Marriage Counseling in Eden

Well as we press forward in Genesis 3 We're not quite toward the end yet.

We're gonna be looking at verses 10 through 13 this morning and then from that next week, we'll

Thankfully have Greg brother preached to us That's in part in anticipation for the little

McDonald, baby And then after that Lord willing on the 8th, we'll come back and finish chapter 8

Story chapter 3. I'll take us to the very end. So this morning we're continuing on what we began a few weeks ago

We looked at the fall and then last week we even considered the fallout of the fall you begin of course with this alienation between man and God and That alienates man from himself now that heart of flesh becomes a heart of stone

Now the soul is dead and trespass and in sin Though the body is alive the body's now decayed

So first man is immediately cut off alienated separated from God and then from himself

Everything is at war within himself and then from nature That which man inhabited this

Edenic paradise was meant to draw him toward God toward God's goodness Toward the infinite complexity of God and yet the divine simplicity the goodness and of the artistry of God every leaf that he saw

Would have the glow of of the divine touch and and now we see man actually using creation as a barrier to God instead

Of being drawn to God through it. He tries to use it to hide himself from God He he makes a covering out of leaves.

He presses himself into the ground to hide And then of course we see as we move into verses 10 through 13 that man is at odds with his neighbor

Man is at odds with his spouse man is at odds with His flesh in that one flesh union that we looked at in chapter 2 and so this morning

We're looking at the continuation of the fallout of the fall and that is the marriage the effect of the curse of sin upon marriage the corrupting effects upon the relationship between a husband and a wife and That begins well,

I'll begin in verse 9, but we'll be looking at verses 10 through 13 The Lord God called to Adam and said to him.

Where are you? So he said I heard your voice in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself

And he said who told you that you were naked Have you eaten from the tree of which

I commanded you that you should not eat? Then the man said the woman whom you gave to be with me.

She gave me of the tree and I ate And the Lord God said to the woman. What is this you've done?

The woman said the serpent deceived me and I ate The relationship

Adam and Eve had with God was perfect They delighted in him and he delighted in them

But as we've seen as a result of the fall pure fellowship Pure fellowship between God and man was broken

God takes the initiative by grace to restore Something of what was lost, but it's not pure fellowship

It's not what it was and it won't be until the finality of the redemption that God introduced into the world

The relationship between man and God then was perfect now broken The relationship

Adam and Eve had with each other was also perfect man delighted in woman woman delighted in man

But as a result of the fall pure fellowship between man and woman between husband and wife

Was broken and We still in our marriages retain the effects of the fall pure fellowship.

What was? Has been broken. I remember as a boy as you might have heard me say in times past.

I was sort of a GI Joe kid and That meant usually much to my sister's embarrassment that I always dressed up in fatigues from the

Mass Army Navy store whenever I got home from school, and I remember one day going over my neighbor's house and His mom had gotten this wonderful gift this beautiful ceramic bowl imported from Italy from a relative beautiful It had beautiful paintings of fruits on it, and it was the pride of her living room table well,

I had a dud pineapple grenade on my h -strap suspenders and Unfortunately, my little paperclip came out in that little you know, two -pound metal sphere smashed that bowl to smithereens

That that is what happens with the fall now You could painstakingly superglue those pieces together and have some semblance of what it was

What it was meant to be like the contours the shape you'd get a sense of the decoration, but no one could say

This is how it was And that's how it is even on the best marriages in this fallen world

No one could say this is truly what it would have been like as God designed marriage to be

We're cracked. We're chipped. We're broken. There's pieces missing Even the redemption that that has begun to work in us and through us in our relationships is only a faint

Dim echo of what God had originally given and what God will ultimately restore

As God had created the world there never would have been a need for marriage counseling think about that Marriage counselors would be out of business if it weren't for the fall

There would be no Jay Adams writing the books that Jay Adams writes Wayne Mack would never write strengthening your marriage because every marriage would be perfectly strong.

I Don't know what the ladies would study on Fridays It wouldn't be adorned because adorned probably wouldn't have been written if there hadn't been a fall

And this is all because Eden was perfect prior to the fall. So only moments before where we are in chapter 3

There was no discord There was no lack of harmony no sense of tension no irritation

Can you imagine a marriage without a glimmer of irritation? Not a glimmer a little too much pepper on the mashed potatoes, you know none of that a

Husband that's just sort of ho honey. I've had such a long day. Can you take care of this? No irritation.

Can you imagine what that would have been like no sense of lack? No unfulfilled desire from each other or for each other perfect harmony

But as a result of entering into sin that sin immediately corrupts their relationship to God and therefore their relationship with each other

It's not coincidental that the law is given in this very order That the law is given first by respect of our relationship to God and second

Bound up with it by relationship to our neighbor That's how Jesus summarizes the law of how we love

God and the second being like it of how we love our neighbor as ourself The image of God as it was reflected originally by Adam and Eve.

That's the significance of Genesis 128 Not simply as individuals but as man and wife in this mysterious

Union that image of God expressed in human community Comprised this love for God and this love for one another love for God and love for neighbor are

Inseparable they're part of what it means to be the image of God. They're part of how we reflect God There's an individuality.

That's that's as true and as necessary as community now That's less so in us than it is in God in terms of God's essence

But nevertheless, we see it reflected and we live in a time where our individuality is pressed over against our sense of community

There's a reason that opioid use and depression and suicide rates have increased since March It's because of this human beings weren't made to be alone

So what's fractured and distorted by the fall is this marriage relationship that once? Existed in perfect harmony

There's an immediate dysfunction and we see it as soon as the falls taking place Even in the temptation dynamics leading up to the act that really is the fall

And so let's consider how to counsel Adam and Eve in Eden Immediately after the fall as we examine these dynamics and then apply them to us

We've already considered in times past that Adam was given specific tasks in Eden Remember Genesis 1 27 and following God created man in his own image in the image of God He created him male and female.

He created them and God blessed them and God said to them be fruitful multiply fill the earth and Subdue it have dominion over the fish of the sea over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves on the earth

Adam and Eve together carried out this calling of dominion together They served as vice regents and what

God had given them and they were to expand the glorious order and presence of God over the face of the earth beginning from Eden and then stretching to the very end of it as they produced

Generations that like them would reflect God's glory God's perfection God's goodness.

This was meant to be man's role Secondly in Genesis 2 15 and following we see something specific given to man

The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and to keep it

Notice specifically that this is given to man Work and keeping as we've said from before looking at numbers three for instance

This is what the priests do in the tabernacle So this is all by way of review

Eden is sort of the primordial temple If by temple we mean the dwelling place of God the tabernacle is then decorated to look like Eden Solomon's temple then has decorations inspired by the

Spirit of God to look like Eden The temple is this garden like presence of God.

It's a temple garden John picks us up in Revelation 22 we return to Eden and now it's also the heavenly

Jerusalem Which is as a city the whole temple and there is no Sun the light comes from the

Lamb It's this beautiful picking up of all of these biblical themes culminating at the very end of Scripture But significantly in numbers three

We read that the priests were called to attend to and to work and it's the same words to to guard and to keep to work

To a bod to keep or guard Shamar and this is what Adam is tasked to do in Eden In other words

Adam is a priest So going back to 216 the Lord God commanded the man

Saying of every tree of the garden you may freely eat. Did you notice that? The Lord God commanded the man

To tend and to keep the garden of Eden as a priest Would tend and keep the tabernacle of God's presence and in 216

God commanded the man of Every tree of the garden you may freely eat

But if the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat for in the day you eat of it You shall surely die So Adam is the guard

Adam is the protector Adam is the keeper Adam is the one who has the commandment

God commanded the man. So what does that require of the man? Not only is he to be the priest, but he's to be the prophet

He must now declare God's Word. This is what God has said to us concerning this tree My wife listened to me

Do not go near this tree Do not provoke the Lord All right, he's the one that's the guard he's the one that's to protect

He's the one that's received the word and therefore he's the one that must declare the word and that's how we come to Genesis 3

And we find a serpent so much more cunning in a class all his own this ancient serpent the dragon and in that cunning

He goes to the woman Because the woman's not the guard or the keeper

Per se the woman's not the prophet And so he goes to the woman to tempt him

We shall not eat of every tree of the garden did God really say this The cunning serpent goes after Eve not

Adam Adam Fails to guard the garden from the presence of the serpent Adam fails to protect

His wife Eve he fails as we'll see to sacrifice himself So all these fallen dynamics come on the head of Adam We read with our eyes trained on the activity that's taking place

And that's why we always have our little reformed dad jokes about a you know if you don't like giving birth you shouldn't have eaten the fruit

What should stand out to us is the absence of Adam in chapter 3 Where is

Adam? Where's the guard? Where's the keeper? Where's the head? Where's the leader?

Where's the warrior? Where's the king? That's what should scream out to us

Why is why is chapter 3 all about Eve at the beginning the absence of Adam is something that should should immediately grab our attention

When the woman saw that the tree was good for food that it was pleasant to the eyes and a tree desirable to make one

Wise she took of its fruit and she ate and she gave to her husband with her as we said a few weeks ago

He's there. He's he's with her. He's standing next to her completely mute Completely complacent completely complicit.

He's not guarding. He's not protecting. He's not acting as a head. He's not laying himself down He's not acting as a prophet.

He's not rebuking. He's not exhorting. He's not directing. He's not reminding He's not saying god forbid.

We do this evil in his sight. Do you know what he said? He's laid out the curses So the first thing we see with Adam is this this utter selfishness this utter selfishness

We see it then Continue as the narrative unfolds Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the

Lord God among the trees of the garden It's interesting in Hebrew in Hebrew you can attach a pronoun to as a suffix to the end of a noun and that's what we have here

We actually have it attached to the verb The pronoun for Adam is part of the verb to hide and that emphasizes that Adam is hiding himself

Adams about Adam So here's the fall and we read in our translation

Adam and his wife hid themselves More literally, it's Adam hid himself in his wife.

It's kind of like the wife's an afterthought Yeah, just lay down there. I'm about protecting myself

So immediately there's this there's this emphasis on Adams Selfishness and his absconding from his role to be the protector the keeper the one who would sacrifice himself for his bride

And the Lord God called to Adam and said to him you see Adam confessed this When the

Lord God called to Adam and said to him, where are you? He said I heard your voice in the garden. I was afraid because I was naked.

I hid myself. I hid myself I Didn't stand between even you

Lord. I hid myself It's the opposite of Christ, isn't it

He stands as it were between the sinner and the wrath of the father and he cries out father forgive them

It's the opposite here Crisis, I lay my life down for the sheep. He puts himself in that place of judgment

Even though it's not a judgment. He deserved Adam deserves this judgment and he wants nothing to do with Eve So he's not guarding her it's not guarding the garden he's not guarding his wife's heart he's not guarding her from temptation

He's not leaving her. He's not protecting her He's not sacrificing himself where there's a need to sacrifice

All of these things guarding protecting sacrificing. Do you notice that these are all? Actions they require effort.

They're labor -intensive. They can be exhausting. It takes work to guard You have to be proactive.

You have to be alert. You have to be thoughtful You have to think through the trajectory of decisions If I don't do this at this time or if we start going down this path, what will this become there's an activity to that It's it's exhausting.

It takes work protecting Always always being able and prepared

Being equipped to protect and then in the midst of that crisis or in that moment or in that situation

To lay down yourself to sacrifice yourself. It's the ultimate form of protection. All of this is activity.

All of this is activity So the great sin of husbands then The great failure behind all these failures is passivity

If all of this is activity the great failure of Adam and every husband since Adam is passivity passivity

The fall corrupted God's design of loving sacrificial other oriented headship into hostile self -serving

Often overbearing but more often completely in different passivity. I You know,

I realize there are some Husbands who tend to be more overbearing and more selfishly dominant and that that is certainly a result of the fall

But in my experience every husband is passive in one stripe or another it tends to be that that aggressive dominance

That selfish dominance comes out in all the areas. It shouldn't and the passivity

Comes out in all the areas It shouldn't where a man should be aggressive where he should be dominant We should have these masculine instincts that tends to be where the man is passive Indifferent lazy and selfish and on the things that he he should be passive.

He should be loving It shouldn't be a big deal there for some reason he becomes very dominant very obsessive

Very upset if he doesn't get his way see everything is corrupted in on itself

What we've seen Adam up to this point is a shocking passivity a scandal of spiritual laziness a

Willful sleeping at the wall While the enemy breaches and destroys and burns down what is what has been so good and so perfect Adam quickly then blames

Eve for his sin He doesn't protect her. He doesn't lead her. He doesn't sacrifice for her

He hides himself without any thought to her and when he gets called out he blames her instead of taking responsibility before God for his own actions his own sins

Instead of covering her of doing what Moses did with Miriam when Miriam was really persecuting

Moses instead when God begins to bring judgment upon Miriam Moses intercedes

Show mercy God. We don't see that in Adam Notice even how he talks of her it's degrading from from the get -go the woman

You gave to me the woman you gave me you named her. She has a name

You named her You named her when you looked upon her and your heart leaps for joy and you spontaneously composed a love song

Flesh of my flesh and bones of my bones and and she was the sort of exclamation point on your worship of God's goodness

And artistry this was the greatest of all of his creations and you named her Eve the mother of all living

But now it's just this woman you gave to me You see already the hostility and the resentment that's taking place in this relationship

She gave me of the tree That's not a way for a guardian a protector a leader a head or a king to think

It doesn't it doesn't matter the mechanics we all know that the one in authority is where the buck stops

Adam has this role of authority. We saw that if you saw the the VP debate, right? We know that you know,

Barack Obama and Joe Biden weren't welding cages, right for ice compounds But the reason you can say who built the cages

Joe who built the cages Joe The reason that's effective is because if you were in charge ultimately you're responsible

Adam's in charge. He's responsible But instead of owning that responsibility

Instead of saying you called me you gave me that commandment about the tree. You gave me the warning

You made me the prophet you made me the priest in the garden You made me the garter and the keeper of the sanctity and of the purity of my wife you you put that upon me instead

Now it's this distanciation. She gave me of the tree and I hate she put me up to it It's almost like she deceived me it's really me against the serpent in my wife

That's how Adams portraying it Sin does what sin always does it spurns the good gift of God and with it it spurns the giver

Who is God it isolates? It becomes so selfish that it becomes blind into selfishness.

It rejects any thought or concern for the other It denies any and all responsibility The people lose self -awareness in sin they become so hardened in it so indifferent to the damage that it causes

So oblivious to the way that they portray themselves Adam this head this guardian this protector who is in one flesh with Eve is essentially saying

God She did it condemn her When you gave me that commandment you said in the day you eat of it you will die.

She did it Judge her kill her kill her God We can go back to how things were if you just kill her

What a leader what a lover What a head what a guardian how how anti Christic is that?

Christ exclaims of his bride father the same words. She did it But condemn me and judge me and kill me and show her mercy

Christ shows us what the husband truly was meant to be Why that authority was given to him why he was made head

That he would be a covering that he would be a fortress that he would be a refuge

Adam had been God's vice -regent in this perfect world and now he's a selfish hardened coward blaming others for his sin and The spineless blame goes so far

Adam even insinuates that God is somehow to blame The woman whom you gave to be with me

So on our hey, you know things were pretty good between us Lord Now I know you said it wasn't good. I was alone, but I wasn't complaining

You gave her to be with me It was your fault really if you think about it begins to blame

God for his sin his passivity And that's almost comical to us it's so absurd and yet we do the same things in a myriad of ways

We blame God by blaming the circumstances of the situations whenever we speak of having to make the wrong choices

We are in effect blaming God. I was put it was put before me. What else could I do?

We begin to think my little Eden would be perfectly fine without my Eve I was doing great in my walk

Eve ruined everything It's a passive selfish cowardly absconding husband that thinks that way

And people all over the world do this they blame God for their problems and their choices and their sins

Adam should have pondered the words that he said the woman whom you gave to be with me verse 12

The reality is God did give Eve to him to be with him for what?

To be guarded to be protected to be a co -laborer in the work of Dominion to be a co -heir of the glory of God To point to the mysterious fulfillment of Christ in his church

He's using as a negative the woman you gave to be with me instead of seeing that's the calling You gave a woman to be with me.

You gave me this woman. You gave me charge You called me to certain responsibilities

You must be the kind of head that will guard and keep that will nourish and protect that will comfort and help that will work together

Unto the calling that I've given to both of you So husbands

How's your priesthood How's your Eden How are you dwelling with the woman that God gave to be with you?

God gave her to be with you Are you guarding her? Are you protecting her?

All that activity that requires thinking through decisions not just for the day or the week but for the decade to come

Things that we're doing now that are gonna form such deep ruts of routine that they'll be impossible to climb out of in five or ten years that kind of guardianship that kind of sense of protecting

Are you covering? In other words, are you laying your life down and sacrifice?

When it's your needs Against the direction that God would have you go.

Do you willingly deflate your ego? Do you willingly set aside yourself? Do you not seek to do your pleasure?

But the pleasure of him who called you For the good of she whom he gave to be with you

Are you dwelling with them as Peter would say do you know where they are spiritually? It's hard to be a priest if you don't know where the person you're ministering to is spiritually

There's a sense that every believer is a priest, of course But I'm saying there's something unique about the role that God gives to a man to a husband

There's a spiritual guardianship a spiritual headship, that's very much like unto a priesthood. It's a great book

I'd encourage you to read it by Samuel Waldron called the man as priest in his home Where he lays out the principles here, it's very important You can be right next to her and be oblivious Dwelling with doesn't mean that somehow just because you're occupying the same space means you're fulfilling any one of these things

Adam was right next to Eve Blindly failing everything that he was meant to do as a husband

So it's not proximity that equals success. It's not being around Or giving scant attention, it's actually this active spiritual labor

And if you're like me you feel the weight of that you feel your failures in a day by day How passive you can be on things that matter the most?

And how the only things that get a rise out of you are things that ultimately don't matter the things that relate to your comfort things that relate to your ambitions

The husband's not just called to be there but to know his wife to know his wife That's a euphemism in Scripture for marital intimacy, but it's it's more than that.

It's not just that it's more than that It's it's recapturing this idea of of the harmony

The harmony which is truly knowing the other as you know yourself that that's the biblical vision

To see God as he is to know God as he is from a creaturely perspective We again and again and again return to Ephesians 5 for husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church gave himself for her

He guards his bride he protects her he lays himself down for her

He sanctifies and cleanses her with his word he presents her to himself glorious No spot, no wrinkle nor any such thing.

She's holy Without blemish That's work

Christ is our high priest in heaven. He's doing the work of a husband You need to know your wife what does she struggle with?

What does she often mention What seems to be a recurrent theme? Can you detect some root of bitterness or envy that you need to take the time and the patience and the care to uproot?

You're in the unique position to guard her soul and protect her soul Has she been spending time obsessing over worldly things or worldly issues?

There's some blind spot that she's unaware of and she's been unaware for a long time You can't be passive with that You have to do the work of recognizing that and it's a spiritual endeavor

Lord Help me help me to lead her through this Lord. Help me to guard her from from the world the flesh and the devil

Help me to be a head that that's guiding her on this on this holy way Lord It presupposes that the husband understands the word and that he can wash her with it

That means that the husband as a priest is is a student of the word. He's hiding the word in his heart

He's meditating upon the word day by day He's creating the the spiritual carwash as it were within his own soul

And you have to know then where you yourself are weak Where you yourself need washing and often it's in that very dynamic as you're seeking to minister to lead to guard

It's causing you to be convicted to be humbled to cry out for the cleansing touch of a

Savior Often it's in that very marital dynamic. It's not that you're some reservoir sanctification and oh my poor wife.

She's so spiritually weak Let me go help her again. It's rather in the dynamic that as you feel this calling from God, it reveals all of these

You know Ungodly things in your own life and walk and so you're dependent upon the same mercy that you'll be then showing to her

You're asking to receive the same grace that you're hoping to impart to her. There's a spiritual dynamic to this

Each of you then must know how to possess your own vessel and sanctification first Thessalonians 4

You have to know to possess your own vessel. It's yours You don't blame others for its current state you guard you protect you keep it's your commandment your calling your responsibility

You're the priest in your home You're the head in your marriage Marriage counseling

When you have a couple we all know this, right? You know you as the counselor you put your seat directly in front of the husband

Doesn't mean the wife doesn't have issues that have to be worked out It just means the husband is the head

Ultimately, there will be no change apart from changing him Husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies

He who loves his wife loves himself. No one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes it Cherishes it just as the

Lord does the church Remembers of his body of his flesh of his bones, you see

All those things that Adam had peeled away from in Genesis 3 That in Christ we see restored

Paul when he's dealing with marriage issues in the church But help of going back to Genesis 3 and then speaking of Christ from that going back to Genesis 2 and speaking of Christ from that And this is how he's addressing marriage to the church

He says that a husband nourishes and cherishes himself in the same way He ought to nourish and cherish his wife.

He must love her in this way the same way that Christ loves his bride That means that there's a gentleness in a husband that's grounded in and reflective of Christ Some of you know and I think

I've mentioned it. I've been reading a Book by Gavin Ortlund on the gentleness and meekness of Christ You said of Moses that he was the meekest man on the face of the earth

I think it was said should be said of Christ that he was the gentlest There's a gentleness to being a husband

It's not this endless series of irritations But then you you swallow

Every third and you sit back content like I've gotten a lot better with my frustration my temper

I only get mad about a few things in any given day Wherever you're irritable

You're essentially doing what Adam did you're blaming God you're saying things would be better without her

You're not saying you gave her to be with me this blessing this co -laborer my flesh my body

I'm gonna be endlessly gentle. I'm gonna nourish. I'm gonna cherish I'm gonna become weak to meet her weakness

I'm gonna put myself aside This is a principle it begins in the marriage and it works its way out into other relationships if you can't do it in your marriage

Husband, you're not gonna able to do it in any relationship But if you can do it in your marriage the most demanding the most pivotal

Of all relationships in this earth horizontally Then there's no relationship that you couldn't exhibit these same

Christlike qualities in This is a Christian principle and I'm saying it begins in the marriage

We who are strong ought to bear with the scruples of the week Romans 15 1 and 3 not to please ourselves for even

Christ Did not please himself The Christian principle is honors given to the weak.

That's a that's a Christian principle not a pagan principle It's not an Enlightenment principle. It's a Christian principle

We read the gospel sometimes and we look at Jesus coming to the lepers or you know

To the paralytics or to the demon -possessed and we read it as though if we were there We would be having the same compassion that he has we would be calling.

Oh Lord, please go to him Won't you receive him? We we read the Gospels in this way filtered through the compassion.

We've already received from God You must know this is something that is not true We would have treated those social outcasts of social pariahs in the way that they were treated back in Jesus day

Jesus comes full of grace full of mercy and compassion And he uplifts and gives honor to what is weak

The Christian has this mentality that they bind and mend and bear up they lose themselves in their esteem of others

And I'm saying this begins in a marriage And husbands love your wives and do not be bitter toward them

Colossians 319 such profound simplicity That if obeyed if followed could end so much marital stress

Love your wives Don't be bitter toward them. Some wives are such patron saints that they just have adjusted to the bitterness

If I remember, you know, I remember giving Elsie wedges of lemons when she was

Younger and she just could take a big bite out of lemon and be I'm not even blink unfazed Bitterness had no effect on her and there's some wives

God bless them. They've walked with their husbands a long time and their husbands have not decreased They've increased in bitterness and the husband the wife has just adjusted to that Don't be bitter to your wife

The husband should be Sweet Refreshing He comes home and The wife's eyes light up Let love be without hypocrisy abhor what is evil cling to what is good

Be kindly affectionate to one another in honor giving preference to one another This is you must have these principles worked out in the home.

It begins in the home. It begins with the husband and wife Nations Are forced one way or the other from this relational dynamic

Children go on to repeat so many of the failures so many of the dynamics that they see and they grow up under And a whole generation can shift

Into the kind of hardness and depravity and resentment that we see in our day But when a husband guards when a husband protects

When a husband lays himself down when a husband nourishes When a husband cherishes when a husband says yes this woman you gave to be with me.

I take responsibility for her I'll lead her in love where I fail. I'll ask you for forgiveness and her for forgiveness

Even at my loss. I will do what it takes to guard and protect and lead her to sanctification

The fallen dynamic doesn't just fall in the lap of the husband does it? We also have to give some marriage counseling to Eve The Lord God said to the woman what is this you've done

The woman said the serpent deceived me and I ate again and everyone's playing the blame game Adam blames

Eve blames no one takes responsibility. I Mentioned and I read from a few weeks ago that that poem the fall

From Preston and Jackie Hill Perry and I said I'd finish it and I do I'm not gonna read the entirety of it

But I want to read a little bit more As we move toward Eve because this is just so beautiful in the way it captures these tensions these dynamics

The husband being the head and wanting all of the authority and dignity of headship without ever assuming its responsibility

But then also the tension of the wife who really Sets out apart from her husband. It's not just that Adam refused to guard and protect

It's also that Eve didn't want to be guarded didn't want to be protected Didn't want to have a head and that then becomes cemented in verse 16 as a form of the curse your desire will be for your

Husband, but he's gonna rule over you So listen to this this is

Starting off with Adam Eve can't you see in our feast for knowledge? We've become fools searching for wisdom in a mere branch

We forgot about the God who had the power to grow us from dust with no roots His mind is as wide as the sky and we were free as clouds

But now the silent hum of shame echoes the land the eerie chill of our father's curse crawls across our conscience

And the very river we bathe our naked souls in is damned because of you. What have you done?

Notice that Adam is echoing God's interrogation of Eve. He's throwing her under the bus

This was what you did though, he still has the fruit in his mouth so to speak And he says don't blame me for murder and name yourself victim as if we're not both ghosts with skin

She there's this immediate death And they both say you left me for dead it's very insightful they're both alienated from each other now

What was meant to be torn in a perfect harmony and in self -dependence that? Though they were true individuals and as individuals reflective of the image of God There was a sense in which they could not truly reflect the image of God until they were together as one flesh

They were interdependent in a profound way and now because of the fall they're alienated in a profound way

There's this alienation and hostility. There's a sense of being abandoned now What was meant to be glorious fruitful in cooperation is is corrupted

You left me for dead Did you forget the sixth day when God made you from dust and Adam says but he made you from me for me

While sleeping he carved you from my caged bones beautiful, but you with your pride of disposition

Switched positions and tried to lead you took heed to a snake without consulting me first. You didn't respect me

He used to usurped my role And he says he gave you authority he made you the head of us, but you became the neck

You were there right beside me. You weren't leading you weren't protecting I Can still see the

Apple stuck in your throat Adam swallow your pride You were supposed to leave me yet I'm to blame your wife your

Eve the one who is now shame once beauty the moment you saw her breath The day you removed

God from your soul and emptied your nest of his glory is the day you begged me to take his place to fill your voids

To become this image of perfection to satisfy your insecurities you see now.

She's projecting outward It's not just what's happened between us now, but now this is what's going to happen to humanity as a result of the fall now instead of a perfect exclusive Fulfillment in harmony between a husband and a wife now

There's the sense of of a man finding a fulfillment. He can never fully grasp in many women

You're saying now God is going to be replaced by woman

Instead of God giving you that sense of completion and you finding fulfillment in me through him now

I must take his place and fill your voids and me your insecurity God forbid our sons grow up treating their sisters like Cemetery stacking their bodies and bones in one closet to wear as one flesh every time they want to feel alive you see and Adam says

Eve Please understand you further prove my point that prideful organ brewing beneath your breasts your heart

Beats with no submission for your husband and for this Your future daughters will not be quiet gentle Some will be as loud as nagging crows

Scavenging on the dead earlobes of men their bodies sculpted for God's glory will become lures

Enticing our sons to sin and these women your offspring Will hand their soul over to men who are not their

God they'll kneel for value at the altar of man's approval But that worship will not make them whole nor holy

Do you see now how caught the centrality of God in that relationship is replaced Now they look for but never find in each other what

God was always meant to be Everything goes awry Man seeks to find

Security and self -fulfillment in many women who he he treats without any concern for them

Cemetery is as he says hung in the closet But Women also looking for an approval instead from God from men though.

There's no security no wholeness Only degradation it doesn't make them whole it doesn't make them.

Holy and together. They say a little later We're both sin wrapped in flesh. We're both broken creation stained glass windows with no shine.

No Sun. No light We're both dark imperfect lost were fallen A very good assessment of The dynamics between Adam and Eve but also a projection of what will come of the fall

Eve was made to do good to Adam You saw that right?

He made you from dust Adam. Yes Eve, but he made you from me for me You were my help me my co -labor in the work of creation and Dominion He Was made to do good to Adam a wife is given to man for his good not evil

But she failed to do good at the tree. She did evil and so she abandoned her role as a helper and said she became a hindrance

So all this emphasis on man's headship on his leading on his guardianship on his self -sacrifice

It's complimented by a woman understanding her spiritual role as a help me As one is going to further and direct and exhort and encourage and rebuke if necessary But but be that spiritual help meeting support and all that God has put upon man to do

And that he won't be able to do apart from her as help me Apart from the gifts and the abilities the insights that she's been given.

She'll either be a help or a hindrance And that's true of every marriage It's true of every marriage

As a wife you're either going to be a help or a hindrance to your husband and to God's design for you both

From the fall forward then the rhetorical question is posed who can find a virtuous wife

Who can find a virtuous wife? and you know, I'm Riffing off Proverbs 31 very interesting proverbs 31 to a feminist would be

You know a patriarch designing the perfect way But I I love that we include in our translations that the inscription

Whenever you read a psalm or often wisdom literature, you have a little inscription that says this is this is the context in which this was written and The context of Proverbs 31 is

King Lemuel Writing out what his mother always reminded him. It was an utterance of King Lemuel's mother

My son my son so much of the emphasis of Proverbs my son

Who's gonna find lady wisdom right who's going to walk in the way of wisdom? My son who can find a virtuous wife?

Her worth is far above rubies The heart of her husband safely trusts in her

So he'll have no lack of gain She does him good and not evil all the days of her life

Charm is deceitful and beauty is passing but a woman who fears the Lord. She shall be praised

And first Peter 3 takes up this language Don't let your adornment be merely outward arranging the hair wearing gold putting on fine apparel

Let it be the hidden person of the heart With the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God He said this is a virtuous wife

There's an incorruptible beauty to the virtuous wife, it's a it's a funny thing that so often that incorruptible beauty is seen as as a wife matures through many decades and And as we could say maybe outwardly the grass has begun to fade the flower has begun to perish

That inward beauty shines Isn't it amazing you see a wife even approaching perhaps widowhood?

You see this incorruptible beauty this gentleness this quietness this wisdom This just sort of infinite well of love

We live in a world that's all about outward show, isn't it? And yet the spiritually mature woman does not want to have that corrupted fixation upon the outward show

She's cultivating and maturing an incorruptible beauty and what that looks like according to the scriptures is a gentle and quiet spirit

That's what she's cultivating To go back to the poem. She doesn't want to be a nagging crow

She doesn't want to be I don't know if you're up with the slang nowadays But what the cool kids call a

Karen feel bad for Karen's actually most of the Karen's I've known in my life have been very godly and saintly women

But a Karen is someone who has a butch haircut and chews out the manager Whenever anything is late or wrong in her order and our culture pop culture calls that a

Karen You know and that you can go on YouTube and watch compilations of Karen's, you know screaming out at police officers for giving them tickets

That's the idea here Not a gentle and quiet spirit not not reserved with dignity and wisdom but a sort of ferocity a

Calling as irritating as a crow henpecking men

Pushing their husband into a position of docility and passivity for which he's responsible

Can't say only my wife was this way doesn't work that way pal But this is what

God has given to women to be virtuous wife Living a culture that despises this design

That would say this is weakness This is self -denial in all the wrong ways.

They mean by that we say yes weakness Reminds us a lot of Christ Our culture alerts women to be the crows

To be the vultures to be the scavengers to be the irritants to be aggressive.

I am woman. Hear me roar The scripture says women should not be roaring It's not what

God designed women to be To be aggressive and fiercely independent and self -assertive

This is a radical overthrow of how God has designed man and woman to complement each other and thereby to flourish

Neither man being passive nor woman being assertive and aggressive Neither of them will find fulfillment in that neither of them will flourish

They'll be misery individually and then miserly Corporately and we see a whole society be turned inside out as a result of that when men are made a feminine shells of themselves and in good men good men

Being made a feminine shells of themselves Listening to a podcast on that on a commute this this week from men

I have books from that ought to know better and it was just blithering Estrogen filled

Feminacy and it was very off -putting Men emasculate their instincts to be men to guard to lead to protect.

Do you know that it was only about a century ago? With a little extra change

But it was still widely expected that men go down with the ship women and children get on the lifeboats

That is Christian principle of civilization Men have a certain generic calling to be guardians protectors and sacrificial heads

The wife and the child goes on the boat Nowadays, I don't know if that I don't know the protocol nowadays

I know what happened with that Italian cruise ship captain. He seemed to jump on the lifeboat real quick It used to be that even if there was a spot on the lifeboat, the captain would go down with the ship

That was just that was just kind of what duty required now I don't know if I'd go along with that. I'd want to preserve life, but you see the principle here

This is what it means to be a man We live in a culture now that puts fatigues on our daughters and sends them off to war

This is a complete Mutation of what God has given and so men who have instincts to be guardians and protectors now

That's called toxic by our culture brothers and sisters. What's talking? What's toxic? It's not masculinity.

It's femininity in men It's a feminacy and what's toxic in women is masculinity not having this

This what's precious in the sight of our God of our Creator a gentle and quiet spirit when you emasculate a man

Or you you make masculine a woman you're perverting God's order and God's design in the case of the woman when you make a woman

And you shave and dye her hair And put a pink hat on her and make her screech along the row in DC You're making harsh what was meant to be comforting

You're making barren what was meant to be fruitful and nourishing You're making hideous

What was meant to be the beauty of fragility? And that's why men would go down with the ship

Because they recognize that at a societal level we've lost that we've lost it

You remember four years ago the parades and part of that whole parade with those anatomical hats if you understand the reference

What was something that they took from a debate line, and they would screech I? Am a nasty woman you remember was that Alyssa Milano going out there.

I'm a nasty woman And if you're a Christian watching that you should say yes, yes, you are

You're hideous hideous There's no part of that that is beautiful It's nothing to be proud of that's something to be ashamed of There's no dignity to that.

There's no beauty There's nothing precious There's nothing glorious There's nothing mysterious now

Everything's cheapened and degraded as a result of sin like Kierkegaard says

The devil comes into the jewelry store, and he changes all the price tags What is meant to be costly and beautiful is not cheap?

And what is cheap is now pandered after What is this but a further degradation of what

God designed to be our good our glory as men as women in our marriages in our homes

Working it's it's logic out into the dominion of society behind all of this cultural vehemence.

There's a despising of God and therefore Therefore there's a despising of true womanhood true womanhood and Along with it then true motherhood

There's a blood cult to this resentment toward motherhood isn't there a blood cult And especially

I think the chief resentment Is a homemaker the idea of a homemaker is anathema to our culture

And it's because a homemaker is a mother is a woman Is walking in the very thing that God designed them to be he's cultivating a gentle and a quiet spirit

It goes against their central dogma, which is the usurping way of the serpent Rule roar be aggressive be fierce

What a beautiful calling Christianity has for women Just as it's a glorious calling

Christianity has for men To lay down your life

Husband's called to lay down his wife and life in a certain way and a wife is called to lay down her life in a certain way

The husband's called to put himself on the line So to cover what needs to be covered

To sacrifice where a sacrifice is needed. That's how he lays his life down like Christ He looks to Christ and he puts himself aside

He doesn't do what pleases him But what God would have him do as a husband with his wife what God has called them in their home and their family to do

And a wife lays down her life by being a help me Being a homemaker

There's a spiritual power in this 20 for all the dynamics of power the feminists throw it away

Women have a have a unique spiritual power in their gentleness in their quietness

They have an incredible influence When you read biographies of missionaries or great revival preachers

You'll find these women that I'm talking about their influence their prayers their example their witness

First Peter 3 says for wives to be submissive Even if some husbands do not obey the word they without a word may be won by the conduct of their wives

There's a power there There's a power there What's gotten into my wife?

Some of you have that testimony You were the indifferent passive husband completely unmoved and your wife was a crow and then the crow came to Christ And you're there and you're passivity going what has happened here what's gotten into my wife there must be something to this

Christ thing That's what first Peter 3 is getting at something has radically changed my wife. I Don't think

I'm a better husband, but she's treating me like I am Spurgeon spoke of such women in this way.

They attained supreme authority over all simply by yielding They gain a queenly position in the house by gentleness and quietness

Nobody dares to offend them not because they would be in an uproar Because they're so kind Gentle see there's a power here that goes against the thinking of the world

Submission does not mean that the husband's will is never changed clearly Peter expects the husband's will to be changed.

Maybe he'll be changed. Maybe he'll be converted as a result of you acting this way Paul seems the same thing in 1st

Corinthians 7 you're setting apart your unbelieving husband just by being a Christian wife to him So don't divorce him if he's willing to stay with you.

You don't know if you're gonna save your husband. That's what he says There's a power to submission isn't there a unique power

The dynamic is very different from how a wife Exercises for calling to how a husband exercises his calling but a wife and everything she does seeks to abound for the

Lord A husband obeys what God has given him to do a wife must obey what God has given her to do

They both must do what God has given them to do because that's what they were built to do That's what they're designed to do.

They're running on all cylinders when they're doing what God called them to do They're finding the fulfillment and the satisfaction

And the joy of what God has originally designed them to do when they do it wives

Submit to your own husband's as to the Lord for the husband is the head of his wife As also

Christ is the head of the church and he is the Savior of the body Therefore just as the church is subject to Christ.

So let the wives be subject to their own husbands in everything Just like the church

This isn't easy. We already mentioned verse 16 God said to Eve your desire will be for your husband

But he will rule over you and you can see from this how this ongoing dynamic of desire of authority of getting my way

It plagues marriages the woman's desire becomes selfish just like the man's desire became selfish

The woman's desire to usurp is for her own ends not for the ends of God Woman can't usurp what

God has given to man to somehow say this is this is what we need to do spirit This is gonna glorify God when God has said no, that's not the kind of glory

I want You're glorifying me wife, even when you're submitting to your foolish husband

You're glorifying me When you're submitting to me in this way and you're doing it unto me, that's how you're bringing me glory

You know, there's a lot of wives out there quite frankly Who've taken the spiritual lead and because they're able to somehow bring their home up by the bootstraps spiritually

They think this is what's pleasing the Lord Right, at least at least we're somehow getting to the end and and the ends justify the means

I'm gonna have to be the spiritual head. I'm gonna have to make the decisions here I'm gonna have to call the shots because at least we're making good

Christian decisions and my husband's just over there on the couch And so, you know, this is what's glorifying to God What's not?

It's not You glorify God in your submission And where the husband's just there as passive as a stone as indifferent as a corpse you

You're doing it unto the Lord. And so you're crying out to the Lord You're crying out to the Lord. Help me.

This is not easy Lord Help me Help me to do this unto you

When I feel no compulsion no reason no basis to do it unto him. Help me to do it unto help me

Because I know that this is what's gonna glorify you May it be my conduct in this way that leads him

Another thing that we see is her desire weakens and disarms the man rather than complimenting and helping him

When the puzzle pieces fit it's a glorious thing when you're mashing and peeling the pieces to make them fit it's not a

Wife that is not cultivating a gentle and quiet spirit. She's disarming her husband. She's weakening her husband

It's sort of this self -defeating effort because you're taking away The ability for him to be that guardian that protector of that head

And then also her desire for the man is not driven by spiritual Concerns but by fleshly concerns fear jealousy self -pity anger pride

This is the curse of Genesis 3 16 Wives submit to your own husbands as is fitting in the

Lord Submission does not mean a woman's will is only as strong as her husband's will that's clearly not the case

The wife has a spiritual strength that's used to serve her husband because serving her husband is how she serves

God So as we come to a conclusion here a few final words

Adam and Eve had the only perfect human marriage the world has ever seen Marty and Marie are a close second, but still

Adam and Eve had the only perfect human marriage the world has ever seen They dwelt in perfect harmony in every aspect of their lives

They worked and worshipped and rested together in perfect fulfillment and satisfaction There was no union more intimate more unified more other oriented than theirs humanly speaking

But as we've seen from the fall as we've rehearsed together this morning They now have a marriage like we have our marriages one sinner looking at another sinner dealing with shame and guilt and dysfunction

But thankfully their hope is our hope We receive the redemptive grace of God which draws us closer to him makes us more like him

Richard Phillips, and I think this is really encouraging as we perhaps all despair when we when we're confronted with the word of what we are meant to be

And if you're feeling like I'm feeling this morning, you just feel this lodestone over your heart For how far you've fallen short of this

And I love what Richard Phillips says it was in mercy That God cursed the woman and the man and ejected a poison into their relationship

That was a mercy It was a mercy That God cursed the woman and the man injecting a poison into their relationship for which he alone is the antidote

In the futility of love apart from God Adam and Eve would have to turn back to God Just as we must turn to God today for grace to repent of sin and minister in love

Love between a man and a woman love between a husband and wife love between man and his neighbor cannot work

Without love for God at the very core And so by means of his curses

God is actually showing mercy drawing us back to himself We're given to each other.

We're given to each other as husbands and wives For support for help for encouragement in the difficulty of the narrow way

For advancement of God's kingdom complementing each other's strengths and weaknesses For the advancements of God's good design in creation that societies might flourish and better behold and reflect

God's good order And so we need God's love at the very center of our lives You have to fill up your tank as it were with God's grace and then be steered by the gospel

You have to be steered by the gospel from his love finding that mutuality that complementarity

Recognizing that at every turn you are co -workers And I love what first Peter says your co -heirs

Is there a specific role? Is there a specific dynamic between a husband and a wife? Yes, but wife you must realize husband

You must realize your co -laborers and your co -heirs equal in dignity equal in glory

And the arrangement that God has built into this creation on that day will fade away lunch into that Beautiful vision that Jesus said in heaven will be like the angels in this very dynamic marriage won't be like What we've experienced it to be

The mutual help that means we're workers together John Engle James says a lovelier scene is not found on the earth and that of a holy couple

Employing mutual influence The wife to the husband the husband to the wife and the hours of their companionship stirring up each other's hearts

That's the most loveliest scene on earth Let's pray father we thank you for your word

Lord we We feel the weight of the calling that we have fallen so so far from Lord We pray that you would

Allow that conviction Lord to bear good fruit of repentance Lord and change

Forgive us Lord forgive me For ways that as husbands we don't guard

Our homes our eyes our ears our tongues They don't protect

We don't root out chase out Deflect or assault the world or the flesh or the devil

Forgive us for ways that we are so self -consumed. We're not laying our lives down in sacrifice

Not walking with our wives in a way of understanding Not covering and washing

Not nourishing and comforting and loving them as our own flesh forgive us And Lord forgive the wives in this body

For times that they have not cultivated a gentle and quiet spirit But cultivated the opposite for ways that the world has deceived and allured them to make woman into something she was never meant to be to turn the beauty and fragility of femininity into something hideous and perverse

Help Lord help our marriages to be better reflections More strongly unified in the grace that you show and the grace that you reveal through them

Let that grace Lord flow from our marriages into our homes from our homes into this church from this church into the community

Lord Let there be true change as true seeds are sown of the gospel Through these efforts through these truths through the way that your grace meets us at these demands and callings and Responsibilities of life and where your mercy meets with the difficulties and the hindrances and the hardships of it

Lord For the For the youth in our church that are preparing for marriage let them consider these things diligently and wisely

Prepare themselves Lord Invulnerability and transparency before you Lord to prepare themselves and examine themselves rightly

For those that are past a married season or are single Lord Let them again understand the beauty of what this all is about which is

Christ in his relationship to his bride and in their exclusive way as They show devotion to you as they show care for the church

May they be that glorious image and that glorious truth to all the married couples here. Whatever season we're in whatever station of life

Let us understand your holy and wise purposes and let us walk in them by your grace for your glory