God Didn't Make Your Conscience
Some think that Satan was the one who told Adam and Eve they were naked, but there is no scriptural evidence for that. Other people believe that God told them, but Genesis 3:11 says, “And [God] said, Who told thee that thou wast naked?” (brackets added).God didn’t tell Adam and Eve that they were naked, so where did they get this information? How did they know they were naked? How did they know to hide from God?And the Lord God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou? And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself. Genesis 3:9-10The Lord had never given them a reason to be afraid of Him. He had created the perfect environment, the perfect world. Everything was awesome! He had never rejected them. There was reason for them to have reverence for God, but not to fear Him. Adam and Eve had never done anything bad. Nothing in their existence had any rejection or punishment associated with it. So, where did they get this knowledge from?God’s question to Adam and Eve gives us the answer:Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat? (Genesis 3:11b)When they ate of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, they intuitively and automatically recognized their nakedness, their sin, and their failure. Immediately, fear and shame came upon them.I’ve heard a lot of people teach that Adam and Eve were clothed in the glory of God and in robes of righteousness, implying that they weren’t truly naked. It’s okay to make an allegory out of it and spiritualize it, but the truth is that they were completely physically naked.And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed. (Genesis 2:25)God knew they were naked, but He never mentioned it to them. He never wanted mankind to be aware of their nakedness.
The Beginning of the Conscience
God didn’t create us with a conscience. The American Heritage Dictionary defines conscience as “an awareness of morality in regard to one’s behavior; a sense of right and wrong that urges one to act morally.” God didn’t create us with an ability to judge ourselves and to constantly evaluate whether we’re right or wrong. He created us in innocence. Adam and Eve were totally naked, and according to Genesis 2:25, they “were not ashamed.”Hebrews 4:13 says, “Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.” To think that, somehow or another, our clothes can hide our shame and nakedness from God is just crazy. God isn’t limited. Superman has nothing on Him! God can see right through us.So, where did Adam and Eve get the knowledge of their nakedness? It came from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. The name of this tree is descriptive of the conscience. I believe that when Adam and Eve ate from the tree, they received their consciences. One of two things happened: Either God created man with a conscience that was originally inactive but was activated when they ate from the tree, or the tree actually gave them a conscience.I tend to believe that the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil created a conscience in mankind. The reason I believe this is because of what the Bible says the Tree of Life had the power to impart.And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever: Therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken. Genesis 3:22-23Eating from the Tree of Life would have caused Adam and Eve to live forever. The tree could have literally imparted something to them. If this is true of the Tree of Life, then I believe that the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil could also impart something.He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God. (Revelation 2:7)And Revelation 22:1-2 speaks of the new heaven and the new earth, along with a river of life and a tree of life on both sides of this river:And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.By partaking of these trees and eating their leaves, life is literally imparted. That’s what’s going to happen in eternity, but that’s also the way the Tree of Life was in Genesis. If that’s the case, then I believe that the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil also imparted something to Adam and Eve. This is where mankind gained a conscience; God didn’t create us with one.
The Problem with the Conscience
What is the fruit of now having a conscience? The very first fruit can be found in Genesis 3:7.And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons.Having a conscience made Adam and Eve self-conscious, and they began to focus their attention on themselves. They weren’t one bit more naked after they sinned than they were before they sinned. Nothing in the natural changed; it was their perception or focus that changed. A conscience makes you focus on yourself. A conscience makes you self-aware. Adam and Eve had been naked before, but they didn’t even notice it. They were so God-conscious that they hadn’t noticed their own nakedness.In 2 Corinthians 5:7, we’re admonished to “walk by faith, not by sight,” but let me just add that if you get so God-conscious that you don’t even notice whether you’ve got clothes on, have mercy on the rest of us who are still carnal, and wear your clothes!Now, Adam and Eve didn’t even know they were naked, but once they ate of the tree, they became self-aware. They became fixated on self, and shame came upon them. Before, they had no shame, but all of a sudden, their consciences brought shame and fear of punishment.These are things God never wanted us to have. He never wanted us to be afraid. He didn’t create us for rejection; He created us for fellowship. He didn’t intend for us to have a conscience, but after Adam and Eve sinned, it became necessary.
God Had a Plan
You might be thinking that it would be nice just to somehow or another get rid of the conscience. But for someone who’s lost, a conscience is necessary because it makes them aware of their sin and shows them the need for forgiveness. I personally believe that this is the reason the Lord had the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden. He had to give us a free choice to serve Him. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be free moral agents. We would only love Him and serve Him because there was no other option. God didn’t want robots.He had to give us the option. I don’t believe it’s just an accident that the option was the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, because the moment Adam and Eve ate from it, they received a conscience. Even though the conscience brings negative effects like shame and fear, it also provides a positive function, which is to show us that we have sinned and that we need forgiveness. So, I believe God had a plan for us since the beginning.Revelation 13:8 shows us that God knew we were going to rebel against Him:And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.He knew that we would sin and that Jesus would become the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. Long before He even created us, He had planned everything out, and Jesus had already accepted God’s plan for Him to come and redeem us. That’s awesome. We could have a selah moment right here and just stop to think about that.If I could somehow imagine myself being God and I were going to create man—knowing that mankind would rebel against me and that there would be terrible things like the Holocaust, divorce, ungodliness, hatred, hurt, pain, and everything else that has entered the human race—I don’t think I would have created man, not after I knew all the pain man would cause.The only way I can understand why God still created mankind is that He saw you and me—those who would accept His payment for sin and who would become new creatures, being born again in His likeness—and He decided that we were worth all of the pain and suffering. That’s just amazing.What establishes the value of something is what someone is willing to pay for it. I think of those little baseball cards that I could get for a penny when I was a kid. Those things are virtually worthless, as far as the actual substance of them, but now they’ve become rare, and people will pay a million dollars for one of these baseball cards. That establishes the value of them.You may look at yourself or at me or at others and think, Well, we aren’t worth much. But the very fact that God Almighty was willing to send His Son to earth and have Him die for us puts a huge value on us. As we just read in Revelation 13:8, Jesus was slain from the foundation of the world.God knew everything that was going to happen, and it was already in His heart and mind. I believe that’s why He made the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and the forbidden fruit. This way, if man did violate God’s instructions (which He knew we would) then man would receive a conscience. This conscience would then immediately start condemning us and showing us that we are sinners who desperately need a Savior.