Bible Passage: Genesis 3:8-15
Pastor: Joel Jenswold
Sermon Date: June 9, 2024

Bulletin (Pentecost 3) June 9, 2024

In the name of, and to the eternal glory of, Jesus,

The scene in the Garden of Eden is crushing.  There are Adam and Eve – the crowning glory of God’s creation – hiding in the bushes.  They are hiding because – of all things – they heard the sound of the Lord God in the garden coming to talk to them!  They are hiding because they are crushed…crushed beneath feelings of guilt and shame.

They had done the one thing the Lord God had told them not to do.  They had eaten from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.  They had listened to the lie and the temptation of the devil who had come to them co opting the body of a serpent for his dirty work.  He had told them if they ate of the fruit they would be like God (v. 4).  They chose to believe the devil’s word rather than obey God’s Word.  It was a crushing blow to God’s perfect world!  “Here comes the Lord!  Hide!”

But what is this?  The Lord calls.  The Lord tenderly seeks.  Where are you? (v. 9)  Obviously the all-knowing God knows exactly which bush they are trembling behind!  But his words are winsome and gracious!  They are an invitation for the man to come out, and come clean!

Adam’s answer shows how completely the image of God had been crushed by sin.  Adam replies, I heard your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid myself. (v. 10)  What a ridiculous thing to say!  God had created the bodies of the man and his wife.  They were glorious!  No!  Adam was not afraid that the Lord was going to see his naked body.  He was afraid God was going to see his guilt.

Patiently God says, Who told you that you were naked? (v. 11)  This hasn’t even been a thought up till now!  Have you eaten from the tree from which I commanded you not to eat? (v. 11)  Look at what the Lord has done!  He has basically written Adam’s confession for him!  All Adam has to do at this point is say, “Yes.”

He does not.  He answers in such a way that we truly begin to see the depths of the devastation sin has brought.  Adam is combative with God!  The woman you gave to be with me – she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate it. (v. 12)  Here Adam is the first victim in the history of all “victimhood.”  “God, you gave me the woman and the woman gave me the fruit!”  Look at how Adam has turned inward.  He now loves himself more than God or his wife!  At this point, who could have blamed the Lord God if he had put an end to Adam’s impertinence and crushed him like a bug!  But he does not.  The Lord addresses Eve.  What have you done? (v. 13)  Again, it is a gracious invitation to confess.  Again, it is met with deflection.  The serpent deceived me, and I ate. (v. 13) 

Something remarkable happens at this point in the story.  There is a change.  There is a change in the way the Lord speaks.  To this point he has come in grace and mercy.  He has come to seek and to save what is lost!  Now that changes.  He addresses the serpent.  Because you have done this, cursed are you above all the livestock and more than every wild animal.  You shall crawl on your belly and you shall eat dust all the days of your life. (v. 14)  For the first time God uses “that word.”  The word “cursed.”  He could have said it to Adam and Eve.  “Cursed are you both!  For eating the fruit and trying to hide and for blaming me for what you did!  Curse you!”  But it is the serpent and the devil who hear the word “cursed.”  For the man and his wife, God has a plan.  A gracious plan.

First of all, the Lord had to deal with what had happened in the garden.  Still speaking to the devil, the Lord says, I will put hostility between you and the woman. (v. 15)  There wasn’t hostility between Eve and the devil.  They had become friends.  Now God would “put” hostility between them.  God would call Eve to faith, and trusting in God once again, she would hate the devil.  God says this same hostility will exist between believing offspring of Eve and the unbelieving offspring of the devil in this world.

God’s plan culminates in one special Seed of the Woman.  He will crush your head, and you will crush his heel. (v. 15)   This one, singular Seed of the Woman, this “he” who will crush the serpent’s head is Jesus!  The devil was put on notice!  “Devil, a woman is going to give birth to a boy-baby who is going to crush your head!  He is going to so thoroughly defeat you that you are going to look like roadkill when it is finished!”  “It is finished!”  Martin Luther said God made the devil afraid of every woman because of this promise!

And 4000 years after these words were spoken, the Seed of the Woman came.  St. John tells us in his first letter, The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work.  And here’s how.  That word “cursed” that God should have spoken to Adam and Eve, but that he didn’t, he spoke to his own dear Son, Jesus Christ, as he hung on the cross.  “Cursed are you!  For Adam’s sin!  For Eve’s sin!  For every sin!”  Jesus bore the curse!  He was crushed for our iniquities. (Isaiah 53) He died for sin!  His heel was crushed; but the devil got the worst of it!  His head was crushed.  Jesus’ resurrection assures it!  Friends, the devil’s claim and grip on you has been broken.  Crushed..by the death and rising of Jesus!

We live in a world where we see the sad results of sin every day.  We see all around us the increase of occult and demonic activity.  It looks like the devil is having his day.  We even see not so much hostility for the devil as efforts today to make the devil out to be the “fun guy.”  It might depress or discourage us.  It might, except for one little truth that makes all the difference.  Through Jesus and his death and resurrection that old serpent has been crushed!

Amen.