on the fall, part two. Last week, we saw the serpent
come into the garden, God's garden. God allowed him into that. He
had to have permission to get in the gardens. He didn't just
stroll in there. He had to have permission. It's
like he had to have permission to touch Job. He had to have
permission to go into that garden and to do what he did. He had
to get permission from God. And he goes into the garden and
he deceives Eve. He took the word of God and he
put a question mark on it in the mind of Eve and got into
her mind. He got into her mind and poisoned
it. And she, she takes the fruit. She takes, takes the bait, so
to speak. And she gives to her husband
and it says, and he does eat. He did eat. And I'm going to
pick up in verse six. I know we covered a little bit
of that last week, but I'm going back up to verse six. And when the woman saw. This tells me he was into her
head. He got into her mind, got her to thinking, got her to looking.
She saw that the tree was good for food, as if she didn't have
enough. You know there's a lot of fruit
trees in that garden. But she saw it was good for food,
pleasant to look at, beautiful tree, beautiful tree. and a tree to be desired to make
one wise. You know, when she's, as she
stands there and she looks at that tree and she sees it as
good for food, it's pleasant to the eyes, desire to make one
wise, what she's doing is justifying her reason for eating in her
mind. Don't we do that? don't we justify
what we do even the things that are wrong we will come up with
a justification for it you know and that's what she's doing she's
justifying what she's about to do and so she took of the fruit
thereof and did eat and gave it to her husband with her and
he did eat satan or eve has fallen into satan's web not too long
ago i was in the woods And it was an early morning, dew was
on, and there was a spider web about that big. I got a picture
of it on my phone. It was beautiful. It was glistening.
The sun was shining on it. The dew was on it, and it was
just sparkling. I mean, it was sparkling. It
was beautiful. It was a masterpiece of work,
but that spider was in the middle of it. Death was in the middle
of it. He was waiting for something
to fall into that trap and he was going after it. And Satan
spins this web of lies and she gets caught up right in it. Now listen though, the fall doesn't
happen yet. It doesn't happen until Adam
eats the fruit. Not until he eats it, because he's the federal
head of humanity. God made him the head. You know,
God is a God of order. Here's something we understand
as believers. God is a God of order. He made
Adam the head. The reason he made Adam the head
is because he represents Jesus Christ. He made Eve to be his
wife. And she was a helpmate for Adam. She represents the church. You
see, the scripture gives us in Ephesians that the picture of
marriage and it's a picture of Christ and his church. You see,
there's an order to this and there's a purpose for it. There's
a purpose why God made Adam as he made Adam and made him, put
him over everything, made him king of the earth. And then he
made Eve from Adam. He didn't make Eve from the dust
of the ground. She came from Adam. Adam was made from the
dust of the ground. His body was. But there's a purpose in
everything God does. So here, the fall doesn't happen
until Adam meets, because he's the head. He's the head of humanity. And it tells us there in 1 Timothy
2.14 that Eve was deceived, but Adam wasn't. Eve was deceived. She was beguiled. As Scripture
says, Satan beguiled Eve. Adam was not beguiled. He knew
exactly what he was doing. He knew when he took that fruit,
he was rebelling against God. He knew what he was doing. And
when he did this, when he did this, the eyes of them both were
open, not until he did it, that both their eyes were open now
listen it says open not enlightened they were not enlightened they
were opened and they were open to evil they were open to sin
and they knew it says they were naked you know there was nothing
wrong with that there's nothing wrong with naked sin is what
puts the evil in it you see it's the sin in us that makes us start
to think evil thoughts You know, before sin entered the world,
there was not even a thought of shame or anything wrong with
them being naked. There was nothing to hide. Nothing
to hide. You know why I've got these clothes
on this morning? I've got something to hide. My nakedness. I'm hiding my nakedness. You
don't want to see that. I don't want to see yours, and
you don't want to see mine. You know why? Sin. Sin is why. Sin, it put the evil in it. it says there in verse 8 and
they heard well first of all let me go back here to verse
7 let me finish it and they knew they were naked and they sewed
fig leaves together and made themselves aprons you know one
of the meanings for that word apron in strong's concordant
is armor armor what weak armor a fig leaf couldn't stop anything
But they made themselves this apron, this armor to hide their
nakedness, but also to hide themselves from God, as if they were going
to hide from God, as if they were going to cover up their
nakedness so God couldn't see it. If you'll notice here how
sin made them ignorant instead of wise, spiritually ignorant,
trying to hide their shame with fig leaves. But that's what false
religion does. False religion sews together
its own works to hide its shame and guilt. That's what they hide
behind. You know where we hide? In Christ. A man shall be a hiding place. And that man is the Lord Jesus
Christ. We don't sow fig leaves together. We don't sow our works
together and try to bring them before God or present ourselves
before God with our works. Nothing at all, except the righteousness
of Christ. And they heard, they heard the
voice of the Lord God walking, walking. They heard that voice
coming toward them. they heard they heard the voice
coming toward them walking in the garden in the cool one of
the translations i read was in the cool breeze of the day as
if there was a gentle just a gentle breeze and you know how perfect
the weather had to be They heard the voice of the Lord
God walking in the garden in the cool of the day. What they
heard was a person. You know who they heard? The
Lord Jesus Christ. That's whose voice they heard. And Adam and his wife hid themselves
from the presence of the Lord God. When they heard his voice,
I can just see them running and hiding. And they hid. they hid among
the trees of the garden. When they should have been glad,
happy to have fellowship with their maker, they go and hide
from him. They hide. It's evident the fall did not
take God by surprise. Because you note the calmness,
you know, we don't have the lightning and the thunder and the smoke
and the quaking that we have at Mount Sinai at the giving
of the law. We don't have that. Here's what
we have walking in the garden in the coolness of the day. The matter had already been taken
care of. The fall did not take God by surprise. We know that
it did not take God by surprise. It was in the eternal purpose
of God. God did not cause Adam to fall. God did not create sin. But he allowed Adam as a perfect,
innocent man. And if people want to talk about
free will, here it is. He let Adam, he let Adam have
his free choice. And that's what he chose when
he was innocent. Now that we're so, now that we
are sinful, we never going to make a right choice. never the fall didn't take him by surprise
didn't take god by surprise god already took care of this because
it's written in the scriptures that christ is the lamb slain
from the foundation of the world nathan said to david after he
committed this awful adultery with besheba nathan confronted
david and said thou art a man thou art a man But he said, but he goes on to
say this to David, but God had put away that sin. He put away
David's sin in Christ. Who's the lamb slain from the
foundation of the world. And it struck me this morning as
I was going over this, this can be said of everyone whom God
saves. God has put away my sin. Because
that's the only reason that God can come to me and have anything
to do with me. Because He's already put it away.
If He had not put away sin, Adam and Eve would have died on the
spot. This would all been over with. Joe Terrell said, if God
had not had an elect people, the Bible would only be three
chapters long. It'd be over with. But God has put away that sin.
God put away that sin. God put it away. we can see this
at the end of this this chapter and look here in verse 9 here's
the first call that goes out it's a call to account and yet
it's a call of grace and the Lord God called unto Adam he
called him Adam Can you imagine that piercing
call? That call that goes throughout the whole garden just reverberates
throughout the garden. And the Lord God called unto
Adam, and he said, Where are you? Where art thou, Adam? You know, Adam, no doubt, was
always before waiting right there, wherever the Lord God came. Adam
was there. He wasn't hiding. But he says,
now, where are you? He's not, and you know, God's
not asking as if he can't find him. God is going to call Adam to
account. Everyone whom God saves now,
everyone whom God saves, he's going to call them to account.
He's going to make us face and confess our sins. And this is
what he's going to do here. They're all going to confess.
except Satan. Adam is going to confess, and
one is going to confess. Of course, they're going to blame
each other, is what's going to happen, but yet the Lord is going
to take care of this matter. But God called for Adam. I want
you to notice this. God does not say, Adam, Eve,
where are you? Where art thou, Adam and Eve?
He doesn't call Eve at all, He's calling the head of the house.
Adam's responsible. He's calling the one that he
has laid the responsibility on. Adam's responsible for that garden. He's responsible to dress and
keep it. He's responsible for Eve, whom God made and brought
to him. He's responsible for her, just as Jesus Christ is
responsible for us. He's our surety. He's the husband. He's responsible for his wife.
God doesn't call Eve. He doesn't say Adam and Eve.
He says Adam. He's going to deal with Adam. Who's he going to
deal with? And he said, and Adam replies to him, I heard thy voice
in the garden. And I was afraid the first time
that word is used. I was afraid that voice that
he heard in the calm in the cool of the day. It was not a threatening
voice. It was not a dangerous voice. He just heard
the call of God. That's what he heard. I heard
thy voice in the garden and I was afraid. And the reason I was
afraid, because I was naked and I hid myself. You know, the scripture
says that all things are naked and open unto the eyes with whom
we have to do. And for the first time, he recognized
that he was naked. Now, this goes deeper than just
not having clothes on. This goes a lot deeper. His soul
was naked. He had no covering for his soul. He knew what he did. He knew
it, and he couldn't hide it. He went and he sowed some figs
leaves together. That didn't work. He goes, they
go and hide behind trees. That doesn't work. He's naked. He's open before God. And he
knew that. He knew that. And God said, who
told you? Who told thee that thou wast
naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree?
This is, see, here's the root of it. You see the law of God's
written on the heart. You can go to the remotest part
of this world with very little education at all. They know it's
wrong to murder. They know adultery is wrong.
Adam, who told you this? The law was written on his heart.
That command, that one command was written on his heart. It
wasn't written on a table of stone. It was written on his
heart. God said, Adam, don't eat of this one tree. You can
eat of all of them, but not this one. Hath thou eaten of the tree whereof
I commanded thee that thou shouldest not eat? You see, the Lord's
revealing his sin to him. If God's going to save a sinner,
he's going to reveal sin first. Our sin is the reason for our
need of Jesus Christ. If I have no sin, I don't need
Christ. If you're good, if you're really
truly good in the sense that God says what good is, we don't
need a savior. I need a savior because I'm sin
and I sin. Adam was only given one command
and he couldn't keep it. He couldn't keep it. And yet
people think they can keep the 10 commandments. Adam, in his
perfect state, couldn't even keep one command. He couldn't
do it. But I see the wisdom of God here.
I mean, I've heard people say they just don't think it's right,
that because of one man's disobedience, we all have to die, we're all
charged with sin. That's the wisdom of God. You
know, if Adam had not done that, that command would still be there,
and every one of us would be faced with that. Every one of
us would. I would have fallen. I would
have fallen. If he hadn't, I would have. I would have. But here's the wisdom of God.
God allows the whole human race to fall in one man so that he can redeem the whole
heavenly race in one man. We fell in Adam, we're made alive
in Christ. There's a real sense, there's
a real sense in which God deals with all of humanity in two people,
the first Adam and the second Adam. They're both representatives. They are both federal heads.
And there's a sense in which God deals with everyone in those
two people. And now here comes what I call
the Adam and Eve syndrome. Adam and Eve syndrome in verse
12. And the man said, the woman, and this is what's interesting.
I looked this up in strong and strong's concordance. Uh, I believe
that was one. One of the words used here for
woman is adulterous. Read it like this. The adulterous
whom thou gave us to me, you gave me an adulterous woman,
a defective woman. The problem, Lord, is what you
gave me. It's what you gave me. The woman
whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and
I did eat. First of all, that wasn't the
question, was it? He said, have you eat of the tree that I commanded
you not to? Well, he said, well, the woman.
How many times have you heard, and have you done it, and I've
done it, you get in trouble, and it's called diversion. You
started blaming somebody else. Well, so-and-so did it too. Well,
I'm not talking about so-and-so. I'm talking about you. But we
do that invariably. We'll throw it off on somebody
else. We try to get the attention on some Adam, the woman you gave
me. She's the problem. No, the scripture
says Eve was deceived. Adam wasn't. He wasn't. Adam, you knew what you were
doing. You knew what you were doing. Adam turned on the one
he loved more. Listen, he loved Eve. He loved
her. And here's what sin does. Here's
the division of every home. Sin turns us on one another,
doesn't it? It divides us. It divides us. It does. Adam turned on the one
that God made for him, the woman you gave me. This is what Satan said to Job,
or said to God concerning Job. He said, skin for skin. Job will
give up anything and everything to save his life. He knew that
happened in the garden. Adam gave up Eve. He didn't stand
there and protect her. He didn't take the blame. He
said, Lord, it's my fault. It's my fault. It's my fault. It's not her fault. She didn't
know what she was doing. She was deceived. It's my fault.
He didn't do that. He said, no, the woman you gave me. Isn't
that amazing what sin does? Well, let me tell you something.
Here's a mark of true repentance. True repentance happens when
we quit blaming others and we blame ourselves. We just quit
saying, well, so-and-so did it too. David said, Against thee,
and thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil, and that
same. And the Lord God said to the
woman, What is this thou hast done? And the woman said, The
serpent beguiled me, and I did eat. See, she blames the serpent
now. Nobody's taking the blame. When God grants true repentance,
that's exactly what you do. You take the blame, and you don't
blame anyone else. Eve's saying, The serpent made
me do it. Satan doesn't make you do anything.
Tempt you, yes. Satan didn't make David commit
adultery with Bathsheba. Listen to what James says in
James 4.1. He doesn't mention Satan in that
verse at all, does he? He says the reason you fuss and
fight and kill each other is because of the lust of your flesh.
That's who you are. who you are and the Lord said
to the serpent because thou has done this you see he gets to
the root of the problem he starts with Adam the head and then the
Eve and now we come down to the very root of the problem Satan
and the Lord said because thou has done this thou are cursed
above all cattle and above every beast of the field upon thy belly
shalt thou go and thus shalt thou eat all the days of thy
life and then in verse 15 now we come
to the remedy for sin you see the Lord pulls everyone to account
everyone comes to account now you notice the Lord God doesn't
say now Adam what do you think we all do about this he doesn't
ask Adam at all does he He doesn't ask Adam how to get out of the
mess he's in. He doesn't ask him for any help.
He doesn't ask him for any of that. Notice here, we have the
remedy here, and it's Christ, the seed of the woman. God preached
the first gospel sermon. God did. And the first gospel
sermon had to do with the incarnation of the Son of God. God says in verse 15, I will
put enmity, that word means hostility, it means animosity, it is a deep-seated
dislike or ill will toward someone, it's positive hatred, it's an
enemy, it's positive hatred, you positively hate somebody
completely. Now I could ask anyone on the
street, I could ask any person in this room, believer and unbelievers,
You hate God. I can say, you hate God by nature.
You really do. And I guarantee it'd be hard
to find. Now, you who believe, you know the truth. You know
the answer. But those who believe not, I
could ask them, and they'd say, I don't hate God. Well, God says
you do. And I confess, one time I did. That enmity right there fits
me. At one time in my life, I can
look back, I can say, yes, I did. Now, I did not walk outside all
the time, shaking my fist in the heaven and saying, I hate
God. You could have asked me when I was a teenager, when I
was 19 years old, if I hated God, if I hated Jesus Christ,
and I'd say, no, I don't. No, I don't. But I did. not to believe on Him, not to
follow Him, not to confess Him, is because of that enmity. It's because of that positive
hatred of God that we have by nature. Every one of us have
it. Billions of people have been born into this world. Everyone
has it. And God has to break that enmity. God has to give
us a new birth. Because that old man never does
love Him. I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between
thy seed and her seed." Thy seed? Satan has a seed? What did the
Lord say to the Pharisees? You're of your father the devil. Here's what struck me, it struck
me when I read that, that just really jumped out at me. In the
same home, in the same house, can be the seed of Satan, and
the seed of Christ. The seed here speaks of Christ,
but Christ has a seed itself. It's the church. You know, it says that Cain was
of that wicked one, the devil. It says Cain was of that wicked
one, the devil. Cain brought an offering to God.
Cain pretended to worship God. And yet he brought an offering
of works. It was the fruit of the ground.
It was cursed. It was cursed. And both those boys were born
in the same house, same parents. One belonged to Christ and one
didn't. One was a seed of Christ and one was a seed of Satan.
That jumped out at me and I thought of that. I thought, wow. And
it, in it, shall bruise thy head the seed though he's speaking
here of christ shall bruise thy head you'll bruise his heel that's
his human nature that's the human nature of christ spoken of as
his heel as a man you'll you'll bruise his heel and you'll notice
god didn't say that's a seed of man because adam didn't enter
into it nothing of adam entered into the lord jesus christ he
was begotten by the holy spirit He speaks of them as the seed
of a woman. And really that's strange because a woman doesn't
have a seed. A woman has an egg. She has the embryo. But he says
the seed of the woman because the seed is Christ and it's He's
of God. Exactly what it is. And he said here in verse 16,
unto the woman, he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and
thy conception and sorrow shalt thou bring forth. children and
that desire shall be thy husband. He shall rule over thee. Childbirth,
the pains of childbirth started right there in the garden. That's
why there's so much pain in giving birth to children. You're giving
birth to sinners. You're giving birth to those that hate God
by nature. That's what you're giving birth
to. John Trapp said this, children are certain cares. In other words,
when we bring up children, we have certain cares. You've got
to take care of them. You've got to feed them, clothe them, nurture
them. You've got to take care of them.
But he said this. This really got me. Children
are certain cares, but uncertain comforts. Some are heartaches
all the way to the grave. And I know some. I know some
over the years that was nothing but a heartache to their parents.
There are certain cares, but there are uncertain comforts.
They may be a comfort, they may not be. And then listen, and
I'll get through this real quick. Verse 17, And unto Adam he said,
Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife instead
of God's voice, you listen to what she had to say and you have
eaten of the tree of which I commanded thee saying thou shalt not eat
of it cursed the ground for thy sake and sorrow shalt thou eat
of it all the days of thy life I was going through the woods
here a few weeks ago down at Brenda's place and it's a jungle
I mean it's literally a jungle and I had blood running down
both my hands both hands I had blood from briars I had blood
running down both my hands and I looked at that When I come
out, I still got some scratches there, scars. And I thought,
that's from the curse. That's from the curse. As angry
as it made me, it made me mad when I did put gloves on. I had blood running down both
my hands. And I thought, after I got out
of it, I thought, that's from the curse. Thorns also and thistle shall
it bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat the herbs of the field,
the plants of the field. Do you know what that was for?
Do you know what the plants of the field, the herbs of the field
were for? The beast. It was for the beast. The fruit
and the trees was for Adam and Eve. He said, you can eat all
these fruit. You can eat all this fruit except for one. And
then when they sinned, he said, now you're going to eat the herbs
like the beast do. You're going to eat from the ground like the
beast do. My, what a fool. In the sweat of thy face shalt
thou eat bread, till thou return to the ground.
For out of it thou art taken, thus thou art, thus thou shalt
return. And Adam called his wife, his wife's name Eve, because
she was the mother of all living. And here's something that stood
out to me. This may be what David meant
when he said, I was shaping iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive
me. I always thought of David talking about his mother his
biological mother. But I'm not so sure he's not
reaching back to Eve. And sin was a whole humanity
conceived. It was not a sinful act as far
as the intimate relationship between a husband and wife. But
the seed was sinful all the way back to Eve, because she's called
the mother of all living. But God provided a sacrifice
and a covering for their nakedness, without their help and without
asking them. Unto Adam also and to his wife did the Lord God
make coats of skin. God killed an animal. God shed the first blood. And
He killed an animal, and He made coats of skin covering for their
nakedness. This is a real picture of the
Lord Jesus Christ, God's Lamb, that was slain for us, and we
are covered in His righteousness. His blood is the atonement for
our sin. God has provided for all whom
He shall save, a sacrifice, His Son, a covering, His righteousness.