CHAPTER XV. THE FIRST PROMISE OF A SAVIOUR-FIRST EFFECTS OF THE CURSE-FIRST CLOTHING-EXPULSION FROM EDEN. WE E can almost hear Satan's shout of triumph when he found that he had succeeded in casting a blight over the fair creation which God had pronounced very good and as the news reached the fallen angels that their leader had established a new kingdom; that man, the noblest work of God, had fallen into "the snare of the devil,"1 henceforth to be the "slave of sin, to obey it;"2 to be "the servant of corruption; and to be "taken captive by the devil at his will," we can almost hear the echoes of their demoniac laughter. We are told that when God's people "have tears to drink in great measure," "their enemies laugh among themselves:"5 Satan's triumph, however, was very short. 3 In gaining his temporal kingdom, the Devil had earned the additional title of " that old Serpent," and also an additional curse. Man had incurred the penalty of an eternal "dying thou shalt die ;" and all holy beings looked for the execution of the fearful penalty: for, until now, mercy and the forgiveness of sins were unknown. Neither fallen angels nor fallen man sought forgiveness; nor of themselves would they ever do so; for we are told "Repentance and the forgiveness of sins are given to Israel by Him whom God hath exalted to be a Prince and a Saviour.' The Lord God called Adam and Eve to him; and after hearing their wicked excuses, before passing sentence upon them, He pronounced a curse on the Serpent. As part of that curse" the LORD God said, I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.”1 Here we reach the most wonderful foundation-stone in history. In this curse we get the first glimpse of the "Rock of Ages:" the first gleams of a coming redemption, seen dimly through the early dawn of revelation. Four thousand years passed before that revelation was completed. Then it was fully revealed that He "who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will," "declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done," had not only foreseen the Fall, but had also provided a remedy for it even before the world was made. A Redeemer was found; and a people were "chosen in him before the foundation of the world:" a people who "were to be saved, not according to their works, but according to God's own purpose and grace which was given to them in Christ Jesus before the world began."5 4 In the curse upon the Serpent we have the first revelation of the Redeemer and his people. Thenceforth there were to be two seeds or races on the earth; the seed of the Serpent, those animated by his Spirit, all the natural seed of fallen man; and the seed of the promise, the Saviour, and those chosen in Him who was to be born of the woman. There was to be enmity put by God himself between the two seeds. We shall see that enmity show itself between the first children, Cain and Abel; and constantly appearing in the history of the church and of the world. The seed of the promise was to be persecuted by the seed of the serpent," but it was finally to triumph; and the Serpent's power was to be crushed by One who was afterwards more fully re2 Eph. i. 11. Matt. xiii. 38; John viii. 44; 1 John iii. 10. 1 Gen. iii. 15. 6 2 Tim. i. 9. Isaiah xlvi. 10. 4 * Eph. i. 4. Gall. iv. 29. vealed not only as the Son of man, but also the Son of God: "that he might destroy the works of the Devil." In the course of history we see that several times, just as Satan had apparently reached the summit of his ambition and had almost the entire possession of the world, he was humbled. It was so at the first temptation; it was so when he got possession of the whole world, excepting Noah; when God sent the flood and destroyed the children of the devil and preserved His own: it was so when Satan combined the church and the state; the priest, Herod and Pilate, against Jesus and it will be so in his last struggle; when he shall gather the nations of the earth against the saints, just before the day of judgment and his own final doom.2 Although a Deliverer was promised, God said to the woman, “I will greatly multiply thy sorrow;" and to the man, "cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it was thou taken; for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return."3 Thus a curse passed on all creatures for man's sin; and since then "the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now," waiting to be "delivered from the bondage of corruption." As a token of his faith in the promised Deliverer, Adam called his wife Eve, that is, life, "because she was the mother of all living." Previously she had been " called Isha, woman, because she had been taken out of Ish, Man." Eve also believed the promise; and, as we shall see hereafter, named her children accordingly. God had put enmity between her and the serpent. Their faith was accepted: for the record goes on to say, "unto Adam also and to his wife did the LORD God make 3 Gen. iii. 16, 19. 1 John iii. 8. 2 Rev. xx. 9. 4 Rom. viii. 22, 21. 5 Gen. iii. 20. 1 coats of skins, and clothed them." These skins must have been the skins of animals offered in sacrifice: as animals were not given to man for food until after the flood.2 We read afterwards of the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world;"3 and also that Christ's people are clothed with his righteousness: "God clothed them." Our first parents were then sent forth from the garden of Eden. They must have been there but a very short time: probably not one week, perhaps only one day; for although part of the blessing in their estate of innocence was, “Be fruitful and multiply," their first children, Cain and Abel, were conceived and born in sin, after the Fall, and their expulsion from Eden.' 1 Gen. iii. 21. 2 Gen. ix. 3. Rev. xiii. 8. Isaiah lxi. 10; Rom. iii. 22. 6 Gen. iv. 1. CHAPTER XVI. THE FIRST CHILD-FIRST SACRIFICE-FIRST DEATH. TH HE first exclamation of surprise recorded, is that which Eve uttered when Cain was born. Part of the penalty inflicted upon the woman for being led by the serpent into sin was, that her sorrows should be greatly multiplied in having children.' However, like most mothers since her time, Eve "remembered no more the anguish, for joy that a man was born in the world." She exclaimed, “I have gotten a man from the LORD," or I have gotten the man, Jehovah: and she therefore called him Cain, that is, gotten or acquired. She doubtless thought he was the Messiah, the promised seed by whom the serpent was to be destroyed. 112 It appears the mother had the naming of the first child born into the world. We also find the wives of Jacob and others naming their children from circumstances occurring or connected with their birth. The hope that they should be the mother of the promised seed, of Him in whom all the nations of the earth were to be blessed, was one of the causes of the intense desire of having children, observable afterwards among the Jewish women. Eve soon found, that, instead of being of the seed of promise, "her gotten," her " Cain was of that wicked one :" was one of the seed of the serpent, one of "the children of the devil." Finding she was mistaken, Eve thought that 2 John xvi. 21. 1 Gen. iii. 16. 4 1 John iii 12. * Gen. iv. 1. 61 John iii. 10. |