The Fall Wasn't the End of the Story

Genesis 3–4; Moses 4–5: Why the Fall Changes Everything—Including the Fall

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There's a moment in Moses 5 that doesn't get nearly enough attention. Adam and Eve have left the garden. They're offering sacrifices in the wilderness. An angel asks Adam why. Adam says, "I know not, save the Lord commanded me" (Moses 5:6).

He's doing something he doesn't fully understand yet.

Then the angel explains the symbolism. Adam hears it. And the Spirit comes upon Adam, and he begins to prophesy. His first words: "Blessed be the name of God, for because of my transgression my eyes are opened, and in this life I shall have joy, and again in the flesh I shall see God."

Joy. Not despite the Fall—because of it. That's where Adam lands.

This week's reading does not let you treat the Fall as a tragedy, even though it looks like one for several chapters.

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The Knowledge Problem

Genesis 3 opens with a serpent offering something that sounds reasonable: "Ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil" (Genesis 3:5). The problem isn't that knowledge is bad. The problem is the source.

Moses 4:6 makes clear that Satan "sought to destroy the agency of man." The temptation wasn't just about fruit. It was about bypassing the path—getting knowledge without the process, wisdom without the weight of experience.

This is still the fundamental human temptation. We want outcomes without costs. We want to know without having gone through the knowing. And every shortcut offered by the adversary has the same architecture: here is the thing you want, without the growth that was supposed to come with it.

Elder David A. Bednar taught that the Atonement of Jesus Christ is not a backup plan. In a 2001 BYU address, he described the enabling power of the Atonement as something God prepared before the Fall precisely because the Fall was foreseen. The doctrine of the Restoration says clearly: the Fall was not a mistake that required divine improvisation. It was part of the plan.

That changes how you read Genesis 3.

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Consequences and Garments

When Adam and Eve transgress and feel shame, they sew fig leaves together (Genesis 3:7). They make their own covering. Then God comes, and He makes them coats of skins (Genesis 3:21)—a better covering, and one that required death to provide.

Latter-day Saint teachers have long noted the symbolic weight here. A sacrifice was made to clothe Adam and Eve in the first act of atonement-as-symbol. They brought inadequate covering. God provided adequate covering. That pattern runs all the way to Gethsemane.

Moses 4:27 records that God made "coats of skins, and clothed them." The Lord doesn't simply announce the consequences and leave them unclothed. He stays. He provides. Accountability and mercy arrive together in this moment, and neither cancels the other.

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Cain's Choice—and the Choice Before It

Moses 5 introduces Cain and Abel. Cain's offering is rejected; Abel's is accepted. Satan comes to Cain "and commanded him, saying: Make an offering unto the Lord."

Read that again. Satan is encouraging worship. But the offering Cain makes is corrupted from the start—Moses 5:18 notes that Cain "loved Satan more than God." The problem wasn't the sacrifice. It was the heart.

Then God comes to Cain and offers him exactly what he needs: "If thou doest well, thou shalt be accepted" (Moses 5:23). He's not rejected. He's corrected. God is still speaking to him. Still reaching.

Cain shuts the door.

"And Cain was very wroth, and his countenance fell. And the Lord said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? Why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well, thou shalt be accepted" (Moses 5:22–23).

God asks Cain two questions and offers one promise. Cain doesn't answer the questions. He goes and kills his brother.

There's a spiritual posture in Cain that's worth examining. He had everything he needed to turn it around. God was literally speaking to him. He chose resentment anyway. Cain's sin is not just murder. It's the hardening—the moment when a person stops asking "why is my countenance fallen" and starts planning how to make someone else pay for it.

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Eve's Testimony

Moses 5:11 contains Eve's own witness, and it deserves its own moment: "Were it not for our transgression we never should have had seed, and never should have known good and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient."

Eve understands the Fall differently than popular Christianity does. She doesn't grieve it. She theologizes it. She sees the arc. She can name the joy of redemption—not as a consolation prize, but as the point.

President Dallin H. Oaks taught in General Conference that we look on the Fall "as a blessing to our first parents, and to all of mankind." That's not spin. Eve got there first.

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Open Your Come Follow Me Manual

The manual's discussion of the Fall is unusually rich this week. Look especially at the "Ideas for Family Scripture Study" section—the Fall is one of those doctrines that pays to discuss out loud, not just in private study. It changes in the conversation.

Come Follow Me Manual – Week 4