Rebellion, Mercy and Grace (2)

Scripture Reading

As we turn to our text this morning, keep in mind that we are looking together at the fall of man in the garden of Eden.

Previously in our study in this series we consider that God had made man with purpose of man being a ruler over the created order. God had created man in his own image. Much was said on that (much more could be said). But just by way of reminder this evening, keep in mind that God created man to rule over the earth, and to subdue it. Man was put there to steward the creation of God.

In the context of the Garden, we considered last time in this series that there was one command given to Adam. The command was that he was not to take and eat of the fruit of the tree that was in the middle of the Garden. A simple command. Just one key command. He was also told that if he ate of that fruit, he would surely die.

Last time we were together, we considered what unfolded in the GArden of Eden under three main points…

1. Deception (vv.1-5)

2. Disobedience (vv.6-7)

3. Blame-shifting (v.8-13)

Man had disobeyed. Man had rebelled against God, seeking rather autonomy, making His own decisions, deciding for himself what was good and bad, rather than living in obedience to God.

This evening, we will continue from where we left off, and look at four further points from this text in Genesis chapter 3.

Keep in mind that I spoke about the fact that it is the events in Genesis 3 that will set into motion the remainder of what unfolds through Scripture in terms of God’s redemptive purposes…

With that in mind, we pick up in verse14 of Genesis 3, where God will now address Adam and Eve following their disobedience, and the blame-shifting that has already taken place.

Genesis 3:14–22 NIV84

14 So the Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, “Cursed are you above all the livestock and all the wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. 15 And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” 16 To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” 17 To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’ “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. 18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. 19 By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.” 20 Adam named his wife Eve, because she would become the mother of all the living. 21 The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. 22 And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.”

Introduction

As we come to our text this evening, we need to keep in mind that was just taken place in the garden of Eden was an act of rebellion against God. Satan had come into the garden in the form of a serpent. In other words, Satan wasn't a serpent himself, but rather came in the form of a serpent. It is perhaps best to suggest that Satan inhabited a serpent and entered into the garden as a snake. It is from this position that he addressed Adam and Eve. Significance of this will become clear to continuing our study.

As we come to our text this evening, we will see you through the curses that God proceeds to pronounce upon the serpent, and also upon Adam and Eve, that God indeed do that which he had claimed he would do, but further than this, it would nonetheless show mercy and grace in the midst of rebellion against him

In addition to this, we will find that God had always purposed to be victorious, and he would indeed always be victorious, even though there appeared to be some usurpation of his authority.

With this in mind, let us consider first main point for this evening, which is really the fourth main point in our overall consideration of Genesis. The main point is curses pronounced.

4. Curses (vv.14-19)

As we move into verses fourteen through nineteen of our text, we find a series of curses that God pronounces upon Adam, Eve and the serpent. We will consider each curse separately.

The first curse that is pronounced in verses fourteen and fifteen is upon the serpent.

Curses upon the serpent

In verse 14-15 we read...

Genesis 3:14–15 NIV84

14 So the Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, “Cursed are you above all the livestock and all the wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. 15 And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.”

The first thing that we must notice from the curse that is pronounced upon the serpent, is that God says that the serpent is cursed above all the livestock and all the wild animals. Now, keep in mind that we need to keep in mind over here that the curse itself is not so much on the serpent as an animal, but rather upon the serpent in the sense that this was the animal that Satan used in order to approach Adam and Eve and deceive them.

The idea of the Hebrew here is rather that out of all the animals, out of all the domestic animals, along with all of the non-domesticated animals, the serpent was selected to be cursed. That’s the idea. The idea of the Hebrew text is that the serpent alone is cursed.

In and of themselves, serpents are neither moral or immoral. Serpents don't have intellect. They are simply creatures created by God. However, we find here that the serpent was used by Satan, and the serpent would then take the curse, and continue to be a perpetual reminder of an important truth through what unfolds in the garden of Eden.

The nature of the curse that is brought against the serpent is that the serpent is told he will crawl on his belly and eat dust all the days of his life. Within this statement there is a declaration of God's divine judgment as well as a demonstration of His divine authority and power and victory over the serpent.

When God speaks here about the serpent eating the dust of the ground, it is not to be taken that the serpent would literally eat the dust of the ground, but rather that it would be a demonstration of the utter humiliation of this creature. In that day we would often see pictures of those who were defeated and conquered as those who were made to lick the dust of the ground. This is the terminology that would have been used.

For example, Psalm 72:8-9 is a Psalm in which Solomon calls out to God to allow the king on the throne to judge and rule with righteousness and justice, and ultimately to be victorious over his enemies. It is a Messianic Psalm… In verses 8-9 we read...

Psalm 72:8–9 NIV84

8 He will rule from sea to sea and from the River to the ends of the earth. 9 The desert tribes will bow before him and his enemies will lick the dust.

As God pronounces this curse on the serpent, it was only appropriate that Satan had come in the form of a serpent, and God now says that the serpent will be cursed and will continually lick the dust. Thus the serpent continues as a perpetual reminder of the degradation of Satan and of the fact that God will be victorious over him. Whenever we see a serpent, a snake, we can be reminded that Satan was abased and was laid low. We can be reminded that Satan would always be the one that was going to lick the dust as he was defeated in the purposes of God.

Revelation 12:9 NASB95

9 And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.

Revelation 20:2 NASB95

2 And he laid hold of the dragon, the serpent of old, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years;

One further thing that is worth pointing out from verse fifteen of the stages the fact that God says that he will put enmity between the serpent and Eve. Keep in mind that when Satan entered into the garden in order to deceive Adam and Eve, up until that point man had been in submission to God. Man had listened to and obey the voice of God. When Satan came in and offered deceitful counsel, and offered a better way of living, man listened to Satan rather than to God.

As such, we find that instead of being in submission to God man was in submission to Satan. When God pronounces the curse upon Satan that there will be enmity between Satan and man, he is saying that there will be a continual struggle against Satan. No longer would Satan be able to continue giving counsel to man that was simply followed without any thought of resistance. Rather, there would be an animosity.

In one sense this comes out in the account of Cain and Abel.

Genesis 4:7 NIV84

7 If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it.”

Curses upon Eve

At this point, God turned his attention to Eve and proceeds to pronounce his judgment and curse upon her as a consequence of the sin that she engaged in. We read this in verse sixteen:

Genesis 3:16 NIV84

16 To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.”

There are just a few things that I would like to point out from this.

Firstly, God says that he will greatly multiply the pain of the woman in childbirth. Before we come to the curse itself, notice that there is even a hint of grace in this pronouncement of the curse. The fact was that God would continue to allow childbirth. Although death had been promised if man rebelled against God, God nonetheless allowed life to continue and not only to continue but to even expand.

But that raises the issue of the curse that is brought upon the woman. God says to her that "in pain you will bring forth children." As we consider the curse that is pronounced upon the woman, we need to recognize that God had made man and woman with unique responsibilities. We haven't had the time to delve into that in terms of the covenants of Scripture, but is important that I just touch on this.

In the original creation design, man was created in order to tend to the garden and to keep it. The woman was brought in as a helper that was suitable to that person Adam. Further to this, we find that the woman was the one that was given the ability to bear children. That is simply to say that man and woman had the unique positions in the original design intent of God.

As God here pronounces the curse upon the woman, we see that the curse actually curses that for which woman was created. In the first place this is found in terms of bearing children. Instead of bearing children in a pain free context, God says that he will greatly multiply pain in childbirth. In other words, there is not only going to be a measure of pain in childbirth, but rather they will be great pain for the woman in bring forth children. That is certainly true in terms of what unfolds in this world today.

In addition to that however, we find that God states another curse that will be on the woman, that will play into her specific role to be a helpmeet to her husband where is the woman was designed and created in order to support her husband, God states over here that the woman's desire will be for her husband.

It's important that we understand what God meant when he said this. He did not mean of a here that the woman would long for her husband would long to be in good relationship with her husband, or would long to have company with her husband. The word desire that is used over there has the sense of having mastery over. In other words, the woman would seek to have mastery over her husband.

To better see this look with me at Genesis 4:7 that we touched on a little bit earlier. In that account Kane was told by God that he needed to keep watch because sin was crouching at the door and its desire was for him. In other words, sin wanted to master him. That's the same use of the word in Genesis 3 verse sixteen of a here. Instead of living in humble submission underneath her husband, the curse of Eve was that she would now seek to have mastery over him.

Curses upon Adam

This leads us to consider very briefly the curse upon the man. Right at the end of verse sixteen we read that God says to Eve, "and he will rule over you."

When God says this year is not simply saying that man will exercise his God-given responsibility to be a faithful ruler over his wife. Rather, the curse is that man will seek to dominate his wife and to lead her with harshness. Husbands would seek to be domineering over the wife's, rather than God's way of being gentle with their wives as they lead them.

Certainly we see these relational evidences of the curse being played out in a world. We see this time and again with marriages that fail. With these and see this time and again when homes do not function in the way that God has designed them to function, and this relational disharmony comes into the home. This comes about as a consequence of sin entering the world. And a lot of the disharmony that we find homes said even in Christian homes, is because husbands want to be domineering and harsh and wives want to rule over the husbands. And I say this simply as a practical portion to Christians. We ought to be careful of this. We ought to be careful about how we relate to one another within the marriage relationship. A lot of the difficulties and challenges in our relationships and marriages can be helped he would put into practice what God says in Scripture in terms of countering the original curse.

This is not the end of what God says in terms of the curse consequences of the man. In verse seventeen he continues to address man:

Genesis 3:17 NIV84

17 To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’ “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.

Because man failed to take his leadership responsibilities in the garden and prevent his wife from eating from the fruit, but instead actually took of that same fruit and ate of it, God says to Adam that he will labor and work the ground with much toil and hardship. No longer with the working of the ground be something that was pleasurable and enjoyable, but rather it would be that which was a burden to man. Men would find working the garden to be a difficult and unenjoyable task. Certainly it would not be work under the original design intent of God. Notice what God continues to say in verses eighteen and nineteen:

Genesis 3:18–19 NIV84

18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. 19 By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.”

God says to Adam that he will find that forms and thistles will come up along with the fruit trees the vegetables. Men will have to contend with these things that make his life difficult. The work that he will do will need to be done by the sweat of his brow.

Now, we need to realize that this is a natural consequence of the curse of the world. We do not have to seek to switch in order to do our work. It's not something that we look for. It's not something that we strive for. Rather, this is just the natural consequence of sin entering into our world. Work will be difficult.

Let me just summarize a very important observation at this point. The reality is that the world in which we live came under a curse because of man's rebellion against God. Everything since that time continues to suffer under the consequences and effects of the sin curse in the world.

The world as we know it today was not the way in which God originally created the world to be. The pain, the hardships, the suffering, injustice, all of these and many other ills in the world that we find today are as a result of the fall of man and the consequent curses placed upon man. This is very important for us to realize.

We must see this because it gives us an understanding of why things are happening in the world around us the way they are. How often have you asked the question, why is this happening to me? Why is life so unfair? Why does life have to be so hard? I think we all lost questions like these and we probably continue to ask them today.

We must keep in our minds when we ask such questions that we are getting the just deserve an consequence of our own sin. We must see that. When we live life as if we don't deserve hard times or difficulties or challenges in this world, we are forgetting the fact that man is in rebellion against God by nature. Yes, the consequences of Chris entered into the world because Adam was termed the federal head. But we also know that we are sinners. That is our nature as we are born into this world. Remember I said, we are not sinners because we sin, but we sin because we are sinners by nature.

With that said, that is not the end of the working of God in this world. We must then go on to consider mercy.

5. Mercy (vv.20-21)

There are two beautiful pictures of mercy that are expressed in these two verses. I do want to touch them briefly, but it's important that we see this and we just delight ourselves in the wonderful mercy of God. We must keep in mind that God is a holy God. He is absolutely pure and without any sin or impurity within him. He is the ultimate standard of that which is pure he sets the standard. And man rebelled against God. Man deserved the just wrath of God upon him. And yet, God showed mercy. Keep that in mind.

The first evidence of God's mercy is in verse twenty where man names his wife. We read here that the man called his wife's name Eve. The name Eve means life or living. It's easier that he named her that because she was the mother of all the living. In the context which God had told man that if he sinned against him the consequence would be death, Adam soared fifteen to name his wife the mother of the living.

This is just a wonderful demonstration of the grace and mercy of God. Will come back to this very briefly in a moment. But for now, just pause and give thanks to God that he would continue to give life.

The next thing we find in terms of the mercy that is shown here is that in verse twenty-one, we read that God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and he clothed them. Just a couple of things that I must point out have you. Keep in mind that Adam and Eve when they sinned they saw their own nakedness. They were confronted by shame. But here God provides a covering in order to cover their shame.

We must see in this a picture of God's covering over of that which brought shame and that was sin. Here we have a picture of God being a covering closing the man. Later on in the New Testament we will find that Jesus is the one that clothes us in robes of righteousness. We have robes that cover our dirtiness and our nakedness.

Also in this connection we find of a here that there is the shedding of blood in order to close man. When God made garments of skin for Adam it was necessary that he would have taken animals slaughtered them and then use the skins from the animals in order to close man. It's already here we see that God is shedding blood in order for man to be cleansed.

The slowest to come out in much more detail as we look at the New Testament in Christ having his blood shed.

As we continue our study in our text we must see sixty from our study in Genesis 3 that there was separation. We don't have a lot of time to go into the detail you so I'll just touch on this.

6. Separation (vv.22-24)

In Genesis 3:22-24 we read…

Genesis 3:22–24 NIV84

22 And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” 23 So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. 24 After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.

In summary form here, I want to point out that man was going to be driven out of the Garden of Eden in this context. We find that there was another tree in the garden, the tree of life. From what we can read very briefly here that tree of life would've allowed man to continue to live forever Eddie Eaton of that tree of life.

When God says that man could not continue to live forever, and thus had to be driven out of the garden. I keep in mind that the garden was the place where God dwelt with Adam and Eve. This is where he would walk in the garden and would have interaction and fellowship. Thus when God drove them out of the garden there was separation being brought between God in his dwelling place and man as he was now cast out of the dwelling place of God.

One thing that we must recognize through this is that ultimately our greatest punishment is the separation between us and God. And as will see the development of the covenants through Scripture will find that God is restoring this ability for man to live in union and relationship with God.

7. Grace (v.15)

Finally with regards to what unfolds in the garden of Eden here, I want us to just look very briefly again at verse fifteen, and I'll close with this.

Genesis 3:15 NIV84

15 And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.”

We were really considered that God had told the serpent that there would be enmity between Satan and the woman. But God actually took it further in this verse and said that he would put enmity between the offspring of Satan and the offspring of the woman. We don't have time to delve into all the intricacies of the statement, but simply to remind you that Adam had named Eve the mother of the living. There would be to offspring's those who would be living in those who would be date. Those who would belong to the kingdom of God and those who belong to the kingdom of Satan. And ultimately this would crescendo to a climactic point where the offspring of Eve would crush the head of the serpent, and the offspring of the serpent would strike the heel of the offspring of Eve.

Herein was the first veiled promise of God that a Redeemer would come and conquer Satan. Here is the grace of God beautifully on display. It would be Jesus Christ that would crush the head of Satan. And in that moment of crushing the head of Satan, Jesus himself would be struck on Israel in other words you would be afflicted, he would be bruised, but the harm caused will be far less than the crushing of a head.

Application / Conclusion

We don't have time to delve further into these matters right now, but I do trust the grip come to recognize just how significant it is to understand and perceive what took place in the garden of Eden in his opening chapters of Genesis. This is critical for understanding in our development of our theology through the rest of Scripture.

I must just add that many have seen these first three chapters to be picture language. This suggested that this was all just an analogy rather than actual events that unfolded. I serious concern to that position because it undermines the reality of the sinfulness of man and his rebellion against God. That is not a picture. That is a reality.

But as we go on in our study of the covenants, what we are going to find is that God is working out his purposes in order to redeem and restore the original relationship that existed between man and God. As a consequence of these events God will now set in motion his predetermined plan to bring his creation into right relationship with him ultimately. And that is what we look forward to. That is what we even strive towards now in our lives.

2 Corinthians 5:14–21 NIV84

14 For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. 15 And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again. 16 So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! 18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. 21 God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Amen