Creation Story and Divine Blessings

Clothed in Christs Blood

Genesis 1:28And God blessed them. And God said to them, Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth. 29And God said, Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food.30And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food. And it was so.31And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

What is the Prime Directive?

Be Fruitful and Multiply and subdue the earth, and Have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves on the earth! And it was exceedingly good. Very good! And there was evening and there was morning the sixth day.

20The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him.21So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh.22And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man.23Then the man said, This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. 24Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.25And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

They were created; And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed. NIV- And the man and his wife were both naked and felt no shame.

3 Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, Did God actually say, You shall not eat of any tree in the garden ? 2And the woman said to the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden,3but God said, You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die. 4But the serpent said to the woman, You will not surely die.5For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.

What is the problem from the outset?

Who claims authority or wisdom?

Who is in subjection and to whom? Who is being honored?

Is this a snake or is it Satan?

Which is a member of Creation? Satan or the snake? Who has dominion over the creature?

6So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.

Who has headship? Who had heard the Word concerning the Tree of The Knowledge of Good and Evil? Who spoke the Word of God over and against the word of Satan?

7Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.

The man and woman had been created exceedingly good. They knew what was good; they saw good; everything around them was exceedingly good by God s own assessment and declaration. Created for good they were good as they were- male and female, man and wife, and they were good being naked.

Upon eating the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil, immediately, they see sin, lust, and shame. Shame comes from the sin. When sin is exposed, unrighteousness is shown, guilt and shame follow. The desire was to be like God. But knowing evil they see their sin and are ashamed to be seen naked.

Afraid to be seen by whom? By the plants of the garden? Of course not, plants have no eyes. By the animals? The animals are naked and they are not ashamed. Who else is there? There is Adam and there is Eve. And, of course God sees everything.

Shame or guilt comes immediately. It does not wait until there are other human beings born to see their nakedness. Their sin is against God.

Luther writes in his commentary on Genesis that the gifts God gave them to fulfill the [Prime Directive] were glorious before the knowledge of evil. The gift of being male was good for Adam. The gift of being female was good for Eve, for God made her that way. Adam being male and having the health and gifts for procreation was righteous before Eve. Eve being female and having health and the gifts of procreation was also a gift to Adam, and righteous before him. They were righteous before God.

7Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.

What changed in verse 7?

Their eyes were opened werent their eyes opened before? Couldn t they see the gifts for procreation before? Now they knew evil and sin. What was once their glory, their way to accomplish the Prime Directive together; now is horrifying and brings shame.

Oh, well, here are fig trees and large leaves and we, with cordage and skill can make aprons to cover our shame. This they do. They cover their gifts with coverings of plant material they fashioned together for themselves. But the wages of sin is death; human death not death of the world s plant life. The fig leaves have nothing to do with lifeblood.

And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.9But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, Where are you? 10And he said, I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself. 11He said, Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?

The only way there could be shame concerning the gifts God had given them was because they now knew evil. They weren t na ve before this. They had perfect intellect and perfect knowledge of themselves and all creation under God s declaration that they were exceedingly good.

The man said, The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate. 13Then the Lord God said to the woman, What is this that you have done? The woman said, The serpent deceived me, and I ate. 12

Here we see the insanity of sin and avoidance of shame. God is present in the Garden. Can they hide from him? Those knuckleheads ! You can see it right off, can t you? You can see just how foolish it is to hide from God. You can see how your father and mother Adam and Eve thought they could hide from the almighty God, and how foolish is that thinking. Remember you are just like them. Having trees handy or not, there is no hiding from the Creator. The hills are his and he made them. Not even earth and solid rock can hide you from the omniscient God.

Of course it is dumb to hide from God behind something The leaves did not work The trees did not work Let s try something else Of course, we can explain why we sin and that will cover our shame. We have excuses.

How did that go? Adam blames his wife and while he is at it, he blames God for subjecting him to woman. Eve blames the serpent, and while she is an it, she blames God for putting the serpent in the Garden. In this, they demonstrate that they have not followed the vocation God had given to them. Adam had authority over his wife and the serpent, but he listened to her and ate.

Eve had authority over the serpent, but she listened to him and ate. She provided the knowledge of evil through the fruit to her husband.

God reestablishes the proper order. He speaks first to the serpent, then to the woman, and then to the head which is Adam. 14The Lord God said to the serpent, Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and above all beasts of the field; on your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life. 15I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.

Here is the promise of victory against sin. Here is the declaration that the Seed of the Woman , the woman s offspring, will defeat the Serpent with a crushing blow. The cost of the crushing blow? A strike to the heel.

Verse 15; God is speaking to the Serpent, but God and the serpent are not alone. The man and the woman are hearing God speak as well. There will be enmity -bad blood, between you(Satan) and the woman, and between your offspring and her s. He will crush your head and you will strike his heel.

A single male offspring of the woman will do this! What is the message for Adam and Eve? Though they have received judgement and a description about how that will play out, they have been promised days on earth, to bear children, and to work the ground until they die; and they will die. A child, a seed, the seed of the woman, will crush their enemy. It won t be pretty! The seed of the Woman will be victorious, but he will bleed, he will suffer. This is the promise of the virgin-born Savior, and the promise of his ultimate victory.

Of course, that champion, the seed of the woman, won the victory for you as well. According to God s own promise Jesus was born to the virgin Mary-truly seed of the woman- who is victorious and is victorious for you and the whole world.

Adam and Eve are still standing Naked in their shame. Fig leaves didn t work. Trees didn t work. Excuses and blame didn t work.

There is Personal nakedness and shame-Genesis 9:22-23: (Noah) 21When he drank some of its wine, he became drunk and lay uncovered inside his tent.22Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father naked and told his two brothers outside.23But Shem and Japheth took a garment and laid it across their shoulders; then they walked in backward and covered their father s naked body. Their faces were turned the other way so that they would not see their father naked.

Whats the problem? He was in his own house, in his own tent, it was his own son. Notice the other two sons avert their eyes, they won t look. They cover the shame of Noah.

The book of Leviticus spends 14 verses in chapter 18 speaking of this nakedness and shame even with regard to close relatives. .

There is National shame in Ezekial 16:36-37: 36This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Because you poured out your lust and exposed your naked body in your promiscuity with your lovers, and because of all your detestable idols, and because you gave them your children s blood,37therefore I am going to gather all your lovers, with whom you found pleasure, those you loved as well as those you hated. I will gather them against you from all around and will strip you in front of them, and they will see you stark naked.

And again, in Ezekiel 23:29-30: 29They will deal with you in hatred and take away everything you have worked for. They will leave you stark naked, and the shame of your prostitution will be exposed. Your lewdness and promiscuity30have brought this on you, because you lusted after the nations and defiled yourself with their idols. You can see that disobedience is presented as nakedness and shame.

From the Prophet Isaiah, 64:6, We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment. We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away.

20 The man called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living. 21 And the Lord God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them.

What has become of clothing to cover shame and guilt? + Do current fashions cover nakedness and remove shame? +Do commercials bait us into unrighteousness even when their subject matter has nothing to do with sexuality? +What kind of clothing is prominent for the prom? +Does clothing worn in our midst really cover what is underneath, or does clothing bring those things to our attention?

I love furs. Gorgeous, soft, warm

How do you get skins for garments to cover someone s shame? Something must die! God killed to make a covering for Man s shame. This was the first death in history. Blood had to be shed, death had to occur to cover their shame because of sin. Death was required to cover their unrighteousness. In the bloody garments was a reminder of death for sin; but in his mercy, the death would not be the unrighteous one. There will have to be a sacrifice required to cover sin.

Another example from Scripture is the Passover. The blood of the perfect male lamb was painted on the door posts and above the door. God was judging sin that night in Egypt. He was going to destroy all the first born. He was justified in doing so, because all the firstborn, man and beast were tainted with sin. Not only the first born, but every living thing.

The only way to cover the sin of the firstborn was by the blood of the lamb. The blood of the lamb clothed the household, if you will, and it was as if it testified that death had already occurred in the home that night. It is interesting that we often think of evening, sundown as the end of the day. For the Hebrews, Twilight was the beginning of a new day.

The new day for you is Complete. God sent his Son Jesus to be the lamb whose blood covers the totality of your sin. That happened for you 2000 years ago at Calvary. There the precious Son of God, though he without sin, became sin for you, and received the wrath of God against sin. This means all sin, each sin. There he redeemed you from eternal death for sin. There his blood was poured out for your sins and the sins of the whole world. There, Satan s head was crushed. There, the complete covering for sin was poured out.