If you have your Bibles, please
turn with me to Genesis chapter 3. We'll look at verses 17 through
21. Genesis chapter 3, verse 17.
And unto Adam he said, that is the Lord God, 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. 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
into the ground, for out of it thou wast taken. For dust thou
art, and unto dust thou shalt return. And Adam called his wife's
name Eve, because she was the mother of all living. unto Adam
also and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins
and clothed them. Let us pray. Our Father in heaven,
we bless you and thank you for great mercy and great grace for
great sinners. We are reminded once again of
what we are in nature and what we do in nature that can never
bring us one iota closer to being. We know by nature we don't seek
you. We don't have understanding.
We are not righteous. We do no good thing. Lies are
upon our lips. It's a poison asp upon our tongue.
We seek after blood. wicked and vile and there is
no thoughts of God in our hearts by nature but we thank you that
in your great and glorious purpose of salvation you sent your son
to die in our room instead and do what we could not do that
is pay a price that would satisfy your justice and your righteousness
We bless you, God, for what you've done for us. Pray for those of
our company who are sick. Ask the Lord you'd be with them
and watch over them, strengthen them and help them. We ask for
ourselves tonight as we gather here that you might cause us
to worship you in spirit and truth and we will, Father, if
you show us the meaning of these words. Drive us down to where
we belong in the dust. and lift our eyes to see the
glories of Jesus Christ and his accomplished salvation. Help
us now to worship you, we pray in Christ's name. Amen. Now as we saw last time, the
curse allotted to Eve was the sorrow that attends the knowledge
that that which has proceeded from her womb was born to die.
That curse pictured and declared the payment price for sin in
the world but also held the doctrine of substitution. One who would
be born the seed of woman even the Lord Jesus Christ would be
born to die and not for himself but for his chosen race and in
dying would pay the penalty that was due to God by them and thus
redeem them from the curse of the law being made a curse for
them. I thought of Mary, who gave birth
to the Lord Jesus Christ, knew that he was the son of God. When
he was 12 years old, he told his mama, it must be about my
father's business. When she tried to interrupt him
when he was talking to folks about what he was going to do
for them, one disciple said, your mother is here. And he said,
who is my mother? And who is my father? You are my mothers. and my father's, but she stood
at the foot of that cross. And Jesus Christ, her blessed
and beloved son, her good boy, her righteous boy, hanged there
in agonies and blood. And the Lord Jesus Christ looked
down to John the apostle and said, John, this is your mother.
From here on out, she's your mother. And looked in the mirror
and said, he's your son. John's your son. Setting forth
the truth. that we are all one in Jesus
Christ. Children, the sorrow that women
have is not in birth, that's travail. The sorrow they have
is in conception, in the knowledge of what they'll bring forth.
We'll die. We'll die. Now in this passage
of scripture that we'll consider this hour, the Lord places the
curse upon Adam and all his offspring. It is a curse of nature. It is
the curse of carnality. And it's inextricably tied to
this cursed earth and ending in a weary demise. From dust
thou came to dust thou shalt return. Adam is sinned against
God by willfully disobeying the command of God and thus has plunged
the entirety of the human race into sin and guilt before a thrice
holy God. You stand before God in either
Adam or Jesus Christ. You are born in Adam, and hopefully
you're born again in the Lord Jesus Christ. But his sin was
imputed to all his offspring. They were charged, you were charged,
I was charged with Adam's sin in the Garden of Eden, though
I wasn't even there. I was in his loins, granted.
But I wasn't there personally, and I did not know that I had
sinned until God woke me to that fact. But I was charged with
Adam's sin. All humanity is born in sin,
born in sin, in the sin of Adam. God's gonna judge you in one
of two men. He's gonna judge you in Adam, or He's gonna judge
you in Christ. Those two men set forth the whole
thing. That's what it said in Romans chapter five and verses
12 through 14 when it talked about the fact that sin has entered
the world and death by sin. For in Adam all have sinned.
Now some have not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression.
He was a type of him who was to come. That means even children
born in this world whom we love and cherish can hardly live without
them, I've got two grandbabies that just keep me so happy in
this world are sinners and they are guilty before God there is
no age of accountability we are born in sin conceived in iniquity
we come forth from the womb as soon as we are born speaking
lies. We drink iniquity like it was
refreshment, like it was water. This is the estimation that God
gives of people that are born in Adam. Adam sinned against
God. implants the whole human race into that scene. The curse
placed upon Adam and his progeny for this heinous act is a treatise
on the words of Job, when Job said, man born of woman is a
few days and full of troubles, and full of troubles. Now in
verse 17 it says, 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 it. Cursed is
the ground for thy sake in sorrow, shalt thou eat of it all the
days of thy life." God gives Adam the reason for the curse
being allotted to him. It is always the reason, the
same reason for disobedience, and it's always plain and simple.
It's as simple as can be. It is listening and obeying the
wrong voice. That's what it is. It's listening
and obeying the wrong voice. Because thou hast hearkened,
and that word means to hear, to listen and to obey, unto the
voice of thy wife. This must be seen in the sense
of rather than or instead of. He obeyed the voice of his wife,
which in truth was obeying the voice of the serpent rather than
the voice of God. God spoke from heaven to Peter
on the Mount of Transfiguration. God spoke at the Lord's baptism
and said, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased,
that means satisfied or propitiated, hear ye him. That's who we are to hear. That
was who Adam was supposed to hear in the garden. That's who
Eve was supposed to hear, but she lended her ear to the serpent
and he lended his ear to his wife. The physical appearance
of the Lord God in the garden was none other than the Lord
Jesus Christ. Rather than hearkening to the voice of God, Adam had
hearkened to the voice of his wife. Simply stated, he obeyed
a voice other than God's. That's not hard to understand.
He obeyed a voice other than God's. Our Lord said of the Pharisees,
he said, if another man comes in my name, you'll believe him,
you'll listen to him. But you won't listen to me. And
when Peter was confronted with not preaching the gospel after
he was let out of prison in Acts chapter 4 verse 19, he said,
what do you think? Should I obey you or should I
obey God? What do you think? And he did
obey God and preach the gospel. This is the heart of sin, you
see. And it travels under the name of unbelief and is the manifestation
of the intractability of the carnal will. Now go on and listen
to God. Gonna listen to me. Gonna listen
to Satan. Gonna listen to every other voice
that comes down the pipe, but I'm not gonna listen to God.
The question must then arise for all of us in this world that
we live, where a million voices come at us from all different
directions. Who am I hearkening to? Who Am I listening to what
voice? Am I obeying? Am I getting, am
I being informed about this world by those who speak about it,
or am I informed about this world by what God says about this world?
Because what God says is the truth, and we are to hearken
to what He says. Also in these words is an interesting
thing. Though there is no record of
Eve doing anything more than giving Adam the fruit to eat,
Since the curse came because he hearkened unto her voice,
there is the intimation that there was some persuasion afoot
here. In all probability, she rehearsed
the lie of the serpent in his ears and the ears of her husband,
and applied human logic, asserting that she had eaten the fruit
and had not died. Therefore, the voice of the Lord
had possibly deceived them, which was what Satan said. The Lord knows something that
you don't know. you eat of this fruit, you'll
have the power to discern in good and evil. However, she hadn't
died, she hadn't changed, and there's no indication that Adam
changed when he ate of the fruit willingly. It just says he realized
suddenly that he was naked, that he was exposed, that he had sinned
against God. People think along those lines
because they obey the other voices that it's okay, everything's
going just fine. However, harvest does not come
in the season of planting, does it? But in the time of fruition,
like one preacher said, payday someday. Payday someday. Because Adam listened to the
voice of Eve rather than the command of God, he and all that
proceeded from his loins was cursed. That's what it says in
verse 18. Thorns and thistles shalt thou bring forth, shalt
it bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat of the herb of the
field. Cursed, the Lord said, be the
ground because of you. That's what he said. You listen
to the voice of your wife and now the ground is cursed because
of you. You shall eat of the cursed ground
and you shall eat in a manner of sorrow all the days of your
life. This will be the curse that will
be upon you. There is no joy in nature. There
is no joy in carnality. It is simply and only a place
of grief and sorrow from the cradle to the grave. I'm sure
you know many who are happy in this world and they rejoice in
their estate but it is not yet harvest time and one day not
far hence for all of us and for those who don't know Christ they
will despise the tenor of their life and come to a full realization
that their life was cursed. They'll know that. That is why
they spend so much time as they approach death trying to fix
things that they messed up all their life. That's just the way
it is. Thorns and thistles will attend
their labor. That means their labor will be
prickly. It will be prickly. It means to exacerbate the prickly
sorrow of leaving all they have to someone else. The thorns and
thistles are there to remind humanity that trouble always
comes with the labor to get worldly gain. All the days of humanity
will be spent eating the herb of the field. Is that important? Yeah. This is a reminder that
humanity, as it is born into the world, cannot enjoy the bountiful
fruit of the Garden of Eden. They're not welcome there. That
fruit was freely given. There, he said, all the trees
yield. You were just taking this all,
except for one. Can't eat of that one. But everyone,
it's all yours. Adam didn't have to work for those. Adam didn't
have to labor for that. He didn't have to labor. He was
put there to watch the garden, to till the garden, but it wasn't
labor to him. Our Lord said everything is yours
free. Now nothing is free. You've got to labor for it. You've
got to work for it. This is the difference you see.
It's a reminder that humanity can't go back in the garden.
They can't stay in the garden. They can't abide there, because
they're not welcome there anymore. They cannot abide in Eden. It
is a place for those who hearken to the voice of God, not to those
who hearken to the voice of their wife, or hearken to the voice
of this world. You see, fallen humanity must
eat the food of the beasts, not the food provided for God's crown
of creation. Humanity, carnality, must earn
its keep and the wages of sin is death. Remember everything
you do and everything this earth has to offer is tainted with
and ruined by sin. The ground is cursed for your
sake, for your sake. Then in verse 19 is a glaring
declaration of the futility of life without Christ. Verse 19,
in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread. till thou return
unto the ground. For out of it was thou taken,
for dust thou art, and to dust thou shalt return. The book ends
here of life. I thought about this as I was
writing this message. I thought about this, here's
my life, the word to. Dust is what I was born, dust
is what I'm gonna end up, and everything else is just the to
in between. Dust to dust, ain't much is it? That ain't much. It's a blip
on the radar. It's a vapor. It's smoke. Faster
than a weaver's shuttle. Faster than a post. There's nothing
to it. It's vapor. It's vapor. The bookends of nature, of carnality,
of a life without Christ is simply this. Dust to dust. Nothing else. Nothing else. That's the end
of wretched fallen man. The serpent's food is dust. It
is a proclamation that what is done in nature is just a way
to end up with nothing. After having labored to the point
of breaking a dripping sweat, you get nothing for it. Because
if it doesn't last forever, it's nothing. It's that simple. It's that simple. Men in rigorous
activity to gain nothing. To gain nothing. This is a vivid
picture of man in his natural religion. the religion of Adam,
the religion of Eve, the religion of the serpent. This is what
happens. All his works, all of them, all
his labor, all his efforts to attain righteousness end where
it began, with nothing. This is the works for righteousness
that men do in order to make themselves have a right standing
before God. This is what it adds up to. It adds up to zero. Imagine
that, to stand before God and proclaim that you've done righteousness,
that you've done great works, that you've built mighty fine
things. People did that in Matthew chapter
7, didn't they? Lord, Lord, they cried, Lord,
they called Him. Adonai, Adonai. Lord, didn't
we, didn't we do great works in thy name? Didn't we cast out
devils in thy name? Haven't we done these things?
He said, depart from me, you workers of iniquity. I never
knew you. You did nothing. You did nothing. I can remember many who stood
before me or sat in hospital rooms and wanted to believe that
somehow what they've done for a loved one or what they've done
for this counts in the matter of salvation. What you do matters. Don't ever think that it doesn't.
Morally. Living right in this world. Living
honestly. Dealing as peaceably as you can
with all men. That matters. It does matter.
But it matters in your relationship with God. Not His relationship
with you. That relationship never changes. But your relationship with Him
can change. But listen to me, no matter what
you do, no matter how kind you are, no matter how sweet you
are, no matter what you do for your neighbor, or for your mom
and dad, or for your children, no matter what you do, does not
count in your salvation. It matters in your life. It does
not count in your salvation. This is a picture of Adam. All
your days are going to be full of sorrow. All the days you'll
work, you'll be labor intensive, you'll multitask in your religion. But it will not bring you to
God. It will not bring you closer to God. Isn't that something? This is the curse of fallen humanity. And no matter the gain. Because
people have gains. the heights that humanity might
reach, the stature and esteem that men might attain, it's here
diminished to one thing, simply stated, so you can eat your bread. Not so you can live in a mansion. Not so you can be rich and famous
and drive a Lexus and have your own jet plane. You do all this
labor, all your life, to feed your face. That's it. That's
what it boils down to. You'll eat your bread by all
your labor. You see, all his labor gets the felon is his bread
and his water. Over in Luke, our Lord gave a
parable in Luke chapter 12, verse 15. He said, to a man who had asked him to
talk to his brother about dividing his inheritance with him. And
the Lord said, I'm not the judge or divider over you. I'm not
going to do that. And then he said in verse 15, and he said,
take heed, pay attention, and beware of covetousness. For a
man's life consists not of the abundance of the things which
he possesses. That's not a man's life. And he spake a parable
unto him, saying, the ground of a certain man, a certain rich
man brought forth plentifully. And he thought within himself,
saying, what shall I do? Because I have no room where to bestow
all my fruits. And he said, this will I do.
I will pull down my barns, and I will build greater barns, and
there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods. And I will say
to my soul, soul, Thou hast much goods laid up for many years.
Take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said, thou
fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee. Then whose
shall those things be which thou hast provided? Your soul goes
on forever. All the rest is just junk. going
to pass away, going to pass away. Now I'm convinced if you die
and leave all you have to your children, you come back 15 minutes
later and ask for it back, they wouldn't give it to you. No, that's mine, mine, losers,
weepers. This is the life of the child
of God, or rather the son of Adam. There is no hope in nature, you
see. There is no hope in you as you are born into this world. There is no hope for you as you
are born into this world. Dust is what you are. That's
how you came into this world. And dust you shall return to.
That's it. This is your life. You can't
live in paradise as a natural man. as a carnal human being. Is your hope in what you've done?
Or doing? Or what you might or will do?
Then your hope is this, it's dust. Just as you are. It's dust. I could stop here
and we say, well this is a sad, sad story. No happy ending here,
but there is light in this passage of Scripture. True light and
true hope. It is clear that it will not
come from the cursed man applying his efforts to the cursed earth.
We know that. It's not going to come that way. Our Lord has made that clear.
The curses are a book ending, however, with two wonderful passages
of Scripture. Before God curses Eve and curses
Adam, He says something to Eve and after he curses Adam he says
Adam says something and these form the two bookends verse 15
says and I will put enmity between thee and the woman and between
thy seed and her seed and it shall bruise thy head and thou
shalt bruise his heel and in verse 21 or in verse 20 Adam
called his wife's name Eve because she's the mother of he said oh
what's he been talking about before everything's death she's
the mother of the living of the living one interpretation of this she's
the mother of life mother of life you see the promise of the
Messiah to redeem men from the curse is reiterated in plain
contrast to the sorrow and woe of the curse. The curse is about
death, the product of nature, the promise and the accomplishment
about life. Isn't that something? The promise about life. Eve is
the mother of the living, also interpreted as the mother of
life. This does not speak to human life, but life in Jesus
Christ, spiritual life. Eve will in her progeny produce
a little young maiden named Mary, who was married to a man named
Joseph. Mary will be impregnated by God. I don't know how that
works, but He got her pregnant. He made her pregnant. And that
which will be born of her is called the seed of woman which
will bruise the serpent's head. He will be the Son of God. He'll
be Immanuel, God with us, the Son born, the Child given, the
Word made flesh. Those are all terms that apply
to Him. Eve, the mother of the living,
and all whom Christ has redeemed from the curse will have what?
Not death. but eternal life, everlasting
life, abundant life, and they will never perish. The promise
of nature is you're going to perish. Because you're dust,
and you'll end up dust, and you're going to perish. You say, well,
we're going to die too. Yeah, and you'll end up dust too, but
not forever. Because the site of your grave is also the site
of your redemption, full and free. It's the site of where
you will be made new. You will be planted in corruption,
but you will be raised in incorruption. Old Ralph Manning used to give
an illustration. I love this illustration. He said in October
we plant those old Gnarly looking bulbs. I mean
any ugly bulbs ain't pretty ain't a nice little pretty seed with
a point on it a nice color They're ugly. They're warped and twisted. He said we plant them and it's
just nothing to him. They're just ugly We don't even want to think about
it put them in the ground But then the sun begins to warm the
earth in spring and all of a sudden glorious daffodils and iris pop
out of the ground They were planted in corruption But they were raised
in incorruption. We all going to be planted in
corruption, but one day we will be raised. And we will be changed. And we will realize that the
sting of death has been abolished. Because the sting of sin, the
sting of death is sin. It's sin. And Christ has put
that away by the sacrifice of Himself. Abundant life. So after this curse, Adam looks
at his wife and says, you're the mother of the living. You're
the mother of the living. I'll call you Eve. And how shall
such a wonder be realized? How can one born and said be
made alive eternally? Read verse 20. Or rather verse
21. Unto Adam and to his wife. Did the Lord God make coats of
skins and clothed them? God did it. Adam didn't do it. Eve didn't do it. The serpent
didn't do it. God did it by substitution. Though it is a type and a picture
of what would be accomplished on Calvary, the Lord God killed
these beasts to skin them. He killed these beasts and made
a covering for his sinful pair. He killed those beasts to clothe
his people. Death brought it about. The death of substitution. This
word clothed is not the word used in scripture for atonement.
This word clothed means to adorn, to dress in splendid or impressive
attire. The word coat means a full-length
robe. So the Lord made him a coat.
And I thought of several verses of scripture, and let's look
at them, beginning with Isaiah chapter 61. Isaiah chapter 61, verse 10. The prophet says, I
will greatly rejoice in the Lord. My soul shall be joyful in my
God, for he hath clothed me, same word. with the garments
of salvation and has covered me with the robe of righteousness
as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments and as a bride
adorneth herself with her jewels." With her jewels. And Luke 15,
the prodigal son went away and wasted all his living. Ended
up working for some religious people who gave him the husks
of the corn, not the corn. The pig got the corn, they got
the husk. He got the husk. And it says he came to himself,
and he realized what he had done and what he was. And he come
up with an idea. He said, I'll go back to my father's
house, and I'll just go back and tell him I've sinned against
him, and I'll be a servant. I won't be a son no more. And so he struck
out toward his father's house, and his father had been looking
for him all along. Father looking out the window
and saw him coming, saw his prodigal son, his son that had wasted
his living coming back. Son's head hung down, ashamed
and embarrassed to face his father. And his father lit out. Run out
to him and grabbed him. Grabbed him and started kissing
him all over. That's what it says. He kissed
him, but in the language, he kissed him and kissed him and
kissed him and kissed him. And he said, this is my son. He said,
Daddy, I've sinned against you. I don't deserve to be called
your son. I'll be your servant. He said, no. Bring me the best
robe. Don't go to the Goodwill. Don't
look in the back of the closet. Go to where all the finery is.
Bring me the best robe and put it on him. He didn't say, offer
it to him. He said, put it on him. And take the ring, the signet
of our family, and put that on his hands and put shoes on his
feet. Because this is my son who was
lost and is now found and there was great joy in that household.
Because he was robed in the best robe, the robe of Christ's righteousness,
like those in Revelation 7 who stand before the throne of God.
And John said, who are these? And the angel said, thou knowest,
these are those that have washed their robes in the blood of the
Lamb. God is their light. Christ is
their light. They're never going to shed tears
anymore. They're never going to have sorrow anymore. They're
robed in pristine righteousness. What is that righteousness? It
is Jesus Christ. He was made to be sin for us,
and we know sin that we might be made the righteousness of
God in Him. God has made us to be in Christ,
wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. Adam and Eve,
naked, ashamed, and cursed. headed for the dust but God who
is rich in mercy for his great love wherewith he loved us even
when we were dead in sins has quickened us together with Christ
by grace you're saved and has raised us up together and made
us to sit in heavenly places in Christ Jesus that in the ages
to come he might show forth the exceeding riches of his grace
and his kindness toward us through Jesus Christ the curse and the
redemption. It's all right in here in this
first book of the Bible. Father bless us to understanding
we pray in Christ's name.