Sermon 2-22-2026

Genesis 3:20-24 -

Legacy Standard Bible CHAPTER 3

20 Now the man called his wife’s name aEve, because she was the mother of all the living.

21 Then Yahweh God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and He clothed them.

22 Then Yahweh God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us to know good and evil; and now, lest he send forth his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat and live forever”—

23 therefore Yahweh God sent him out from the garden of Eden, to cultivate the ground from which he was taken.

24 So He drove the man out; and at the east of the garden of Eden He stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword which turned every direction to guard the way to the tree of life

We remember from Genesis 3:16 “To the woman he said, “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.”” In stating that the woman’s desire would be for her husband, but he would rule over her, God is noting the friction in a marriage as created as a helper strives to take on the role of leader. This strife is on full display even in our time as the issue of male leadership in the home and female submission to that leadership is a hot button topic in our culture. There seems to be an intentional aversion to the idea as submission to leadership is somehow seen as being dominated and enslaved. That has certainly been made worse by those men who seem to believe it is their right to be a dictating tyrant in the home. Those men also have a fundamentally wrong view of biblical manhood.

Why is this? We saw the answer in Genesis 3:6-19. The fall, mankind’s spiritual death severing their relationship with God and damage done to all of creation as a result.

In creating man first and giving him the task of naming all the animals (Genesis 2:19-20), God instituted the pattern of male headship. That pattern, now broken by the fall, is decreed by God in Genesis 3:16. That pattern is then demonstrated in the first verse of our text Genesis 3:20 “Now the man called his wife’s name Eve”. She did not name herself, the man named her, just as he had named all the animals and called her “woman” after she was fashioned from his rib.

The name “Eve” means “life” or “life-giver”. The name makes sense for a couple of good reasons. 1. As she would be the one to give birth to the first new humans, she would, humanly speaking, be a life giver. 2. From a more spiritual standpoint, in naming her “Life giver”, Adam could be looking toward the hope of the promise God made in the proto-evangelion of Genesis 3:15 “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.””

Both reasons seem to be in view as Adam was likely referring to the woman as the mother of the promised Savior and the rest of mankind. Very early on, he understood they had need of a promised Savior to undo what they had done to their own, as well as our, detriment.

Adam learned, in the making of the fig leaf loin coverings, that their attempts to cover their own shame were pitiful and useless. But God, on the other hand, from Genesis 3:21 “And the Lord God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them” , can and did. Many look at this event as the institution of animal sacrifice for the atonement of sin, and it could have been. But more importantly, it was clearly demonstrated to both the man and the woman, right there, that only God can cover your shame and that a death had to occur to make the covering possible.

In the spiritual death of our first parents, the death of an animal or animals and the covering of their shame by God Himself, we see Romans 6:23 “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” vividly displayed.

Our first parents died as a result of their transgression and sin. We are born dead in our trespasses and sins Ephesians 2:1–6 “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the flesh and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,”

Our first parents learned firsthand what too many of us still need to learn. Man cannot save himself and all of his attempts to do so are pathetic, pitiful and worthless. Our nature at birth makes us a child of wrath. Our rescue from being one of the children of wrath relies utterly and completely on the grace of God in the matchless worth and propitiatory sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Although the grace of God is finally and fully realized in Jesus Christ, God demonstrated His grace in a subtle way in Genesis 3:22–24 “Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever—” therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. He drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.”

To insure that man did not live forever in his fallen state of spiritual death, God cast them out of the garden and barred all access to the tree of life. Had man eaten from the tree of life in his fallen condition he would have lived on forever in that condition. I’ll leave you to ponder this question, How much and what levels of sin could a man who cannot die commit?