A Question and a Prediction (Genesis 3)

Adam and Eve, our first parents, have disobeyed God and they can hear him coming towards them in the evening of the day in which they had sinned against him by disobeying his instructions about eating the forbidden fruit. But was this coming by the Lord to be a time of fellowship in which they would share comforting matters? They did not think so. The reason for their apprehensive anticipation was that they knew about his threatened punishment. They now fear in their souls what God will do. After all, God had warned them of the consequences of disobedience. He had spoken of death, but what did that mean? They had never seen death before. But was he coming as judge and executioner, or was he coming in another manner?

The arrival of God

Moses says that Adam and Eve heard the sound of the Lord walking in the garden. How could they hear his footsteps since he is a spirit? The answer to this question is what is called a theophany. In a theophany, God takes on a form in which he can be seen and heard. This would have been how he had appeared to them previously when he had spoken to them when giving his covenant instructions about not eating the forbidden fruit. And it would be a frequent way by which he would appear down the centuries to come until he became a man permanently with the coming of Jesus.

Of course, his decision to come to the garden on this occasion points to his grace because it reveals that he wanted to meet his erring creatures. Observe how he approached the guilty pair. He is not rushing towards them to punish them rapidly for their sin. Instead, he is walking towards them. The picture is that he is looking round, calling to the man ‘where are you?’

Adam and Eve were also aware of the presence of God. What does the word ‘presence’ call to mind? It is a reminder of his sovereignty. That is obvious from the response of the three creatures that are before him – the two humans and the serpent. They are silent before him until he speaks, and their silence indicates their awareness of the greatness of his authority. True, there was a degree of dishonesty in Adam and Eve, a reluctance to accept responsibility for their actions. Still, they recognised that the King had come to his garden to meet his subjects.

The Lord asked a profound question when he said, ‘where are you?’ It is not a question indicating ignorance on his part. Rather it is a summons to Adam to come and stand before him. Spurgeon, in a sermon, mentions five aspects of this divine question and we can use them to understand what is contained in this unusual question.

First, Spurgeon said that it is an arousing question. By this he meant that God was awakening Adam to where he was, to think about his new state, a new state in which he was now afraid, and a state in which he had lost a great deal compared to what he had been given previously.

Second, Spurgeon said that it was a convicting question in the sense that it was designed to lead to a confession of sin by the guilty pair, of their acknowledgement of their disobedience against the God of heaven.

The third aspect that Spurgeon saw in this question is God’s sadness at man’s lost estate. He points out this detail in these words: ‘Oh, it is amazing to think how the Lord felt for poor Adam!... we have not a God who cannot be moved — we have One who feels, and who describes Himself in human language as having a father’s heart, and all the tenderness of a mother’s heart. Just as a father cries over a rebellious son, so does the eternal Father say, “Poor Adam, where are you?”’ Spurgeon asked his congregation: ‘I pray you, let this mournful wailing voice of the Eternal God come to your ears and move you to repentance!’ The question comes to us, what does the Lord’s response to our departure from him say to us?

The fourth feature of this call identified by Spurgeon is that it is a seeking voice. The Lord came to where they were, condemned as covenant-breakers, lost, deserving his judgement, without any hope. He has not come to punish them to the degree that he could have done and which they deserved. Instead, he comes to the condemned with a desire to speak to them, to reveal something to them that they could not discover otherwise.

The fifth aspect that Spurgeon suggested about this divine question is that of justice summoning them to the divine tribunal. If they do not hear the question as arousing them to think realistically, to convict them of their sins, to reveal his sorrow at their state, to indicate his seeking them, then all they can expect is his justice for their continued rebellion against his good will. Sin against God cannot go unpunished by him. The call to come into his presence is insistent. Adam can refuse to come, but such a response will be defiance. And if he does not come with the right attitude, what will there be for him apart from condemnation?

The chapter tells us what the response of Adam and Eve was. They refused to accept personal responsibility for their sin. Adam blamed Eve and she blamed the serpent. Adam also confessed that he was naked, which indicates that through his sin he had lost a natural kind of clothing which some commentators suggest was a form of glory, probably connected to them having been made in God’s image. Eve confessed that she had been deceived by the serpent.

How would God react to those answers? Would he find them appropriate? He did not find them suitable, but that did not mean that he had nothing else to say.

The announcement of God

God then speaks to the serpent. Unlike the way he had interacted with Adam and Eve, God does not ask any questions of the serpent, nor does the serpent say anything to God. Obviously, there are aspects of mystery here, since the serpent is more than merely a snake. In two passages in the book of Revelation, the devil is described as the ancient serpent, a statement that is enough for those who accept the Bible concerning the identification of the one who tempted Adam and Eve.

Commentators differ as to how to explain the connection between the devil and an animal. Some suggest that the devil took possession of a literal serpent (one of the two that had been created by God), and it was this possession that enabled it to be crafty as described in verse 1. Since he is invisible to humans, the devil would have to take possession of a creature in order to interact with Adam and Eve, although this view says nothing about the other serpent that had been created by God. Others say that he took on a shape that looked like a serpent. In whatever way he did it, his aim was to get Adam and Eve to disobey God and he was successful in getting that to happen, and he probably assumed that God would have to punish them for doing so.

In his announcement to the serpent, God first pronounces judgement on him. He was cursed beyond that which had happened to other creatures. The contents of the curse – ‘on your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life’ – obviously fit with how a snake moves along the ground. Yet the description can be seen as a reference to the degree of judgement that was often meted out on a defeated ruler; such were often made to abase themselves before their conquerors. Instead of ascending in triumph his assault on God’s creation will bring about humiliation. It is evident that God is not speaking merely about a literal snake because he says to the serpent that it will not only have this descent, but that its head will be crushed by the Deliverer at some stage in the future, which could hardly be said of a snake in the Garden of Eden.

The point that God made in the hearing of Adam and Eve is that the devil is a humbled foe. In malicious pride, he had attacked those made in the image of God and by his insinuations he led them into sin. Although capable of creating powerful arguments, his thoughts are not expressions of heavenly wisdom. Like him, these thoughts are debased and intent on bringing people down low. Adam and Eve had heard that their sin had brought them low, but it had not yet taken them as low as their attacker. God had spoken with an interest in them and a desire to bless them when he cried, ‘Where are you?’ He had no such question for the enemy of their souls.

God also said in the hearing of Adam and Eve that he was going to intervene in the situation. He was going to bring about hostility between the woman and the devil, which in one way could be taken as saying that she would be on the opposite side of the devil, and therefore on the side of God. He also said that this enmity would last and last because it would not be limited to them individually. It would show itself in the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent.

Who is the seed of the woman? We can see from the description that he is an individual, a powerful individual who can crush the mighty enemy, and yet an individual who can be bruised by the serpent when being crushed. It is not difficult for us to see here a reference to the coming of the Saviour. He was sent into the world, says John, to destroy the works of the devil. Jesus did this to some extent when he resisted the temptations of the devil in the desert, and he also did it to some extent when he delivered people who were demon possessed. Yet the location where he crushed the head of the serpent was the cross, where he was also wounded. Paul reminds his readers in Colosse that, when Jesus was on the cross, he brought to open shame the powers of darkness by removing from them the claim that they made against his people for their sins. Usually, a crucified person’s crime was placed over his head. Paul takes that practice as an illustration and says that what was written above the head of Jesus was the sins of his people. Jesus paid the penalty and was bruised in the process but having paid it he has won a great victory, an eternal victory, and the devil can no longer demand their punishment.

The final matter we can consider is whether the victory is his alone or does he share it with others. Note what Paul said to the Romans about this matter: ‘The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet’ (Rom. 16:20). It is probably the case that many of Paul’s readers would suffer terribly in a few years’ time during the persecution instigated by Nero. Maybe we think that their experience did not look like a triumph. But we can add to it the words of Revelation 12:9-11: ‘And the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him. And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God. And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death.’

The coming of God to meet with his creatures after their Fall into sin was a great day for the human race. It was the day that the future triumph of the Son of God was first announced!