Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayer for attention to Genesis chapter 3, and we'll
just read the first part of verse 18. In fact, the first two words
are what is upon my spirit. Thorns also. I want to read the portion from
verse 16 to 19 again, and these principally include the
symptoms of the curse. Unto the woman, he said, I will
greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception. In sorrow thou
shalt bring forth children, and thy desire shall be to thy husband,
and he shall rule over thee. And unto Adam he said, Because
thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten
of the tree of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not
eat of him, cursed is the ground for thy sake, In sorrow shalt
thou eat of it all the days of thy life, thorns also, and thistles
shall it bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat the herb of
the field. In the sweat of thy face shalt
thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground, for out of it
wast thou taken, for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou
return. So I want to speak of the symptoms
of the curse and its removal. In other words, symptoms of the
curse and symptoms of its removal. And we know that a symptom is
not the thing itself. We might have a cold, a common
head cold. There is no cure for a cold. But you can go to the pharmacy,
you can go to many places, and you can get things to take for
your cold. But all they are doing is dealing
with the symptoms. You might get panadol for the
headache. You might get something to stop
your nose running. But they are not dealing with
the cold, all they're doing is dealing with the symptoms. But
because we've got the symptoms, we know that we've got the cold.
Now the cold won't kill us, but if we had something like cancer,
and then we just had symptoms, a pain here, a lump there, and
we just dealt with the symptoms and didn't look past the symptoms
and saying this, is actually coming because there is a much
greater thing wrong, then we would suddenly find that we died
not because of the symptoms, but because of actually what
was wrong. And so it is in that way that
in thinking, especially just these two words, but it's just
one of the symptoms of the curse, thorns also, as to the symptoms
of the curse and of its removal. But first then, I want to look
at the curse and its cause, the actual curse itself, and then
we'll look at the two points, symptoms of the curse and symptoms
of its removal. We read the portion together
in Galatians, and there was a reason why that we did that. In Galatians
chapter 3 and verse 10, we are told, for as many as are of the
works of the law are under the curse. For it is written, cursed
is everyone that continueth not in all things which are written
in the book of the law to do them. We might think, well, that's
all right. All I've got to do is to get
the law of God and continue and walk in that and I won't be under
the curse. But then we have in verse 11,
but that no man is justified or accounted free from guilt
by the law in the sight of God, it is evident for the just shall
live by faith. And the law is not a faith. but
the man that doeth them shall live in them." Adam and Eve were given the law
of God. They were prohibited from eating
of the fruit of the tree for the knowledge of good and evil.
And they did. And with the thought that God
had really in a malicious way, prevented them from taking it. He knew that they were no good
and evil. He was just preventing them from
a blessing. Eve did not consult Adam, did
not consult God. In fact, she watered down the
word that God had given to them when Satan asked what was said,
And she says, lest ye die. But the serpent said, ye shall
not surely die. So the serpent is addressing
what really God had said. But as soon as they had broken
the commandment, they were very evident, knew that they had done
so. They knew that they were naked.
They knew they couldn't stand before God. The sentence in the
day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. The cause
of the curse was the broken law. The curse upon those that break
the law is death, eternal death, physical death, spiritual death,
eternal death. Banishment from God, driven out
from the garden, the wrath of God abiding upon everyone who
is under the curse of the law. It is a sentence of condemnation. We all are as condemned. You could go to the prisons of
this land and say, everyone in that prison is condemned. They're
condemned to prison. You could go on death row in
America And you say each one there is condemned to be put
to death. They're on death row. The sentence
is already given. It is yet to be fully enacted
out. And the sentence against us is
already given. In Adam it was given. We're born
already. Sometimes you might have those
that are drug addicts, and they have a child born, And that child
is dependent on drugs because it's had it through his parent
as soon as he's born. But we are like that. We are
born into the world and we're already infected with sin. We're already dead in sins. We're
already under the curse. We're already under condemnation.
We shall die physically. We shall come before the judgment
throne and die eternally. body and soul, eternal dying,
eternal death. And while here below we are in
separation from God, alienated from God by wicked works and
under His frown, cannot know God, we are spiritually dead. So the actual curse, the actual
malady is that of eternal consequences, not just like Cancer, you might
say, which is being used to bring us down to a physical death.
But the curse is that which endures forever and forever. It is eternal banishment from
God, eternal wrath of God upon us. And we should remember that. The curse and its cause focused
in upon the fall, upon the sentence of God, upon that transgression
of the law of God. And remember that the Lord has
given here below symptoms. Symptoms so that we know what
he has said is true and will come to pass. Symptoms that are
linked to the curse. People might say, all right,
you say that's the curse. You prove it. How is it really
so? How do you know that we really
are under that curse, that we are spiritually dead, that we
have eternal death, eternal consequences before us? How do we really know
the severity, the seriousness, of what that curse is. Well,
it is known by the symptoms. The same as it is if we've got
something wrong with us, an illness. We know how to link the symptoms
with the illness. And often all we need is just
one symptom, if it is a unique one, And that is enough to say,
well, we have got this particular illness. And then because we
know all what is bound up with that illness, then that symptom
says all of these things are going to happen to you. You're
in danger of all of these things coming upon you. And you say,
but all I've had is this one little symptom. How can that
be so? That's because in history, that
time and again it has been proved that that is a true symptom of
the greater underlying illness that is there. You might say
that all serious illnesses that are found are found out because
of the symptoms first. And there are some that as soon
as the symptom is found they're not treating symptoms they go
straight to the cause and deal with that i want to this evening
then look at the symptoms of the curse and then symptoms of
its removal going back to our text and the
context The Lord says first of all to
the woman in verse 16, who is saying to her, the evidences
of the curse are going to be found in her pregnancy, in the
bringing forth of children in childbirth. There she shall know
pain. There she shall know the sicknesses. the pains, the headaches, the
difficulties, the many things that attend many pregnancies,
and then the pain of the birth and the travail itself. God has clearly identified that
as one of the symptoms of the curse. A reminder to every mother,
a reminder to everyone that is bringing child into this world,
there's a symptom of the curse. Another symptom with the woman
is that her desire shall be to her husband. He shall rule over
thee. Now, under grace and under God,
there's to be many kind and loving husbands, but how many it is
not so and though God has right from the beginning in innocency
he set the order and that's referred to in the headship that Adam
was first formed then Eve but it's spoken of here as a curse
when the husband instead of a loving union and over the wife is actually
ruling, ruling over in a tyrannical way, you might say. Then the Lord has symptoms that
Adam is to know. And he said, Because thou hast
hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree
of which I commanded thee saying thou shalt not eat of it." So
here is the broken law and the curse. Because of this, here
is the symptoms of that death and of that sentence under the
law. Cursed is the ground for thy
sake. In sorrow shalt thou eat of it
all the days of thy life. In other words, the labour of
man, specifically Those that lived off the land were very
much insulated from that today. In former days it was very much
more so. But it relates to the labour
of the land. The sorrow shalt thou eat of
it all the days of thy life. Thorns also and thistles shall
it bring forth unto thee. Thou shalt eat the herb of the
field, not the beautiful things that were in the Garden of Eden,
they were to go out and to the labour for the food. And everyone that knows how it
is to work in the Garden, you do it one day, you pull out the
thorns, you pull out the vessels, you deal with it, and a few weeks
later it's all coming back again, and it's got to be done again
and again and again. You might say the symptoms keep
coming back, They're treated and they keep coming back. They
keep reminding us why they are there, why these things are there. We're told also that the land
shall not yield her increase, shall not be as fruitful as what
we would hope it should be. We think of the times of famines
that have been very much in the Bible times, but today as well. And the Lord withholds the rain.
and the affliction is felt. We think of the decay, how many
times over the years we've been here in this chapel, have we
spent so much time and others in the maintenance of the building,
the rotten on the timbers and the work that needs to be done
to maintain it constantly. It's all a reminder, change and
decay in all around I see, says the hymn writer. O thou that
changest not, abide with me. Let me think of the pests and
the diseases. I think it wasn't until I started
and had my own allotment that I actually realised what a battle
a farmer had. How many things used to attack
every kind of thing you grew that would be something. The
carrots would have the fly, the potatoes and the tomatoes would
have the blight, and there'd be one thing after another that
used to come, and a never-ending trying to battle with them. Illnesses, sufferings, all that
we have in this world, and often like the account at the end of
Ecclesiastes which describes the body slowly as we get older,
weakening. We need glasses, we need hearing
aids, we have teeth falling out. All of these are described in
that chapter and they're just all reminders, symptoms of a
body that is slowly being taken down that will return back to
the dust and is under the curse. There's other reminders that
are known especially by God's people that feel their own spiritual
deadness and when they see others and they see men and women that
cannot see creation, they cannot understand spiritual things,
and they realise that those also are symptoms of the curse. The natural man receiveth not
the things of God, neither can he know them. All of them are
symptoms of it. Really we have the reminders
with the graves, the tombstones, the death round about us, But
those symptoms that are in themselves you might say small things, but
they are pointing to something that is much, much greater. And I would that we might be
often reminded, because these things are around us all the
time. All the time we have these reminders. Maybe from this evening, look
at them in a different way. Instead of looking at, well,
we must deal with these thorns again, we must deal with these
weeds again, you think, here is this symptom recurring again. Here are these things coming
again. Those of you that work in the
garden, if you've been working on the pyracanthral, pulling
out thorns and things sometimes, you have your arms covered with
scratches and blood, a reminder of it. and look upon them as
a symptom of a greater, more important thing. Symptom of the
curse. I want to look now at the other
way, a symptom of its removal. And I hope this will be a help,
a help to you. that you see, able to see clearly,
the removal of the curse through symptoms. As much as we might
say a small symptom is indicating the great trouble and great curse,
so in the removal of the curse, small symptoms are really true
indicators that that curse is removed. After the flood, if you were
to go to Genesis 8, we read that Noah, the Lord smelled a sweet
savour I think I probably got the wrong, oh sorry. Genesis 8 and verse 21, Noah
built it, oh verse 20, Noah built it an altar unto the Lord and
took of every clean beast and of every clean fowl and offered
burnt offerings on the altar. The Lord smelled the sweet savour. Now that was, it was a type,
it was pointing to Christ. That was the sweet savour the
Lord smelled. This is pointing to Christ, Christ
bearing the curse. He says, I will not again curse
the ground anymore for man's sake, for the imagination of
man's heart is evil from his youth, neither will I again smite
anymore everything living as I have done. Now in this what
is meant, he will not destroy the world anymore with a worldwide
flood. We still have thorns and thistles,
we still have the ground cursed in that way, but in that great
event of Noah's flood shall not be repeated. While the earth
remaineth, sea time and harvest and cold and heat and summer
and winter and day and night shall not cease. And he gave
the, I do set my bow in the cloud as a mark, as a sign, that he
would look upon it and remember his covenant, remember his promise. So in a way that is a symptom,
in a way that is a reminder of that curse being taken away,
but still remains that greater curse upon man and the need to
be delivered from eternal death, spiritual death, delivered from
the wrath of God, the curse of the broken law upon him. In one sense, the reminding or
reminder of the curse still being there, it teaches us what is in Romans
8, that the whole creation groaneth together until now. It waits
for the day when the Lord shall make a new heaven, a new earth
wherein dwells righteousness. It points that even though in
a spiritual way the curse is removed from man through the
cross of the Lord Jesus Christ, yet there still is a waiting
for the Lord to return and for not the earth destroyed by water,
but by fire, renewed by fire, and that there should be then
a new heavens, new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness." So what
are the symptoms then of the curse being removed? We go back to Galatians 3 and
the verses that we read. But the last verse, the verse
13, the second to last to what we read, Christ hath redeemed
us from the curse of the law. So there is the real curse. There is the real malady. This
is not a symptom that the Lord has redeemed us from and delivered
us from. It's the actual thing, the curse
of the law. been made a curse for us, for
it is written, cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree. So the symptom of that curse
being removed is our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ hanging
upon a tree, the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is why
we are to remember in the Lord's Supper His death. his blood that was shed, his
body that was broken. In one sense it is a sign, in
another it is a symptom. It is that which we see, that
which has been done upon earth, that is a symptom of something
much, much greater spiritually, that has actually been accomplished
and done. Even though on the earth after
Christ has died and suffered and bled, even though there's
still the pain in childbirth, there's still the thorns and
weeds, there's still all that evidence, the symptoms of the
curse, but we have the symptoms of the curse removed. And as
we said, removed first in a spiritual way, giving spiritual life, And
then at the end of the world, the symptoms removed or the curse
upon the earth removed and new heavens and a new earth being
brought in. We might say, done the same in
two stages as what the curse of the fall was. Because God
said, in the day that thou eatest thereof shalt surely die. Immediately,
he died spiritually. But then afterwards, he died
physically. And after that, unless redeemed,
died eternally. So when a soul is quickened to
when Christ takes the curse and bears that curse, when a soul
knows that first it is known spiritually, And then at death
it is known physically where that soul returns to God and
at resurrection he rises again on new heavens and new earth. The spiritual death comes first,
the spiritual life comes first. The removal of the curse is first
known in a spiritual way. Going back to our text, and this
is one reason why I chose just those two words really for our
text, thorns also, is because our Lord Jesus Christ had a crown
of thorns that was planted on his head. The Holy Ghost is there
signifying Here is one that is identifying with the symptom
of the curse. He is having these thorns pressed
into his brow, bring forth blood. They are a symptom of the curse. As if God would say, this despise
Nazarene. Yes, Jesus hanging on the cross
is identified with the curse. that it is He that is dealing
with the curse. You cannot see all the transactions,
you cannot see all that is being done. We read of what has been
done, that He fulfilled the law, He made it honourable, and that
He is satisfying the law by the shedding of blood. There is no
remission but by the shedding of blood. We read of that, we
are told of that, we are told that. He endured the wrath of
God. We know that he rose again from
the dead. His sacrifice was accepted, the
great antitype of Noah, the Lord smelling a sweet savour. But
we have this, this little symptom, this little identifying point
that points to that time, that points to that man, two things
really, on the tree and the the thorns, is to identifying Him
with the curse. And like a symptom, it is not
the actual thing, but it's pointing to what has been done and transacted
there. And this is by faith that we
believe it is so. We believe that the Lord Jesus
Christ has been made a curse for us who knew no sin. that
He suffered in our place, that He has redeemed us, that He has
purchased us, that He has stood in our place, that He has endured
what we were due to endure. And this is the Gospel, this
is that which is to be proclaimed in every nation, kindred and
tongue, to be set forth that the Lord Jesus Christ is the
only way of deliverance from the curse. Not dealing with the
symptom, but dealing with the actual condemnation, enduring
the wrath of God himself, is a perfect cure, not just a masking
over. What the Lord has done is a finished
work, a perfect cure. And He's given them symptoms
of it at the time that He suffered on Calvary's tree. But now there's
other symptoms. We need to know, has this been
done for us? Has the Lord borne our curse? Has He taken away our sin? And so in the same way, the Lord
gives to us in the Word very clear symptoms of that curse
being taken away. And like we said with our Lord
Calvary, the earth is still being forethorn. Does every symptom
still as if the curse is in the world, and it is, the reminders
are still there, and everyone that is not a believer in Christ,
that is not trusting in Christ, is still under that curse. But those that are believers
in Christ, those that have put their trust in Him, those for
whom He has given eternal life, They are no longer under the
curse. The Apostle Paul says, there
is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus,
who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. The change of walk, the change
of direction, is one of the symptoms of the curse being taken away. The Apostle Paul, that great
change on the Damascus road, what a difference in his life.
He says, what I am, I am by the grace of God. A change is a real
scriptural symptom. That God wrought change. He which hath begun a good work
in you will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ. The blessing of being given spiritual
life, that which was lost at the fall, is restored. And that life that is restored
and given, this side of the grave is not perfect, but there are
real clear symptoms that that life is there. The Lord says,
my sheep, they hear my voice, they follow me. One symptom of
the life is a hearing ear. The Lord attends it with every
one of his parables. He that hath an ear, let him
hear. And in all the letters sent to the churches in Asia,
he that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto
the churches. Mine ear hath he opened is a
very clear symptom of that curse being taken away and therefore,
justly, righteously, God has given life and opened the ear
of that person. There will also be symptoms when
the Lord takes that very curse and turns it into a blessing. Many are the afflictions of the
righteous, but the Lord delivereth them out of them all. The psalmist
says, it's good for me that I was afflicted. Before I was afflicted,
I went astray. Now have I kept thy word. The Lord uses the curse. He uses afflictions. He uses
sicknesses. He uses those things that are
here because of the curse, to bring about a spiritual life
and exercise and concern for the soul. Many of God's people
can trace the beginning of His work with them through something
that they have been through, some trial, some difficulty,
some affliction. The Lord has used those things
of the curse And like He did with Balaam, He turned the curse
into a blessing. Like was done at Calvary, the
curse was turned into a blessing. The blessing of the Lord and
Saviour Jesus Christ upon His people is a blessing of eternal
life. I give unto them eternal life,
they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out
of mine hand. And that is in John 10. where
the Lord speaks about going before his sheep. It's another symptom
where the Lord goes before, where the Lord then provides for them,
leads them forth by the right way. When the children of Israel
came out of Egypt, immediately there was the cloudy pillar by
day and by night. The Lord led them. He chose out
the path. He went before them in it. The
Lord had delivered them. There was every evidence that
he had. They were a redeemed people. When I see the blood, I'll pass
over you. And so we might not, we cannot
see our names written in heaven. We cannot see that the Lord may
not hear that or even have a text that we can claim as our own
that the Lord has blotted out our transgressions, that he has
forgiven us our sins, that we are his children, his sheep.
But where he has given those symptoms of it, small though
they are, though it might be like the man that was born blind,
one thing I know, or as I was blind, now I see, they only are
there because of the reality, because
of the curse taken away. You read in our articles of faith
that we believe that God never enlightens the non-elect to make
them capable of receiving grace. The blessings of grace are sovereign,
they are eternal. By grace ye are saved, through
faith, and not of yourselves, It is the gift of God. And what
I'd really encourage you to do, look at those symptoms that are
given in the Word. Acknowledge them where God has
given them to you. If you were ill, naturally, if
you had symptoms, and some people are like this. They have the
symptoms, but they deny them. And they say, I don't want to
know. I don't want to know about it. Because they subconsciously
realize what is involved in that. And there are those that refuse
to acknowledge that they're under the curse because of that. But
put the other way around. Don't be like that, that the
Lord has given you those symptoms that He has borne the curse for
you. And He has opened your eyes. He's given you life. He's given
you a love to His people, we know. that we have passed from
death unto life because we love the brethren, he's given you
a hearing ear. He's made trials work together
for good, trials in your employment, trials in your family, trials
in the church, and he's turned them for good. And we have these,
maybe not one, but maybe quite a few symptoms that are pointing
to one thing, and that the Lord himself at Calvary Street has
borne your sins there, endured the curse for you, and that there
is no condemnation upon you. May we learn as much to look
upon the symptoms of our sin as to look upon the symptoms
of the blessing of the curse being taken away. As much as
what the Lord sets before us, those thorns also on the brow
of our Lord, and his suffering on the accursed tree may shine
upon those things he said accompany salvation. Those things that
are real evidences of it. Yes, we're still in a body of
death. We still sin. We still have about
us the evidence of the curse that the world and our bodies
taken down and renewed again. But what we have irrefutably
when given by the Lord is those symptoms of a life that shall
never die, that is eternal, and that we shall be with the Lord
at last, forever and ever in heaven. Don't ignore those symptoms,
but may you recognize them and your heart lift and joy and be
glad to realize that these things are there. there because what
the Lord hath done on Calvary and what he's done in your heart
by grace. May the Lord have all the honour
and glory we do need is vital for us that we be delivered from
the curse but rejoice if we have the symptoms that we are. Amen.