I began my 2015 reading plan today, reading Genesis 1-4 in English and trying to read Matthew 1 in Greek.
The opening chapters of Genesis are extremely important for multiple reasons. I probably reference Genesis 1-3 in my teaching and preaching more than any other portion of Scripture. You cannot understand the Bible, you cannot understand this world, without understanding Genesis 1-3. It is the foundation on which the entire Bible stands.
Despite my familiarity with these chapters, I find myself sorrowful and rejoicing every time I read them or think on them.
I weep over what was lost. God created a good, very good, earth. Everything he created was good, including the crown of creation, mankind. He also demonstrated His goodness in preparing a garden for the man to work, and providing a wife for the man when no helper suitable for him was found.
A man and a woman, naked and unashamed, in a garden with everything they needed provided. No sickness, no death, no pain, no fear, no worry, no anxiety, no relational discord. Most importantly, there was no separation from God.
Then the man and the woman disbelieved God and trusted the lies of the serpent and the desire of their eyes over the words God had spoken. Everything changed.
Suddenly they realized they were naked, and there was shame.
Then came the curses. The serpent was cursed, the man and the woman were cursed, all creation was cursed. The man and the woman were sent out of the garden, and out of God’s presence. They were sent out of paradise with a promise that life would be full of pain hardship, and then they would die.
In Genesis 4 the first human ever born murdered his own brother out of envy and anger. A few generations later one of his descendants boasts about his own murders. The heart of man was irrevocably corrupted. It seems that all hope is lost.
But in the curses and the aftermath God made a promise and gave us a picture of the hope to come.
In Genesis 3:15 God told the serpent, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.” When we read this in English we might not pick up on the fact the offspring is singular. One man will crush the serpent’s head.
In Genesis 3:21 we’re told that the Lord God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them. They had been told that if they ate the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil they would die. And one day they would. But that day something else died in their place. Not only did a sacrifice die in their place, the sacrifice provided clothing to cover their shame and protect them as they went out into the now-cursed world.
Then I come to Matthew 1, and it begins with a genealogy. Although Matthew begins with Abraham rather than Adam and Eve, he is making a point - the woman’s offspring, the child promised first to Eve, then to Abraham, then to David has arrived. God was faithful to his promise.
The offspring, named Jesus because he would save his people from their sins, succeeded where Adam failed. Adam and Eve succumbed to sin under the best of circumstances; Jesus resisted in the worst of circumstances (contrast Genesis 2-3 with Matthew 4:1-11). Where Adam and Eve doubted God’s word, Jesus quoted the words of His Father to the devil.
He remained sinless his entire life. And although he did no wrong, although he was the one person in the history of the earth who didn’t deserve to die, he was sentenced to the death and suffered great pain on the cross.
In doing so He fulfilled the promise of Genesis 3:15 and the picture of Genesis 3:21.
In giving up his life his heel was bruised, but he crushed the serpent’s head. Sin and death were defeated forever.
In giving up his life he provided for his people a covering for their sin and shame. For our sake God made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
God proved this by raising Jesus from the dead. The promise for those who believe is that the earth will one day again be what it once was. All who repent and believe in Jesus’ gospel will die, but will also be resurrected to new life in the new creation. Man will once again walk with God on a good earth. Every tear will be wiped from our eyes, death will be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore.
So today I mourn what was lost. And today I rejoice for what has been done and what is yet to come.
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