Beholding the Stricken Earth

Welcome! Today we continue our series entitled Beholding: A Wide-Angle View of the True Story of God with the message “Beholding the Stricken Earth.” The core idea of this series, of “beholding,” is to spend some time really thinking about connections and implications of what we read in the Bible. Last week, Brian had us reflect about the fall of man, the events involving Adam, Eve, the Serpent, and God, as described in Genesis 3. Both today and next week, we will be looking at the implications and consequences of the fall. Today we are focusing on the effects of the fall on our physical world, and next week we will look at the effects of the fall on the history of man right up to the present day.
 
As I mentioned at the beginning of the series, I am taking the Creation account in General as literal, especially when it comes to the nature of the fall of man. I am assuming that death entered the world with the fall but did not occur prior to that time. I realize that there are theologians and others who hold to a different view, who take Genesis more symbolically, and I certainly do not believe that a belief in the literal view of Genesis is necessary for salvation. What is necessary is that you believe that your sins have separated you from God, and that you have personally repented and placed your faith in Jesus Christ to save you. Such a person the Bible calls both “born again” and a “new creation,” and such a person will seek to continue to obey and honor God, although they will likely also have some measure of setbacks and failures when they take their eyes off of Christ. Such a person will normally grow in faith and obedience during their remaining days on earth, and then God will complete His transformation of them, making them suitable for the eternal life that is to come, a life that I believe the Bible shows has many things in common with the pre-fall world (although there are many differences as well).
 
Now, in preparation for beholding the stricken earth, I think a good place to begin is to remember God’s twin blessings on animals and on people in Genesis 1:
 
God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth.” – Genesis 1:22
 
God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.” – Genesis 1:28

These are pre-fall pronouncements of blessing by God. We see that God saw, from the very beginning, reproductive activity as a part of His plan for the earth, and that it was good. It was His will that animals multiply and populate the earth, and that people would do so as well. Note that there is nothing in this pronouncement that mandates that it be an open-ended, unending mandate to reproduce. Death had not yet entered the world, so unending reproduction would of course lead to unlimited overpopulation. The pronouncement instead should be understood to mean that God’s plan was that life would be abundant, but it would also be supportable, self-sustaining, able to continue indefinitely. I would argue that this means that at some point reproduction would cease. I suppose it is possible that man could alternatively advance technologically to the point of becoming able to travel through space and populating other worlds with his offspring and the offspring of other life from earth. But man fell long before this became a possibility, and I don’t think it is particularly useful to discuss “what if” scenarios such as this.
 
The implications of a world without death are far-reaching. It is indeed hard for us to imagine this world because death is now an essential part of the cycle of life in our world. The pre-curse world would have been quite different from ours. Not only no disease, but no “old age”. In a pre-fall world, creatures, including man, would reach an age of full development, of maturity, but then would age no more. Animals would not feed on other animals, meaning that carnivorous animals either did not exist or were radically different from how they are today. The same would go for animal-eating plants like venus flytraps and even creatures like fig wasps that lay eggs and die inside figs as an essential part of their reproductive cycle.  
 
What did God mean by asking man to “rule over” the other animals of creation? This did not mean that he was to exploit them; indeed, as we see in Genesis 2, he wasn’t even allowed to eat them.  The Hebrew word used is “kabash” which has multiple meanings, but the one that makes the most sense is the royal term, used to describe how a king would work to make everything good and perfect within his kingdom. I believe this was the role God intended for man – to ensure that the world remained a perfect place for all creation. He was to tend it, to take care of it, but in reality God had already done all the hard work. Really, man’s main job was simply to be responsible and not mess things up.
 
And man wouldn’t mess things up because he was in regular contact with God. Man was not yet separated from God by his sin, so again, it is hard for us to fully understand what this pre-fall relationship was like. We do know from Gen. 3:8 that God would often “walk with” Adam and Eve. We don’t know exactly what this was like, what form God appeared as, and so on. But with a relationship like this, Adam and Eve were not left to trying to figure things out on their own. God was there with them, helping them and guiding them.
 
I think it is an important detail that God was with them but was not with them continuously. He met with them at specified times, walking in the garden. But He also allowed them time apart from Him, and it was in those times that Adam and Eve chose to believe the serpent and his lies over God.
 
I am not going to go over the fall itself, since we looked at that last week. But I want to look at the consequences after Adam blamed Eve, and Eve blamed the serpent. It is clear from these consequences that God viewed all three as guilty.
 
So the Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, “Cursed are you above all livestock and all wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” – Genesis 3:14-15
 
To understand this pronouncement, we need further understanding of just who the serpent was. The serpent was clearly highly unusual, if not unique, as a talking animal. It was also clearly a deceiver. I and most theologians believe it was the deceiver, Satan, himself. If he had to maintain physical form for a time on this earth, it was in a position of extreme lowliness, a position of shame, crawling on the ground. The pronouncement may have been more symbolic, rather than literal, but the emphasis on shame would be the same. As for enmity between him and the woman, this would refer to the fact that the other demonic beings also would hate humankind, seeking to deceive them, and even harm and kill them. If the symbolic interpretation is correct, as I believe, it is also a reference to the Messiah, Jesus, who as the son of Adam who would reverse Adam’s curse, would also permanently defeat Satan (crush his head, a mortal blow), whereas he would only have temporary effect on the Messiah (striking his heel). Now, a poisonous snake can kill with a single bit on the heel, and indeed, Jesus did die. But He did not remain dead, and rising from the dead, in addition to proving that He was who He said He was, was also a pronouncement of Jesus’ ultimate and total defeat of Satan.    
 
To the woman He said, “I will make your pains in childbearing very severe; with painful labor you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” – Genesis 3:16
 
I won’t go into detail about the implied dis-harmony between husband and wife that is here, as that is more a subject for next week, but I do want to point out the greatly increased physical discomfort that is also pronounced here, specifically with regards to childbirth. This idea of pain as a part of the curse also comes out in the pronouncement to Adam:
 
To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat food from it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.” – Genesis 3:17-19
 
It is here we first see that the wages, or penalty, of sin, is death, as restated in Romans 6:23. And here we are told again, that pain will be a part of life from now on. Painful toil. The very land, the very earth, will change. It will not be like the garden, but it will demand hard work even to provide basic sustenance. It will produce thorns and thistles, not only meaning that weeds will overtake what you plant, but that the world will not be safe. Thorns and thistles cause pain. You will be cut; you will bleed.
 
It is really the implications of these verses that we need to stop and behold, to think about. Death is now a part of the world. Living things die, including people. They become injured, sick, frail. The world is transformed from a garden, or a kingdom for man to maintain, into a place where it is hard even to survive, where animals eat other animals, where animals will eat you, given the chance.
 
And it is not just animals and plants and microbes that are threats; the very ground is “cursed.” The world itself is no longer a safe place. Earthquakes, tsunamis, tornados, lightning, fires, and hurricanes are now an ever-present part of this world. And because our bodies are changed, mortal, decaying, even slipping on a slick surface can have severe consequences.
 
Even eating now is fraught with danger. Many plants are poisonous. Food, even water, may be contaminated by toxins or poisons. And many parts of the earth are hostile to life. Other parts may be amenable at one time but become difficult to survive in (such as in a drought) a little later.
 
The dangers of the world mean that we can die at any time. Many of us have near-death stories we can share. I have at least three. I once slipped on a hike in the Sierras, in a snowy/icy patch, and I started slowly slipping down towards a 1000-foot cliff. I tried to stop progressing, but it was quite icy. I slid about halfway to the cliff before finally managing to punch through the ice and stop sliding. Another time, I walked out on a street not seeing a speeding car. I froze like the proverbial deer in the headlights (actually, I was in the headlights), and I only escaped injury or even death because the car slammed on the brakes. And then four years ago I had my heart attack. It is only because of the mercy of God that I am with you today.  
 
We live in a fallen world, a world that still deals with the curse that God pronounced on Adam and his children. And, as we are all sinners, we are in absolutely no position to argue with God about why the world is the way it is.
 
One thing I have thought about is that the early descendants of Adam all knew what had happened. They all, like us, experienced the curse every day. But I think it may have been a different experience to know that it was grandpa, or great-great-grandpa, who started it all. You can see an interesting example of this in the account of Lamech naming his son amidst the genealogies in Genesis 5.  
 
When Lamech had lived 182 years, he had a son. He named him Noah and said, “He will comfort us in the labor and painful toil of our hands caused by the ground the Lord has cursed.” – Genesis 5:28-29
 
It is abundantly clear that Lamech was thinking about his Great (x6) Grandpa Adam! Noah’s very name means comforter or even caretaker. Imagine naming your child “caretaker” telling them that they need to take care of you because you are getting old and tired. Actually, we might have to pay for counseling for our children later because of this, but Mimi and I used to joke with our kids when they were very small, “We are very busy having to take care of you.” “Yeah,” they would say. “Will you take care of us when we are old?” Confused look. “Yeah,” they would say. Eventually, usually around age 5, they would say “No.” Poor Noah! Even his name was tied to this idea!
 
The world is broken, because the first people disobeyed God. And the world remains broken, and people continue to disobey God. Jesus speaks of this broken world, and warns of the consequences of continuing to disobey God, in Luke 13:
 
Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. Jesus answered, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish. Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.” – Luke 13:1-5
 
The broken world serves as a warning to us. It serves as a reminder. God is perfectly holy, perfectly good. Life is fragile, and its very fragility calls us to consider God and our rejection of Him. The broken world calls us to repentance. As is written in Isaiah,
 
“Come now, let us settle the matter,” says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool. If you are willing and obedient, you will eat the good things of the land; but if you resist and rebel, you will be devoured by the sword.” For the mouth of the Lord has spoken. – Isaiah 1:18-20
 
Much like we saw in the Ezekiel series, God uses dire circumstances to shake people up and get them to seriously consider the Lord. But as we also saw in Ezekiel, a time comes, a time that cannot be predicted, that is too late. The time for repentance is always now.
 
The message of God’s response to Adam and Eve’s fall is that God is perfectly willing to take away security, peace, and an easy life if a person with all these good gifts from God chooses to rebel against Him. There is no question that He does this at least in part because He is holy and perfectly righteous, and sin is an affront to God. But it is equally true that He does this in part because it may lead people, not only those affected, but others, to repentance. And God’s heart for us, as we see both in Isaiah and from Jesus in Luke, is that we would repent.
 
I realize most of you are fully aware of what I am about to say, but I will say it anyway because it is good to be reminded and because there might be someone who does not yet understand this: Repentance is a broad term that can both refer to, number 1, an overall decision to surrender your life to God and choose to serve and obey Him, and number 2, a specific decision to agree with God that a specific action is sin and to turn away from it and back to Him. Repentance of the type of number 1 is the kind of repentance that leads to salvation, being saved from the ultimate consequences of your sins, which is eternal separation from God. Repentance of type #1 involves confessing your sin and placing your trust in Jesus, who has died on the cross for your sins. Jesus’ death was a kind of substitutionary sacrifice for you. Prior to repentance of type #1, you were lost in your sins, already separated from God, and no amount of good works on your part could ever fix your situation. Faith in Jesus is the only path for a sinner (and everyone is a sinner) that leads to salvation.
 
Repentance of type number 2, for a Christian believer, for someone who has already given their lives to Christ, involves agreeing with God about your sin and returning back to Him, thereby restoring your relationship with Him. I am reminded of Jesus’ washing His disciples’ feet as a symbolic example of this kind of repentance. Peter first rejects Jesus’ approach to wash his feet, but Jesus tells him “Unless I wash you, you have no part with Me.”  Peter then asks for Jesus to wash His entire body. Jesus says that those who have had a bath only need was their feet, as their bodies are otherwise clean. I would never want to minimize the seriousness of sin for a Christian believer, and indeed, Jesus’ “then you have no part with Me” makes it clear how serious sin is for the believer. But at the same time, people who have already put their trust in Christ for salvation can be assured that their salvation is secure; they have, figuratively speaking, already had a bath.
 
I would put it this way: For the believer, times will come when the Holy Spirit calls you to repentance. There is only one kind of response that is appropriate: to repent. To refuse to do so invites Jesus’ statement “unless you do so, you have no part with Me.” Indeed, someone who absolutely refuses to repent may not in fact be saved.
 
Does repentance mean that we will never sin again? No. You may sin in that very same area again the same day. But the Christian life should be one in which we, again and again, allow Jesus to wash our feet. We don’t run away from Him and hide in the garden, like Adam and Eve. Indeed, we should come running to Him!
 
And so, we live in this broken world, the world under God’s curse, a world filled with hardships and challenges and dangers, a world in which life is short and death is certain, until Jesus comes. If this were all there was in life, God would still be justified in His decisions to put the world in this state. But this is not all there is in life.
 
God sent His Son into this broken world to redeem all who would repent and put their faith in Him. What His Son, perfect and without sin, went through – not only the physical suffering He experienced on the cross, but the unimaginable weight of taking the punishment of the sins of the world on Himself of experiencing rejection and separation from His Father, well, it is something we only barely understand. But He did this so that we could be reconciled to God, and for those that do come to Him in faith, this broken world is only the preface to the story of our lives. We have eternal life wih Him ahead of us! Look at how Paul describes this in Romans 8:
 
I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God. – Romans 8:18-21
 
This recalls the exact wording of the curse in Genesis 3: cursed is the ground because of you. The curse is not directly on Adam, but it is on adamah, on everything Adam touches. It affects plants. It affects animals. It affects the entirety of God’s creation on Earth. It affects the Earth itself.
 
We don’t appreciate the depths of the curse. We go to the supermarket and food is plentiful, food of every imaginable kind. But for every product there, a ton of planning and hard work has gone into making it possible to provide them. Try making your own garden, without power tools, without buying bags of improved soil or fertilizer, without pesticides, and you will start to understand the curse on adamah. we see hints of this future in several passages in Isaiah. In Isaiah 30, there is described a change in the land, where water is plentiful, and even the sun and the moon are brighter so that plants grow prolifically. In Isaiah 32, the wilderness, we are told, will become a fertile field. That is, you just stick seeds in the ground and that’s it. The crops just grow. Isaiah 35 describes the desert becoming desert no more, becoming filled with flowering plants. All of these descriptions are just hints of what is ahead. And the changes will not only be on the land; they will also be on people. Eyes of the blind will be opened. Ears of the deaf will be healed. The lame will leap like the deer. The mute will shout for joy. And Isaiah 55 uses some of the same figurative language we see here in Romans: The mountains and hills will break into shouts of joy and the trees will clap their hands. Indeed, all of creation will change. The curse will end!
 
Let’s continue in Romans 8:
 
We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. – Romans 8:22-25
 
We are part of God’s creation, and so we too long for the future day when the curse is lifted, when all of creation is free again to experience only the blessings of God. We long for the day when our bodies don’t continue to weaken and fail, when our minds are again sharp, when our pain is gone and doesn’t return. We long for this for ourselves and for our loved ones. It is difficult to imagine a world in which everyone and everything is free from the curse. Doctors are going to need to find something else to do.
 
Of course, in a world without sin, many other activities will cease. There will no longer be police. There will no longer be a need for insurance or insurance adjusters. There will no longer be retirement planners. I am only scratching the surface here.  
 
But for now, we wait. We wait, filled with hope. It’s interesting how we can find joy in waiting for something we don’t yet have. Tell a child you are going to give them ice cream a little later, and watch them become happy now. We should have that same joy! We should be excited about our future! It is easy to put our future eternal life out of our minds, not only because of the business of our lives but because we struggle to imagine it. But I think it is good to try. Hope brings joy. We should wait patiently, as the verse says, but also confidently, being encouraged by the thought of it.
 
And so, to encourage you further, let us read the rest of Romans 8:
 
In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God. – Romans 8:26-27
 
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. And those He predestined, He also called; those He called, He also justified; those He justified, He also glorified. – Romans 8:28-30
 
What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave Him up for us all—how will He not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written: “For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.” – Romans 8:13-36
 
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. – Romans 8:37-39
 
Yes, we live in a broken world, a world with hardship, and toil, and pain and death, but this situation is temporary. If you are in Christ, an eternal, unimaginable, wondrous future awaits you. Wait patiently and find your joy in what lies ahead.
 
Let me close with snippet of a verse from Revelations 22:
 
No longer will there be any curse. – Revelation 22:3a