As the story goes, Eve ate that dang piece of fruit. There were, of course, plenty of trees to choose from with plenty varieties of fruits to pick. Why, some may ask, did she have to choose that piece of fruit on that particular day?
The answer: Don’t we do the same exact thing?
Maybe our story is different in words, but it’s the exact same in principle:
There are plenty of positive ways to enjoy a Friday night–ways that are enjoyable but don’t dishonor God/a person’s body. How many people, though, decide to go out to the bars and participate in excessive drinking, lewd sexual encounters, and other foolish activities? They say that it’s a blast–much fun and all that. But this behavior is not God-honoring.
“I don’t do that,” you might say. Fine. (I don’t either.) So, let’s think of some other things that we all do–even those of us who try our darnedest to honor God in everything we do.
Wandering eyes: There are so many images out there. And we are a curious species, aren’t we? Guys struggle to keep their eyes from zoning in on the cleavage that chick is so selfishly showing off. Women get a glimpse of a rock hard abdomen and want to see more. For some, this leads to more visual exploration–online or in magazines. For others, this goes even further: addiction, obsession, affairs, pre-marital sex. It’s a challenge to overcome because we’re wired to be attracted to one another. God made us so that we would fit together perfectly. But curiosity killed the cat–or caused a whole litter of unexpected kittens. Yet, there are so many other beautiful and holy things to rest our eyes on: sunrises, ink in a book, eyes of our beloved, paintings in museums, and precious baby smiles. So often, we can’t resist that tempt-acious fruit. And one piece is not enough.
Judging: There are many good thoughts out there. They take a tremendous amount of effort to find, sometimes. Especially when there’s this voluptuous brunette chick with white streaks in her hair, red claws-for-nails, and Egyptian-thick make-up walking toward you with a shirt that reads, “I’m PMSing. Back off!” What are we supposed to do, right? Shoot. I’m not supposed to judge her. What do I do? What should I think? I think we’d all fail at this one. Except, maybe, the reader who owns the shirt. You might ignore it. I can’t help it, though. That shirt, to me, just screams something not nice at all: “White trash!” Yikes! What’s a girl supposed to do? I judge. And I try to take these thoughts captive but, sometimes, these thoughts run away from me. I’m terrible when it comes to this–my personality: sarcastic and a fan of people-watching. And in situations like this, I don’t know what I’m supposed to do; is this person asking me to judge her? I suppose I should look into her eyes as she passes me and smile at her and think about how much God loves her. And pray for her. I should definitely pray for her. But I choose that danged fruit. The forbidden one. Over and over again.
We all have the fruit in our lives. From the very beginning, we’ve been drawn to it, longing to hold it, enjoy it, and have more when we’re done
What’s your forbidden fruit?