01-16 Adam & Eve Part 2
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Genesis 2:22-25
Genesis 2:22-25
"THE FIRST SUPPER" (Garry Friesen)
(with apologies to Moses ben Amram)
Adam was hungry. He had had a long, challenging day naming animals. His afternoon nap had been refreshing, and his post-siesta introduction to Eve was exhilarating, to say the least. But as the sun began to set on their first day, Adam discovered that he had worked up an appetite.
"I think we should eat," he said to Eve. "Let's call the evening meal 'supper.'"
"Oh, you're so decisive, Adam," Eve said. "I like that in a man. I guess all the excitement of being created has made me hungry, too."
As they discussed how they should proceed, they decided that Adam would gather fruit from the garden, and Eve would prepare it for their meal. Adam set about his task and soon returned with a basket full of ripe fruit. He gave it to Eve and went to soak his feet in the soothing current of the Pishon River until supper was ready. He had been reviewing the animals' names for about five minutes when he heard his wife's troubled voice.
"Adam, could you help me for a moment?"
"What seems to be the problem, dear?"
"I'm not sure which of these lovely fruits I should prepare for supper. I've prayed for guidance from the Lord, but I'm not really sure what He wants me to do. I certainly don't want to miss His will on my very first decision. Would you go to the Lord and ask Him what I should do about supper?"
Adam's hunger was intensifying, but he understood Eve's dilemma. So he left her to go speak with the Lord. Shortly, he returned. He appeared perplexed.
"Well?" Eve said.
"He didn't really answer your question."
"What do you mean? Didn't He say anything?"
"Not much. He just repeated what He said earlier today during the garden tour: 'From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat.' I assure you, Eve, I steered clear of the forbidden tree."
"I appreciate that, but that doesn't solve my problem," Eve said. "What fruit should I prepare for tonight?"
From the rumbling in his stomach, Adam discovered that lions and tigers were not
the only things that growl. So he said, "I've never seen such crisp, juicy apples. I feel a sense of peace about them. Why don't you prepare them for supper?"
"All right, Adam. I guess you've had more experience at making decisions than I have. I appreciate your leadership. I'll call you when supper's ready."
Adam was only halfway back to the river when he heard Eve's call. He jogged back to the clearing where she was working, but his anticipation evaporated when he saw her face. "More problems?" he asked.
"Adam, I just can't decide how I should fix these apples. I could slice them, dice them, mash them, bake them in a pie, a cobbler, fritters, or dumplings. I really want to be your helper, but I also want to be certain of the Lord's will on this decision. Would you be a dear and go just one more time to the Lord with my problem?"
Adam was not keen on bothering the Lord again, but after Eve said some very nice things about him, he agreed to go. When he returned, he said, "I got the same answer as before: 'From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat.'"
Adam and Eve were both silent for a moment. Then with light in his eye, Adam said, "You know, Eve, the Lord made that statement as though it fully answered my question. I'm sure He could have told us what to eat and how to eat it; but I think He's given us freedom to make those decisions. It was the same way with the animals today. He told me to name the animals, but He didn't whisper any names in my ear. Assigning those names was my responsibility."
Eve was incredulous. "Do you mean that we could have any of these fruits for supper?" Eve said. "Are you telling me that I can't miss God's will in this decision?"
"The only way you could do that is to pick some fruit from the forbidden tree. But none of these fruits are from that tree. Why, I suppose we are free to eat a little from each one of them." Adam snapped his fingers and exclaimed, "Say, that's a great idea! Let's have fruit salad for supper!"
Eve hesitated. “What’s a salad?”
That story comes from Garry Friesen’s Decision Making and the Will of God. We can only speculate what that 1st day would have been like for Adam & Eve. There are some observations that can be made about them...
Created fully mature (adults, ability to walk, talk—full vocabulary)
There are some things we just can’t know…did Adam have a belly button, did they have memories of anything? Prior to Gen 3 would they have had any questions concerning God’s will for them?
Tough to answer some of those questions but what we do know is that God made the perfect provision for the crowning achievement of His creation—man and woman. And His provision met the need for both the man and the woman:
21 So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. 22 The Lord God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man.
This is the first wedding ceremony—the establishment of the institution of marriage and the family. Today this institution is being attack fiercely by Satan. From every direction, the god of this world is seeking to destroy what God created for mankind’s good—he’s doing it not so subtly.
You’re probably aware that the month of June is “Pride” month. You see little rainbows in numerous businesses and the result is that our nation (not exclusively) will spend the entire month celebrating perversion, honoring sin, denouncing the very blessing of the the most gracious and generous God who has given humanity the gift of marriage and family. This is what’s under attack. The current attack on the family is the ideology that it can be whatever you want it to be. If you want the traditional family of husband, wife and children…that’s ok (the world believes this is a condition of slavery). If you want 2 dads, 2 moms that’s ok. If you want polygamy or polyandry—there’s no problem. If you want group/communal marriage. This attack (promoted by LGBTQ+ and “Pride month”—I hate that my birthday shares this godless ideology) has had the effect of great hardship and will reap disastrous consequences in the years and decades to come.
And the only solution is to continue to call the world to repentance and faith in LJC.
The Blessedness of Marriage
The Blessedness of Marriage
The first thing we must understand is that God gets to define marriage. God’s definition has always been represented from this first marriage ceremony as the forging together of 1 man and 1 woman. There is nothing to argue about this b/c there is no one else at this point. And what God establishes about marriage (and we know it is a marriage: Mt 19; Mk 10; Eph 5:22-32) is for the good of humanity and ultimately to promote His glory among His creation.
Adam’s Response
Adam’s Response
Notice, Adam’s Response:
Adam speaks 3 times in the Bible (3:10, 12). What he says in 2:23 is a monumental acknowledgement, profound statement of what just happened. This is Adam’s public declaration of his loyalty to Eve. He is swearing allegiance to her b/c she has become the most important human relationship that he will ever have—though he doesn’t know it at this point, they’re going to go thru everything together (the fall, removal from Garden, murder of a son…).
Adam understands what his counterpart is: “bone of my bones...” This was a common Hebrew kinship formula that expresses the closest possible connection that 2 people of 2 groups could ever share. So Adam recognizes that the one corresponding to him was just like him (with the obvious differences that exist b/t male and female).
Adam had been accustomed to naming the animals earlier and he does the same here:
She shall be called “woman” (ʾiššâ) because she was taken out of man (ʾîš)—where a play on words exists in Heb. They are so much like and connected to each other and would share the deepest intimacy that could be known to humans—thru this ecstatic poem Adam declares his loyalty, fidelity to this woman taken from himself—it is his pledge to her and to God for the gift that was given to him.
God Ordains Marriage
God Ordains Marriage
Gen 2:24;
To understand the authority of Gen 2:24 I want to take you to Matthew’s Gospel:
Mt 19:3-6;
The instruction of our Lord is explicit in that He takes His hearers back to the account of creation teaching that it was God who ordained marriage on the 6th day of creation. He is the one who established it and marriage, the blessing of God upon humanity is not up for man’s opinion or suggestion as to what he thinks it ought to be. It cannot be redefined as if God somehow made an error when He ordained this blessed union.
Paul similarly teaches that what happened in Gen 2:24 is foundational to understanding God’s purpose for marriage and how this union becomes the illustration of the union b/t X and His church. To destroy the biblical picture of marriage is to destroy the illustration of how Christ and His Bride relate.
Going back to Gen…thru Moses God reveals the progression of 3 priorities that are necessary for marriage to function the way God intended—they are easy to remember: leave, cleave, weave.
24 For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.
Leave
Leave
1 reason why many marriages fail today is b/c men and women fail to cultivate this primary relationship, establishing their 1st loyalties to one another. This is ultimately a failure to “leave his father and mother...” I would remind you that there is equality before in male and female. One is not superior to the other. But there is a functional leadership (headship) that is established in God creating Adam first then Eve for him (1 Cor 11:3,7,9). Here, the man must exercise that headship by leaving his father and mother—and helping his wife do the same with her parents. Now, there tends to be confusion over what this does and does not mean:
Does not mean:
break off all relations with parents/family
that family bears no responsibility for assisting (1 Tim 5:8)—its often difficult for young couple to find financial independence
Geographic distancing—you don’t have to leave geographically. It was common in Jewish culture to add rooms to the father’s house and that’s where the new couple lived. There could be problems with that—but to leave doesn’t mean you need to put distance b/t you and family (you might as God providentially gives opportunities).
Does mean:
leave behind a dependency relationship (emotional, financial)
leave behind your parent’s temporary God-given authority over you
leave behind the parent-centered, parent-controlled manner of living; running to parents when life gets hard
leave behind the dependence of parent’s approval; not threatened or embittered if parents disagree with you
leave behind the standard of how things are done (mom cooks that differently)
leave behind parents as chief confidants
Sometimes it may be necessary to put physical distance b/t your family and your parents if there are dynamics that make it difficult to cultivate a marriage and 1st loyalties within that union.
Cleave
Cleave
This is borrowed from KJV (shall be joined, hold fast, united to his wife). I was reminded recently that cleave—like a cleaver technically means to separated. the idea behind the Heb term is to stick to, cling to, hold to and speaks of a strong bonding together of objects describing gluing or cementing of those objects.
20 “My bone clings to my skin and my flesh, And I have escaped only by the skin of my teeth.
Ruth 1:14 (NASB95) clinging to Naomi
14 And they lifted up their voices and wept again; and Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her.
2 So all the men of Israel withdrew from following David and followed Sheba the son of Bichri; but the men of Judah remained steadfast to their king, from the Jordan even to Jerusalem.
Deuteronomy 10:20 (NASB95) holding to the Lord
20 “You shall fear the Lord your God; you shall serve Him and cling to Him, and you shall swear by His name.
22 “For if you are careful to keep all this commandment which I am commanding you to do, to love the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways and hold fast to Him,
5 “Only be very careful to observe the commandment and the law which Moses the servant of the Lord commanded you, to love the Lord your God and walk in all His ways and keep His commandments and hold fast to Him and serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul.”
8 “But you are to cling to the Lord your God, as you have done to this day.
When it comes to marriage and God’s instruction is that the man is completely cherish her above all others. He is to consecrate himself (and by way of example the woman is to follow and do likewise) to her, bonding himself in such a way that it would require death to break that bond b/t them.
Weave
Weave
This is the summary of what happens when a husband and wife are joined together in the covenant of marriage before God—they become one flesh. This is a permanent bonding and Paul explains that the spouses now belong to each other.
4 The wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does; and likewise also the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does.
Jesus explains that portion of Gen:
6 “So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.”
This is the most intimate relationship that a husband and wife can enter into (and it doesn’t really have anything to do with sexual intimacy). MacArthur explains it this way:
In God’s eyes they become the total possession of each other, one in mind and spirit, in goals and direction, in emotion and will. When they have a child it becomes the perfect emblem and demonstration of their oneness, because that child is a unique product of the fusion of two people into one flesh and carries the combined traits of both parents.
To leave, cleave and weave is God’s design for marriage. It is this design, the marriage of 1 man and 1 woman that is severely under attack today. There has been the massive undertaking to pervert God’s design by legalizing same-sex marriage and that perversion cascades into the perversion of the most foundational definitions of what is male and female. You can see the relationship that when marriage and the family is destroyed, children are brought up with fluid definitions of what marriage is and even fluid definitions of what it means to be male or female. The month of June is a prolonged celebration of that very perversion—using something that is very precious to us—the symbol of God’s covenant with humanity in Gen 9—the rainbow.
Gen 8:20-22; 9:8-17;
Back to Adam & Eve—what a fullness of life and fellowship they enjoyed in Paradise—all centered around the simplicity of God’s instruction to worship and obey. They had an unhindered, unrestricted fellowship with God, the had a one-flesh unity b/t themselves and there was truly an innocence in their condition:
25 And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.
We can’t even really talk about nakedness without the shame and embarrassment that comes from the fall. With our fallen minds and weak flesh we gravitate toward those things/thoughts which are not edifying.
The Book of Genesis, Chapters 1–17 (6. The Creation of Woman (2:21–25)) HAMILTON
With the exception of this verse, nakedness in the OT is always connected with some form of humiliation. The three major uses of nakedness are: (1) as a description of the poor (Job 24:7, 10; 31:19; Ezek. 18:16); (2) as a sign of shame or guilt (Gen. 3:7, 10, 11; Ezek. 16:22, 37, 39; Hos. 2:3; Amos 2:16; Mic. 1:8); (3) in reference to birth (Job 1:21; Eccl. 5:15). A full documentation of all passages would show that nakedness as a symbol of guilt is most frequent, and perhaps such a connection between nakedness and guilt was suggested by the abbreviated dress of slaves and prisoners of war.14 (“Naked” occurs with “shame” in Gen. 2:25; Isa. 20:4; 47:3; Mic. 1:11; Nah. 3:5.)
Adam & Eve knew no such thing, no shame, no guilt—not yet! For we know what lies ahead in ch 3. Luther describes this verse:
Genesis 1–11:26 (3) The Man’s Companion, the First Woman (2:18–25)
“Therefore this passage points out admirably how much evil followed after the sin of Adam. For now it would be regarded as the utmost madness if anyone walked about naked.”
But this is the pre-fall condition of God’s creation and this is also where we have God’s declaration of His own enjoyment of what has been created:
31 God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.
Genesis & Exodus (Commentary) Allen Ross
God intended that the man and the woman be a spiritual, functioning unity, walking in integrity, serving God together, and keeping his commandments. When this harmony is operative, society flourishes under God’s blessing. Improper innovations only introduce chaos and ruin into society (see 4:19; 6:1–4).
Commit your marriages and your families to the principle of honoring God in these relationships and you’ll encounter the blessing and goodness of God.