How God’s Word Gets Distorted

Genesis 3:2–3 (NASB95) 

2The woman said to the serpent, “From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat; 3but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat from it or touch it, or you will die.’ ” 

As the woman responds to the serpent’s provocative question, she attempts to correct his distortion of God’s command. Her reply is emphatic, affirming that the fruit of the trees in the garden is indeed permitted, yet when she references the tree in the center, her words begin to diverge from what God originally said. She shifts from the liberality of God’s original command, omitting the language of “any” and “freely,” and instead focuses on the prohibition. She also adds her own boundary, saying that they must not even touch the tree’s fruit, a detail God never gave.  

The narrative highlights that both sides in this conversation are straying from the truth in their own ways. The serpent acts with cunning, bending God’s command to sound unreasonable, while the woman, perhaps out of naiveté or a desire for safety, makes the prohibition more stringent than God required. She even refers to God simply as “God” rather than “the Lord,” echoing the serpent’s language and further shifting the tone of the conversation. In doing so, she loses sight of the generosity and relational closeness that marked God’s original words. Ultimately, the urgency and certainty of the consequence—“you will surely die”—is also softened in her recounting. 

I will repeat it: half-truths are not truths – they are lies and they are dangerous. Both Satan and Eve are guilty of the same thing, even if for different reasons. This is still a common tactic today. 

The church today must be vigilant in how it handles and communicates God’s word. There is always a temptation, whether out of fear, zeal, or misunderstanding, to add to or subtract from what God has actually said. Overcorrection or unnecessary strictness can distort the true character of God just as surely as dismissing or relaxing His commands. Let us strive to remember not only God’s boundaries, but also His generosity and grace, holding fast to what He has truly spoken and resisting both the cynicism of the serpent and the embellishments of our own anxieties.