Sermon Tone Analysis

Woman in God’s Creation Totally Not an After thought

​ ESV

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.

And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

When God made man He did so in community.

It wasn’t a him who made man, it was an US that made man.

It should not come by suprise then that when God made man a him was not in mind, but always a “them”.

When God made man there was always a male and a female in mind.

Females were not an after thought, rather they were always a part of God’s plan.

God made man in His own image, after His likeness.

So if God was a “US”, then mankind had to also be a “them” - always plural and never singluar.

Always community and never isolation.

For God, the Son and the Spirit and the Fater, to look into the mirror and only see a singular or isolated man by himself would distort the image of God.

So hopefully its clear that females and males were in mind when God made man.

He refers to “them”, male and female, when He says “let them have dominion over the fish” or “…male and female He created them” or “God blessed them” or “…God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it...” or “Behold, I have given you (plural) every plant…for food”.

God prepared a world for “them” In fact, this was observation that God made after making Adam: “It is not good for man to be alone”.

Adam was on the earth as a single, but in the mind of God "man” always existed as we and as such there was a deviation.

So to fix things He took the rib from Adam’s side and fashioned a woman.

The woman was never an after-thought.

She was always in the mind of God and now that she was with the man, when God looks into the mirror, His reflection is no longer distorted.

The two were one () God’s perfect likeness, His perfect image was restored.

“Let US make man in our image, after our likeness”

So here it is: male and female were both made in the image and likeness of God.

Both were to have dominion over living things.

Both were blessed.

This world was prepared for both of them.

You need male and female to see the image of God accurately.

You need female and male to see God’s likeness holistically.

Seeing male apart from woman is like observing light without darkness, like heat without cold; how does one exist without the other?

How does chaos exist without serene?

How does the female exist without male and how does the male exist without female.

I love the way Paul states that in the Lord the woman is not independent of the man and man is not of woman.

We need both and they need each other.

Both need God.

Which brings me to a key point—why does Adam need Eve?

What role does she play?

ESV

Nevertheless, in the Lord woman is not independent of man nor man of woman; for as woman was made from man, so man is now born of woman.

And all things are from God.

Husbands who is your wife to you?

What is her purpose, her aim?

We know her role and identify is priceless and irreplaceable.

We cannot remove her from creation, from life.

She must be there, she must be in the picture.

Not as an assistant, not as a maid, not as a convenient sexual partner.

She is more significant than what she does or what she looks like—she is the Oxygen that if removed from Hydrogen all the water on earth would cease to exist.

How do we as men treat someone that plays such an important of a role?

Let me introduce you to: Ezer Knegdo.

Adam called her Woman.

Her other name was Eve.

My Ezer Knegdo’s name is Uwem.

Point being: her place in my life is for life and is irreplaceable.

The Meaning of Ezer Knegdo

I will just come right out and say it: Ezer means to help with a meaning of deliverance or rescuing.

This implies that she has the ability help and to deliver, to rescue.

She is not an African American maid as in “The Help”.

She is not weak and fragile.

“Help” as recorded in , is written in the Hebrew implying that the one bringing the help has the capability to come to someone’s aid.

Judah needed God to fight for him and help him against his enemies.

God is certainly not weak.

God certain has the capabilities it takes to deliver.

So applying a “weak” or subservient meaning or sense to the word “helper” is completely inaccurate.

No, husbands, our Ezer’s are mighty and able to give aid.

Furthermore, we are the ones that need the help, the deliverance, the rescue, the strength they can supply.

Does she necessarily have your physical strength or speed?

Maybe not, but is that the only type of strength that matters?

ESV

And this he said of Judah: “Hear, O Lord, the voice of Judah, and bring him in to his people.

With your hands contend for him, and be a help against his adversaries.”

Knegdo is a combination of three words which gives a picture of the woman standing opposite to the man, face to face, with the idea that she is comparable to him—similar to him.

Face to face, not below, not above, not behind—face to face.

She is not in competition with him, she is an Ezer, there to help him.

Our world and culture can teach and does teach differently.

But there was never a “lesser than” idea in the mind of God when he made woman.

Husbands it’s important to see her not as opposition or a threat, or as lesser than or weaker than.

She is similar to you and there to help you.

Her wisdom, strength, beauty, nurturing, relational abilities are meant to help you.

Perspective of Women in My Early Days

So now that we’ve got the theory understood, let’s talk about real life.

I did not grow up with this understanding.

My role models did not have this paradigm.

My childhood friends did not see females this way.

From 4th grade until my 30’s, my perspective of women was painfully disjointed from God’s idea of Ezer Knegdo.

This is difficult to write, but I think I need to be honest and transparent.

My early childhood friends were all girls.

I played house.

I played with dolls.

I even played with Barbie dolls.

I got along better with girls than I did with boys.

In my early days, however, it was an insult to do girl things.

It was an insult to be slower than a girl, get beat at a sport by a girl, and it was socially unacceptable to wear girl colors.

Though many of my friends were girls, some of my best friends were girls, as I grew up, this became less and less acceptable.

Naturally too, girls were less friends and my world was opened up to the idea of romantic relationships with them.

So in my head a shift took place from buddy to potential girlfriend.

Early on this was not sexually motivated.

I was a romantic as a child always hoping to one day find the “one” that I would fall in love with and be with forever.

Some of my favorite movies as a child were Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, Pretty Woman, and My Girl because I loved when the man and the woman, the boy and girl, would finally fall in love.

I wanted to be in the movie, I wanted this to be me one day.

Early on I never knew what sex was.

I didn’t even think about it.