Sin and Its Consequences

Introduction

There is much to be learned from Genesis. It is God’s way of revealing to us how certain things began and why things are as they are in this world. The first eleven chapters deal more with universal beginnings. Creation, sin, languages are explained in these opening chapters. At the end of chapter three there is another beginning found. You will recall the story. Adam and Eve have sinned in the garden. God gave them an ideal place to live and work, but having been tempted, they gave in to that temptation and sinned against God. After a brief encounter with God in which neither took responsibility for their sin, God tells what is going to happen to them. There are pronouncements against the three participants in this event: Adam, Eve, and the serpent.

These pronouncements often called curses are consequences for sin. To each transgressor God speaks a word about a function in life and a relationship. Their placement here is to reveal why our world is the way that it is. As we go through these we will see the consequences of sin which continue in our world to the present day.

The Three Participants

God speaks first to the serpent. At the beginning of chapter three, the serpent appears on the scene to tempt Eve. How are we to understand this serpent? It is a real snake or is it simply a symbol of evil or is it both real and symbolic? An important point to remember is that according to Genesis 2:19, before sin entered the world, Adam and the animals had a special relationship. There was harmony and compassionate coexistence. The exact nature of the relationship would be hard to describe, but for animals to come to Adam so that he could spend time with them in order to name them speaks of some kind of mutual coexistence.

The serpent is real, but it is also symbolic. In Genesis 3 we have the serpent tempting. In Revelation 12:9 and Revelation 20:2, 7-10, the serpent has become the symbol of Satan. Thus, the serpent is both real and symbolic—a real animal used by Satan to tempt. That which man trusted will become his adversary. Thus, when Eve begins talking with the serpent she doesn’t suspect anything unusual.

The pronouncement God gives the serpent is twofold. First, God states that the serpent will crawl upon the ground forever. This is not to say that the serpent was able to walk before. Instead, God is relegating the serpent to ground dwelling. Slithering along the ground will be his permanent residence. Second, God makes a statement that the serpent will always be man’s enemy. Verse 15 poses some problems for us not only in terms of translation but in interpretation.

Verse 15 has a long history of being understood as the first prophecy about Jesus in the Bible. Seeing the symbolism of the serpent aligning with Satan, this is God’s way of declaring that the seed or offspring of the woman will crush the serpent, or the devil. But this interpretation was not always the first interpretation. Before the time of Jesus, this was understood as the Jews’ victory over Satan. Soon after the time of Jesus, some scholars saw the woman as the Virgin Mary and that Jesus was her seed. Some modern day scholars deny any reference to the devil or to Jesus.

It seems to me the best explanation is that there will be continual enmity between man and the devil with man ultimately prevailing. While there is no reference to Mary or to Jesus either explicitly or implicitly, the truth is the only way for man to be victorious over Satan is through Jesus.

It is here then in verses 14 and 15 that there is a falling out between man and the animals. At one time man had an intimate relationship with the animals but now man and animals will be against each other. And while we may domesticate animals there is a tendency for animals to act inconsistently and at times erratically.

One of the consequences of sin is a breaking of relationship with the creation. There is a parallel text in Romans 8:18-22 in which Paul reminds us that the creation is awaiting redemption as well so that it can be what it was intended to be. While this presents some interesting questions, we can only speculate about what the redemption of creation will be like. God’s pronouncement against the serpent affected all creation and animals so that there would be an adversarial relationship between us and creation.

The second participant is woman. She isn’t named until Genesis 3:20 after the pronouncement. We will see the reason for that in just a moment. God pronounces that one of the consequences of her sin is that she will have extreme pain in childbirth. This function of life is changed forever. We can safely assume that childbirth was part of God’s intention for woman from the beginning, but until sin entered it would have been painless. Because of sin, there will be pain. In fact, the word here could be translated agony or hard labor. The second pronouncement gives us some problems.

The problems center around the word “desire” and “rule.” Given the feminist climate in which we live you can imagine how this has caused quite a bit of furor in the scholarly community. The word desire is found in only two other places in the Bible. One place is Song of Solomon 7:10. In this passage it is used to describe sexual desire. If this is the meaning here in Genesis 3:16, then God is saying although there will be pain in childbirth the woman will still sexually desire her husband.

But the other place where the word “desire” is found is in Genesis 4:7. The word is used to describe sin’s intensity. Upon closer inspection what we read in Genesis 3:16 parallels Genesis 4:7 in word order and usage. In Genesis 3:16, desire for husband and he will rule. In Genesis 4:7, sin desires to have you and you must rule or master it. The words for desire and rule are the same in each verse. This is no accident. The speaker is God and he is helping us to understand the meaning of both verses.

God is saying that there is going to be a constant struggle between the sexes. The woman will try to control her husband but she will fail because headship is God’s design for man. Notice that this is said to the woman. The man is not told to rule, the woman is told that the man will rule. God’s pronouncement is that disharmony will become a part of the marriage relationship. The consequence of sin is that a husband and wife will not always get along.

There are several reasons why this interpretation makes sense. First, in Genesis 2:23, Adam has already named his helper. The idea of naming something demonstrates headship. Second, when the serpent tempted the woman she exerted influence over her husband. According to Genesis 3:17 Adam listened to the woman rather than leading her. God’s intent was upset by sin; thus, the pronouncement reflects this loss of intent. Third, in the two areas of a woman’s greatest blessing (childbirth and marriage) the woman would most clearly see the consequences of her sin. Relationship with her husband has been altered because of sin.

The third participant is Adam. God’s pronouncement against him is for two reasons. First, he listened to his wife. He gave up headship. We should not read this that husbands are to never listen to their wife nor that men are to take a dictatorial stance in the home. The point is that Adam gave up his leadership role. He should have cautioned, warned, and refused to eat. Instead he was swayed by his wife to do the wrong thing. Second, he ate the fruit. He knew he wasn’t supposed to eat the fruit, but he did anyway. Thus, God makes the following pronouncement.

From this point on Adam’s work would be extremely difficult. From Genesis 2:15 we know that work was a part of Adam’s life. The pronouncement is not of work as some curse, but that work now would be extremely hard. The work he would do would produce thorns and thistles. While the ground would grow good things, it would be a constant struggle to grow what really mattered. Notice Genesis 5:29 in which Lamech names Noah hoping to find comfort from his toil in the fields.

There is a falling out between man and his environment. The consequence of sin is that the environment and man will constantly be at odds. While work was always a part of God’s plan, now man’s work will be more difficult because the environment will be at odds with him.

Second, Adam dies. But we should not see here the penalty of death as a direct result of sin. Rather it is the expulsion from the garden which guarantees that death will take place. According to Genesis 3:22, God was determined not to allow Adam to continue to eat of the tree of life and live forever. Thus, the banishment from the garden would guarantee death.

Lessons

This section is to explain the beginnings of some events in our world. Pain in childbirth, disharmony in marriage, disharmony with nature and the environment, and hard labor in providing all began because of sin. These things serve as reminders of sin’s power in our lives.

Second, sin has definite consequences. We may not always know what those consequences are. They may not be as direct as what God does here in this section, but make no mistake, there are consequences to sin. We live at time when many in our world expect their sin to be ignored, forgotten about, and understood. The president may declare that his sin is private, but he forgets that some of it took place in a public place built with public money on public time. There are consequences to sin. Sin must be paid for. For all time, Jesus paid the full debt for sin. And in his payment he took care of some of the eternal consequences of sin, but he did not in his death destroy all consequences for all time. We must trust Jesus to deal with our sin.

Follow Jesus

If you’d like to respond to this message or learn more about following Jesus, please reach out.