10 - Adam And Eves Judgement 2010

Last time we saw that God first judged the serpent and Satan. The serpent would be doomed to lick the dust of the ground all of his days. Satan, on the other hand, would experience war and ultimately be defeated by the “seed of the woman.”

“And I will cause hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.”—Genesis 3:15

On the cross, Satan bruised the heel of Jesus Christ, God’s Messiah, fulfilling the prophecy of Genesis 3:15 to a tee!

And when Jesus Christ returns in the Second Advent or Second Coming, He will deliver a death blow to Satan’s head.

“The devil, who deceived them, was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet are. And they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.”—Rev. 20:10

While the first part of God’s judgment involved war, the second part of God’s sentence involved woe.

“I will sharpen the pain of your pregnancy, and in pain you will give birth. And you will desire to control your husband, but he will rule over you.” (Vs. 16)

The woe God spoke of focused on two things: There would be sorrow centering in the area of a woman’s greatest fulfillment, in the bringing forth of children.

“I will sharpen the pain of your pregnancy, and in pain you will give birth.”— 3:16

And there would also be subservience. The “one flesh” relationship which she enjoyed with her husband would be subject to the strain of competing wills.

“You will desire to control your husband, but he will rule over you.”—3:16

Marriage was made in heaven but marred by hell. Before sin affected the character of man, conflict simply did not exist between man and woman. There was perfect harmony; there was no division of mind or thinking, because the Lord had created them in a state of innocence.

Adam was the leader of the two, while the woman was given as a “help meet.” The word “meet” in the original means "at the side of, or mate."

Eve was to be a helper, one called alongside Adam to help him in his work, to walk next to him in life, to be a companion and a blessing.

Yet at the temptation of Eve, it was the woman's desire to become equal with God through rebellion. Satan had promised that she would “be like God, knowing good and evil.”

To be like God would have meant also ruling over Adam, rather than at his side as a helper. But this was not God’s plan.

Eve was made to be Adam’s “completer,” not his competer.”

What did the Lord do? He placed the woman under the authority of her husband as a reproof for her rebellion against the authority of God.

Ever since the fall, the woman’s primary relational battle has been in the area of submission to the leadership of the man. Consider the entire women’s liberation movement. It is not primarily a rebellion against men, but against the authority of God.

Simon Peter addressed this very issue:

1 In the same way, you wives must accept the authority of your husbands... 5 This is how the holy women of old made themselves beautiful. They trusted God and accepted the authority of their husbands. 6 For instance, Sarah obeyed her husband, Abraham, and called him “my dear husband.” You are her daughters when you do what is right without fear of what your husbands might do.”—1 Pet 3:1, 5-6

In other words, you are Sarah’s daughters if you maintain a right attitude in the eyes of God, whether or not your husband does right.

In case you think God is being unfair, listen to what Peter tells the husbands next:

7In the same way you married men should live considerately with [your wives], with an intelligent recognition [of the marriage relation], honoring the woman as [physically] the weaker, but [realizing that you] are joint (equal) heirs of God’s grace, in order that your prayers may not be hindered and cut off. [Otherwise you cannot pray effectively.]”

So the second woe for the woman was that she would have to learn submission in spite of her own strong will.

And finally the third part of God’s judgment fell on Adam—the male. With Adam God pronounces a curse on work.

“Since you listened to your wife and ate from the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat, the ground is cursed because of you. All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it. 18 It will grow thorns and thistles for you, though you will eat of its grains. 19 By the sweat of your brow will you have food to eat until you return to the ground from which you were made. For you were made from dust, and to dust you will return.”—3:17-19

There was to be unrewarding toil, hard labor on a sin-cursed earth. The man would have to toil for a living because the ground, which had naturally produced plants for food, was now cursed to grow thorns and thistles.

Matthew Henry writes: “His business, before he sinned, was a constant pleasure to him, the garden was then dressed without any uneasy labor, and kept without any uneasy care; but now his labor would bring weariness and would waste his body; The curse upon the ground which made it barren, and produced thorns and thistles, made his employment about it much more difficult and toilsome. If Adam had not sinned, he would not have sweated.”

And along with toil at work, unrelenting terror of death would also be man’s lot. God said to Adam, “In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken: for dust you are, and to the dust you shall return.”

John Phillips writes: “From that day to this the specter of death has haunted the planet. The very ground over which Adam had to labor would remind him daily that it was waiting to receive him again.”

Before the fall there was no death. Death came by sin. “When Adam sinned, sin entered the world. Adam’s sin brought death, so death spread to everyone…”—Ro. 5:12

Phillips goes on to write:

“Death is a horrifying thing. Men mock it. They seek to rob it of its gruesomeness by embalming the dead and surrounding their coffins with garlands of flowers. But death is still death—the king of terrors, the last enemy, the final catastrophe this side of eternity—the ultimate wages of sin.”

The Good News is that Jesus Christ came to destroy this last great enemy of mankind:

“Because God’s children are human beings—made of flesh and blood—the Son (Jesus Christ) also became flesh and blood. For only as a human being could he die, and only by dying could he break the power of the devil, who had the power of death. 15 Only in this way could he set free all who have lived their lives as slaves to the fear of dying.”—Heb. 2:14-15

In many of Jesus’ statements He addressed our fear of death with a promise:

“I tell you the truth, anyone who obeys my teaching will never die!”—John 8:51

“Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die.”—John 11:26

And it was no accident that our Lord Jesus Christ wore a crown of thorns upon His brow—the very symbol of the curse—that we might know that He became a curse for us!

Adam’s Good Confession of Faith

Notice next Adam’s confession. He called his wife “Eve” because she was “the mother of all living.” This was not just any confession; it was a confession of faith! God had just pronounced the sentence of death upon the race, but had also declared that the woman’s seed would bring salvation. Adam believed this.

He confessed his faith by calling his wife the mother of all living, not the mother of all dying. He had believed God’s word, that He would send “the bruiser of Satan’s head” in a redemptive act that would reverse the curse. Adam believed the promise of God!

It was by faith that he who had named all of God’s creation now named his wife after God’s promise, and his faith was instantly honored at the bank of heaven.

Note next Adam’s covering:

Adam had soon discovered that the fig leaves of his own self-effort would not do in the Presence of God. Condemned by God’s judgment, and with only time standing between himself and the final execution of the death sentence, all now depended on God.

And God soon revealed that He would rescue them (and us) by grace. This is revealed in what the Lord did next:

“And the Lord God made clothing from animal skins for Adam and his wife.”—3:21

There in Eden, blood was shed for the very first time. Adam and Eve must have stood there in shock as they saw one of God’s beautiful creatures taken in their stead and slaughtered before their eyes—its blood shed, that their sin might be covered.

This was the first dramatic illustration of the future event at Calvary, of the horror of sin when the Bruiser of Satan’s head—the Lord Jesus Christ—would be slain to cover the sins of men.

Paradise Lost

Next, God acted governmentally. He drove Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden. Why? Because in that Garden stood the tree of life. If, in their fallen condition, they had eaten of that tree, they would have remained in their sins forever. They would have become like the fallen angels for whom redemption is impossible.

God turned the guilty couple out of the garden out of care, compassion, and mercy. To make sure they were kept away, an armed guard comprised of Cherubim was dispatched to guard its entrance.

Likely, a cherub armed with a flaming sword stood at the gate of Eden until the Great Flood came and altered the face of the earth.