I fear that so much of what is nowadays called by the self-exalting and self-vaunting ‘deconstruction’ or ‘ex-vangelical’ is nothing other than the age-old ‘way of Cain’ (Jude, verses 8-11): willful rejection and rebellion against what they know in their own conscience to be right … but choosing rather to believe and do their own way.
Cain knew what was right, but he willfully chose to reject and rebel against the way of the LORD to do his own way, and mistakenly thought he would coerce and force the LORD to just have to accept it.
“In the course of time Cain brought to the LORD an offering of the fruit of the ground, and Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions.”
The LORD didn’t – He rejected Cain and his offering just as Cain had rejected Him:
“And the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering He had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his face fell” (Genesis 4.3-5).
In his anger against the LORD and his brother, Cain murdered his brother Abel; “And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother’s righteous” (1 John 3.12).
And yet Cain knew very well what was right and good. Not only had his fallen parents, Adam and Eve, instructed him in the right way, but the LORD Himself confronted him and told him he knew the difference between right and wrong:
“The LORD said to Cain, ‘Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen. If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it’” (Genesis 4.6-7).
The self-exalting, self-vaunting so-called ‘deconstruction’ is ‘the way of Cain.’ And I say ‘I fear’ that it is so because “There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death” (Proverbs 14.12) – as it was for Cain.
And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who seek Him. ~Hebrews 11.6
You have to exercise faith to really, truly pray. That’s one of the things that makes it so difficult and daunting. We are creatures of our senses. We see, hear, smell, touch, and feel with our senses. Praying is an assault on our physical senses by which we live and in which we so trust. It is an insult to our self-vaunting physical human ‘intelligence,’ ‘reasoning,’ ‘ability,’ and ‘effort.’
Praying is an exercise of believing and trusting in the physically invisible and untouchable God, “…who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see” (1 Timothy 6.16).
Our praying evidences, expresses, and exercises our faith in God:
that He exists
that He is real
that He is really listening and hearing you
that He cares enough to receive and respect your prayer to Him
that He would, in reality, know you are praying to Him and would actually respond to your request,
and most indicting of all – that He can really do any more about what you’re praying for than you can do for yourself.
If we get to the root and bottom-line of our lack of real, sincere praying, we will find that it is our unbelief – unbelief that God is any more real than we are or that He can actually do any more about our desperate needs than we can do for ourselves.
Our human senses berate us, mock us, and scream at us: “What are you doing? Who do you think you’re talking to? And if He is really there, do you think He has attention, time, and concern to listen to you? If you are so needy and you want this so much, then quit wasting your time and get up and do something about it!”
We can say what ‘we please’ [see Hebrews 11.6 again] about believing and having faith in God and His Word He has given us to pray by; but our prayerlessness is a veritable testimony to our practical skepticism, agnosticism, and a-theism. We really don’t believe that ‘He exists and that He rewards those who seek Him.’
The Voice of our Intercessor and Mediator on the other hand commands us to ‘have faith in God’ and pray:
“And Jesus answered them, ‘Have faith in God. Truly I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, “Be taken up and thrown into the sea,” and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.’” ~Mark 11.22-24
“I write these things to you who believe in the Name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life. And this is the confidence that we have toward Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of Him.” ~1 John 5.13-15
Believe that God is … and that He rewards with His pleasure those who draw near to Him and come to Him – then pray with that faith!
I came across this quote by Pastor Mark Dever the other day, and it got me to thinking…“So many times I’ve seen men, particularly young men, act as if real leadership is shown in correcting others. That’s why young men’s sermons often scold. What they haven’t figured out is that you can often accomplish more by encouragement. There are times to scold. But 80 to 90 percent of what you hope to correct can be accomplished through encouragement.” ~Pastor Mark Dever
…to which I have added this supporting Scripture I’ve often thought about and aimed to follow: “Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing” (1 Thessalonians 5.11); and the keystone exhortation “And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near” (Hebrews 10.24).
…and also this caveat to the Dever quote… [Although I dare to say that ‘scolding’ is not exclusively the proprietary domain of ‘young men’s sermons.’ Some older ones, also, seem to have not outgrown it!]
…then I wrote this little parable…
DON’T BE THE PESKY LITTLE GNAT
There was once a pesky little gnat who lived on a far-off savannah along with the other neighbors who lived their own lives in that same habitat [but pesky little gnats are everywhere, really].
The pesky little gnat decided it would attack the local neighbor Rhinoceros because it [the pesky little gnat] resented it was so small, thought it was being overlooked, was not being recognized for the influence it thought it had, and should be getting more attention and respect than it was. In its little mind, it thought every neighbor on the savannah should recognize and consider it to be the overlord of them all and do everything the ways it thought they should.
And, more personally, it was so envious of Rhinoceros’s size, stature, standing, strength – and especially that formidable snout-horn! [Even though neighbor Rhinoceros was actually encouraging to his smaller, weaker neighbors since his very imposing presence discouraged many would-be predators.]
So, it began attacking its neighbor Rhinoceros, who was just minding his own business, feeding on the same savannah. [Well, maybe the pesky little gnat was minding its own business, too – because I guess pestering other neighbors is the pesky little gnat’s ‘minding its own business.’]
It repeatedly harassed, attacked, dive-bombed, buzzed the ears, and tried to bite the hide of Rhinoceros – all to no effect. Anything and everything it could think of to do just to needle, irritate, provoke, or try to distract…. And when its lone attacks didn’t deter Rhinoceros from grazing – or even get his attention, for that matter – the pesky little gnat recruited its small swarm of fellow pesky little gnats to come and help it.
Of course, Rhinoceros wasn’t harmed, and didn’t even feel the attacks. In fact, Rhinoceros wouldn’t have even known he was being attacked had not his friendly neighbor, Brother Gazelle, told him:
“Brother Rhinoceros, are you aware that the pesky little gnat and its cohorts are trying to bite you?”
“Well, no, Brother Gazelle, but thank you for your concern. No matter … I have just been minding my own business, doing my usual grazing – what us rhinoceroi are created, called, and gifted to do – and I will continue.”
The only thing the pesky little gnat accomplished was just getting itself all worked up in a swivvet and bent out of shape in every way in its attempts to harm thick-skinned Rhinoceros.
God does not call, choose, or use a ‘self-made’ man. Anyone who seeks to be a ‘self-made’ man has only a mess with which to work to begin with, and only a bigger mess to make for all his efforts. We did not make ourselves to begin with, nor can we now. We must be content to be who God has created us to be in Christ … and what God is pleased to give us to do to serve Him and others.
The Psalmist said the same thing this way: “Know that the LORD, He is God! It is He who made us, and we are His; we are His people, and the sheep of His pasture” (Psalm 100.3).
It was so in the beginning. God created the first man. “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth’” (Genesis 1.26). The first man had no participation and made no contribution to that first creation. He was not a ‘self-made’ man – he was a ‘God-made’ man. And God didn’t consult with the man about whose image he would be made in. God chose the image in which the man would be made – His own. Further, God assigned to the man what he should do for God’s purposes, pleasure, and glory. And, still further, God made the venue in which the man would serve Him: “And the LORD God planted a garden in Eden in the east, and there He put the man whom He had formed” (Genesis 2.8).
God made the man who He wanted him to be, assigned him to fulfill the work He wanted him to do, and even made the venue where the man would fulfill that assignment, and placed him there. And for the (probably brief) time the man was willing to surrender to his Maker’s will, it was Paradise.
Then he decided he wanted to be a ‘self-made’ man. And that’s when he made all the mess of himself and the world in which everyone of us finds ourselves.
It is so also in the new creation of the new birth. “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2.8-10). Does any one of us think he can create a better ‘workmanship’ than God has? Or make a better ‘self-made’ man than to be created ‘in Christ Jesus’? Or make for yourself better ‘good works’ than those God has chosen and ‘prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them’?
And yet, in our quest to be ‘self-made’ men, we strive, angle, lobby, and seek to announce ourselves through all sorts of surreptitious schemes, hoping we’ll be noticed, seen, and heard – advance our own name and ‘brand.’ I recall, much to my shame and embarrassment, one such experience from my much-younger self’s days. Not to say there haven’t been others since then [that ‘self-made man’ ambition seems to be a chronic thing] … but this one still haunts my conscience and gnaws at my memory. This was 50 years ago, around 1972, and I was just starting out as an ‘up and coming’ young preacher – probably 21 years old. But there was a prominent pastor in our fellowship who was one of the most influential leaders among our circles and associations of churches and pastors. The church he pastored hosted an annual Bible Conference, and that year he invited me to preach on their program. Numerous other churches and pastors attended. And it was a distinguished honor to be invited. But I remember sitting at the table with him during one of the meals, thanking him for inviting me to preach, and crassly expressing it this way: “Thank you for the exposure.” I still cringe to remember I had those thoughts and said those words. But also to assure you that God has His ways of crushing and correcting such ‘self-made’ desires and ambitions.
So here’s at least some of what we need to learn – and will learn – if we sincerely want to be servants of the Most High God and be used by Him in His service, to please Him, and bring glory to Him:
God is wise enough to know what He wants us to be and do
God is sovereign enough to exercise His prerogative to assign to each of us what He wants us to be and do
God is gracious enough to want and give to each of us what is best for us to be and do
God is powerful enough to arrange all the opportunities for us to fulfill who He wants us to be and what He wants us to do
God is faithful enough to gift, equip, and prepare us to fulfill all His good purposes for who He wants us to be and what He wants us to do
Or you can still persist in your ‘self-made man’ ways. You’ve got a lot of examples you can follow and emulate [just to name a few of the most prominent in the Scripture’s ‘Hall of Shame’]:
Cain
Nimrod
Balaam
King Saul
Judas Iscariot
Alexander the coppersmith
Demas
Diotrephes
Why wouldn’t we be content to simply obey Jesus’ most-often used commission: “Follow Me!” Trust Him to make you who He wants you to be and give you what He wants you to do. For when we do, we will find that “For in Him the whole fullness of Deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in Him, who is the Head of all rule and authority” (Colossians 2.9-10).
And really, who could – or should – ask for anything more? “Delight yourself in the LORD, and He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the LORD; trust in Him, and He will act … Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for Him … The steps of a man are established by the LORD, when he delights in His way…” (Psalm 37.4-5, 7, 23).
“Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable [which would certainly include any ‘self-made’ desires and ambitions], he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work.” (2 Timothy 2.21)
God can, and He will:
“Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip you with everything good that you may do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.” (Hebrews 13.20-21)
THE LORD IS WITH THEE,AND WE ARE BLESSED THOU ART WITH US!”
Dear Tanya,
I have written Pastor York a separate letter of thanks and appreciation; but I think he would concur that his ministry and influence would not be what it is without your companionship and contribution as you have travelled, appeared, served, and ministered alongside him. You fulfil all the portrait ‘excellencies’ of the Proverbs 31 wife, but I think especially of a couple specific commendations: “The heart of her husband trusts in her, and he will have no lack of gain (verse 11),” and “Her husband is known in the gates when he sits among the elders of the land (verse 23).”
You know how that over the past few years I will occasionally greet you with this [what I have come to call] “Ave Tanya” greeting. Obviously, it’s a takeoff on the traditional ‘Hail, Mary’ or ‘Ave Maria’ prayer. I have adapted it for myself: ‘Hail, Tanya, full of grace! The Lord is with thee, and we are blessed thou art with us!’
It is not really even a jest…or a parody – I am full of sincerity. Because you are full of God’s grace. And the Lord is truly with you. And you have blessed us everyone by being with us. Everyone universally bears that same testimony. Everywhere you go, everyone you meet, everyone with whom you associate – they all testify, without being asked specifically, that the first, most prominent, and lasting impression they have of you is that you are full of grace!
You are full of grace in your character and conduct. I know we are more accustomed to thinking about and defining ‘grace’ from a theological perspective, but the English definitions are more expansive and inclusive: ‘Seemingly effortless beauty or charm…; a characteristic or quality pleasing for its charm or refinement; a sense of fitness or propriety; a disposition to be generous or helpful; goodwill, mercy; etc…’ You embody, demonstrate, and live out all the graces of Christ-like character and conduct in everything you do.
You are full of grace in your very presence. Maybe ‘exude’ would be the best word here.Grace enters our presence when you come among us. You present yourself with grace; you carry yourself with grace; you approach us and interact with us with the grace of love, cheerfulness, and encouragement. You still minister grace to us, even when we are not face-to-face with you, but see you interacting with others.
You are full of grace in your correspondences among us – especially social media. And this is a rare gem of grace, to be sure – but you practice it consistently and with ease. You don’t have to pretend or ‘put on’ to be gracious. You are a constant source of encouragement to us all as you wittily and graciously ‘cheer on’ all of us to Christian love and fellowship and good works.
You are full of grace in your personal expressions of compassion and sympathy. This is so one of your hallmarks of grace. So many times, especially pre-Covid, when one of our sisters in distress or heavy-hearted would approach the steps of the platform during response time to kneel and pray, pouring out their hearts to God. And you would go to her, wrap your arms around her, and cry and pray with her. We knew that you knew and most probably had previous correspondences with her. But whether you did or not, you would exercise the grace of sympathy in its purest expression: to ‘feel along with.’ And we know this goes on all the time, behind the scenes, and so much more than any of us even knows.
You are full of grace in your modeling of what a Christ-like, Christ-honoring marriage is and how it works. You have been for us all such an example and model of a gracious counterpart in your-all’s marriage. How you two love, adore, respect, and interact with one another; how you team up with one another in the lessons, seminars, and sessions on Biblical, God-honoring marriage that you have given – not only to us, but all over the world. Your grace has been an invaluable and indispensable asset of that witness to the grace of God and the Gospel.
You are full of grace in your abundant epieikes. I think I have the correct word here. I know Pastor has referred to it more than one time in his sermons. I think it often referred to as ‘forbearance,’ but Pastor has often given us the ‘York paraphrase’ as ‘put-uppance.’ I’ll just leave that one right there – but you are full of that grace also!
And I could go on… But I just want to give you my heartiest “Grace to you!” because you have given yours to us!
Here on the day of your final sermon and service with us as our Senior Pastor, please allow Debbie and me to once again express our deepest love and gratitude to you for the personal and spiritual ministry you have given to us during these past six-and-one-half years we have been blessed to worship and serve here in our church.
We give thanks to God first ‘from whom all blessings flow,’ but we thank you also for being such a willing, able, and faithful servant of God as He ministered His grace to us through you.
First, we want to thank you for the privilege and joy God has afforded us to call you ‘Pastor,’ and we do so with the greatest depth and degree of respect and affection. We’ve been personal friends and even ministry colleagues for decades, but since our coming here to our church, you’ve been ‘Pastor’ to us. God promised in Jeremiah’s day, “And I will give you shepherds after my own heart, who will feed you with knowledge and understanding.” (Jeremiah 3.15). And so you have.
And not only you, but we have been further blessed for the foreseeable future with the wisdom you have exercised by choosing our other pastors to serve us alongside you. You have cultivated in them the same graces and gifts you model to carry on the work of God and the ministry of the Gospel. For this, we are grateful, hopeful, and full of joy and anticipation for God has yet in store for us.
As you well know, both Debbie and I were born into pastors’ homes. Neither of us has ever had any other pastor besides our fathers. My father was my only pastor until I assumed my first pastorate. Debbie’s Dad was her only pastor until we were married. Then, until we came here, I have been her pastor. All this to say that: I am most personally and affectionately grateful to you for ministering, not only to me, but also to my wife in ways that I was either not gifted or didn’t have the opportunity. I love you for that.
I know that I have expressed these things to you before in personal conversations, but I want to reiterate them here in this testimony. When I resigned my former pastorate, we had not planned either for that departure nor where we would go from there. Buck Run Baptist Church was not on our radar nor horizon. We didn’t have enough knowledge [or presence of mind] to even be considering Buck Run. All I knew about Buck Run Baptist Church was that there was one in Frankfort, and you were the Pastor. But I had never attended a service either at the old campus nor our present one. In fact, I had been in Frankfort only a very few times over those thirty-five years we had ministered in Lexington.
But when I resigned there, Debbie and I prayed and committed to God that we would continue to worship and serve in a local church in whatever opportunities God would be pleased to open for us – we just didn’t know how or where that would be. Then in that first week after my resignation, you and I spoke to one another. Then we attended our first service here. And here we are. As Abraham’s servant said concerning his journey to find a bride for Isaac, “The man bowed his head and worshiped the LORD and said, ‘Blessed be the LORD … who has not forsaken His steadfast love and His faithfulness … As for me, the LORD has led me in the way…’” (Genesis 24.26-27).
Here is what we have found in our church … and I say this, first, to the praise of the glory of God’s grace and also as an expression of our love for our dear brothers and sisters who are our church body – but I say it with thanksgiving to you because I know you have taught, cultivated, and modeled the grace that our church so abundantly ministers:
Our church is our Holy place. It is so because the Presence of God is here. God is pleased to dwell among us and manifest Himself in every service, in every way. Our church is truly to us our ‘Bethel’ – our ‘house of God.’ We constantly experience here what Jacob did when God met him and revealed Himself to him in the ‘ladder dream’: “Surely the LORD is in this place … How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of Heaven!” (Genesis 28.16-17). Except that we all strive to be more awake and engaged in the enjoyment of His Presence than Jacob was while he slept and dreamed!
Our church is our Healthy place. We are consistently and faithfully fed on the rich diet of the Word of God. Every sermon, every lesson, every counsel, every conversation – all of it is committed to the authority, sufficiency, and power of the Word of God to enrich us with the words, will, and ways of God. As you have often taught us: the Word of God is informative, transformative, and performative. To sit under the healthy ministry of our church’s pastors is the first appetizing servings of the age to come when “On this mountain the LORD of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined.” (Isaiah 25.6). I only hope that we all recognize and treasure how richly and exceptionally blessed our church has been – and is – to have the caliber and quality of preaching, teaching, and leadership we enjoy on a daily basis. It isn’t so everywhere.
Our church is our Healing place. Our church is a true ‘Grace Place.’ Love is spoken here – with an ‘unconditional’ dialect and inflection. There is healing for the wounded; there is re-setting of the spirits and lives for the broken; there is encouragement for the downcast; there is help for the weak; there is acceptance for the rejected; there is a welcoming embrace for the lonely; there is always the message of salvation pointing to Jesus Christ for those who are lost and out of the way.
Our church is our Happy place. The joy of the LORD is here. Our church worships with joy, sings with joy, serves with joy, fellowships with joy, witnesses with joy, hopes with joy – and even weeps with one another with the joy of the LORD who is our strength. Our church embodies all of those ‘happy’ Scriptures we so often think and talk about: “I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the LORD!’” (Psalm 122.1); “Make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the earth! Serve the LORD with gladness! Come into His Presence with singing!” (Psalm 100.1-2); “With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. And you will say in that day: ‘Give thanks to the LORD, call upon His Name, make known His deeds among the peoples, proclaim that His Name is exalted. Sing praises to the LORD, for He has done gloriously; let this be made known in all the earth. Shout, and sing for joy, O inhabitants of Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.’” (Isaiah 12.3-6).
And, I say again, all of this is so – largely because, especially over the past twenty years of your pastoral ministry here, you have taught, lead, and modeled this gracious culture in our church.
And not only do we want to thank you on this occasion for all you have done for us, but we also commit to express our continuing gratitude to you by each of us doing our parts to carry on our church’s ministry for generations to come.
‘CHRIST IN GENESIS’: MAKING THE CONNECTIONS & SETTING THE CONTEXT
1/ We have now come to chapter 4 of Genesis as we continue our quest for ‘CHRIST in Genesis.’ Pastor Alistair Begg has said: “The unity of the Bible lies in the fact that it is the one story, it is the one word of the one God concerning the one salvation that is found in the one Person of the Lord Jesus Christ.” We want to begin the Story searching for, discovering, seeing, and rejoicing in that truth.
2/ Chapter 4 concludes this opening section of the narrative, inspired by the Spirit of Christ Himself (1 Peter 1.11), originally intended to be read aloud, listening for the use, repetition, and sounds of the words, and receiving the warnings and encouragements that are conveyed in the message of the Story.
3/ This section began in ch 2.4 which describe the ‘the generations [toledot / tole-dah] of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens.’ We have discussed what a ‘toledot’ is and how Genesis tells the story of these earliest ‘beginnings’ by compiling these ten historical ‘toledot’ accounts [see Lesson 2].
4/ So chapter 4 will describe in sordid account and detail what became of the heavens and earth that God had created so perfectly and innocently. We will begin to witness the horrible effects of the curse of sin that have so corrupted and degraded God’s creation immediately in that very first generation of fallen humans – and still continues to this day. See Romans 8.18-25.
5/ The contents of this first chapter will include: [1] The birth of the first children to Adam and Eve (1-2); [2] The offerings that Cain and Abel offered to God (3-7); [3] Cain’s murder of his brother, Abel (8); [4] God’s curse on Cain (9-15); [5] Cain’s rejection and departure from God’s Presence (16); [6] The earliest descendants and culture that came from Cain (17-24); [7] The birth of Seth to take the place of Abel (25); [8] The announcement of the godly seed beginning to call on the Name of the LORD (26). Of course, we won’t even try to deal with all the details that are related to all these events. We do want to stick with our intended theme: to show how CHRIST is promised, foretold, and typified in these events.
I / Historical-Redemptive Progression
1/ I know you may not be familiar with this term, but it is used prominently to describe one of the ways the Bible begins to point to Christ and prepare the world for His coming into our world to fulfill the purpose and plan God has had for the world and history even from before the beginning of it [see again Ephesians 1.9-10 & Colossians 1.20]. God knew where He was going – and what He was going to do – with the whole creation even before He created it: to glorify Himself and Christ through it all [Revelation 4.11]. He knew we would sin and corrupt His creation; but He also purposed to redeem us back to Himself through Christ. The Bible tells that story from the very beginning. ‘Historical-Redemptive Progression’ is one of the ways we read and interpret the whole story of the Bible … from Genesis to Revelation.
2/ Historical-Redemptive Progression simply means that in all the historical events that really happened to real people in real times, God is supernaturally and sovereignly working out the progression of His redemptive purposes – all to be fulfilled in Jesus Christ: both in His first coming into our world, and to be finally and fully consummated when He returns again at the end of this age.
3/ Nothing in the history of the world has ever happened by chance, accident, or haphazard, random occurrences. In every event of all history, God is sovereignly and supernaturally superintending it all to bring it to its ultimate fulfillment in Christ and the eventual New Creation.
II / New Testament Fulfillments and References
1/ So, coming back now to our immediate lesson text in Genesis 4, here’s how we’re going to look for the ‘CHRIST-markers’ in this chapter – and also in the lessons that will follow. We have the distinct advantage of being able to look for and see the ‘Historical-Redemptive Progression’ of Christ and the Gospel – even all the way to the New Creation – by looking back from the New Testament vantage point of its fulfillment in Christ. In other words, we read the Old Testament through New Testament eyes and lenses. Christ announced His fulfillment of all the Law and the Prophets [Matthew 5.17-18; Luke 24.25-27, 32, 44-46; et. al.]; and then His apostles wrote the rest of the New Testament to explain their understanding of the Old Testament Scriptures as the Holy Spirit gave them understanding and inspired them to write it for us.
2/ So what we will do is search the New Testament for references back to these Old Testament events. That will give us the Christ-centered Gospel interpretation for what took place with them – and how it all will advance the ‘Historical-Redemptive Progression’ of the coming of Christ and His Gospel.
III / v 1 / ‘I have gotten a man with the help of The LORD’
1/ Let’s begin with Eve’s excitement with the birth of first baby to be born into the fallen human race through the created processes of human reproduction. “Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, ‘I have gotten a man with the help of the LORD!’” First off, we can’t even begin to imagine what awe, wonder, and excitement she must have experienced with this very first human conception and childbirth. But, I’ll have to leave you to imagine that for yourself…
2/ Eve’s greater excitement had to be that she must have fully expected this first man-child to be the promised Redeemer God had promised back in ch 3.15: the ‘proto-evangelion’ or ‘first Gospel’ promise. God had promised that He would give a Redeemer who would come from the offspring of the woman – a Redeemer who would ‘bruise [crush] the head of the serpent’ and reverse the fatal effects of the curse He had pronounced upon them because of their sin. ‘Surely,’ Eve must have thought, ‘this is the promised Redeemer!’ If you consult the chart I have provided for you, CHRIST: in Creation to New Creation, you will find in the section on the left [‘CHRIST-markers in the Old Testament’] that the last ‘CHRIST-marker’ I have written is what I call: ‘PININGS’ for CHRIST [wistful and wishful ‘longing’ for a Redeemer to come…] That’s what this exclamation by Eve is: she is ‘PINING’ for the promised Redeemer!
3/ Going back to the end of ch 3.22-24, they had been expelled and driven out of Eden, their former Paradise. From that day to the birth of this first man-child, they had been ‘pining’ for the reversal of the curse they had brought upon themselves – haunted by the memories of ‘the way we were.’ “Mem’ries light the corners of my mind / Misty water-colored memories of the way we were / Scattered pictures of the smiles we left behind / Smiles we gave to one another for the way we were / Can it be that it was all so simple then / Or has time re-written every line? / If we had the chance to do it all again / Tell me, would we? Could we?” But, of course, they couldn’t do it all again – someone would have to come and do it all again for them…on their behalf. That One was the promised ‘seed of the woman’ whom God had promised who would be born of woman to redeem them from the curse of the law they had broken [Galatians 4.4-5]. So Eve could ‘pine’ and pin her hopes on her first baby boy, Cain, all she wanted to … but as we shall see, Cain was not the promised ‘seed of the woman’ Redeemer God had promised!
4/ BTW, those who would have heard this narrative read [as everyone did when it was first delivered], their ears would have picked up the similarities in the sounds of ‘Cain’ [qayin] and ‘gotten’ [qaniti].
IV / vv 2-7 / ‘And The LORD had regard for Abel and his offering…’
1/ Another man-child was born to Adam and Eve: Abel. Many Bible expositors speculate that Cain and Abel may have been twins since we are told only once that ‘she conceived’; then “And again, she bore his brother Abel.” But regardless, we now have two sons born to them. The first human siblings.
2/ Immediately, we are going to witness the separation and divergence of two ways of human thinking, believing, values, and conduct. Again, this goes back to ch 3.15 [God’s curse on the serpent and his descendants]: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring.” It is imperative to note here that God has Divinely-appointed His Son as the ultimate ‘seed of the woman’ to come in the fullness of time to be the promised Redeemer. The Serpent is committed to killing the Redeemer – not only when He is born into the world – but also to kill all those who would be in His ancestral line of predecessors to bring Him into the world [Revelation 12.1-4].
These two lines of human conduct will begin to form and diverge here in these two first sons. They will branch off into [1] the way of Abel’s descendants (Hebrews 11.4) – that is, the way of faith in God, obedience to God, worship of God, followers of God; and [2] the way of Cain’s descendants (Jude, v 11) – that is, the way of rebellion against God, enmity and warfare against God’s believers, and ultimate condemnation by God and separation from Him.
Or, to put it another way: ‘The way of the Lamb’ versus ‘the way of the Dragon.’ The serpent and his descendants will come to be identified also as ‘the dragon’ as the Story of ‘historical-redemptive progression’ unfolds and develops [see Isaiah 27.1 & especially Revelation 12, 13, 16, and culminating in ch 20.2, “And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan…”] So, from here on, the ‘seed of the serpent’ will be the same as ‘the way of the Dragon.’
You need to see these two alliances at enmity with one another forming, fighting, and diverging here in Genesis 4. We will follow these two enemy warring lines all throughout Genesis – and even throughout the rest of the Scripture narrative and the historical-redemptive progression of the Gospel.
3/ Abel is a man of faith. He believes in the God-Creator he has learned about from his father, Adam, and he offers the sacrifices his father has taught him are acceptable to God. We know this because we read in Hebrews 11.4: By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks. NOTE: Abel was a believer and a man of faith before he offered the acceptable sacrifice. The ‘faith’ he exercised and obeyed was his belief in God he had learned from Adam.
4/ Cain, on the other hand, has allied himself with the spirit of the ‘way of the Dragon.’ He rejects what he knows to be the right offering that pleases God, and he offers the sacrifice that he himself chooses and produces. And the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering He had no regard. God looked, not only on their offerings, but first of all on their hearts. NOTE: God accepted Abel and his faith first…then his offering. The LORD had no regard for Cain and his rebellious spirit first…then rejected his offering. But Abel had borne witness to his faith…even to death!Rev. 2.10.
5/ This infuriated Cain. So Cain was very angry, and his face fell. The LORD had no right, authority, or prerogative to require him to offer any other offering than the one he chose to offer – and God should accept it. He was angry, and it showed, and he wanted everyone to know it – even God. The LORD intercepted Cain in mercy and reasoned with him: The LORD said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it.” Cain’s sin, and ours, is depicted as a ravenous beast that is crouching to kill, destroy, and devour us [see 1 Peter 5.8]. But Cain is insistently and insolently rebellious against the will of God. He will not repent and do what he knows is the way of faith and righteousness. He has gone to ‘the dark side,’ the way of the serpent-dragon.
V / vv 8-15 / ‘We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one…’
1/ Now we witness the first murder in the history of the human race, and the apostle John will tell us just who inspired Cain and instigated him to commit it against his brother Abel – and why. Cain seethed and stewed in his anger, bitterness, resentment, and yes, his wicked hatred toward his brother … he conspired and planned in his evil mind how he could and would murder him. ‘The way of Cain’ thinks and says: ‘If you disagree with me and live differently than I do in my rebellion against God, then you don’t deserve to live. I will kill you and rid you from our society and from the earth.’ This is the ultimate ‘cancel culture.’
2/ Cain spoke to Abel his brother. We can be sure this ‘speaking’ was in hatred, animosity, and antagonism … being red in the face and with his veins and arteries bulging. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. I’m going to interject the apostle John’s commentary on Cain’s motive and purpose here so we can keep it in mind as we go from here throughout the rest of human history: We should not be like Cain, who wasof the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother’s righteous. Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you. / 1 John 3.12-13. When John says Cain was ‘of the evil one,’ he means: ‘from the evil one, belonging to the evil one, acting like the evil one.’ Cain had the spiritual DNA of the evil one in his heart and soul. And who was the evil one? He is the serpent who beguiled Eve to sin, and then went into the world to make war against the predecessors and offspring of the ‘seed of the woman’ from whom the Redeemer was promised to come. See Revelation 12.17 – this history-long hatred and warfare ‘of the evil one’ against Christ and His followers had its ‘genesis’ here with Cain’s murder of Abel. We continue to experience it as ‘spiritual warfare.’
3/ Jesus Himself said that Abel was the first martyr for the faith [Matthew 23.35; Luke 11.51]. Jesus also said that those who would kill Him were doing so from the same spiritual DNA of the dragon: You are of your father the devil [just as Cain was], and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning… [John 8.44]. All of this history from Genesis to the Cross to the New Creation is summarized in Revelation 12. But the war was engaged here with Cain martyring his brother Abel.
4/ NOTE: Cain didn’t just kill another man as his descendant Lamech would six generations later [Genesis 6.23-24]. Cain murdered his ‘brother.’ That relationship is specifically reiterated seven times. We are commanded to love all others, but especially our ‘brothers.’ When Cain is confronted by the LORD, he denied any responsibility or culpability in what he had done: “Where is your brother?” He [Cain] said, “I do not know; am I my brother’s keeper?” This is the message John gives us in 1 John 3.11-15.
5/ Now we see another prominent ‘CHRIST-marker’ in the testimony of Abel’s blood. The LORD declares to Cain that his guilt is undeniable and inescapable because “The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to me from the ground. And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand.” We all know what Abel’s blood was crying out for: justice, vengeance, retribution. And The LORD moves against Cain to avenge the blood of His faithful martyr … even though, in His common grace and mercy, that sentence will be mitigated [see vv 11-15].
6/ BUT, when Christ came and was murdered for the very same reasons [Matthew 23.29-36], His blood secures the forgiveness and justification even of those who put Him to death [which is, of course: all of us]. “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” / Luke 23.34. The promised Messianic ‘seed of the woman’ who would come would die to redeem the fallen offspring of Adam who would believe in Him. He would come to shed ‘the blood of the new covenant for the remission of our sins.’ And so, the Hebrews writer declares that we have NOT come to the mountain of the law and our self-worked righteousness, which can and will only condemn us in the guilt of our sins. BUT we have come to Mount Zion, the refuge of grace, “…and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel” [Hebrews 12.18-24].
VI / vv 16-26 / How ‘the rest of the story’ of the human race began…
1/ All we can do here is point out some prominent events that will serve as markers to direct us through the rest of Genesis, the Scripture narrative, and the history of the world … on to the end of the ‘historical-redemptive progression’ of Christ and the Gospel. See 1 Corinthians 15.20-28 & Revelation 20.10.
2/ v 16 / Then Cain went away from the Presence of the LORD and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden. His descendants [‘the seed of the serpent’] also will establish and cultivate a culture of rebellion against The LORD and continue to wage a war of enmity against ‘the seed of the woman’–people of faith. [We will see them re-constitute after the flood in the descendants of Ham / Genesis 10.6-20; 11.1-9
3/ v 25 / And Adam knew his wife again, and she bore a son and called his name Seth, for she said, “God has appointed for me another offspring [seed] instead of Abel, for Cain killed him.” The enmity and warfare against the promised ‘seed of the woman’ will continue, but God’s redemptive purposes will prevail. The LORD provides another offspring of faith to bring in the Redeemer in the fullness of time [Luke 3.38]. “…in order that God’s purpose of election might continue…” [Romans 9.10].
4/ v 26 / At that time people began to call upon the Name of the LORD. Contrast with v 16. These two lines of ‘the seed of the serpent’ [rebellion against The LORD] and ‘the seed of the woman’ [faith in The LORD] now begin to, not only diverge from one another, but to declare themselves and act on their respective convictions. We’ll see in following lessons where it goes from here…
Matthew 6.5-6 LSB: 5 “And when you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. 6 But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.”
Hey! You there! Struggling with praying, wondering if maybe after all, you’re just uselessly talking to the air, the ceiling, or the floor!
How would you describe yourself, what do you think of yourself, how do you evaluate yourself … when you are praying to God and desperately seeking an audience with Him?
small?
obscure?
unknown?
unnoticed?
insignificant?
no standing or stature?
no influence?
a nobody [maybe even to God]?
Do you fear that your praying is all in vain? Maybe because you have no prominent platform, no celebrity status, no ‘others-approved’ creds to offer your Father in Heaven to commend you to Him?
Jesus orders us off of our public platforms, to leave the ‘street corners’ and public marketplaces where we may be even trying to ‘be seen by men.’ If that’s what you’re seeking, then if and when you get the fickle approval of others, that’s all you’re going to get. But you didn’t pray to God.
“Go into your inner room” [‘closet’ (KJV)], and ‘when you have shut your door’ on yourself and God, then ‘pray to your Father who is in secret…’ Because in doing so, you are entering the Very Presence of the Very God. He is there with you, and you are there with Him. “And your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.”
Because Jesus Christ has made the way to God before you and calls us to follow Him there.
Hebrews 9.11-14: 11 But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) 12 He entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of His own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption. 13 For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, 14 how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.
Hebrews 10.19-22: Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, 20 by the new and living way that He opened for us through the curtain, that is, through His flesh, 21 and since we have a Great Priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.
Yes, you, struggling there alone with God your Heavenly Father – you have not only the invitation and command to ‘enter the Holy Place of the Presence of God by the blood of Jesus,’ but you have also the assurance of your standing and acceptance with God through the merits of Christ’s own righteousness and substitutionary offering of Himself for you.
Christ’s merits which we claim and plead by our personal faith and trust in Him give us an assured confidence, even boldness [Hebrews 4.16] to pray to our Father in our secret places.
And Jesus promises that when we plead His merits, we will have with His Heavenly Father and ours the assurances of:
access
authority
acceptance
audience
and answers
“…and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.” And, after all, our greatest reward which we seek and want more than any other is to be with Him.
Genesis 4.1: “Now the man knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and gave birth to Cain, and she said, ‘I have gotten a man with the help of Yahweh!’”
And thus, with the arrival of this first child born after their fall into sin and the imposition of the curse upon the whole creation God had made ‘very good,’ the longing and ‘pining’ for the promised Redeemer of Genesis 3.15 also is born.
But, oh, how bitterly disappointing Cain will be! He was not at all the ‘seed of the woman’ who would ‘crush the head’ of the serpent (Romans 16.20). Cain himself was ‘of the Evil One’ (1 John 3.12).
‘Long lay the world in sin and error pining…‘
And this same renewed longing and hope would be re-conceived and re-born with every mother and man-child all throughout the Old Testament. The plaintive wailing of “How long, O LORD?” would echo and reverberate for seemingly endless centuries of longing for the birth of their long-awaited and long-expected Savior – only for their hopes to be shattered with everyone who would come after.
They would be known as those who were ‘waiting for the comfort of Israel’ and ‘waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem’ (Luke 2.25, 38).
But … ‘How long, O LORD?’
But then, ‘when the fullness of the time came’ … “Now it happened that while they were there, the days were fulfilled for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn Son…” (Luke 2.6-7). God has kept His Word and sent His Son, our Redeemer and Savior as first promised from the beginning! The waiting, longing, and pining is over! The angel of God heralds the announcement: “Do not be afraid; for behold, I bring you Good News of great joy which will be for all the people. For today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the LORD! … Glory to God in the Highest, and on earth peace among men with whom He is pleased!” (Luke 2.10-14).
“And the God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. The Grace of our Lord Jesus be with you” (Romans 16.20).
I am praying and hoping you, also, hear Him, believe in Christ, and rejoice in the yet-to-be-fully-enjoyed hope of the Glory of God!
‘CHRIST IN GENESIS’: MAKING THE CONNECTIONS & SETTING THE CONTEXT
1/ Yes, I know: usually if the two words ‘fall’ and ‘rise’ are used together, they usually ‘rise’ and then they ‘fall’ – ‘the rise and fall of…The Roman Empire / The Third Reich,’ etc. But this time, I’m deliberately titling this lesson ‘The Fall and Rise of the Human Race’ because that’s precisely how we’re going to see CHRIST presented and portrayed in Genesis 3: we ‘fell’ into sin; but CHRIST ‘raises’ us up again!
‘The Fall of the Human Race’ will chronicle Adam’s role in the disobedient transgression that brought upon the human race and the whole creation the curse of sin, separation from the life and fellowship of the Creator, and banishment from the beautiful Paradise the LORD God had planted for him and given him to govern for His glory. Strangely enough, even in his transgression, Adam is a type of Christ, ‘the One who was to come’ [Romans 5.14…also the fuller commentary in vv 12-21].
‘The Rise of the Human Race’ will be told in the stories of the promises of CHRIST, ‘the offspring of the woman’ [v 15]; and in the sacrificial animal that was slaughtered to cover their nakedness [v 21]; and in the ‘guarding of the way to the tree of life’ [v 24] until CHRIST would come to secure our right again to eat of it [Revelation 2.7] … and also in that Gospel commentary, Romans 5.12-21.
2/ There are numerous prominent characters in this narrative: the serpent, the woman, her husband, the man – but no character is more prominent than CHRIST! We will see ‘CHRIST-markers’ [refer to our chart/graphic] in every scene of this story.
I / vv 1-7 / “You shall surely die…” [the Fall of the human race]
1/ These verses will describe the verbal exchanges between ‘the serpent’ and the woman as he deceives her into believing that the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil would be good for her. Adam follows her in the act of disobedience and rebellion against the LORD God. God’s forewarned punishment came true and was fulfilled: “…for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die” [see ch 2.17].
2/ We are introduced to ‘the serpent’ who will become the arch-enemy of God and everything God has created for His own Glory … until he is destroyed by God in the end. So where is CHRIST in the introduction of ‘the serpent’? We will discover as the metanarrative of the Scripture is revealed, it is really CHRIST HIMSELF whom ‘the serpent’ opposes and seeks to supplant and ultimately destroy.
3/ ‘The serpent’ is also called by a number of other descriptors throughout the Story of CHRIST:
Murderer, liar, father of lies [John 8.44]
Thief [John 10.10]
Enemy [Matthew 13.39]
God of this world [age] [2 Corinthians 4.4]
Tempter [Matthew 4.3; 1 Thessalonians 3.5]
Dragon, ‘that ancient serpent,’ ‘the devil and Satan,’ ‘the deceiver of the whole world’ [Revelation 12.9]
4/ As such, from his first appearance here in the Garden of Eden, the Paradise of God, the serpent’s all-consuming mission has been to wage his bitter vendetta of rage and hatred against CHRIST. John sums up the purpose of the serpent from the beginning in his historic summation in Revelation 12.17: “Then the dragon [serpent] became furious with the woman and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring, on those who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus.”
5/ And then, there is this more personal juxtaposition in 2 Corinthians 11.2-3: “For I feel a divine jealousy for you, since I betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to Christ. But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.” Even Eve’s betrayal was against CHRIST.
6/ We must also keep in mind that the serpent was not created evil. The serpent was among the beasts of the field that God created on Day 6 in ch 1.24, and it was good. But at some point previous to this account, Satan had fallen from his own angelic estate [Jude, v 6; 2 Peter 2.4; Revelation 12.4, 9]; and now Satan enters and takes control of this serpent beast God had created good and corrupts it. He doesn’t approach the woman under his own identity – but through the guise of a wise and shrewd creature [Trojan horse?]. He invades God’s perfect creation to destroy it also and attempt to usurp it as his own kingdom.
7/ All throughout the Scriptures, we are told that Eve, ‘the woman,’ was deceived by the manipulative arguments of the serpent [see v 13; 2 Corinthians 11.3; 1 Timothy 2.11-15]. Here are some of the deceptive perversions and corruptions of God’s words and Eve’s ways of thinking toward God:
v 3b / The serpent questioned and cast doubt in Eve’s mind on God’s goodness: “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’? In other words, “Did God actually create all these good trees and fruits and then tell you you couldn’t eat and enjoy them?” Actually, what God had said was: “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden…”[ch 2.16]
vv 2-3 / Eve replied correctly concerning God’s liberties and prohibition – except that she seemed to expand on the prohibition to include ‘neither shall you touch it…’ Whether God had actually said that, we don’t know. What Eve does suggest is that she understood the ‘untouchable’ parameters of the prohibition.
v 4 / The serpent now sees a chink and opening in Eve’s questioning of God’s goodness, so now he unleashes an all-out assault on God’s truthfulness: “You will not surely die…” This is now a full frontal denial of God’s honesty and truthfulness as their God.
v 5 / The serpent proceeds with the knock-out blow to Eve’s faith in God and her devotion to Him as her Lord and Sovereign. The serpent deceives and convinces Eve that she can become her own ‘god,’ judging and deciding for herself what is good and wise – deciding for herself what she can have and do. She can be an equal with God over the choices and governance of her own life – exercise her own self-sovereignty … and God is being selfish and stingy to deprive and withhold this ‘wisdom’ from her: “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
Except that: no, you won’t be like God. God can know about evil without being personally corrupted by it. The tree of the knowledge of good and evil for the man and woman meant that when they ate of its forbidden fruit, they would ‘know’ sin by personal experience. They would have the ‘knowledge of good and evil’ in their moral constitution and relationship before God. Before eating of the forbidden fruit, they had only knowledge of good. If they had continued obeying God, they would never have known anything but good – like God. But by eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they have now entered the realm of participation and experience in evil [sin], and made themselves ‘alienated from the life of God’ [Ephesians 4.18] and ‘dead in trespasses and sins’ [Ephesians 2.1].
8/ v 6 / Now the woman has been totally duped and deceived. We have a term for what has just happened to her thinking: ‘gaslighting.’ Gaslighting is when someone feeds you a line or narrative that is totally false and contrary to the truth and reality – but they get you to believe it and accept it as the truth. So here’s what Eve’s perception of God’s character and word turned out to be: “So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.”
NOTE: the root of all sin is in our desires [James 1.12-18]. All of our sin is conceived in our heart of desires – what we love and want more than anything else. AND, the expression of all our sin is in giving way to our human sensual desires that are contrary to the character, will, and desires of God. Yes, sin is anything that we think, say, and do that displeases God. But, before the action of disobedience, there is first the desire for something to please our human senses with the pleasure of enjoyment. Eve first saw that the tree was good for food [pleasure of the sense of taste], and that it was a delight to the eyes [pleasure of the sense of sight], and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise [pleasure to the sense of pride, self-will, self-exaltation] – all of it yielding to the desire to enjoy sensual human pleasures that God had forbidden.
9/ Adam voluntarily joined his wife in her transgression. She was deceived; Adam was not deceived. Adam is the one who had spoken personally with the LORD God and received the covenant mandates, conditions, stipulations, and prohibitions. Adam was the ‘federal head’ of the human race. All of the succeeding humans who would be born would come from his ‘seed.’ And so, with Adam’s sin, transgression, disobedience, sin came into the world, and death by sin. [See Paul’s commentary in Romans 5.12-21.]
10/ v 7 / Here is ‘the FALL of the human race…’ Then the eyes of both were opened [knowledge of good and evil], and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths. Immediately, we are made to realize that their self-efforts to ‘save, rescue, rectify’ themselves won’t suffice… We need a Savior!
II / vv 8-13 / “Where are you? … What is this that you have done?”
1/ But God would not allow His human creation to be lost from Him without loving them, pursuing them, saving them, and bringing them back to Himself. Even in these actions, we can see a brilliant ‘CHRIST-marker’ in God’s proactive purposes: For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life [John 3.16].
God pursued Adam: And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day… And Jesus would say: “For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost” [Luke 19.10].
God called Adam: …and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. But the LORD God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” NOT that God didn’t know where Adam was, but God would require Adam to admit where he was.
God confronted and convicted Adam: And he [Adam] said, ‘I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.’ He [LORD God] said, ‘Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?’ Here we have the first introductions of fear and shame – the roots and streams of sin from which flow many of our human ‘brokennesses’ – expressions of our sinfulness and fallenness.
2/ Immediately upon being confronted with the convicting truth of their sin, both Adam and Eve try to deflect blame and accountability away from themselves toward someone else: Adam blamed Eve, and by extension, blamed God for giving her to him; Eve blamed the serpent for deceiving her. This is what sin has done to us: not only does our sin turn us all into liars by denying our own personal guilt, accountability, and culpability … but sin turns us against each other. Sin turns us all into ‘me-first self-justifiers’ and makes us all willing to throw everybody else under the bus if it will save ourselves.
III / vv 14-19 / “I will put enmity … between your offspring and her offspring…”
1/ From this point in this narrative on to the end of this chapter, God’s words will be rich and replete with ‘CHRIST-markers.’ The CHRIST-markers will be seen even in the curses that the LORD God pronounces … because only CHRIST can save us from the curse of sin that is the consequence of our disobedience. And before we even get into this part of the narrative, I will direct your attention all the way to the end of Scripture and history – to the New Creation. Because there, we are promised in Revelation 22.3: No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and His servants will worship Him. But, we’re not there yet! Back here in Genesis 3, the curse is just being pronounced. All of the longing we read about in Romans 8.18-25 begins here in Genesis 3.14-19.
2/ When God created all things very good, He blessed what He had made [ch 1.22, 28; 2.3]. Now because of sin, there is a triple curse: ch 3.14, 17; 4.11.
v 14/ The serpent is cursed and consigned to live in the dust and eat everything in the dust.
v 15 / HOWEVER … here is one of the brightest rays of Gospel promise and hope in the Scriptures. In fact, we call this promise the protoevangelium or ‘the first good news / Gospel.’ The serpent has been the instrument of bringing all this sin, rebellion, curse, corruption, and death into the world God has created for His pleasure and Glory. The serpent will wreak yet more and more havoc, misery, woe, destruction, and death before he, himself, is destroyed. But he will be destroyed in the end! [see Revelation 20.10]. And He will be destroyed by the very One whom he most seeks to destroy – the ‘offspring who shall come from the woman.’ The serpent surmised that if he could corrupt and destroy the spiritual purity and ‘virginity’ of the woman, then everyone who would be born from her would be corrupted and destroyed spiritually. And we would be without a Savior. But God promises to bring a Savior into the world through the woman – and it will be a virgin woman, too [as He will reveal in ages to come]. There is a warfare that commences between the offspring of the serpent and the offspring of the woman. But in the fullness of time, the offspring of the woman will crush the serpent’s head – effecting his death! Jesus Christ did this on the Cross! [see John 12.27-33; Revelation 12; 1 John 2.8; Romans 16.19-20]
v 16/ Even is not cursed, but she is consigned to enduring painful travail during the process of childbearing. Also, since she usurped the role of following her husband’s leadership in the temptation and transgression, she is also to assume the role of competitor and rival against her husband’s headship. However, according to 1 Timothy 2.11-15, she shall be ‘saved’ from disgrace by fearing and serving God and instilling faith in God in her children.
vv 17-19/ Because Adam failed to exercise godly leadership over Eve during her temptation, the earth and ground is cursed with the futility with which the whole creation now groans [see Romans 8.18-25 again].
3/ CHRIST has redeemed even the earth from its cursed condition – and by His death, resurrection, and ascension, He is bringing in the New Creation wherein all things will be made new and reconciled back to God [see 1 Corinthians 15.24-28; Ephesians 1.9-10; Colossians 1.15-20].
IV / vv 20-24 / “…to guard the way to the tree of life”
1/ vv 20-21 / Not only did the LORD God promise the Savior to come through the offspring of the woman, but He also provided a type through which their sins would be covered–by the skin of a slaughtered animal. We can’t imagine the emotional and psychological trauma that must have shocked Adam and Eve as they witnessed the LORD God slaughtering one of the creatures they had co-existed with before their sin … and which Adam had named. And now to see that it was their sin that necessitated the sacrifice of an innocent animal to provide a covering for their shame and nakedness.But God was making the promise here also that it was His purpose, will, and desire to provide an ‘atonement’ for their sin. This type would be repeated again and again throughout the Old Testament – but especially in Genesis 22.9-14.
2/ vv 22-24 / Not only had Adam disobeyed the LORD God by eating the forbidden fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, but he had also disobeyed by NOT eating of the tree of life. It kind of appears that if they had eaten of the tree of life, it would have made them immortal. But as it was, now they had surely died. With an act of mercy, the LORD God drove them out of the Paradise to continue their cultivation of the ground outside the garden among the cursed fields of the earth. Flaming cherubim [fierce angelic guardians were placed at the entrance of Paradise – NOT to keep them away from the tree of life or to keep it from them … BUT RATHER “…to guard the way to the tree of life.” In other words, to provide the way for them to enjoy eternal life and immortality in His Presence and company. Jesus Christ is ’the Way, the Truth, and the Life…no one comes to the Father except through Him!’
3/ Jesus Christ is both the Tree of Life and the Keeper of the way to the Tree of Life. He promised the church in Ephesus: To the one who conquers I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the Paradise of God [Revelation 2.7]. And when we see that tree, its fruit is sustaining eternal life and its leaves are healing the nations [Revelation 22.1-5]. This is CHRIST! “He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By His wounds you have been healed. For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls” [1 Peter 2.24-25]
~Dave Parks 