A Lamp Unto My Feet Bible Study Website
GENESIS 3:14-24
Lesson #11
THE BEGINNING OF TODAY’S REALITIES
- Memory verse: Gen 3:15
- The consequences of the sins of Adam and Eve are with us today. In fact, these consequences show us the beginning of the reality of the world we live in today.
- Read Gen 3:14-16
- Remember that God reveals himself to us by using types and prefigures throughout the Old Testament.
- The first prefigure is Adam.
- Read Rom 5:14
- Read 1Cor 15:20-28, 45-49
Adam as a Type of Christ by Contrast
| Adam | Jesus Christ |
| He was made a living soul
Gen 2:7 1Cor 15:45 |
Christ is a life-giving spirit
Joh 1:4 Joh 5:21 |
| He was of the dust of the earth
1Cor 15:47 |
Christ is the lord from heaven
1Cor 15:47 |
| He tasted forbidden fruit
Gen 3:6 |
Christ tasted death
Heb 2:9 |
| All descendents from Adam die
1Cor 15:22 |
All in Christ, live
1Cor 15:22 |
| Adamic creation is flesh
1Cor 15:50 |
The new creation in Christ is spirit
Joh 3:6 |
| Adam caused death to reign
Rom 5:14 |
Christ caused grace and righteousness to reign
Rom 5:17 |
| Adam caused judgment to come upon all
Rom 5:18 |
Christ caused justification to come upon all who believe
Rom 5:18 |
| Adam caused all humans to be sinners
Rom 5:19 |
Christ caused all people in Christ to be righteous
Rom 5:19 |
- The emphasis in Genesis is seeing the power of God in relationships. It begins with the vertical relationship between man on earth and God in heaven, and includes the horizontal relationships between human beings.
- In the last lesson we saw the ruination of the vertical relationship between man and God because of sin, guilt, and blame.
- In today’s lesson we will see the results of sin in the horizontal relationship between Adam and Eve.
- Read Gen 3:14-24
- The Second Dispensation — The Age of Conscience (Gen 3:24-Gen 8:19) – The Adamic
Covenant Gen 3:14-21
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- Remember that God reveals himself through covenants. We learn the balance between God’s grace and justice by seeing how he deals with sinful man. God’s program of operation is to demonstrate love and justice by a balance of grace and consequences for sin.
- The last age was an age of law. This new dispensation is an age of grace.
- Remember that the basis of salvation was still faith in God.
- Adam’s salvation was not based on man keeping his responsibilities of the covenant.
- Man’s responsibilities in the covenant were a test for blessing or chastening through consequences by God.
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Characteristics of the Adamic Covenant:
| God’s promises | Man’s responsibilities |
| God promised to curse the serpent | Man must now work hard for a living |
| God promised to send a Messiah redeemer | Women must labor in childbirth |
| Man must eat vegetarian food | |
| Man must perform animal sacrifice | |
| Man must wear clothing | |
| Man must not enter the garden and eat of the tree of life |
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- Every covenant has a sign or symbol to mark the covenant:
- The symbol for the Adamic Covenant is the coats of skins.
- It was God that killed the first animal to provide a blood covering for the sins of Adam and Eve.
- God did this to provide an example for animal sacrifice.
- The covenant duration:
- How long would this covenant be in force?
- Until the age of Messiah begins. The age of Messiah is the millennium.
- The life span of man during this dispensation of grace is 900 years.
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- In considering the consequences of Adam and Eve’s sin, it is important to notice that while Adam and Eve were judged and received consequences for their sin,
- Satan was the only one that was cursed for initiating the temptation.
- That curse is extended to the physical earth (Gen 3:17 Rom 8:18-22).
- God speaks to Satan: (14)
- Satan, a spiritual being; the fallen angel, Lucifer, uses an animal, a snake or serpent, to manifest himself to Eve.
- God curses that animal in regards to his nature.
- “thou art cursed”
- “upon thy belly shalt thou go”
- It is hypothetically supposed that the serpent or snake may have been a beautiful winged creature prior to this, but the Bible does not tell us this specifically.
- “dust shalt thou eat”
- Dust is a symbol of death.
- The snake becomes a loathsome creature.
- The snake also becomes the symbol of sin. (Num 21:5-9 Joh 3:14-15 2Cor 5:21)
- Sin and death are tied together.
- The snake illustrates this truth by representing both sin and death. Remember, the wages of sin is death. (Rom 6:23).
- Notice God does not annihilate Satan on the spot. Why?
- God is a gracious God.
- However, God never offered Satan or the other fallen angels redemption and salvation.
- God will continue to use Satan to give man a free will choice down through human history.
- However, notice that God maintains, constantly, the ultimate control.
- Gen 3:15 is the most important verse in the Old Testament. Why?
- It shows us God’s entire plan of human history. All the rest of the Bible and all the rest of history is the working out of this one verse.
- It reveals the physical and spiritual nature of the world in which we live.
- It is the first prophecy pointing to Christ.
- It reveals the basic nature of God as one of love and justice.
- In his love, God gives a promise of a redeeming Messiah through this prophecy.
- It shows us God’s entire plan of human history. All the rest of the Bible and all the rest of history is the working out of this one verse.
- The meaning of Gen 3:15
- God is speaking to Satan, the spiritual being. God curses Satan in regards to his nature.
- “I will put enmity between thee and the woman”
- “enmity” means = hostility, hatred, animosity.
- God will put hostility between Satan and the woman.
- The woman represents Israel, the Jews. (Isa 26:17 Isa 54:6-8 Jer 6:2 )
- The Old Testament frequently speaks about Israel as a woman in the travail of childbirth, suffering persecution and bringing forth the Messiah. (Mic 4:10 Rev 12:1-5)
- This explains why the Jews have been persecuted as a people down through history and will continue to be so persecuted until Christ’s second coming.
- “(enmity) between thy seed and her seed”
- Seed is singular in each case referring to one individual in each case.
- The seed of Satan is the Antichrist, a man, who will do the will of Satan persecuting the Jews and Christians during a 7 year tribulation period yet to come upon the earth.
- The seed of the woman is Jesus Christ, who does the will of God.
- “her seed”
- Usually we refer to seed as coming from men not women. Why does God use, “the seed of the woman”?
- This is a reference to the virgin birth of Jesus Christ.
- Jesus was not born by the seed of man (Joseph) but by the Holy Spirit. To make sure we would look for a Messiah without sin passed through the seed of man, he used the phrase, “seed of the woman.”
- While seed is singular, descendancy works through time from one individual to the next.
- We, therefore, have the conflict between non-believing people who fulfill Satan’s desires and believing people who fulfill God’s desires.
- In other words, the world will be filled with only two kinds of people, those who believe in God and his promised Messiah, and those who do not believe in God and follow Satan.
- Through all history we see this conflict between God and Satan, between God’s people and Satan’s people.
- “he (Christ) shall bruise thy (Satan) head”
- “head” refers to a position of authority.
- On the cross, through death and resurrection, Jesus gained authority over Satan by becoming sin for us and paying the penalty for sin (death). He redeemed us from the curse in Gen 3.
- “thou (Satan) shall bruise his (Christ) heel”
- The word, heel, is singular.
- In the act of crucifixion, the position of the feet on the cross is significant.
- One foot is nailed on top of the other.
- One heel is badly bruised every time the crucified person takes a breath.
- To take a breath, he must push himself upward by pushing this foot against the cross.
- This phrase is a reference to the crucifixion.
- God speaking to the woman (Eve) (16)
- She is judged in regards to her nature as a woman.
- She will have pain in childbearing.
- Because death is now present, women will have more children than would have been necessary before death entered the earth.
- She will have sorrow in raising children who now have the sin nature.
- “thy desire shall be to thy husband”
- The word “desire” sounds like a good thing. However, the Hebrew word literally a means = a self-centered grasping of control.
- Instead of having equality between men and women, the relationship between men and women will be one where women grasp at control over men.
- This curse is the basis of the women’s movement through history.
- “he shall rule over thee”
- Instead of being equal co-regents, the man is given the authority over women because Eve was easily deceived.
- This is the basis of man’s determination to dominate women.
- From the last two consequences, we see the origin of battle of the sexes that is with us to this day.
- God is speaking to Satan, the spiritual being. God curses Satan in regards to his nature.
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- A positive footnote:
- The consequence of this first sin is a curse that came on all the world and all humans for all history.
- Read Gal 3:13
- This verse tells us that the Christian is free from this curse because of Jesus Christ.
- Therefore, Christians should be the people most free from this battle between men and women.
- Unfortunately we frequently see this battle at its worst in Christian churches and Christian families.
- It is sad that Christians do not understand how free we are.
Homework
Genesis 3:17-24
- Application of Gen 3:14-16
- In your own life, in what ways have you observed the consequences of Adam’s sin?
- Preparation for Gen 3:17-24
- Read Gen 3:17-24
- How do you explain the fact that Adam did not die that day?
- What is the significance of the coats of animal skins?
- Why did God remove Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden?
- Read Gen 3:17-24
- Memory verse: Psalms 103:14
