How Did the Fall of Man Affect Humanity?

Believe it or not, at one time, we humans had no worries or ills. We were given every comfort: our bellies and our hearts were full and we could hope for an eternal communion with God in a paradise on earth. We, however, were not content, which isn’t a surprise, considering our obsession with sometimes wanting things we cannot have. And so, when Adam and Eve disobeyed God and acted against his one order to them, we suffered a fall from grace that we still struggle to recover from to this day. What does the Bible say, then, about how this fall has affected us?

We all must suffer the indignity of death, because of our fall. The Apostle Paul’s letter to the Romans (Romans 5:12, New International Version) tells us that because of our sin of disobedience, death was allowed to enter into this world, and it has stalked us ever since. In fact, death haunts us all, every living thing, because we all share in that original sin as men and women (humanity). The only two exceptions to this rule were Enoch and Elijah, who the Bible tells us God took directly to heaven while they were still living and breathing.

We are ashamed of ourselves because of our fall from grace. After Adam and Eve committed sin, they became ashamed of themselves and attempted to hide themselves away from God as He walked through the paradise He had created for them (Genesis 3:8-10, NIV). Even today, we manifest this shame in all of the many small things we do that cause us to later regret the doing of them.

Man has lost his sense of original purpose because he chose to sin. Due to the sin committed by Adam and Eve, we now must struggle daily to remember that we were created by God to glorify Him and exalt Him above everything else. There are numerous passages in the Bible – especially among Paul’s various epistles, or letters – that point out what our mission was, and still is. But because we are tainted by sin, which manifests itself in incredibly small and large ways on many occasions, we suffer pride and envy, deceit and treachery, and a mistaken belief that the universe tends to revolve around "us". We think we are supreme, and that we’ve somehow “unlocked” all the mysteries when the truth is that we really know exceedingly little. In fact, what we’ve managed to learn about anything at all is a gift from God that we continually fail to appreciate.

Ultimately, the fall from grace we suffered caused us to lose our innocence. Before we disobeyed God, we enjoyed innocence and joy, which none of us can even come close to experiencing again, no matter the strength of our earthly righteousness and sincere desire to stay by God’s side. That was lost to us, and we won’t get it back while we live on this earthly plain of existence, sadly. Unfortunately, this loss tends to darken our figurative sight to the Word of God on occasion, and as many passages in the Bible tell us, we are all tainted by sin, and there is nobody among us who is ever completely without it.

We can hope for salvation through faith, and an eventual glorification at the time of the Rapture. The best we can hope for, and this is due to Jesus’ sacrifice on our behalf, is that we can live lives of righteousness and faith that will enable us to eventually overcome our earthly pain and join God in heaven. This is no small thing, but imagine what we could have had if we’d only stayed on the original path God laid before us.