The following is a sermon manuscript, preached on January 15, 2023, at Foundation Reformed Church in Quakertown, PA.

Introduction

If you remember our 4-week study through the first few chapters of Genesis is about how to establish a Biblical worldview, where we have analyzed foundational components for a Biblical Worldview.  The first week, we talked about our presuppositions and the pattern (order) that God created: Identifying that God’s reality is true reality.  Last week, we focused on the necessity of the God’s Holy Word interpreting, and establishing our knowledge of the world and how it works.  This week we will be considering what deviation, disobedience, and death looks like in the federal failure of Adam.

Let me ask you this:Is this statement true? Humans are born good - perfect, generally speaking. This is exactly what I wager most people will tell you if you ask them.  They will say that people who act badly are that way because of some negative experience, some trauma, some other nurture or nature issue external to themselves.  The problem with this perspective of the human nature is that it shifts responsibility of sin to something, or someone other than the individual.  It skews the Gospel, and it also, denies the reality of the federal failure of Adam in the Garden of Eden.

I went to a break out session in a workshop one time that was on how to deal with difficult kids in your children’s ministry.  The opening statement starting the breakout session was “there are no bad kids, just bad decisions”.  Granted I don’t know what all was meant by that statement other than, we should not label individual children; but I later thought to myself, if you believe this, then how does the Gospel really apply – How do you teach kids that they are sinners needing a Savior?  A weak view of sin and a weak view of the human condition will produce in you a weak view of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  This is a problem because Paul says that the Gospel of Jesus is the power of God for Salvation to everyone who believes (Romans 1:16).  This means that a weak view of the Gospel is a weak view of God’s power and a weak view of God’s salvation.  The implications are far reaching.  

The reality is that since Adam sinned in the Garden with Eve, Humanity has been born into death needing God to provide a means of salvation.  The effects of the sin of our First Parents reaches well beyond them even past humanity as it also affected the very Earth on which we live.  So, this morning, we are going to consider exactly what happened on that dreadful day to see nuggets of wisdom for us in our daily struggle against Satan, Sin, and our Flesh.               

There are 4 things about the Federal Failure we should take notice of this morning:

1. Satan Questions Their Situation (The Situation) 

2. Adam and Eve Adopt Separation (The Separation)

3. Responsibility Shifting (The Shifting)

4. Revealing of Salvation (The Salvation)

The Slippery Slope of Satanic Sin starts here with a situation:  

SITUATION: (Genesis 3:1-7) “Satan Questions God’s Word”

The situation is Satan questions God’s motives in God’s directives.  Satan is introduced by the snake asking a question to the couple about God’s direct command.  The Hebrew word for “you” is plural in verses 1-5 which helps indicate that Adam and Eve are together in this situation with the Serpent.  Satan’s deceptive actions begins to get the couple to bargain with the words of God.

Take notice of what Satan does here:  He takes the Freedom “true freedom” that God had given Adam and Eve and paints it as oppression.  God had told them they could eat from every tree, but one.  Satan says, God is oppressing you by not allowing you total freedom to eat from this forbidden tree.  

Do we see this in our world today?  This scheme of Satanic deception?  Have you heard that Christianity is oppressive?  The Feminist movement would say that we oppress our women because of our complementarian male headship doctrine.  The LBGTQ+ movement says that we are oppressive because we reject marriage for anything other than a man and women.  The Society says that Christians are oppressive because people are expected to have monogamous sexual relationships in marriage and that hinders my freedom to have fun.  The society might say that Christians are mentally oppressive because one must own their sin.  There are many people saying right now that the church is oppressive because it is hindering women’s reproductive rights as it advocates against abortion.  

These are all important to recognize corporately, but let us think about this also individually.  Do you think at times or have your thought at times that God’s regulations are oppressive?  Some people I have talked to in the past said that they didn’t want to become a Christian because of all the things that they would have to give up aka Christianity is oppressive to their own desires.  Do you think this way?  

Satan’s goal was to get Adam and Eve to believe that God was withholding good from them, that His rules were oppressive to them.  Satan created a false sense of freedom contrasted with the actual freedom that they did have. Ironically, they would choose the false freedom which would actually oppress them.  If we, ourselves, are not careful, we will naturally do that too.   

Satan’s work is to get us to sin, that sin will oppress you.  That is why John 8:34-36 says:

34 Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin. 35 The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever. 36 So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. 

The word of God shows us how Satan attempts to deceive us with his cunning word games; however, we can identify it and then act accordingly by the internal empowerment of the Holy Spirit.  This is what we call growing in discernment.  

Sin does more than oppresses us, it separates us from God:        

SEPARATION: (Genesis 3:8-10) “Adam and Eve Willingly Run from God”

Adam and Eve heard God in the Garden and ran from Him willfully.  This is the tragic natural response of the sinner to our Holy God.  A change had taken place opened Adam and Eve to know guilt in a way that was previously foreign to them, but this crippling guilt drove Adam and Eve from the very desire to be with the only one who could help them.  

Why did Adam and Eve separate themselves from their God, who handmade them?  Fear.  They were afraid.  They had not experienced fear before in the Garden of Eden or with their personal God, but post sin, they were afraid of God.  They did not want to be in God’s presence anymore, so they ran from Him.

Sin makes us act in a way that is unnatural to us.  Sin blinds us to see the reality of the situation, to understand exactly what we need.  Adam and Eve needed God more than ever because they had disobeyed God and they were without a cure.  This is the natural propensity (reaction) of sin when God’s presence appears.

Remember back with me to the Exodus account.  God has told Moses to lead Israel into the Wilderness that they may worship their God and serve Him.  They get to Mount Sinai, and God visits them on the mountain.  Its glorious, there is fire, lightening, smoke, wind, earthquaking, and the people beg Moses to not let that happen again.  The people of Israel were afraid of God.    

Exodus 20:18-21  Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled, and they stood far off 19 and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die.” 20 Moses said to the people, “Do not fear, for God has come to test you, that the fear of him may be before you, that you may not sin.” 21 The people stood far off, while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was.

We need to see that it is only God who can fix the separation issue that sin causes us to experience.  We need reconciliation with God and with each other.  This is where we need God to provide for us that which we could not provide for ourselves.  Jesus removes the Separation between God and Man by being our 2nd Adam who is faithful.  

We need to really believe this church because God does not want us running from Him in fear when we sin.  We don’t need to hide ourselves behind the trees pretending God cannot see us or doesn’t know where we are.  We need to run to Him in repentance, so we can be healed from our sin.  This form of running to God is also the catalyst and motivation to not continue in Sin.  

Hebrews 4:14-16 Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. 

              

SHIFTING OF BLAME: (Genesis 3:11-13) “Adam and Eve Shift Responsibility” 

What does Adam and Eve do when confronted with the Truth of their sin?  They blame shift.  Look with me in our text to see how this goes down:  God asks a series of questions.  None of them does Adam actually respond to in the affirmative.  Meaning Adam sidesteps God’s questions.  Then Adam explains with a great blame shift.  Adam blames the woman and God for His sin.  

Adam says the woman gave it to me, so I ate it.  Adam also in that statement blames God for his sinful action.  God is the one who gave the woman to Adam as a help mate.  Adam says “the woman whom YOU gave me”.  This is actually a very common way of dealing with sin.  This method is not only ungodly, but it is also an affront to God.  God gave Adam Eve for companionship because there was no one like him in the created world.  Adam then tells God that His gift that was given to him to help him fulfil the God given mandates is the very reason why Adam sinned.  Then the woman does the same thing in which she blames the serpent.  

God gave Adam and Eve the perfect opportunity to repent, but they did not.  They just blame shifted.   We need to be careful of this in our own lives where we take the blessings of God and make them excuses for our own sin.  We don’t want/need to blame God for our sin.  

God may have blessed us with a great career, but that does not mean we get to use that job to partake of ungodly behaviors.  God may have given us a great spouse, but that does not allow us the right to blame him or her for our lack of anger control.  God may have given us a great group of friends, but that does not mean we get to skip church to spend every Sunday on the Lake with them.  

If we are to grow in sanctification and grace, we have to own our sin, repent – Turn away from it – and seek God for healing.  There is no alternative.  As a matter of fact, if we blame everyone else for our sin, we can never come to the Gospel with a view that will allow Jesus to save us from sin because we see it as everyone else’s fault or caused by everyone else.  This is exactly what Satan wants.  He wants to see people blame others for their sin, so that they stay in a condition that prevents the salvation of their soul.

Our Gracious God did not leave Adam and Eve to fend for themselves even in the curse, He revealed that there will be and now is a way out of the curse of sin.             

SALVATION: (Genesis 3:14-20) “A Revealing of Hope to Come in the Offspring”

The reality of sin brought curses upon the serpent, Eve, the Earth, Adam, and all Humanity, but God gives a glimpse of the hope of salvation in Jesus in Genesis 3:15 which is commonly known as the protoevangelium.  

The pronouncement of the curses highlights exactly what God is going to save His people from: This salvation will come to destroy Satan – The Serpent, to restore order, and to cleanse the people from the iniquity of their new sinful nature.  The world was perfectly ordered before the Fall of humanity.  Everything had its proper place, and harmoniously existed relationally within the context that God designed.  However, sin ruined this or disordered this reality.  Every layer of fabric was disordered by the sin of Adam and Eve.  God is going and is currently doing to reorder that which was broken by sin.  

How does God say He will remedy this?  Genesis 3:15 – Through the offspring of the woman.  God tells Eve that her offspring will bruise the head of Satan.  This offspring will be contently battling the offspring of Satan.  That is why there are multiple attempts to kill every male child from the decree of Pharoah to the Decree of Herod looking for Jesus.

Adam names Eve, Eve because she is the mother of all living, but she was the one who introduced death to her Husband.  The same person who started the chain reaction that led to the death of all humanity is named the mother of all living.  So how can she be the mother of all living?  Her seed, Jesus Christ, is the fulfillment of Genesis 3:15 and everyone who believes and trusts in Him will have eternal life.  

Romans 5:18-19 Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. 19 For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.   

The failure of Adam means that all humanity will die, and are sinners.  Everyone born of man and woman face this reality because we are all born into Adam.  Those who place their faith, trust, and submit to the Lordship of Jesus Christ all have life because Jesus is the life giver because Jesus was obedient.  

Where are you this morning?  It is obvious that you are in Adam because I see you.  But are you in Christ?  God did not leave humanity with out hope even in the midst of the pronouncement of a curse.  Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.  If you are unsure of where you stand with Jesus Christ this morning, lets speak after service, I, as would any of the other leaders here, would love to share the hope of life in Jesus Christ and the freedom from sin with you.   

Conclusion

Do you see how Sin is a Satanic Slippery Slide away from God’s design into Slavery?  Can you better recognize the situations that you might find yourself in, and spot how Sin might be knocking at your door?  

Have you been hiding from God because of some sin that you have committed?  Have you thought that you cannot approach God anymore?  Run to Him for healing!  

Have you not owned your sin, but shifted blame for it to others or even God, himself?  Do you personally know hope, the one Savior who bruised Satan’s head on the cross and in the resurrection who is coming again to crush the serpent with his followers?  

Let’s be watchful church, the age in which we live is evil and Devil is looking to destroy you, don’t let Him!    

 “This is the Word of the Lord. Thanks be to God”