January 13 - Part 3, God reconciled all things back to him through Jesus

Yesterday I introduced the second part of the meta narrative of the Bible. Today I want to give you the third one and tomorrow the fourth and final piece of the Meta Narrative. So let me recap the first two. We aren’t spending extended periods of time on the second part because we will come back to it regularly. Tomorrow I will give you the fourth piece that we will also talk about extensively. But let’s recap the first two. 

 

Part 1 - In the beginning, chaos consumed all things. Yet the Spirit of God stepped into the middle of the chaos and created life. So to summarize part 1 - God stepped into the middle of the chaotic darkness and spoke life in the middle of the darkness. 

 

Part 2 - humanity is still drawn to the chaos of the darkness

 

Part 3 - Well, part 3 is the most important part of all. And we first hear about it in the middle of the curse found in Genesis 3. So let me read it again and show you what it is all about. 

 

Genesis 3:8-19

Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as eh was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid form the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, “where are you?” 

 

He answered, “I heard you in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.” 

 

And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?”

 

The man said, “The woman you put here with me - she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.” 

 

Then the Lord God said to the woman, “what is this you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” 

 

So the Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, “Cursed are you love all livestock and all wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heal.” 

 

To the woman he said,

 

“I will make your pains in childbearing very severe; with painful labor you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and eh will rule over you.” 

 

To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’ 

 

“Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat food form it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for  you, and you will eat the plants of the field. But the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since form it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.” 

 

 

There is a lot unfolding in this curse that is pronounced to Adam, Eve, and the Serpent. . . Even the ground. All things were cursed when sin was brought into the world through Adam and Eve’s disobedience. 

 

First the serpent was cursed for deceptively causing Adam and Eve to allow the darkness to come back into the world. And the sentence was that the serpent would be the most cursed above all livestock and wild animals. Not only that, it would crawl along the ground on its belly and eat dust.

 

A little further down, you have the pronouncement of Eve’s curse. Now part of this is prescriptive, and the other part is descriptive. Now you can tell which part is prescriptive because it start with the words - I will make. . . The descriptive simply explains part of what will happen. Listen to this again. “I will make your pains in childbearing very sever; with painful labor you will give birth to children.” This was the punishment for the curse.

 

One might ask, “Why would God cause pain as part of this curse?” 

 

To that, I say. . . I don’t know. 

 

Maybe it was so that every time a woman gives birth she is reminded of the work and pain it is to follow God’s plan. It doesn’t come easily. Or maybe it was just to be a reminder that we are in a fallen state. I don’t fully understand why God pronounced lasting pain and suffering. But he did it for a reason. So we have to understand that there is a constant reminder that we should follow His plans fully! Otherwise, we will experience pain. See because the next part is descriptive. 

 

It says, “Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” 

 

This wasn’t a curse that God put on woman. This was the effects of what happens when sin enters the world. The order that God created of Man and Woman working together as helpmates, now has chaos introduced back into it. And the result, though God desires man and women to work together in causing all things to thrive and reproduce, that order will now be subjected to chaos. The result - man will think themselves better or more powerful than woman, ultimately forgetting what without woman, man is not good in their state of singleness. 

 

But there is an important piece that involves both the woman and the serpent that is pronounced here in this curse. It’s sandwiched between the woman the serpent’s sentence. God prescribes this part as well because it starts with the words, “I will put. . . “

 

Vs. 15 - I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” 

 

The first part of this in the Hebrew was instantaneous. I will put enmity - which means hostility and hatred - I will put enmity between your offspring and hers. God made sure that it was obvious that there was a distinction between the ways of this serpent and the ways of God. This once again echoes the separation that took place in chapter one when God separated the light and the darkness. God caused instant separation that was obvious and identifiable. 

 

But then listen to the second part that God was making happen. 

 

“I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers. He will cuirass your head and you will strike his heel.”

 

Who is this talking about? 

 

Jesus! 

 

Here just three chapters into the Bible narrative, we see God talking about reconciling all things. While this serpent will have offspring that will cause hostility and hatred toward the people of God, the woman would have a child that would crush the head of this serpent. 

 

So while the serpent struck the heal of the woman’s offspring - Jesus being put to death on the cross - the woman’s offspring would crush the head of the serpent - Jesus rising from the dead and eventually throwing the devil into the lake of burning sulfur. 

 

Now get this prophecy.

 

Jesus would crush the head of the serpent after being struck on the heal. 

 

To understand this more, let me read 2 Corinthians 5:16-21

 

So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from god, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. 

 

Just a spoiler here, not only does this part help us understand the 3rd part of the biblical meta narrative, but it also just gave you the forth part too. You can figure it out, but we will talk about it tomorrow. 

 

But understand what happened here, 

 

Part 1 - God created life in the middle of the chaos, Part 2, mankind is drawn to the chaos and allowed it back into creation, then Part 3, so God reconciled mankind back to him through Jesus. 

 

Let me give you a definition of reconciliation. 

 

This word means to change, or exchange - as in coins - for others of equivalent value. 

 

Jesus paid the price through his death for something equal in value - us being in relationship with God. 

 

Why? 

 

Because this has been the desire of God’s order since the creation began. He wants us to be in right relationship with him, and the only way to make that happen was to make sure we were part of his order again. So Jesus paid the price for us to be made right with God again. Death, was equally traded for our relationship with God. Not our death, but the death of Jesus.

 

Jesus paid the price for us to be reconciled back to God. 

 

And that is part 3 of the meta narrative of the Bible. 

 

So again, 

 

Part 1, God created order out of chaos. Part 2, mankind is drawn to the chaos. Part 3, God reconciled us back to him through Jesus. And part 4, will be revealed tomorrow. . . . 

 

But reread our passage from 2 Corinthians 5:16-21 and see if you can figure out what that third part is before tomorrow. But for now, that’s all the time we have left for today. I love you, and God bless!