I must also express my appreciation
and thanks for all the hospitality that you've showed my wife and
I. We've enjoyed being here with
you again and seeing many people that we've known for a long time
and meeting new friends. Quite a blessing to come and
hear other men preach the gospel. I appreciate each one of these
men, thank God for them, and pray for them, and pray for God's
blessings upon their ministry. And I'd like to speak to us tonight
from Genesis. While you're turning here to
Genesis, I want to tell you a story. You know, as a preacher, and
all these men here can identify with what I'm going to say, we
do our best, try to make sure that we are not misunderstood.
We try to make ourselves understood when we stand up to preach, but
in spite of everything we do, sometimes we're misunderstood. And that is especially true with
children. And I read the story of this
young lad, and he became extremely afraid to go into the church
building. He would enter in with his mother
and father, but when he went in, he'd always be at their side
and would not let go. And his mother was determined
to find out what it was that made him so afraid of going into
that building. And so she asked him one night
and he said, because I know that there is a zeal there. And she
said, what is a zeal? He said, I don't know. But he
said, it must be something like a dragon or a crocodile. And it must live in the corner
of the building. And he said, I heard the preacher
talking about it. And so the mother got down the
concordance and looked up the word zeal. And she started reading
the various verses that have that word in it and came to that
verse in John chapter 2. which says, the zeal of thine
house hath eaten me up. He said, there it is. There it
is. If you will, turn with me to
Genesis chapter 3. And I'd like to speak to us tonight
about man's fall and recovery from this chapter. Moses, we believe, was the divine-inspired
author of Genesis. And, of course, he wrote about
the fact of the fall many years after it had taken place. But notice in verse 6, the last
three words, he tells us that man failed. And he does so in
three words. He did eat. He makes no comments. And he doesn't express any shock
about the fact that man has fallen into sin. Remember, he wrote
this years later. The apostle Paul in Romans 5
and verse 12 said, wherefore, as by one man, sin entered into
the world and death by sin. And so death passed upon all
men for that all have sin. And we know tonight, and the
scriptures reveal unto us, that Adam is that man by whom sin
entered into the world. And no one should, no one really
can doubt that sin has entered into the world because we have
all sinned. We all sin. And because of sin,
death has passed upon all men. But in the New Testament, the
Apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 11 and 1 Timothy chapter 2, he
tells us, first of all, that Eve was beguiled. And then he
tells us that Eve was deceived, but not Adam. Adam was neither
beguiled nor deceived. And so in this third chapter
of Genesis, we see, and we are taught, that through man sin
entered into the world, and it will be through the woman that
the Redeemer shall come into this world. And tonight, I want
us to consider two things from the chapter. First of all, let's
consider for a few minutes how Eve was beguiled, and then secondly,
I want us to consider how man is restored. So first of all,
how Eve, our mother, Adam's wife, how she was beguiled. Paul tells us in that one verse
that it was through subtlety, or if you prefer, craftiness. Craftiness that the serpent beguiled
or deceived our mother. And he deceived her, if you read
these verses, he deceived her and he never one time mentioned
the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And he certainly
never told her, take that fruit and eat it. But yet he beguiled
her and deceived her. Now notice verse 1. Now the serpent
was more subtle than any beast of the field which the Lord God
had made. When we read this, we look back,
we read back, and of course we have some idea about a serpent,
about a snake, and we think about the fact that a snake appears
to be crafty, to be subtle. But my friends, that's not what
I believe that we are to see here. Because when we read here
that the serpent, was more subtle than any beast of the field which
the Lord God had made, it is speaking of this one particular
serpent, that he was more crafty. And of course we know from the
book of Revelation chapter 20 and verse 1, that old serpent
which is the devil and Satan. When this serpent spoke to Eve,
there should have gone off in her mind a warning signal, an
alarm bell. Why? Because the beasts of the
field do not speak. And surely she had been made
aware of this. Adam surely had informed her
that there was a day when God caused all the animals that he
created to pass before Eve and God named each one of them, but
for Adam there was not found and help meet. There was no animal
that could talk. There was no animal that God
had created that Adam could communicate with and that animal could communicate
with Adam. I was in my yard recently working
and And one of my neighbors passed by, and I spoke to him, and I
went back to doing what I was doing, and I heard him say something. I didn't understand what he had
said. And so I said, pardon me? And
he said, oh, I was talking to my dog. And I just jokingly said,
well, that's all right until that dog starts answering, until
he starts talking back. I mean, animals are not supposed
to talk. And Eve, she should have known
that. This serpent was more subtle
than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made, because
behind that serpent was the serpent, that old serpent, that is, Satan,
the devil. She knew that something was wrong
with that picture. See any of those puzzles where
they tell you there's five or six or ten things wrong in this
picture and you try to find it? Well Eve, surely she must have
known there's something wrong in this picture. Here's an animal,
here's a beast of the field and this beast is now speaking to
me. That should have set off warning
bells ringing in her heart. And look at his question. Hath
God said, you shall not eat of every tree of the garden? In
other words, he doesn't deny that God had said this, but he
asked this question. Is this that I have heard true? The report has come to me that
God has told you that you are not to eat of every tree in this
garden. Could that be correct? Is that
true? Did God really say such a thing? Maybe we need to talk about this. Maybe we need to think about
this. Maybe there is another way of
interpretation. When the scripture says that
men are dead in trespasses and sins, and yet someone comes along
and says, well, maybe there's another way of interpretation.
Maybe there is just a little life still left in fallen man. When the scripture says, it,
that is election, is not of him that willeth nor of him that
runneth, but of God that showeth mercy, maybe there's another
way to look at this. Maybe there's another way to
understand this. When the scripture says it is
of grace and not of works, well maybe Maybe we need to talk about
this. This has come to my attention
that God has said, you shall not eat of every tree of the
garden. Is this true? Is this correct? He asked and he asked her to
make the decision. And her response opens the door
for the serpent to deliver what one is called an undercut, an
uppercut, and then a knockout punch. Her response opened the door
for the serpent to deliver a knockout punch. Compare what she says
with what God said. If you look back in chapter 2
at verses 16 and 17, This is what God had said. And
the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the
garden thou mayest freely eat, but of the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil thou shalt not eat, for in the day that thou
eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. But notice how she responds
in verse 2. And the woman said unto the serpent,
We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden, but of the
fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden. God
has said, you shall not eat of it, neither shall you touch it,
lest you die. Now, if you took the time, you
could see she left out two words. Two words that God had spoken. God had said, of every tree of
the garden, of every tree. And God had said, you may freely
eat. But she leaves out these two
words, every and freely. The two words left out show God's
goodness. God's goodness to man of every
trait. There's not just a few trees
in this garden, there are many trees. And Adam, of every tree
of the garden, thou mayest freely eat except the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil. All of this, actually in chapter
2 from verse 4 on through the end of the chapter, it is all
showing the goodness of God to man. Because if you would remember
in chapter 1, after God had finished creation, He pronounced everything
good. Everything was good. And yet,
He planted a garden in which to place Adam, showing God's
goodness. In other words, everything was
already good, but God creates a garden to show goodness flowing
out of His goodness to plant man in. And have you ever noticed
that verse in verse 12 of chapter 2 when it says, and the gold
of that land is good? Have you ever heard of any bad
gold? Any bad gold? I don't think so. But all of this is to show the
goodness of God and it serves as a backdrop for what we have
in chapter 3 to show the utter, absolute unreasonableness of
man disbelieving God, rebelling against his creator. She minimized God's goodness
when she left out that word every and freely, and then she emphasizes
God's strictness When she adds that word, you shall not touch
it. God never said that. But she
emphasizes God's strictness when she includes that word. And then
she impugns God's justice when she says, lest you die. Did God ever say, lest you die? I don't think so. No, God never
said there was any maybe so about it. God said, you shall surely
die. You shall, Adam, you shall surely
die. That was the undercut. Now comes
the uppercut, verse 5. Here's the serpent still speaking.
For God doth know that in the day you eat thereof, then your
eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as gods, knowing good
and evil. Should you eat, you shall be
as gods. Now, I do not know why the translators,
the King James translators at least, why They translated that
word there, you shall be as gods, with a small g and a plural,
because it is the very same word Elohim that we have in Genesis
1.1, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. And
Adam and Eve, for them, there was only one God. There were
no other false gods at that time in the world. There was only
one God, the God that they knew as their Creator, the God that
came in the cool of the day and walked with them, and they had
fellowship and communion with Him. That was the only God there
was. You shall be as God. Now the
fact that this noun is plural may refer to the fact that God
is a trinity of persons. In the Godhead, we know there's
a Father, there's a Son, and there is a Holy Spirit. One God,
but three persons in the Godhead. And so, the word being plural
may refer to that fact. But I say unto you tonight, when
Satan said, you shall be as God, The only God they could have
had in their mind was the Lord God Omnipotent. That's the only God they'd ever
heard of. That's the only God they'd ever
been exposed to. God Almighty. You shall be as
God. And you shall be as God, notice,
in a particular way. in a particular area, you shall
be as God, you shall know good and evil." You shall be as God, knowing
good and evil. Now, our Lord said this about
the serpent in the New Testament. He said, he was a murderer from
the beginning, an abode not in the truth, because there is no
truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh
of his own, for he is a liar, and the father of it. If you
look down to verse 22 in chapter 3, remember Satan said, God doth know that in the day
you eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and you shall
be as God, knowing good and evil. In verse 22, the Lord God said,
Behold, the man is become as one of us to know good and evil. So the serpent told a lie, or
he told a half-truth which was a lie. He told our parents, told
Eve, and I'll assume that Adam must have been close by, and
he didn't restrain his wife. You shall be like God, and you
shall know good and evil. And the scripture here says that
he has become as one of us, knowing good and evil. Man came to know good and evil
in a very different way than the way in which God knows good
and evil. I would say simply so that I
can understand it tonight. God knows good and evil and he
loves good and he hates evil. But man's knowledge of good and
evil became a subjective knowledge and it's turned upside down so
that now man, Adam, once he disobeyed God, now he loves evil and hates
good or God. And the knockout punch, if you
go back now to verse 6, the knockout punch, she took of the fruit
thereof and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her,
and he did eat. Now, I don't need to say this,
emphasize this here in this place, but I want to say it anyway.
And I like what Todd said last night, the God-man, he said,
I love to say that. And when he said that, I thought,
how many times have I said that? But I still love to say it and
I love to hear it. And I'm going to say this, I
know that you know this, but when Adam did eat, as the scripture
says, Moses records it, and he did eat, man fell down dead. That is, he fell from that state
in which he had been created to have communion and fellowship
with God. He was not merely wounded, he
was not only bruised, he didn't break his little finger in the
fall, as Charles Spurgeon said, he broke his neck. man fail. Now, the second part of my message,
consider how men are restored. And I like what I read John Newton
said. He said, many have puzzled themselves
about the origin of evil. I observed that there is evil.
and there is a way to escape it. With this I begin and end."
I like that, don't you? There is evil and there is a
way to escape it. Consider how men are restored. And I use this word restored
tonight realizing that the Lord Jesus Christ, He does much more
than restore us to Adam's unfallen state. Because when Adam was
created, he was created with a righteousness, but it was a
creature righteousness. And when he fell, he lost that.
But the Lord Jesus Christ said, I am come that they might have
life and that they might have it more abundantly. And so when
Christ restores us, I know there's a scripture which says he restored
that which he took not away. And I'm going to use that word
restored tonight. How man is restored. But I realize that the Lord Jesus
Christ does much more than restore what we lost in Adam. We lost
that creature righteousness But the righteousness that we have,
which He gives unto His people, is referred to as the righteousness
of God. Because He is God. And He worked
it out for us. Now I want to point out four
things to us in this chapter about how man may be restored. How men are restored. First of
all, we were lost through a representative, and that is the only way of our
restoration. Let me say that again. We were
lost through a representative, and that is the only way of our
restoration. When were their eyes open? Adam
and Eve, when were their eyes opened? If you look back again
at verse 6, the woman She took of the fruit thereof, and did
eat, and her eyes were opened. No, it doesn't read like that,
does it? No. She took of the fruit thereof,
and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her, and he
did eat, and the eyes of them both were opened. Adam, he not only represented
Jew, he represented his wife Eve. He represented all men. For the scripture says, for as
in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. All
that Adam represented died in Adam. And all that Christ represented
shall be made alive. There's no question about that.
All that the Father loved With a free love, Eve gave up
that word freely. We love that word freely, don't
we? Being justified freely by His
grace through our Lord Jesus Christ. And God's love is free. And we love that word every,
because He took all of our sins, every one of our sins, when He
represented us. All that the Father loved and
chose in him from before the foundation of the world shall
be made alive. Adam represented all men in a
covenant of works. That's what it was, a covenant
of works. And he failed. And when he failed,
he died. And all of his posterity, we
all died in him. Christ represents His people
in a covenant of grace. You know, it's never called a
covenant of grace, I don't think, in the Scripture. But it's all
of grace. It's called a covenant of peace.
It's called an everlasting covenant. It's called a new covenant. But
I like to call it a covenant of grace, don't you? A covenant
of grace. Because it was a covenant that
God made with Christ as a representative of his elect people from before
the foundation of the world. And there were stipulations in
that covenant, just like there was in the covenant of works.
There was stipulations in the covenant of grace, but all the
stipulations were laid upon the surety of the covenant. And he
had to come and fulfill everything that God requires in order to
the salvation of all of His people. And that He has done. For as
by one disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience
of one shall many be made righteous. So first of all, we were lost
through a representative and that is the only way of our restoration. Number two, you shall be as God
was part of the temptation God must become as one of us for
our restoration. You shall be as God. That was
a temptation. But for our restoration, in order
to our restoration, God must become as one of us. He must become a man. The apostle said, who being in
the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God,
but made himself of no reputation and took upon him the form of
a servant, and was made in the likeness of men, And then again,
for what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the
flesh, God sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh. As our brother brought out this
morning, he became our kinsman redeemer. He was bone of our
bone and flesh of our flesh. He had no sin. He did no sin. He knew no sin. But he was made
in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin the sins of his people
were condemned in him. And this seed of the woman that
we read of here in Genesis 3 and verse 15 is none other than the
Lord Jesus Christ. The seed of the woman. Notice
in verse 15, God said, And I will put enmity between thee, and
the woman, that is, the serpent and the woman, and between thy
seed and her seed. And if the woman is a picture
of the church, and the apostle Paul tells us that she is, in
Ephesians 5, he said, I speak of a great mystery, that Adam
and Eve, Adam and his wife Eve, she was taken
out of his sight. She was born of his bone, flesh
of his flesh. And if the woman here pictures
the church still in chapter 3, God said, I will put enmity,
speaking to the serpent, between thy seed and her seed. And there's always, always been
and always shall be enmity between the world and the church. Between
the lost and those who know God. Unless the church becomes so
much like the world that there's no difference. But there's always
going to be enmity between the seed of the serpent and the seed
of the woman. But then, notice it says, between
thy seed and her seed, it shall bruise thy head. It, singular. This seed. is the seed of Abraham
that God said, in thee, that is in thy seed, shall all the
nations of the earth be blessed. God the Holy Spirit prepared
the eternal Son of God of body from the Virgin Mary to which
he joined himself in a union that shall never never cease. There's only one union. I guess
it would be stronger than the union between God and man in
Christ, and that is the union in the Godhead, between the Father
and the Son and the Holy Spirit. We do not speak of him as two
persons, but one person with two natures. He's both God and
man. And he bruised the head of the
serpent, and at the same time his heel was bruised. In Isaiah
53, the scripture says, he was bruised for our iniquities. And
when they nailed him to the cross, not only his hands were nailed,
but in the Psalm, Psalm 22, he said, they pierced my hands and
my feet. And so this was literally fulfilled. He shall bruise thy heel. And
I like what one man said. He said, it's even possible maybe
to see the good shepherd here. And I like to see the Lord Jesus
Christ as the good shepherd, don't you? And the shepherd leads
his sheep out, and as he's going by the pathway, there's that
serpent. He's called there on the side,
and he's sly, and the shepherd passes by, and that serpent strikes. at the heel, but the shepherd
turns around, he crushes the head of that serpent before he
touches one of his sheep. And number three, a tree was
prominent in our fall and even so in our restoration. That tree
in the garden was the focal point of man's sin. of man's fall. And that tree upon which Christ
hung is the focal point of our restoration. It is by his substitutionary
death in the place, in the stead of his people that we are restored. The tree in the garden was in
a place of life, but he was crucified upon a tree at Golgotha, a place
of a skull. place of death. God cursed the
ground here for man's sake, but His law cursed us for our disobedience. And it was on a tree. The Scripture
said, Cursed is everyone that hangeth upon a tree. It was upon
that tree of Calvary that the Lord Jesus Christ was made a
curse for us. that he might redeem us from
the curse of the law. Man knew that he was naked just
as soon as he ate that fruit. And I don't think that's speaking
necessarily of him being physically naked. He wasn't blind. He knew when he ate that fruit
that he was naked before God. And when God came and God called,
what did he do? He ran further into the trees
among the leaves. And that's always the way it
is. When God the Holy Spirit comes seeking one of God's elect,
a man gets a little concerned, a little interest in his soul,
in his relationship with God. The first thing he does, he tries
to put some fig leaves together, some good works to cover himself.
And the more the Spirit of God comes convincing him of sin,
the further he goes. The further he goes trying to
hide his nakedness from God. And it's God who must find him,
call him, restore him. And those skins, when the scripture
here says in verse 21 of chapter 3, unto Adam also and to his
wife did the Lord God make coats of skins and clothed them. Those
skins must have come from some animal. They must have. When Christ was crucified, his
garments were taken. They gambled for one and, I believe,
parted the others. He was stripped of his clothes
that you and I might be clothed with his righteousness. And the earth now would produce
thorns as a result of sin. And as he hung there on that
tree, he was crowned with thorns. And the last thing, the fourth
thing, the temptation and the restoration. Have you ever thought about this?
The temptation came to a living man, a living man, the temptation
came to a living man and God said, eat and thou shalt die. The restoration comes to men
who are dead and God says, eat! and live. Ho, everyone that thirsteth,
come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money, come ye,
buy and eat. Yea, come, buy wine and milk
without money and without price. I read a few weeks ago this story,
a true story that happened at the one of the battles during
the war between the states. After a great battle, the next
day, the ambulances, such as they were in those days, were
out on the battlefield collecting the wounded, and they came up
upon a man, a Union man, who was wounded, and the surgeons
there on the ambulance thought, he's beyond help. There's nothing
going to help him, and we have a limited space to carry patients
away. And he cried out, what about
me? We've got to leave you. We've got to leave you. There's
not room. And as that ambulance drove away,
they heard this man say these words, which are part of Isaac
Watts' hymn. He said, here, Lord. I give myself to thee, tis all
that I can do. That's all, isn't it? To give
yourself to Christ. If you're hungry, eat. Eat and live.