The Story of God: Paradise Lost

Consequences: Something that logically or naturally follows from an action or condition. Now most of know that there can be both good or bad consequences that follow an act.  As we’ve begin to unpack the story of God, we’ve seen good and bad consequences. We’ve seen the good consequences of God’s creating work. We’ve see how God created a world that was “very good.’ How He created the first man from the dust of the ground and he was good. How He gave this man a good purpose: to work and care for His creation. And He then fashioned a perfect match for the man, and brought her to the man and when he saw her, she was “wow” good. He then gave them both the freedom to enjoy everything in the garden except for one tree in the middle of the garden. And He gave them rest to enjoy life with Him in this garden. God had created the good life.  In fact, with all His creating work: God established the Pattern of the Kingdom: Where God’s people were living under God’s rule, in God’s place and enjoying God’s blessings. Life was good…

But then we saw how the man and woman fell to the snare of the devil. Even though God had given them everything they needed to live the good life, they chose to live independent of God’s rule. And with that one act, The Kingdom Perished. Their actions shattered their relationship with one another and with God. For the first time they experienced shame, fear, alienation and blamed God and the devil for their own disobedience. It is here where we pick up the story once again and learn of the negative consequences of their actions: How Adam and Eve’s choice to live independent of God’s rule had devastating consequences for us all. And the first one is this:

We Lost Peace on Earth  So the Lord God said to the Serpent, “Because you have done this, ‘Cursed are you above all livestock and all wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” Genesis 3:14-15

Even though the Serpent had destroyed what God had set-up for life; God did not destroy the Serpent. Instead, He cursed him. As a result, our world has now become the battleground between the serpent’s seed and the seed of the woman. From this point forward there would be open war between the seed of the serpent and the offspring of the woman. Who are the offspring of the woman? “God’s chosen people.” How does the seed of the Serpent oppose the offspring of the woman? Through spiritual warfare:

We see his hostility come to life in Exodus One, where the evil one works through the King of Egypt who plots to kill all newborn Hebrew boys through their own midwives. Yet God’s thwarts this attack: The Hebrew Midwives feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt told them to do; they let the boys live (Exodus 1:17). And from their faithfulness to God would emerge Moses, whom God would use to deliver His people from oppressive slavery in Egypt. Later, In Esther 7, the evil one attempts to work through Haman who devises a plan to kill every Israelite. But once again God uses a woman to thwart the Devil’s scheme. Queen Esther risks her life by approaching the king with this request: “O King, if it pleases your majesty, grant me my life – this is my petition. And spare my people – this is my request. For I and my people have been sold for destruction and slaughter and annihilation” (Esther 7:3-4). Upon listening to Esther’s plea, the King granted her request and again God’s people were saved.

Then we come to the New Testament, where we see the evil one at work in King Herod, who upon hearing of the birth of the promised Messiah, he schemes to destroy the Messiah by ordering the murder of all boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who are two years old and younger. But once again, the evil one is thwarted by God. An Angel warns Joseph in a dream to escape with Jesus to Egypt.

Why does the evil one try over and over again to destroy the woman’s offspring? We see that right here in this text: Because it was through Israel God’s Savior, Jesus the Messiah would come. And come he did. And immediately we see the devil try to take him out by tempting him. But when that didn’t work, he then worked through evil men to have Jesus arrested, falsely tried, beaten and crucified on the cross. It was there on the cross that this prophecy was fulfilled: Satan bruised his heel. It was at the cross, the evil one thought he had won. He thought he had finally defeated the seed of the woman, but in Christ’s death the tables were turned. Scripture says it this way: “He was wounded for our transgressions, He was BRUISED for our iniquities, the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his stripes we are healed.” Isaiah 53:5  Jesus’ death on the cross turned the tables on the evil one, because it was through His death and resurrection that the church was born… and it is now through the Church, that the Serpent receives his death blow. Listen to this truth from Romans 16:20: “The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet.” The “your feet” is none other than the Church – the body of Jesus Christ. At the cross Satan was defeated and he will soon be crushed by the Church…

But until then, he continually opposes the seed of the woman. That is why Jesus said these words for us to remind us, that the evil one is still at war with us: He said, “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.” John 15:18-19 And this is why there is still no peace on earth today. This is why there is suffering, evil, conflict, chaos and war in our world today.

We (also) Lost God’s Blessing for Life  Remember God’s original blessing to man and woman created in God’s image? That is recorded for us in Genesis 1:28 and reads: God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it.”

As a result of sin, man and woman would have to fulfill God’s mandates to fill and subdue the earth without the benefit of God’s blessing. Life now becomes hard.   This is what we see now are the consequences for their sin. First for the woman: Fulfilling God’s Mandate to FILL the earth becomes hard: To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” Genesis 3:16

It is important to note that the woman is not cursed here. She is simply suffering the consequence of her sin, in that now, her role in filling the earth involves suffering. Now instead of a joyful process, bringing forth children involves anguish. Her pain in childbirth involves the entire process. The Hebrew root of this word primarily expresses grief and worry. This word is not typically used to express physical pain, but the pain of mental anguish. So what does this refer to? It includes the anxiety about whether she will be able to conceive a child; anxiety that comes with all the physical comfort of pregnancy, anxiety concerning the health of the child, and anxiety about whether the baby will survive the birth process.

The next devastating consequence that effects us is this: Fulfilling God’s Mandate to SUBDUE the earth becomes hard: To Adam He said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’ “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.

Man’s natural relationship to the ground – to rule over it is reversed. Instead of the ground submitting to him, it now resists him and eventually swallows him. God created man to have pleasure in his work; what was once a joy has become burdensome toil.  Now he must provide for his family through painful toil – the same word used of the woman in childbirth. Now man suffers anguish and worry to put food on the table. His work becomes his security, not God. As long as he works, as long as he brings home the bacon, he can survive. So one of the consequences of the Fall is that men often become workaholics. Our identity becomes wrapped up in our work. Accumulating money becomes our motivating factor in life. Because if we can put away enough money, then we no longer have to worry, and we can remove the anguish of the Fall.

But as bad as that is, it’s not the worst part of the Fall. There’s one more thing we lost:

We Lost Paradise    Adam named his wife Eve, because she would become the mother of all the living. The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.”So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life. Genesis 3:20-24

Here now is the most devastating consequence of sin. Adam and Eve are kicked out of Eden. The text says that God literally drove the man out. Man is no longer welcome in paradise. Adam and Eve are not just exiled from the good life; they are now separated from the very presence of God. Now all mankind suffers the same consequence for their sin. We didn’t just lose peace on earth. We didn’t just lose God’s blessing for the good life, we lost God!

But Hope Remains… God leaves us with two images of grace from this passage. The first image is that of the promised seed of the woman. God did not leave Adam and Eve without hope. We are reminded that hope will come through her offspring, Jesus Christ. He is the seed who will one day come and defeat the Serpent. And when he comes, he comes to restore God’s kingdom in the hearts of men and women. The promised seed of the woman is the good news that there will be a day when God’s people will live in God’s place under God’s rule and blessing once again. What was lost will be found in Jesus! One day all the hostility we experience in this world will end. One day the pain and anguish that makes life so hard will be removed. And one day our separation from God’s presence will be completely restored. That’s the first image.

And it’s the second image where God reveals how this promised seed will restore God’s Kingdom: That image is of the first sacrifice that took place right here in the garden. God saw how Adam & Eve’s efforts to cover their sin and shame were completely inadequate. So God did for this couple what they could not do for themselves. He sacrificed an animal and made for them garments of skin to cover them. In so doing God cares for them and restores them to fellowship with Him. This is a beautiful picture of what Jesus Christ has already done for us. His sacrifice did for us what we could not do for ourselves. His sacrifice covers our sin and shame and restores us to fellowship with God.

We live today with the consequences of the Fall. But God’s story is not over. This is what God would have us see today: That God reversed the consequences of our sin with Jesus! When Adam and Eve sinned paradise was lost, but with the sacrifice of Jesus God’s presence can be found. That’s the hope that remains for a world without peace, where life is hard and paradise is lost. It’s the hope God gave us when He promised us Jesus. It’s the hope that is found in the sacrifice of Jesus that opened the way back to fellowship with God. And it’s the hope that’s at the heart of our mission as God’s people. This is why we exist to help people become friends, family and followers of Jesus. This is why we are part of the bigger story of God. We have this hope!