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Pastor Ben Mitchell
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If you all want to turn with me to 1 Timothy chapter 2, we will pick up pretty much where we left off. Maybe some slight crossover in between last week and this week because I didn't mark my spot, so I may cover something I already have, but no problem there because it'll help us remember where we are.
So what we did last week is we began the discussion of Paul's, what we call last week his closing arguments, of the prohibitions that he has been giving in the preceding verses of chapter 2. So we've already read, we spent a great deal of time focusing on some of the more nowadays controversial verses that we find in verses 11 and 12 where it says, Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection, but I suffer not a woman to teach nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.
And so we spent a great deal of time on that, not only discussing what exactly Paul meant, what he intended by those words, by that prohibition, but also addressing some of the objections to this specific argument as well, or these prohibitions.
And so we did that, and then we get here into verses 13 and 14, which is where we started, we began covering last week, we'll continue to today, where the Apostle Paul is now explaining why it is that the prohibitions he just gave are so important.
They're not, he's essentially proving that he is not coming up with anything on the spot. He is not taking his own personal preferences as a man and saying, look, I have some authority, so I'm just going to tell you all this is what I think is best.
It's nothing like that. And we can gather that by virtue of the fact that this is inspired Scripture already, but as if we needed more, he then gives us more in these verses 13 through 14, where he grounds the prohibitions in the creation order itself.
So that's kind of where we left off last week. I will say also as a quick reminder, one of the things we covered last week at length was the reality that because we live in a fallen world, there will be times in which the norms of Scripture require an exception in usually sad cases.
And we looked at length at a couple of Scriptures, 1 Corinthians, but also Acts 16 as well, where we took note of the fact that we have scriptural, what's the word I want to look for here? We have basically the biblical precedent for a particular exception, and then we looked at Acts at a narrative of the exception in play, and that is there are times in which a woman may become the head of a household.
In 1 Corinthians 7 is where we get the framework for that, and it is the case in which a woman has been married, she is now a widow, and she has the choice to either remarry or not to remarry. And if she doesn't, then by default she is then retaining that position of being over and managing and being the head of that household, including the estate involved with that household.
Sometimes that would even include servants that she was now in charge of and things of that sort. So then we went to Acts 16 and we considered the story of Lydia who was in that very position. What we concluded there is that while that is a permissible exception, it's still not the ideal situation.
And we talked about that at length. We don't need to rehash the whole thing. But one of the other things we talked about is that while there are sometimes a permissible exception, though never being the ideal, any time we receive an outright prohibition, there should never be an exception.
So the reason we wanted to point that out is because sometimes people who want to object to 1 Corinthians 2 .12 by saying, well, this is obviously just Paul simply addressing something going on in that local church, it doesn't apply to all.
We know this because look at Lydia, because look at Priscilla, because look at Deborah. They'll start going down the list. And what they don't understand is they are making a little bit of a category error in that all of those contexts are very unique, very unique in and of themselves.
And what we're seeing is we're seeing permissible exceptions from God in an instance where the scene is somewhat sad. In the case of Lydia, she was presumably a widow. In the case of Deborah, the country was in shambles and they were being judged because of the idolatry that they were indulging in.
We addressed Priscilla at length. There was nothing odd going on there. It was a great example of what Christian discipleship can look like. And, of course, her and her husband Aquila discipling Apollos was a very great example of that.
But with all of that being said, when it comes to a specific outright prohibition, that is when we no longer can say, well, we need an exception here because there's just not any good men around, so let's ordain Pastor Karen or something like that.
There can't be those types of exceptions when there's an outright prohibition. I will say this, though, is the only time there ever could be a prohibition is if the lawgiver himself, I've got to start over, if there ever is an exception to a prohibition, maybe I did say it right the first time, that can only ever come from the lawgiver himself.
And so, you know, for example, in the Mosaic Law, there were certain prohibitions about dietary laws and types of clothing to wear and things like that. So those were outright prohibitions, but they were abrogated by the lawgiver himself.
They weren't people deciding arbitrarily, well, we're just not going to do this anymore. So if we ever receive direct revelation from God saying that 1 Timothy 2 .12 is now no longer applicable, well, the lawgiver has the prerogative to do that.
The question is, will he and has he? And, of course, you can flow from there. But those two principles to remember are very, very important. I'll repeat them one more time. There should never be an exception where there is a prohibition.
And then number two, even when there is a permissible exception, it is still not ideal. If we remember those things, it helps us stay on kind of the straight and narrow of staying to biblical norms as much as possible within the providence of God.
It is by his hand if a woman becomes a widow, and at that point, by no control of her own, she has now stepped into a situation that is not the norm. But she is doing so because, again, of providence.
And so there you go. Let's go over to chapter 2, verses 13 and 14, now that we've refreshed our memory a little bit of where we are, and really start getting into these verses even more than last week.
The Apostle Paul, after giving us the prohibition of women teaching or having authority over the man, he says in verse 13, for Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression.
Now this is very interesting argumentation for perhaps the modern perception of what's going on here because we may wonder, what on earth does any of this have to do with what Paul has said leading up to it?
Really, really amazing stuff here, and I'll remind everyone once more, that as interesting as it is and as much as the modern sentiments want to buck up against this particular passage, really starting around verse 9 on down, to obey this passage is to return to the Garden of Eden in a unique way, as we now see Paul discussing at this particular point.
So the first reason that man is to maintain authority in teaching in all things pertaining to the church authority and its structure and all of that is because he was formed first, as we see in verse 13 here.
And woman was then brought to him so that he wouldn't be alone in his pursuits. God's design was that man would be created to have dominion and to subdue the earth and that woman would help him in accomplishing that specific goal.
I didn't necessarily have this in my notes, but I think it's worth doing because it's very helpful. Let's go over to Genesis chapter 2 for just a second. And it's amazing because what we're about to read in Genesis chapter 2 is exactly what Paul is quoting in this 1 Timothy passage.
The reason we know that is because he is using the exact same language down to the word choice as what we find in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament. That would have been the church's Bible in the first century.
Very, very few laymen would have been able to read or would have been reading Hebrew. And so when they read their Old Testament scriptures, it was in Greek. And the Apostle Paul, even Jesus, would often quote the Greek Old Testament because that is what the people understood.
And so the Apostle Paul in verses 13 and 14, when he uses the word formed, for example, it's the exact same word that is used in the Genesis account of woman being formed from Adam. But take a look at this.
Genesis chapter 2 verse 18. It says, at this point, Adam has been created and been given dominion and authority over the earth. He has been made king over the earthly realm. And verse 18 of chapter 2 says,.
And the Lord God said, It is not good that man should be alone. This is the first time that God sees something that isn't good within the creation order. It's not that he created anything imperfectly, but it wasn't yet complete.
And so he sees that Adam is alone and that he does not have a suitable helper there by his side, and that's not good. And so listen to this. I will make him an helpmeet for him. And that Hebrew word right there, etzer, is an incredible phrase.
We'll talk about it more in just a minute perhaps, but I wanted that kind of in the back of y 'all's minds as we work through this. Adam was created to take dominion, to subdue the earth. Woman was brought to him to help him accomplish that mission, which is an amazing thing.
And so with that being said, and with Paul tying the prohibitions we're now given in verses 11 and 12 to that creation order, what that means is that for the authority structure of the church, let's just use that as the example for a second, the church or the home.
When the authority structure, especially in those two places or contexts, are inverted, what that means is that the creation design itself is being disregarded by those involved. So in other words, when a conscious choice is made for a woman to step into the authority of a church position or to start leading the home as the head of the household, even though the husband is still alive and in part of the household, what that is is it's to disregard the creation order and the creation account that we read just a second ago.
But what's even more amazing about that is that it doesn't matter how much the creation order of things and their design, because remember, all of what we've been talking about for weeks at this point comes back to God's good design for men and women.
Their natures, natural law, you might say. It doesn't matter how much the creation order or the design of men and women is disregarded. People can do it all day long. They do it every day. They're doing it right now as we speak, and somewhat boldly even.
But it doesn't matter how much it's disregarded. When God embeds universal laws into the creation, as He did, then those laws will always come back to the surface. That's how it works in nature itself.
We can observe this in a number of things, and of course we can observe it in other universal laws that no one has any contention with at all, whether that be gravity or decay or whatever it may be. When laws are embedded into the structure of creation, then they will resurface, even when they're trying to be pushed down, kind of like the analogy of a person trying to push the ball underwater and hold it down, and eventually it's going to give.
That is how it works, and it works certainly in this particular context as well. Those laws will always come back to the surface. We've talked before about natural law. I mentioned it again just a second ago, and that it's really important.
It's an important piece to this discussion, and this is just another example of it. Because of the creation order, and that includes even the sequential order of creation. In other words, man, Adam being created first, and then Eve being formed from him, which is what Paul appeals to here in verse 13.
It's natural, because of these things, for men to assume the roles of authority in a hierarchical structure. Here's the amazing part, though, is that we can obviously point to structures, to constructs, in which there may be, it could be a household, it could be a church, again, there may be women preaching right this minute, as we speak, somewhere in the world, someone is.
But it doesn't matter where, if you have those constructs in place, the men will still have authority in some way, shape, or form, whether they are doing so in a God-honoring way, or in a manipulative, passive, or abusive way.
And in many cases, when you see a woman in an authoritative position, such as these examples we've been given, and even down to the household, in many ways, that can be a manipulative tactic by the man that is abdicating on his responsibility that he should be shouldering, even if verbally he is maybe being supportive of this kind of strange, modern household construct, he may be verbally affirming of it, but deep down, or not even deep down, but just right there in his mind, as he is strategically living his life out, there's actually a manipulative component to it.
And so because of natural law, and because of the way we were designed, men will eventually get back to the top of the authority, but it may be kind of a behind-the-curtain, manipulative kind of authority, as a puppet master kind of thing, rather than the God-ordained form of it, where they are just front and center, front of the battle lines, assuming the authority, shouldering the responsibilities, and doing exactly what Christ himself did in the grandest degree.
So what Paul is doing here, by quoting the creation account in Genesis, is he's anchoring, and this is a really amazing thing, he's anchoring the prohibitions of verses 11 and 12 to the pre-fallen state of mankind.
And this is important, because a lot of Christians today, and I'll say this, Christians whom I respect greatly, Christians who are very astute Bible scholars, and students, and teachers, and I could go on and on, even some that I respect greatly, they will have this interesting assumption that the concept of headship in marriage, where the father's the head of the household, and there's this hierarchical structure, husband, wife, children, that sort of thing, they will assume that that headship is a result of the fall, but to take that particular assumption is to miss some of the greatest points of the full story of redemption, because what we have to do, and what we cannot misunderstand, is what marriage signifies and has signified from the beginning, even before the fall, which was this, that Christ, who is the bridegroom, is the head of the church, is bride.
That is what marriage and the institution thereof has symbolized from the beginning, and that's why Jesus appeals to it when he's being put on the hot seat yet again by the Pharisees, from the beginning it was not so, in his teaching on divorce and things like that, and so the way in which the institution was first designed and created was always intended to be a foreshadowing of the ultimate marriage, that being, again, the bridegroom, capital B, and the bride, capital B, Christ, and the church.
And so anytime y 'all see that, you may see that pop up from time to time. I saw one example of it somewhat recently that I'll use, just because it literally popped up, which was a particular writer mentioned just in passing, how marriage, pre-fall, was more like a democracy, and that because of the fall, at that point, as a result, wives should submit to their husbands.
So this particular writer was affirming headship, and in the submission, this is a female writer as well, she was affirming headship and submission to the husband and things of that sort, but as a result, she was, not as a result, she was saying that that reality is a result of the fall, not part of the original design.
Let me show you really quick the verse where some people get this from. Might as well throw it out there really quick, because you all may see this pop up, but in Genesis 3, chapter, excuse me, chapter 3, verse 16, you don't have to turn there if you don't want to, but Genesis 3, 16 says this, this is after the fall at this point, man and woman have both rebelled, and God is now kind of divvying up the punishment, so to speak.
He curses the serpent, says, you know, you will eat the dust the rest of your life, be it upon your belly. Adam, by the sweat of his brow, will he have to work? You all know the story, but in verse 16, it says, under the woman, he said, this is God talking to Eve, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception.
In sorrow thou shalt bring forth children, and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee. So, oftentimes an appeal will be made to this verse to say that headship is a result of the fall.
The problem with this, of course, is number one, right here in this very passage we're in, in 1 Timothy, we see the Apostle Paul saying that the pre-fall design is the basis for authority and submission in the order that it is.
So you have that, you have Paul in 1 Corinthians saying that the woman was formed for the man, and so you see these teachings, especially from the Apostle Paul, that go prior to the fall, but that teach headship.
But, in addition to that though, the thing we have to remember is what's happening in that particular verse we just read, is that the result of the fall is that the woman will not enjoy it in every case.
Now, in sanctification she can. In fact, a Christian woman can very much revel in the original creation order even in a fallen state. Not because her husband's perfect, not because he is this sinless saint and he's just the best in the sense of being a perfect human being, but because of understanding that original design and its protections within it.
So, a godly woman, as she is progressing in her sanctification, will at some point begin to realize all of the things the Lord has protected her from in establishing things this way. All of the stuff that he puts on the shoulders of the husband so that she doesn't have to.
But, even more than that, it's not just simply so she doesn't have to. In other words, you could do it, but I'm just going to cut you some slack over here. It wasn't even that simple. Because what he did was, he structured it this way in conjunction with their very nature.
So, we'll talk about this more in just a moment, but all women, 100 of them, whether they're saved or not saved throughout time, regardless of culture, race, geographical context, all of them have been given the maternal nature.
They've all been given instincts and design features that comport with motherhood. Whether they have children or not, they have these maternal instincts that are God-given. They are not defects. They're there on purpose.
From there, you can understand, okay, you might not necessarily want a human being made in the image of God, equally valued, equally dignified, equally intrinsically valuable, but who has a different nature, one that tends toward the maternal instincts.
You don't want that human being having to be the one to make decisions to perhaps execute criminals or to make the decision whether or not we should deport illegal immigrants or to, God forbid, be on the battlefield or serving in some form of a situation like that.
Why? Well, the name Eve literally means life-giver. And all of the daughters of Eve from that point forward were created and put in the earth to give life, not to take it away. And so God, in his grace and in his mercy, created this hierarchical structure.
We call it patriarchy. It's a perfectly biblical term. It just simply means father rule. As in with the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And he did this so that they never had to make decisions and choices and actions that would kill them anyway.
On the inside, really hurt them. So it's a protection. And again, the sanctified woman of God, as she starts to realize this, even post-fall, won't have as much struggle with that Genesis 3 .16 concept as a fallen, excuse me, an unbelieving woman would.
Go ahead, Robert.
Sure. Right.
Well, it's one interesting result of the fall is that so here's what's interesting about it. The fall, which was caused by our own volitional choice, our own moral culpability. We wanted the knowledge of good and evil.
We received it. And so we got what we asked for. So what happened was because of the fall, what were previously enjoyable things in the garden, such as work, and such as the headship of Adam and Eve. Jen, Ash will get this a little bit as well.
But one of the best, if you ever wanted just a very nice fictional analogy or illustration of what it may have been like in the garden. Not that we can know what it would have been like, so I'm not saying that this particular author was prophetic in that way or that he had some kind of revelation.
But just with putting the pieces together of scripture and the creativity of the human mind, one of the best analogies or illustrations I've ever read on what it may have been like, the dynamic between Adam and Eve was Perilandria, written by C .S. Lewis.
He wrote a trilogy of books in the 30s into the 40s that are referred to as the Space Trilogy, sometimes the Ransom Trilogy. There's three books in it. They're all very different. But they're connected.
And the second book is called Perilandria. And I don't want to give it away too much, because I think everyone in here should read it. It's wonderful. But essentially, and you can deduce this pretty early on in the story, is the main protagonist is coming into a planet that is not fallen.
Sin has not marred this place yet. But, of course, the main plot is, will it? And you have the dynamic between the green lady and the king. And this is, again, a fictional retelling of Adam and Eve and their dynamic, but on a different planet.
And in the story, he beautifully showcases what that patriarchal dynamic and relationship looked like, but with the like, I used the word a minute ago, revel. And that is what you see. That is the sense you get, especially when in the dialogue that includes the green lady, the picture of Eve.
She revels in her position under the king, who is, of course, a perfect, sinless king. Anyway, so I say all that just to, again, address this. Pre-fall, things that were enjoyable all the time, whether it be labor, whether it be headship, whatever it may be, they were pleasurable.
They were enjoyable. They could be reveled in. Post-fall, all good things require work. And this is the point I was getting at. All good things require energy. And they require, in some cases, resistance.
Well, our human nature, not necessarily liking that feeling, will often pick the path of least resistance, which is essentially what I think Robert was pointing out a minute ago. In the short term, decisions will be made because they're easier and feel less cumbersome.
That may be subverting the household structure. It may be taking a creational design pattern and disfiguring it because you then no longer have to deal with this internal struggle you have, such as the desire will be toward your husband, he will have rule over thee.
Post-fall, that design of headship was no longer pleasurable all the time. It still can be, in God's grace, and exclusively in Christian households, I would say. But it's a lot harder because that husband is no longer sinless.
That husband is no longer perfect. He still bears the responsibility that Adam had, but in a fallen state, it can get messy. And so, understanding that men and women are to picture that amazing reality of the bridegroom and the bride, even before the fall, we can see all of the sudden, going back to 1 Timothy 2, verse 13, we can see that that sequential act of creation, in other words, Adam first, then Eve, that symbolizes God's design for men and women.
It may not seem obvious to people reading this today, but that's why what Paul was doing was a very cogent, again, closing argument to those prohibitions that we've already read. One way that I have heard this concept put before is that God created Adam first with a particular design and a particular mission.
He then created Eve second to help Adam accomplish the mission. Now, both of those things are incredibly important. You take one of them away and it's not good anymore. So, what was it like before Eve was there?
It was not good. From the very voice of God, he made the proclamation, it is not good that man should be alone. So he is not he is not he is not, what's the word I want to look for, sufficient. He is not sufficient to fulfill the creation mandate alone.
It requires his etzer, his help me, his his wife who is going to come alongside him and help him accomplish what he cannot accomplish alone but it is still his mission. And so again, the order of the design signifies the purpose of the design.
In verse 13, the order of the design, sequentially, signifies the purpose behind the design. I did have it in my notes, I couldn't remember if I did or not, but going back to Genesis 2 .18, that phrase, help me, that Hebrew word for that, the help me that was created for Adam was one who was a helper that was fit for him and that was corresponding to him.
To put another way, man and woman together are of the same type, they're of the same essence, they are both the image of God and when they come together in a one flesh union they literally are the consummate form of the image of God.
So they're of the same type, but they are standing opposite to each other. That's what the word, the connotation behind the Hebrew word, they're of the same essence, of the same type, but standing opposite looking at each other.
And so again, going back to the foundational phrase we began with many, many weeks ago, months ago at this point, is that men and women were created with equal value, dignity, and worth, but beneficially different.
And that's where the standing side by side comes into play. They're of the same type, but standing opposite to each other. When God created Adam, he commissioned him to a certain position and Adam's creation order corresponds to that position.
When he created Eve, he commissioned her to a certain position, and Eve's creation order corresponds to that position as well. This is somewhat redundant, I realize, but it's important that, again, we get these concepts in our minds because it helps so much with discerning what was going on in the New Testament and how to respond to potential objections we may receive in a feminist and egalitarian culture that we live in right now.
Again, the timing signifies God's design for each of them. Hence, because of that, Paul's use of this creation order to demonstrate his concern in 1 Timothy 2 was necessary. That is how we know that all of what we have been reading transcends whatever culture you look at.
Again, the big argument against this that it applies to women in the church now is that this was a cultural prohibition that is restrained to ancient Ephesus 2 ,000 years ago. It doesn't apply to anyone or any church anymore.
That argument falls apart when you get to Paul's creation order appeal in verses 13 and 14 because it then becomes transcultural. Those above it transcend it above the cultures and applies to all of them equally.
We have about close to 10 minutes left. Just a little further. We are so close. So close to finishing chapter 2. We get to verse 14 now. He says, and Adam was not deceived but the woman being deceived was in the transgression.
Again, what's going on here? Why is Paul making an appeal to this specific event? What does it have to do with the prohibitions? So in this verse we learn that another reason women can't be in authoritative positions in the church or in the home is because of the way in which Satan shrewdly upended that sinless state in the Garden of Eden.
He was very strategic, very intentional, knew exactly what he was doing and how he as a finite and fallible creature could manipulate. He's a very powerful one but he is still finite. He is still fallible.
There's only one of him. He's not omnipresent. He's not all powerful. He has a horde of minions that can do his bidding. Yes, but he is still just one singular creature. But he's a powerful one. And so what he did was he got strategic and he had to make the choice, how exactly am I going to make this king of the earth made in the image of God who has been given the dominion over this realm that I have now been cast into, what do I need to do in order to steal the keys to that kingdom?
In what way can I conquer these two humans? And by right of conquest be the rightful king and owner of every kingdom that is to be built on this earth. So that was his motivation. He already attempted to ascend to the most high or at least he had the prideful thought that he would do that.
That didn't work so greatly. There was a rebellion in heaven and he was cast down with a third of the angels. So now he is left with, well, what do I do now? Missed that opportunity as if there was even a chance.
And it was a great battle that was decisively won. Now I am going to ascend to the heights of this realm and become the God, the king of this realm. How do I do it? So in his shrewdness, what he did was he intentionally bypassed Adam on purpose.
It wasn't a coincidence that he happened to come across Eve because he couldn't find Adam. There was an intentionality behind going around Adam who again was given the keys to the entire dominion of the earth.
He was the king of the earth at that time. Remember Jesus is referred to as the last Adam. So there is a correspondence there pre-fall where Adam is the type, Jesus was the anti-type, where Adam was the first Adam, Jesus was the second or the last Adam.
Adam pre-fall was what Jesus redeemed post-cross in his ascension to heaven and of course he was a far more glorious king than Adam ever was but there was still a correspondence. Adam was given that position.
And so Satan, feeling threatened by Adam in his particular position, bypassed Adam, the king of the earth at that point, and he went straight to Eve. That was Satan's strategy then and as we know, it worked.
And it remains to be his strategy today. It's one of his primary strategies to subvert not just the creation order but all institutions that were ordained by God today. And so because of his strategy, because of his playbook that of course God knows intimately well himself, we were given a protection from that particular playbook, from that particular strategy, that is and that protection is for women to stay out of authoritative roles so as not to fall for that same vulnerable position that Eve herself was in.
Now I'm going to say something that sounds incredibly provocative, but if we think about it in biblical categories, it makes sense it's consistent with the rest of scripture and that is this. All women, when they are born human, but prior to glorification in other words, all women share in the vulnerability of Eve, their first mother.
What was the vulnerability? That she was more easily deceived. Now, here's the amazing part about it. Eve was no dunce in the Garden of Eden. In fact, Eve was the most intellectual woman that ever lived in all of human history.
She was a sinless woman with 100 brain capacity. Colin probably knows the actual percentage, but the percentage of our brain capacity now is negligible. What is it? I don't know what it is. That's why I was...
Oh, that was an 80s thing? So in other words, you can't quantify it in percentages? Right. Well, okay, I agree with that. It's not like to say what Colin was referring to a second ago, in the 80s there was this model created where we now use 3 or something of our brain capacity, which gives us this image of being 97 brain dead, essentially.
Yeah, we would understand that that's not the case. Maybe you can't quantify this in percentages. Maybe that's not an analogy that's helpful anymore. But what we do know is that the capacity, however you want to quantify it, is negligible relative to a pre-fall sinless state.
Maybe we could say that's an assumption. Do we know the exact relative comparison? No, but what we do know is that Adam singularly named every animal on Earth. He had a pretty heightened capacity, whatever it may be.
Did you have another.
Thought? Sure.
Sure. Consciousness, the source of it. No, I know. Simulation theory. Yeah.
Yeah. No, of course they do. Right. Sure.
The 80s, the funny 80s quantification of brain capacity is a materialistic argument. Sure. Right. No, exactly. There is there's both are true. Essentially, we're not Gnostics. Our bodies and our brains are still, well they're fallen.
Our consciousness is fallen. Our intellect is fallen. Our intelligence is fallen. But at the same time, the source of those things is Ecclesiastes tell us when a person dies, the spirit returns to God from which it came.
Well, guess what goes with that spirit? The consciousness and the knowledge of your personal history. None of that dies. As Paul says, if I die, I'm present with the Lord. That was Paul. Paul was present with the Lord, not just some ethereal ghost of Paul.
That's the Gnostic error that Ashton was pointing out. But to Colin's point, you look at neuroscience today, the greatest brains behind that particular field of science today, they have no idea what's going on.
No clue whatsoever. There are some really interesting things that we can see. You know, think well we just this grand puzzle, which is cool, but it's not necessarily the answer. But going back to what I Again, with the assumption that however you want to put it, whether it's capacity or or however you might put it, Eve's was at the fullest sense, the fullest heightened sense.
It was not mature yet. And the reason why that's an important little footnote to throw in there is because Hebrews tells us, the writer of Hebrews tells us, that the sign of maturity is the knowledge of good and evil.
The reason why the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was prohibited by God for Adam and Eve, at least I'll have to say this is my opinion, because I can't necessarily prove this, but to me it makes sense in light of that Hebrew, the verse in Hebrews, is that that prohibition was not necessarily a permanent one.
That someday they may have hypothetically reached a point of maturity in which they could have received the knowledge of both good and evil, but remained sinless because they would have been to a mature state in order to actually be able to deal with that reality.
The sin came in them rebelling against God, deciding we want it now rather than at any point in the future. Again, a little bit of an opinion there, a little bit of conjecture, but regardless some of the principles there are the same.
And so Eve, prior to the fall, though she was sinless and functioning at 100 brain capacity, just for argument's sake, she wasn't ditzy, she wasn't a dunce, she wasn't just this little, she was innocent, but not like an innocent child that literally knows nothing and can't really make decisions and things like that, certainly with the kind of will that she had.
And so because of that reality, we can understand that if Eve had this particular vulnerability in that particular state of being at the top of humanity and its intellect and capacity and things of that sort, then it kind of goes without saying that that same vulnerability would exist today and that the devil would continue to try to exploit it and perhaps even with more ease than he had in the garden, depending on exactly how it all unfolded.
And so at this point, I need to try to land this plane, but I'm not necessarily at a good stopping point, so I'll go just a little further and see where we hit here. Women, because of their God-given natures, have a greater desire and capacity to create harmonious relationships with people where any felt or apparent friction is absorbed into an amicable atmosphere.
And because of that, women are more vulnerable to false teaching. Now, going back to those maternal instincts I mentioned a second ago, this is again a feature, not a bug. This is a God-given ability, not a deficiency.
But it is a specific thing that should be cultivated in a situation in which flourishing can happen rather than exploitation. And so one of the reasons why you can deduce that women, going all the way back to Eve, have been more vulnerable to deception, generally speaking, is because of those maternal instincts to create a harmonious atmosphere that is conducive to peaceful living, the kind of environment that you would want for kids to be present in, for creating a household, a home, all of these types of things.
And so we can kind of understand how these things all fit together, even if they seem somewhat that they are distinct, but they're more connected than we may see on the surface level. And it's at this point that a lot of people, and I'll end with this thought here in just a second, but a lot of people would object to the idea, I said a minute ago, somewhat provocative, and a lot of people would object to it, to the idea that women are generally more susceptible to deception than men, because as the argument goes, to say such a thing is to imply that women are now intellectually inferior to men.
If they're more susceptible to deception, you're saying that they're not as intellectual, and that they are inferior in that particular way. But to make that particular argument, to make that particular counter-argument, isn't all that great, because it assumes there's an assumption in it, to come back and say, if you say that, you believe this.
The assumption is that men and women cannot have different strengths and weaknesses, both of them. And as we know, they obviously do. In fact, in this very passage, in 2 Timothy, Paul told us as much.
I mean, we have example after example of this, but in verse 8, he says, I will therefore that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting, and then he immediately follows that up with his teaching on modesty.
And so just in this chapter alone, we have learned that men are more prone than women are to sinful anger and quarreling. So that is a specific weakness that men have, more so. And that's just one. I'm just using the examples that happen to be in this particular passage.
And then after that, we learn that women are more prone to sinful immodesty. And so Paul gives some instruction for there, for both. And as another example, in 1 Peter chapter 3, the apostle there calls the woman the weaker vessel.
A lot of people take issue with that. But the thing that they miss is that he makes that statement, and he's actually doing so to make the argument that they deserve honor in a very special, unique way.
But a lot of people will see that, they'll feel funny about it. What they miss is that he says that the woman is the weaker vessel, without ever implying that she is less valuable than man, or inferior in any kind of way.
Peter's words do not invalidate the woman's comparative strengths. So when he says that, he's not saying, you know, he's not saying women are just intrinsically inferior, like Islam would say. What he's saying is that they should be treated with a unique honor, because they're the weaker vessel, without at any point invalidating their comparative strengths, in the areas in which they shine the most in manifesting God's image in them.
And so it is possible that women are more prone to deception as a part of their maternal and feminine design, but that does not mean that women are less intelligent than men. It just means they're simply different.
Men and women are simply different. They are equal in value, worth, and dignity, but beneficially different. So we have to pause there for the sake of time. A little bit more on verse 14. Just a couple notes left, and then we can close out the chapter with verse 15, which is a really amazing verse in and of itself.
And then we'll go there. I apologize I didn't leave a lot of time. Did you have another thought, anybody? Go ahead. No, no, go ahead. Go ahead, because I'm only eating into my own time. Yeah. Which chapter?
Yes. He was, it's worse. It's worse than deception. So Paul in 2 Timothy specifically says Adam wasn't. What that does is it does not remove culpability. Okay, let me make another connection. In Romans chapter 5, we are told that humanity is fallen not in Eve, but in Adam.
It is because of Adam's sin specifically that the human race fell, because what he could have done was, number one, he could have protected his wife before Satan even showed up, but he also could have assumed responsibility even after she took the fruit.
Think about it. Adam was sinless after Eve ate. He could have offered himself as a sinless substitute right then and there as the first Adam, and then we don't know what would have happened, because that's not what happened.
What he did instead was knowing the commandment of God, the law of God that was given, which was only a singular commandment, and knowing that his wife just did something that was going to spiral, at the very least, her into some form of punishment.
Rather than saying, I'm going to step up, and as the analogy goes, kill the dragon, save the girl, rather than doing that, I am going to partake myself so that she won't be alone, perhaps. I mean, I'm conjecturing a little bit, so that she won't be alone in this sin that she just partook of.
And so Adam made a conscious choice to disobey God in favor of his wife with the assumption, I guess, that that would somehow be better than him taking responsibility for what had just happened. So the question is, what was he?
I don't know if I have a word for it, but it was far worse than being deceived. It was willful rebellion with an understanding that the serpent was probably lying. Or, in fact, that the serpent was lying, because Adam was the one that received the law directly from God.
Eve wasn't formed yet. It was Adam's responsibility to tell her what the law was. And that's why one of the reasons why I think Eve may have stumbled on the exact wording of it, still a little bit of conjecture, but I think that may have been the result of Adam giving her the law incorrectly or maybe, you know, maybe not fully or something of that sort.
Or maybe, because if you think about it, what she said was she added a little to it. And so it's like maybe Adam number one messed up in his role of responsibility by adding to God's words that weren't necessary, and then he, like, doubled down on it with him abdicating that responsibility in the garden, in that scene.
Pretty much. That was kind of the decision he made perhaps from the false assumption that that that would somehow be better, because she had already done it. I'm not totally sure, but just to address your point, he wasn't deceived.
It was worse than that, and that is why we are falling in Adam and not Eve. Well, we went way over, and I apologize for that, but we're trucking right along. We'll get done with this chapter soon enough.
Let's go ahead and dismiss, and then we will go in our next service. Heavenly Father, thank you so much for this wonderful day, for being with us, blessing our time together, blessing the time spent in your word, and we ask that you continue to bless our time together.
Be with all of our loved ones that are out, and just be with us in our fellowship, and in this time of refreshment this week. We love you, and we ask all these things in your name. Amen.