely die" (verse 5). Guess who Eve chose
to believe! She ate of the forbidden fruit (the divine record does not
say it was an apple), then shared it with Adam "and he ate" (verse 6). As a
result of their disobedience they were driven from the garden of Eden (verse
24).
2. In Genesis 4 we read of the sin of Cain who, in a fit of anger, killed
his brother Abel. Abel's worship sacrifice had been acceptable to God,
while Cain's had not (verses 3-6). Was this caprice on the part of
God--accepting one and rejecting the other? Thousands of years later, the
writer of the New Testament book of Hebrews looked back to this incident and
said: "By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain..."
(Hebrews 11:4). Since "faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of
God" (Romans 10:17), it is quite obvious that God had spoken to Cain and
Abel and instructed them as to the kind of sacrifice to make. Abel, acting
on faith, complied with God's instructions. Cain, presuming to offer a
sacrifice of his own choosing, did not. As a result of his disobedience,
God placed a curse on Cain (Genesis 4:11-15).
3. By the time we get to Genesis 6 "the wickedness of man was great in the
earth, and every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil
continually" (verse 5). God's punishment for such moral corruption was a
mighty flood over all the earth. Only Noah, his wife, their three sons, and
their wives were spared.
4. In time, however, disobedience to God again manifested itself. The
ancient cities of Sodom and Gomorrah became so depraved that "the Lord
rained brimstone and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah, from the Lord out of the
heavens" (Genesis 19:24).
5. Hundreds of years passed. The Israelites (the descendants of Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob) are in slavery in Egypt. God raises up Moses to deliver
them and lead them back to the land God had promised their ancestors--the
land of Canaan. The Israelites were barely out of Egypt before they began
to complain and to wish that they had remained in Egypt (Exodus 16:2-3).
Later, while Moses was on Mount Sinai receiving the law that would govern
them for the next fifteen hundred years, the people prevailed upon Aaron,
Moses' brother, to make a golden calf for them to worship. With their
idolatrous mindset they cynically said: "...as for this Moses, the man who
brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of
him" (Exodus 32:1).
6. Later, as punishment for believing a false (though majority) report
concerning their being able to conquer the land of Canaan from its heathen
inhabitants, the Israelites were forced to wonder for forty years in the
wilderness which lay between Egypt and Canaan (Numbers 14:11-38).
7. Another striking example of disobedience involves the actions of two
Israelite priests. "Then Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his
censer and put fire in it, put incense on it, and offered profane (strange,
King James Version) fire before the Lord, which He had not commanded. So
fire went out from the presence of the Lord and devoured them, and they died
before the Lord" (Leviticus 10:1-2). This incident is highly reminiscent of
Cain's presumptuous act of worship recorded back in Genesis 4. Why are
people, even today, so slow to learn that it is God who is to be pleased
in worship, not themselves?
8. After finally entering the land of Canaan, the Israelites would
go through cycles of flagrant idolatry and disobedience to God. As a
result, God would bring other tribes against them in war. They would be
punished for their sins and then cry out for deliverance. God--always a God
of mercy--would hear their cries of repentance and raise up deliverers
(judges) for them. The people would remain faithful for awhile, then the
cycle of disobedience, punishment, and deliverance would be repeated. The
Old Testament book of Judges tells how this tragic story repeated itself
time after time. At the end of Judges we have this sad comment about the
condition of the people: "In those days there was no king in Israel:
everyone did what was right in his own eyes" (Judges 24:25). And, as we
have pointed out in previous studies, this was one of the most corrupt times
in Israel's history--all because mankind insists on ignoring God and His
will and "doing his own thing."
(To be continued).
If this essay has blessed you, feel free to forward it to others who may
benefit from it.
Hugh Fulford