Genesis, The Worst Day Ever, Pt 2, "The Results", (Cue the Dramatic Music)

I think my posting title is a bit long, don't you?

If you're new to us here at ye ole' blog, we are going through a series, starting in Genesis, where we try to get an overall feel of the Bible story. We're not covering the whole of Genesis, but are trying to go from Genesis to Gospel. The faithful few of you who have actually read this blog maybe asking yourself the following:

Self: "You know what? We're supposed to be getting a framework for understanding the whole Bible, right?"
Yourself: "Yes"
Self: "We've been doing this for like 4 weeks and we're still in Genesis. I don't think we're ever going to finish!"
Yourself: "Be patient."
Self: "I don't know. I am thinking reading about a bucket of hair would be more interesting than this."

This guy didn't write my blog.

To which I say, I understand your frustration. It's slow going through the initial parts of Genesis, but trust me, there's a method to the madness here. Genesis is a foundation to understanding the Bible as a whole. If we don't rightly look at Genesis, then the way we understand the rest of the Bible will be all messed up. So yes, it's slow, but it's purposeful. I promise things will speed up eventually. Plus we're going through a spiritual topic, so that should make you feel good about yourself, right? When your friends ask you how you spent your free time you can tell them you read a really cool blog by a very interesting man about God and the Bible and they'll be like, "Whoa, you're cool."

When last we left our heroes, (Adam and Eve), they had just submitted to Satan's temptation and eaten the very fruit God told them not to. They trusted Satan over God, disrupted the creation order, and did what they weren't supposed to. Now we're going to get to open the Pandora's box and see the wonderful results, (sarcasm), of their choices...

Read Genesis 3 if you haven't already. We're looking specifically at Genesis 3:7-24.

Man's answer for shame

V7, "Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths." This is AFTER Adam and Eve had disobeyed God, which the Bible calls "sin". Let's briefly look back at Genesis 2:25, BEFORE they sinned and how they saw themselves. "And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed." So something has changed since sin. You may ask, so what? "Now they're wearing clothes. No one likes nudists anyways." Well the point here is bigger than that. Man and woman now know shame. They now know what it is like to do something wrong. They now know their need for "covering" from disobedience. Instead of living in open fellowship with God man and woman are now covering themselves up with leaves. Leaves! Man has been trying to cover up his imperfection and shame from this point on. Nowadays we use more sophisticated things like religious works, good deeds, sacrifice, giving, and rationalization. This is not a good start.
So God shows up, (v8-10), and comes to see man and woman, but they hide themselves from him because they know something is now wrong with them and the world. A few things to note here about God's interaction between man and woman:
- God calls to the man. Just as Satan distorted the creation order, (see previous blog), God works within the creation order, going to man.
- God is the one pursuing man and woman, not man pursuing God. Man hides from God and God pursues man. (This will be a running theme throughout the Bible). Being all knowing God obviously knew what happened to man and the woman, but he seeks them out in an effort to restore fellowship. He asks "Where are you? Who told you that you were naked?" As individuals who now live with the knowledge of good and evil, we instinctively know we are not right with God and seek to hide from him. The sin of man and woman has created false sense of the character of God. Man now thinks God is out to get him. Man no longer trusts God or rightly knows who HE is. So sin has distorted man's view of himself, (shame), and man's view of God. Man is trying to hide behind foliage and is hiding himself from his good and loving creator.
The effects of disobedience and unbelief that we see here in man and woman are traits that have been inherited by every man and woman since. Man has a messed up view of God, (we think he is evil, deceitful, made in our image, and must be appeased by works). Man has a messed up view of himself, (man thinks he is good and can cover his imperfections by his accomplishments or works). Every man, woman, and child since has inherited these traits. Whoopee! (more sarcasm) Let's continue...

V11-13, "Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?' The man said, 'The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.' Then the Lord God said to the woman, 'What is this that you have done?' The woman said, 'The serpent deceived me, and I ate." 
God asks man what happened, (already knowing the truth). Man, having a chance to come clean and confess to God, chooses to do so, admitting his fault, admitting his lack of leadership, admitting to distrusting God...(what? That's not what happened? Oh, the man actually blamed the woman AND God? Boy that was stupid). Yes. Man blames the woman. "She did it." Man fails to take responsibility for his actions, fails to admit his disobedience to his creator, and instead blames the woman that he, the man, was given to care for, protect, and lead.

But that's not all Bob, show us what other stupid things Adam did!

Not only does Adam blame the woman, but he blames God. "This woman YOU GAVE ME". Man, a being who has not been around long, who was made from dust, decides to turn around and blame the almighty, eternal, all knowing, and all powerful God. This would be the equivalent of an ant attacking a A-1 Abrams tank. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Not only does Adam fail to take responsibility in his relationship with the woman, but he blames God. Think about how this plays out in your life. When something goes wrong, who do we usually blame? Others. Granted, there are some high quality people that take responsibility for their actions, but they are few and far between. Such behavior is cultivated INTO them and is not natural. (If you have children, you know what I mean). Adam blames the woman and then he blames God. Brilliant.

At this point God has every right to squash, (an actual theological term), the man into little bits. But the kindness of God persists. He turns to the woman and says, "What have you done?" The woman, to her credit, fesses up. The woman is the only one between the two people who actually takes responsibility for her actions. "I was deceived and I ate." Make a note here. When you get called on your irresponsibility and disobedience, just admit it. Blaming and hiding have never worked out well for anyone ever, (unless you're a politician in Washington. Yes, I went there).

The truth finally came out and now God announces the results of their disobedience. Here are the effects of sin's corruption in the world:

V14-20
The serpent/Satan:
- The serpent is cursed above all livestock and was confined to crawl on his belly for the rest of his days. Therefore we can conclude that the snakes we see in our day are different than they were originally created. What did they look like before? I don't know. But the snake received punishment from God for cooperating and being used by the devil.
- God promises to put enmity, (i.e. hatred), between the offspring of the serpent and the offspring of the woman. God is talking to the devil here. The offspring of the devil will be at war with the offspring of the woman. There is also the promise that the devil will bruise the heel, or injure, the offspring of the woman, while "he", the offspring of the woman, will bruise the head of Satan. Herein lies a promise of future salvation and redemption of man. This is also called the "protevangelium" or first gospel. This is the "seed" of the salvation story that will develop further in the Bible. The point here is that a savior shall come through the "seed" of woman who will destroy the "seed" of Satan.

The woman/relationships:
- The woman will have trouble giving birth and delivering children. She will have pain in labor. Pain in labor is meant to remind woman of the effects of sin. (We'll never know what it was like for a woman to give birth without sin in the world, but apparently it was a lot less unpleasant. I would put a picture here but well, you know).
v16 - "You will want to control your husband, but he will dominate you" (NetBible). "Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you", (NASB). The consequences of sin affect relationships with men and women. Men, who were to care for and protect women will now seek to rule over women in a cruel way. Unfortunately we know this is all too true in sinful men. They dominate cruelly with their strength and power. They become bullies. They become abusive in speech as well as physically. They are not caretakers, they are dictators.
Consequently, women are affected in their desires to control and manipulate their husbands. They will desire to be in control. We can all picture the "evil" woman in the movies who rules through manipulation and deceit. As a result of sin woman will no longer want to remain in a relationship of submission and service to her husband. Instead she will desire to take over and be in charge. Sin has ruined and will corrupt the relationships between men and women.

Adam/the world:
- The ground, which formerly was blessed by God as "good" would now be cursed. Man would no longer eat without toil and difficulty. The work of man would be difficult. The world would no longer work as God designed it. Man would survive and eat through difficulty and struggle. Any man or woman who has ever had a job in the real world knows this is true. Customers are difficult. People lie, cheat, and steal to get what they want. Bosses are jerks. People are not paid what they deserve. Managers and companies can be cruel dictators. Not only is work difficult, but the world is corrupted and broken. The world is not as God designed it. People get sick and die. People get cancer and Alzheimer's. Children are born with debilitating diseases. If you have ever thought that things are not supposed to be this way you were right. God planned the world to be good, healthy, and in fellowship with him. Now things are broken, corrupted, and dying.

Oh yeah! Well I hate the results of sin!

As sin entered the world, man blamed woman and blamed God. Sin will forevermore corrupt the relationships between man and women. Man's relationship with God is ruined. Man and woman now feel shame and try to "fix" things in whatever stupid way (leaves, religion, good works, money), they can imagine. The world will be broken and tainted. It's as if a cyanide had been dropped in a glass of pure water. Everything is now poisoned and ruined.

Tune in next time for another encouraging message from Travis! It's hard to find any sort of hope in this, is there? What we do find here are answers to some of the key questions that are asked. Where does evil come from? What is wrong with this world? What is wrong with mankind? The Bible answers these questions for us. The answer is not that man is uneducated, or that there is not enough money spent on the poor, or that men are too violent, (all of which have some validity to be sure). The answer is that man is corrupted by sin and his relationship with God and mankind has been broken. Man's need is not to have more things, be a better person, or be smarter. Man needs to be reconnected to his Creator. Man needs to deal with the problem of evil.

Next time we'll look at the end of Genesis 3 and the final results of man's sin. I promise there is hope in the future. We're just not at the future yet.