Latest / Cumberland Trace Church of Christ (Formerly Lehman Ave Church of Christ) / Equipped 2026: "Creation and the Fall" by Caleb Colley

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Equipped 2026: "Creation and the Fall" by Caleb Colley · Cumberland Trace Church of Christ (Formerly Lehman Ave Church of Christ)

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in Jackson, Tennessee. He's a graduate of Freed Hartman University, where he
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received a BA in Communication, a BS in Biblical Studies, and an MA in New Testament.
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He also received a Master's Degree in Humanities from Faulkner University and
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a PhD in Philosophy from the University of South Carolina. He has taught in the
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Graduate School of Theology at Freed Hartman University, the Georgia School
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of Preaching, and in the Philosophy Department, University of South Carolina.
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He's married to the former Rebecca, and they have, pardon me, not former Rebecca,
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former Rebecca, Mineson, and they have a six-year-old daughter, Maggie, and
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three-year-old son, Ellis. He is going to be speaking to us on the topic of
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Creation and the Fall from Genesis 1 through 3, and just a reminder, here in
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the auditorium as we go throughout the weekend, we're going to march through the
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book of Genesis, basically group of chapters by chapters, and so we
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encourage you to catch many of these sessions, but come speak to us, Kevin.
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Young people today have some cognitive dissonance in many cases because at home
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they are told that the Genesis account of creation is literally true, that God
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created all the different kinds of living things in six 24-hour days, and
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they're told that at church as well, and probably by many of the people they know
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who are Bible believers, but then they go to school in many cases, or they watch
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things on television, and they're told something different from that, that the
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earth is millions of years old, and that all the different kinds of living things
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came about as a result of naturalistic processes, unguided, random chance
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mutations. There are a couple of ways that typically this is resolved. One is
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that the young person dismisses atheism and evolution and maintains that what
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the Bible says is true. On the other hand, the young person may dismiss what the
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Bible says and believe in naturalism, believe in Neo-Darwinism, that is natural
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selection plus mutations equals all the different kinds of living things we see
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around us. But there is a third way, and that is what we would call theistic
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evolution, and that is simply the idea that God used evolution in order to
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create all of the different kinds of living things so that Genesis 1 through
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2 is a summary of what happened in evolution. That what Darwin said in the
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origin of species in 1859 is basically what happened, and Genesis 1 and 2 is a
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picturesque or symbolic way, a poetical way, of explaining how evolution occurred.
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And God may have supervened on that process in some ways that we don't
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really understand, that God may have directed it, but as far as observation
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from human observers is concerned, Darwinism is exactly what happened. And
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the biblical narrative, therefore, in Genesis 1 and 2 does not commit us to any
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particular historical framework. So we are not restricted to saying that the
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creation took six days, like Genesis apparently says. We can say it took as
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much time as we want, and we can also say that it wasn't that God specially
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created each different kind of living thing, like Genesis says, but that they
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could have arisen through these apparently unguided naturalistic
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processes. So that's theistic evolution. That's that third way. And it was a
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pretty popular way to go even back in the late 19th century. James Woodrow, who
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taught at Columbia Seminary in New York, notice he is writing just a few years
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after origin of species was published, wrote,
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The Bible teaches nothing as to God's method of creation, and therefore it is
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not teaching anything contradicting God's Word to say that he may have
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formed the higher beings from the lower by successive differentiations
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and several series of acts. So he says, writing in the late 19th century, we are
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just not committed to any particular historical framework. Maybe the most
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famous theistic evolutionist ever is Francis Collins, who was involved in the
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Human Genome Project and founded an organization called BioLogos, which is
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explicitly committed to teaching an evolutionary understanding of creation.
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So in the statement of purpose for his organization is theistic evolution. He's
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explicitly on that side, and he says, God, who is not limited in space or time,
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created the universe and established natural laws that govern it, seeking to
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populate this otherwise sterile universe with living creatures, God chose, notice,
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God chose the elegant mechanism of evolution to create microbes, plants, and
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animals of all sorts. Most remarkably, God intentionally chose the same
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mechanism, evolution, to give rise to special creatures who would have
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intelligence, a knowledge of right and wrong, free will, and a desire to seek
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fellowship with him. This view, evolution, that we are the result of evolution
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guided by God, this view is entirely compatible with everything that science
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teaches us about the natural world. It is also entirely compatible with the great
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monotheistic religions of the world. So here, Collins says you can have it both
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ways. You can believe in neo-Darwinism, that is natural selection plus mutation
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equals all the different kinds of living things, and you can have the Bible, and
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there's absolutely no problem because, as we said, this is the definition of
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theistic evolution. The Bible does not commit us to any particular historical
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framework whatsoever. If you've got Halley's Bible handbook in your library,
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then you have a statement in there, and I use Halley's Bible handbook too, I'm not
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being critical other than just to say, here's what he says, whether the seven
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days were days of 24 hours or long successive periods, we do not know. See,
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that leaves open the possibility of theistic evolution. John H. Walton is one
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of the most well-known commentators on the book of Genesis in the world today,
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and he says that the words of Jude 14 and 15, which reference Genesis, are a,
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notice this, a literary factuality. Yes, this is how the familiar story goes,
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rather than a historical factuality. Yes, this is what really happened in time or
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space. So when a New Testament writer describes what happened in the Old
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Testament, what they are doing is using a literary factuality rather than a
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historical factuality. That is a very clever move, but what I'm going to argue
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today is that it won't work, that the New Testament commits us to a literal
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understanding of Genesis 1 and 2, and then at the end of the lesson we are
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going to talk about Genesis 3, but we're primarily going to spend our time on
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what the New Testament says about how we must read Genesis 1 and 2, because, and
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this is the overall thrust of our time together today, it is not a simple matter
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of slightly adjusting your reading of Genesis 1 and 2, and then having the rest
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of the Bible as you like. It is not the case that we can say, I'm just going to
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shift my interpretation of Genesis 1 and 2, and that will not affect how I view
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the rest of the Bible. That will not work. So I would like to give you 12 New
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Testament facts, it won't take long, but 12 New Testament facts that cannot be
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true if theistic evolution is true. And I think what you're going to see is that
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if you lose the literal interpretation of Genesis 1 and 2, you do not just lose
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those two chapters. You lose Jesus, and you lose Paul, and you lose Peter, and you
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lose the Hebrews writer. Are you willing to compromise your reading of all those
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people in order to have a slightly different reading of Genesis 1 and 2,
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which may allow you to be more acceptable among some in the scientific
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community today? I'm unwilling to make that deal. Anyway, we're putting to the
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side that science doesn't support evolution to begin with. That's not part
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of our lesson, but we could certainly show that materialistic development of
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these different kinds of creatures has never been proven, and that mutations are
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a sorry suggestion for a mechanism to produce living kinds, because mutations
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hurt creatures. They do not create super creatures. If a fruit fly, for example,
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gets a mutation, it doesn't become a super fruit fly or give birth to stronger
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fruit flies. What happens is it probably can't give birth, and then if it can, it
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can't fly, or it can't see, or it doesn't have the right number of legs. It's not
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going to work. Mutations are bad. You don't want them. Mutations are not going
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to turn you into Superman or Superwoman. It does not help develop different kinds
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of creatures. So science is against it, but what we're saying today is the New
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Testament is against it. Genesis 1 and 2 will not allow for it, because it says
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the evening and the morning were the first day, second day, third day, but the
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New Testament will not allow it. Christians should be very invested in
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the proper understanding of Genesis 1 and 2, because Jesus was, Paul was, Peter
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was, and the Hebrews writer was. So we should follow their footsteps. Number one,
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a man and a wife were present from the beginning of creation. That's an Old
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Testament fact, but today we're saying it's a New Testament fact, because Jesus
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said that in Mark 10 and verse 6. From the beginning of creation, God made them
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male and female, and that's a reference to Adam and Eve. I know that for sure,
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because in Matthew's account of the same conversation in Matthew 19, 4 to 6, that
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famous passage about marriage and divorce, Jesus said that they were male
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and female, and he's quoted Genesis 2.24, which is a reference to the marriage
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between Adam and Eve. That was the institution of marriage, and Jesus based
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his doctrine of marriage and divorce and remarriage, which was different from
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anything that had been taught before, on the principle that man shall leave
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father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they too shall be one flesh.
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Jesus understood that this really happened, that there really was Adam and
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Eve, and that they were present from the beginning of creation. That's fact number
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one. That can't be true. See, if theistic evolution is true, that can't be true.
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There would have been many generations of life on earth, a gradual development
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over eons of all different kinds of living things, leading up to the
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presence of Adam and Eve. Number two, Adam and Eve were the first human beings.
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That's an Old Testament fact, but it's a New Testament fact. Paul says in 1
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Corinthians 15, 45, the first man, Adam. Who was the first man? Adam. He became a
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living soul. Well, if theistic evolution is true, there were thousands, hundreds of
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thousands of men that had developed gradually from proto-humans or other
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kinds of hominids, and God selected one of them to be Adam. That's the general
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way theistic evolution is explained, is that yes, there was an Adam, and that was
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one of these many hominids who was alive at the time as a result of evolution, and
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God picked one to be the representative, and that was Adam. He picked a woman to
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be the representative. That was Eve, if there was a literal Adam and Eve at all.
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Some theistic evolutionists say there was, some theistic evolutionists say
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there wasn't. But the New Testament fact of the matter, to which Christians are
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committed, is that Adam was the first human being. Number three, God created the
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first woman from the man's body. The first woman did not develop as the
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result of random, accidental, naturalistic chance mechanisms unguided. The first
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woman was created from the man, and that's not just an Old Testament fact.
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That's 1 Corinthians 11, verses 8 and 9. Man does not originate from woman, but
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woman from the man. Number four, Adam and Eve were humanity's universal parents.
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Paul nails that down in Acts 17, 26, that God made from one man. All of humanity,
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all the people came from Adam and Eve. If theistic evolution is true, Paul was
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wrong. That was just incorrect, because we all came from lots of people, and those
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lots of people originally came from a single-celled organism. And how that got
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there, nobody knows. But if Genesis and Acts, notice we're putting them together,
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if Genesis and Acts are true, then Adam and Eve are humanity's universal parents.
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Number five, well, before I get to that, notice Jesus' genealogy in Luke 3 goes
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all the way back to Adam. And the theological point that Luke is making,
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and I think Gary Prentice Waters is correct in this in his understanding of
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the passage, the point Luke is making is that Jesus is the Savior of all humanity.
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That is, Jesus died to make possible the salvation of anyone who would come to
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Him. And the way that is argued is by saying Jesus is a descendant of Adam.
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The genealogy goes all the way back, and mark it down. Anytime you have a theistic
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evolutionist, you will have someone who is very careful to draw a line and say,
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at some point, you begin to read Genesis literally. But that line will always be
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arbitrary. Anytime somebody says you read, let's say, Abraham, starting with Genesis
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12, that's literal. But before that, the stuff about a global flood, that sounds
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miraculous. Let's not use the global flood. That sounds like something we don't
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think geology would support today. But geology does support the flood, but
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someone might say, that makes us scientifically uncomfortable. So the flood
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didn't happen. Tower of Babel, that sounds weird. A lot of strange things going on
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in Genesis 11. So let's just put that aside and say, that's mythological,
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that's a poetical passage. Cain and Abel, Adam, all that we'll say is poetical. There
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will be an arbitrary line, not a reasoned line, just arbitrary, just because it
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doesn't make us feel good to draw it anywhere else. But what does Luke do? He
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draws Jesus' genealogy all the way back to Adam. Question, where in that genealogy
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should we draw a line and say, prior to this, it's poetical and non-literal? Or
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it's just a symbol? See, Luke would not have any of that. Adam and Eve are
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humanity's universal parents. Number five, God directly created Adam from the dust,
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not from pre-existing hominids. See, if theistic evolution is true, Adam just
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developed from creatures that were already there. The Bible says, God made
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Adam from the dust. That's not just an Old Testament fact, that's a New
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Testament fact from 1st Corinthians 15, 47 to 49, in the discussion of our, we
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hope, literal resurrection of the dead. That context in which Paul discusses all
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this in 1st Corinthians 15 is our hope for our resurrection, that we will go to
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heaven one day in our bodies, in our glorified bodies. We hope that that's
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literal, we believe it is. Well, why isn't the discussion of Adam being formed from
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the dust also a literal matter? Then, the serpent deceived Eve. Paul sure thought
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that that happened, both in 2nd Corinthians chapter 11, verse 3, and in
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1st Timothy chapter 2, verses 11 to 14, Paul discusses the fact that the serpent
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really did deceive that first woman, Eve. So it's not just a fact of Genesis, it's
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a fact of Paul's epistles. Are we going to side with Paul and say that that
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really did happen? Paul's understanding of gender roles is based on some things
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that literally happened back in the book of Genesis. And so if those things didn't
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happen, it would make no sense for Paul to base his argument about gender roles
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on that matter from Genesis. So we must side with Paul and say the serpent
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really did deceive Eve. Number seven, Abel is a literal historical figure. I know my
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topic is not Genesis 4, that's going to be the next hour, but I'm just going to
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mention here that in Luke chapter 11, 50 and 51, Jesus talked about how the
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prophets had been slain from the foundation of the world, all the way from
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Adam to Zechariah. Zechariah was killed in 2nd Chronicles 24, which is the last,
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very last section of the Hebrew Bible as their books were arranged. They had the
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same books, but they had them in a different order, and 2nd Chronicles was
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their last book. So Jesus was saying from the first book of the Bible to the last
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book of the Bible, the prophets had been killed all along. Prophets have always
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been persecuted. But if Abel is not a literal person, why would Jesus have
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brought him up? Nobody doubts that Zechariah was a literal person. If you
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believe the Bible at all, you believe Zechariah was a real person. He's not
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some poetical symbol. But if that's the case, then surely Abel is a literal
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person. And if Abel is a real person, I have to go ahead and ask the question,
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don't I? What about Abel's dad? Why would Abel's dad be some kind of a symbolic or
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non-literal story if Abel is a real person? And Jesus clearly believed Abel
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was a real person. And Hebrews 12 24 mentions how that the blood of Abel
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speaks. So Abel is still talking today by virtue of the lessons that he teaches,
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but he was a real person, clearly. Cain, number 8, is a literal historical
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figure. John says that if we hate our brother and we allow that to go unchecked,
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then we will be in the same sinful situation in which Cain found himself.
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But of course, if Cain didn't really exist, then John's example loses its
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potency. John believed that Cain was a literal historical figure. And also Jude
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did, because in Jude 11, he said that the false teachers of his day were following
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the way of Cain. But if Cain never existed, then the example loses its
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potency. Number 9, God rested after creating all the different kinds of
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creatures. Have you ever thought about the fact that in the book of Hebrews, and I
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may just read this passage, but as I read it, notice that the Hebrews writer draws
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a comparison between three things. God's resting at the end of the creation week.
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Joshua's giving the people of Israel a rest in Canaan after the wanderings in
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the wilderness. And our eventual rest that we will receive in heaven. And all
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three of those things are understood to be real. So let's read it together.
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For he has said somewhere concerning the seventh day, and God rested on the seventh
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day from all his works. And again in this passage, they shall not enter my rest.
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Therefore, since it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly had good
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news preached to them failed to enter because of disobedience, he again fixes a
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certain day. Today, saying through David after so long a time as has been said
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before, today if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts. For if Joshua had
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given them rest, he would not have spoken of another day after that. So there
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remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. For the one who has entered his rest
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has himself also rested from his works as God did from his. So, the Hebrews
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writer says, God rested, the Israelites rested when they got to go into Canaan,
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but some of them missed it. Don't you miss your rest in the way they did. You
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need to make sure you enter your rest. But all of that is predicated on the
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reality that God rested at the end of the creation week. But get this, if
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evolution is God's mechanism for creation, then he has not rested. Because
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evolution hasn't stopped. Whatever type of evolution is going on, whether we're
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talking about micro, small-scale change, which is real, or macro evolution of
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large-scale change from one type of animal to another stronger, better type
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of animal, which is not going on. Whatever type of evolution is going on, it's
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always been going on. And if theistic evolution is true, then the same type of
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mutations that produce the kinds of animals that Genesis describes is still
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happening today, and there is no sense in which God rested. God has not rested. He
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never stopped, because the mechanism he used to do the creation is still
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happening. You see the point we're trying to make? So, the Hebrews author then is, I
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hate to say this, I hate to even utter these words, but if theistic evolution is
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true, the Hebrews writer is confused. And we should not pay a whole lot of
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attention to what he says here. Number 10, Adam and Eve committed the first sins. If
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theistic evolution is true, then surely they didn't commit the first sins,
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because there were many people in existence at the time when Adam and Eve
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lived, and they were all sinning. So sins were being committed left and right when
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Adam and Eve lived. But Paul says in Romans 8, and also in Romans 5, that it
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was that first creation of man who committed the first sins. And he makes
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reference to the cursing of the earth, which occurred after the fall. We'll talk
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about the fall a little bit in just a few minutes, but Paul refers to that in
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Romans 8 as indicating he clearly believed that that's exactly what
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happened. Number 11, Adam, Abel, Cain, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and
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the judges and prophets are equally historical. Because in Hebrews 11, the
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Hebrews writer mentions all of these people as exemplars of faith, and that we
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should follow after their example. But if some of them, and we don't know which
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ones it would be, because remember the line of historicity is always arbitrary
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for theistic evolutionists. There's always going to be some arbitrary point at
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which we say, prior to this line of history, it's all figurative, it's all
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symbolic, and after this line, it's all literal. But we don't know where it is.
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The bottom line is, for the Hebrews writer, they're all literal. They all
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really lived. So therefore, they are all good examples for us. We don't take a lot
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of inspiration from people who did not live and really do these things. The
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Hebrews writer's point is, they did it. They really did express faith in
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obedience. And so you can do the same thing. But if we could just respond and
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say, well, some of them did, but some of them are just fictitious. They never did
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what they did. Well, then it would lose its potency. Number, let's say in Jude 14
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also does the same thing, because he mentions Enoch as the seventh generation
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from Adam. So he has a totally literal understanding of that time period as
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well. Number 12, the last one, Noah's flood is historical. If Noah's flood
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really happened, then I struggle to see why we should think that the creation
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did not occur as God said. Because Noah's flood is one of those passages that's
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very difficult for naturalists to accept because of their uniformitarian
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assumptions. They assume that all history happens exactly the same way.
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So you can read what happened in the past based on what happens in the
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present. And Noah's flood is obviously something we don't see happening. It's a
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global flood. It's a deluge of the whole earth, and we don't see those. We only see
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local floods. So a lot of people say that Noah's flood was merely a local
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Mesopotamian event. But, of course, 2 Peter 2.5 treats Noah as a historical
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character. And Jesus does as well in a variety of passages. Noah's mentioned a
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number of times in both 1 Peter and 2 Peter. So the real problem is Genesis 6 is
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supposed to be literal. But if that's the case, then why not Genesis 2? So the line
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would be arbitrary. Before we leave this point, let me just notice some teachings.
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I've noticed some facts that the New Testament states that could not be true
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if theistic evolution is true. But now, let's also just observe some teachings.
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And you may just want to make a note of these. We don't have time to talk about
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these in any detail. But observe, there is a comparison between Christ and Adam
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in Romans 5, which becomes mysterious if Adam didn't really exist. There's a
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comparison between the flood and Judgment Day. We are supposed to believe
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in certain facts about the Judgment Day because of certain facts about the flood
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in 2 Peter 3. Namely, the suddenness of it and the unpreparedness of people to accept
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it because people were shocked by the coming of the flood in 2 Peter 3.
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Both of those are the same. But if the flood didn't happen the way the Old
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Testament says it does, then the example that Peter uses is opaque. We would not
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know what to make of it. Then there are the comparisons between the ark and
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salvation. We teach a lot about baptism from 1 Peter 3, but the context is an
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illustration where Peter says, you know about the flood. Baptism is like the ark
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rising on those floodwaters. Baptism is essential. And one of the ways we see
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baptism is essential is because of how essential the ark was in the way that
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the water saved those people back in Genesis. But if that didn't really happen,
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then the example loses its potency. Then there is the comparison between Abel's
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faithful service and Christians' faithful service. We emphasize that it's
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possible to worship God faithfully in spirit and in truth. And one of our parts
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of evidence for that is Abel's faithful worship in Hebrews 11 verse 4. He
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worshiped in the way that God had authorized him to worship. But if he
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never existed, then the example loses its potency. So step back from this. We've
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given these 12 New Testament facts and then a handful of New Testament
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doctrines, all of which are compromised by theistic evolution. So when somebody
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today says, it's not a really a big deal if you believe that the days of Genesis
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were 24 hours or if you believe that they might have been eons of time. When
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somebody says that today, I would submit they have just not carefully considered
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everything that the New Testament says about the book of Genesis. And I hasten
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to remind you, we're not talking about scientific evidence today, although
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there's a wealth of scientific evidence to support creation. Just as Genesis said,
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that includes not just biology, but geology as well, and astronomy. We could
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do so much on that. But today we're just saying, if you are committed to the New
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Testament, I submit to you, you are tacitly committed to a literal
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understanding of Genesis 1 and 2. But then we also have Genesis 3, and I want
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to take the remaining minutes. We have 13 minutes and 30 seconds remaining. So
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let's see if we can take the 13 minutes and 30 seconds we have remaining to talk
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about some of the issues that come up in the fall. And this is a huge topic, but
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I've got several different ideas here to run through, and you can take notes or if
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you'd like the slides, you can have them and maybe study it some more on your own
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at your convenience. But one thing we see is the clarity of Revelation. It's always
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true when God reveals Himself, people have sufficient understanding to please
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Him. That doesn't mean that people understand everything that they could
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possibly know if God revealed more. God is as wise in His reservations as He is
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in His revelations, but people can know what God wants them to do. And that was
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true with Eve. Remember the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field
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that the Lord God had made, and he said to the woman,
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indeed has God said, you shall not eat from any tree of the garden.
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God had not said that, and Eve proceeds to try to clarify that. But the devil is
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going to try to confuse Eve about the particular command that God has given.
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And the thing that we remember when we read it is that God had given her
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specific explanation through Adam as to what trees she could eat from and which
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she couldn't, and that was clear. So when people say today that it's impossible to
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really know what God wants us to do, or the Bible is too mysterious. My wife
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Rebecca has a doctor that she's seen several times, and they've had some
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religious discussions because he thinks of himself as a real spiritual person.
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And what he will say, he's not committed to any particular religion, but what he
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will say is something that a lot of people say today, and that is that he
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just loves the mystery of Christianity, and how it's just so spiritual, and you
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never understand it totally. And he talks so much about how hard it is to
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understand, but then if you bring up plain scriptures about what God expects
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us to do, well then those are sort of minimized. He just minimizes those, and
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doesn't really want to talk. He wants to talk about the mystery. He wants to talk
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about how grand and spectacular it is, and he's sort of like Naaman in Second
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Kings 5, where if there's an appeal made towards something we perceive as being
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difficult or grand, then that's appealing, but just a plain command like, go wash
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in the Jordan River seven times, that sort of eludes him. But it was possible
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for Eve to understand what God wanted her to know even then. Number two, the
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cleverness of temptation. So there's the clarity of Revelation, then there's the
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cleverness of the devil's temptation. He appealed to Eve in just the way that
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would lead her astray. He said, you surely will not die. That sounds good.
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Everlasting life sounds good. Of course, she already had that at the time when
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she was eating of the tree of life. She never would have died, but he says, you
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will not die if you eat this other fruit, for God knows that in the day you eat
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from it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.
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That sounds so flattering and appealing, and Eve was a sitting target for that.
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She wanted to be flattered and told how intelligent she could be if she would
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just eat this. So the devil, the devil's not omnipotent, but the devil does use
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the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, the
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things that he knows will appeal to human creatures. He's been subject to
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those types of temptations himself, and he knows that we can be persuaded if our
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guard is not up. Number three, the course of her transgression. There is a
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progression from one step to the other. Look at the beginning of verse 6, when
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the woman saw the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes,
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and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and
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ate. There's a seeing of the fruit, a visual appeal, and then there's an
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understanding, or at least an attempted understanding, of what the fruit could do
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for her, and then there's the actual sin. But there's a process, as we find in
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James chapter 1, 13 and 14, that each man is tempted when he's drawn away of his
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own lust and enticed. Well, here she was enticed, but if she had just said from
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the beginning, I know that that tree is there, I can see it, but God has forbidden
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that, and that's what matters. God has drawn a line, and I'm not going to move
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God's line. Anytime we go into sin, it's because there is a line that God has
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drawn, and we are unwilling to stay on that line. We've got to go and do our own
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thing. Number four, there's a crisis of leadership, because Adam was right there
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with her when she ate the fruit, and she gave to Adam and he ate, but there was no
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leadership on the part of Adam to try to get her to stop doing what she was doing.
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He was responsible for her. There is a responsibility of the husband for the
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spiritual welfare of the wife. She ultimately makes her own decisions, of
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course, but he made no fight against the sin. Look at verse 6b, and she gave also
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to her husband with him, and he ate. So we have to ask ourselves, are we playing
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our roles as husbands to lead our families in the right way? Fathers, do not
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provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the discipline and in the
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instruction of the Lord. And if the wife is in the position of a helper for her
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husband, as Eve was, if the wife is in a position of being obedient to her
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husband, as Eve was supposed to be, then it behooves the husband to lead in the
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right way, to make sure that if the family does just the way the husband
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does, they will all be obedient to God. And that was the challenge that Adam
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failed. Number five, the complication of fractured relationships. Everything gets
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messed up. As soon as this fruit is eaten, then Adam and Eve have to cover
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themselves. There's conflict between the two of them, and there's also alienation
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from God. And that's what sin always does. It separates us from each other, it
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makes relationships complicated, and then it also complicates our relationship
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with God. Isaiah 59 1 and 2 says it separates us from Him. I'm not going to
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take the time to read this, but notice, I'll let you read it on your own time,
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how peaceful and nice and easy everything was before the sin. And then
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as soon as the sin occurs, there's worry, anxiety, fretfulness, concern about what's
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going to happen next, hiding from one another, and hiding from God, and being
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where life is a total mess. Everything that was right goes wrong because of
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sin. And each of us who has sinned, which is all of us who are adults, can look
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back and say, I've made my life worse. It never makes my life better. There's a
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fleeting pleasure associated with it. Eating that fruit, I suppose, was nice. It
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did taste good, I guess, in the moment. Maybe there was a rush of feeling
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independent, but that was quickly overshadowed by the disaster that came
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from eating that fruit. Okay, look at number six then. There is the clearing of
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guilt. God makes it possible in His mercy for the guilt that came about from this
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sin to be absolved. God made a plan for man to be forgiven of his sins right
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there at the beginning. There was an animal sacrifice which resulted in the
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skins of clothing that Adam and Eve had. Adam and Eve could be right with God
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after that, but most important, God made a prediction that the head of the serpent
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would be crushed, even as the offspring of woman would have his heel bruised,
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that the devil who had caused Eve to sin would be ultimately defeated. And we live
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in the happiness that the devil has been defeated. And the devil cannot really
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bite us with his teeth anymore. He can only gum us. The devil can tempt us, but
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we get the choice as to whether we will be led so far into temptation that we are
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caused to sin. And I will put enmity between you and the woman and between
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your seed and her seed. He shall bruise you on the head and you shall bruise him
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on the heel. Finally, the consequences of compromise. Adam and Eve are let out of
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the Garden of Eden, and it is guarded by the angels, and now they no longer have
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access to the tree of life. Of course, we know, because we've read to the end of
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the story, that there is the tree of life in heaven. Not necessarily a literal tree,
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but on either side of the tree of the, I mean, of the river of life in Revelation
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22, there is the tree. And so we have the opportunity to live forever with God. But
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that will be only true if we are able to respect the danger of sin as it is
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presented in Genesis 3 and live in keeping with the principles that God has
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given us. You might think that the entire story of the Bible, this is one way to
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read the Bible, is the story of man's struggle against sin, which God will win
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for him, but only if man will submit his will to God. All of us will sin. That's
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the tragic thing about it, is that we read Genesis 3 and we think, oh, I would
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never do that. If I were in Eve's shoes, I would have enough sense to not eat that
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fruit. But we've all eaten it. We have all gone against God. All of us like sheep
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have gone astray, and we have become rebels and enemies of God, and we just
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have to think to ourselves, will I allow my sin to be punished on the cross? I
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mean, it will be punished. God's a holy God. He is the just and the justifier, so
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he will be just and punish that sin. But will I allow the sin to be punished on
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the cross, or will my sin be punished in hell? Genesis 3 shows us that our sin can
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be punished on the cross. I know the cross is not mentioned. This is the
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Proto-Evangelium, or the first statement of the gospel, the gospel in nation form.
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If you just had Genesis 3.15, you would not know what God was
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going to do, but you would know that the defeat of that serpent was coming. And we
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turn all the way to the end of the Bible in Revelation, and we see that that
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serpent is cast down and permanently punished. He's called that old
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serpent, the deceiver, the devil, and he is punished in hell forever. We get to
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decide if we're going to be with him there. The Bible begins with a serpent
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who tempts Eve to sin, and then it ends asking the question tacitly or
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implicitly asking, do you want to live forever with the serpent, or do you want
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to live forever with the one who redeemed mankind from the curse the
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serpent brought into the world? And everybody who lives gets to experience,
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in many different ways, the disaster of the consequences of what the serpent did.
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I mean, if you read the end of Genesis 3, we're not going to take the time to do
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this, but you see the penalty for the woman in childbirth that comes about as
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a punishment for the sin, and then you see the punishment for the man in terms
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of the difficulty of tilling the soil, working with the earth, and then you see
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both of them cast away from the tree so that physically they will die, so that
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God makes sure everybody feels the pain of the punishment of sin without getting
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the whole measure of it. If you get the whole measure of the punishment for sin,
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you're lost in hell forever, and that place is described in some terrible
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terms. I don't know if they're all to be taken literally, but it's a garbage
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dump from which you can never escape, where there's weeping and gnashing of
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teeth, Mark 9, 43 to 48. It's a prison you can never get out of, 1 Peter 3, 21.
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It's away from the presence of God and his blessings, 2 Thessalonians 1, 9.
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It's a place of conscious torment and bitter regret, Luke 16. The rich man
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lifted up his eyes in torment and wanted somebody to touch his finger to water
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and then touch it to his tongue because he was tormented in the flame. Think
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about those pictures of heaven as the New Testament describes it, and remember
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that the serpent has made his appeal to woman to try to put all people in that,
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and then that God, through the crushing of the serpent's head, has made it
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possible for us to avoid it, and then asked this, is there really any choice to
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be made? The amazing thing about people being lost is that they would choose to
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be with the serpent rather than to be with the Lord who crushed the serpent's
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head. There's not really any choice to be made. When you think about being with the
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devil and his angels forever and ever, or being with the Lord and his angels and
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all of the sainted dead, to be with, I mean, to sit around a table with Abraham,
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Isaac, and Jacob, as Matthew 8 and verse 11 says we can, all of those people who
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were literally historical figures, to be there with Abel and to be there with all
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David and Samuel and Elijah and Elisha and Jesus and John the Baptist, just to
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be with all those forever and ever. That will be wonderful. I'm just tempted to
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go ahead and preach on heaven right now, but the time is gone, and I
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hope that we will take Genesis 1 to 3 for what they actually say, to believe
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them as literal history, and then live in keeping with the spiritual
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implications of what those passages teach. Thank you very much for your good
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attention.