A Sunday school was putting on a Christmas pageant which included the story of Mary and Joseph coming to the inn. One boy wanted very much to be Joseph; but when the parts were handed out, a boy he didn’t like was given the part, and he was assigned to be the innkeeper instead. He was pretty upset but didn’t say anything to the director.
During the rehearsals he thought about what he might do the night of the performance to get even with his rival. Then, on the night of the performance, Mary and Joseph came walking across the stage. They knocked on the door of the inn, and the innkeeper opened the door and asked them gruffly what they wanted. Joseph answered, “We’d like to have a room for the night.”
Suddenly the innkeeper threw the door open wide and said, “Great come on in and I’ll give you the best room in the house!” For a few seconds poor Joseph didn’t know what to do.
Thinking quickly, he looked inside the door past the inn-keeper then said, “No wife of mine is going to stay in a dump like this. Come on Mary, let’s go to the barn.”
And the play was back on-track. (Brian Harvison, May 29, 2008, www.SermonCentral.com)
Wow! That young actor knew how to recover from what could have been a real disaster.
Sometimes, life surprises you and you are faced with certain disaster. So how do you recover from such surprises? How do you recover even if the disaster is a result of your own failure and sin? How do you recover from a fall?
Well, if you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to Genesis 3, Genesis 3, where we see how God invites the first human beings to recover from their fall. Their original sin brought ruin to themselves and to the entire human family, but God offers hope for recovery, not only for them, but for all their descendants, even for you and me!
Genesis 3:8 And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden (ESV).
They had sinned against God and now they are scared.
Genesis 3:9-11 But the LORD God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” And he said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” (ESV)
Tell me: Do you think God asks these questions, because He doesn’t know the answer? No, of course not! God knows exactly where Adam is. God knows exactly what Adam did. Why then does He ask? It’s because God wants Adam to openly confess his sin. Does Adam do it?
Genesis 3:12-13 The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.” Then the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this that you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”
Do they openly confess their sin? No. They both play the blame game. In fact, Adam has the audacity to blame God Himself. In verse 12 he says, “The woman whom YOU gave to be with me” – she did it to me. Then Eve blames the serpent.
Now, that is NOT the way to handle it when you mess up! Yet that is what a lot of people do. They blame others for their failures, or they make excuses.
According to a recent (2018) Career Builder survey of more than 1,000 HR managers, excuses for being late to work are essentially the same in every industry. The most common excuses are traffic (51 percent), oversleeping (31 percent), and weather (28 percent).
However, the most unique excuses include: “I was here but fell asleep in the parking lot;” or “my fake eyelashes were stuck together;” and “an astrologer warned me of a car accident on a major highway, so I took all back roads.”
Perhaps, the most unique excuse was from a person who said, “I had morning sickness.” The only problem was that excuse came from a male employee. The Washington Post article that reported on the survey noted, “One thing is for sure: innovation is not dead in America.” (Gene Marks, “The Boss Has Heard Them All: The Craziest Late-to-work Excuses,” The Washington Post, 3-26-18; www.PreachingToday.com)
People have creative ways of excusing their sin, but it seldom if ever works. No! When you fail, don’t make excuses. Just...
CONFESS YOUR OWN SIN.
Admit what you did wrong and take responsibility for your own actions.
There’s an old story about the Prussian King, Frederick the Great, who toured a Berlin prison. The prisoners fell on their knees before him to proclaim their innocence, all except for one man, who remained silent.
Frederick called to him, “Why are you here?”
The man replied, “Armed robbery, Your Majesty.”
“And Are you guilty,” Frederick the Great asked him.
“Yes indeed, Your Majesty,” the prisoner replied. “I deserve my punishment.”
Frederick then summoned the jailer and ordered him, “Release this guilty wretch at once. I will not have him kept in this prison where he will corrupt the fine innocent people who occupy it.”
Proverbs 28:13 says, “Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy.”
So don’t make excuses; don’t play the blame game. Just confess your own sins; admit your own faults. Then…
ACCEPT THE CONSEQUENCES OF YOUR ACTIONS.
Take what comes from the hand of God.
At the beginning of Lent one year, Deron Smith and his wife in Springfield, Missouri, sat at the dinner table with their three daughters, ages 6, 8, and 11. They attempted to explain the meaning of the period and some of the practices that go with it.
He said, “Some people like to show they are thinking about what Jesus gave up for us by giving up something they think has become too important to them, like their computers or coffee or dessert or meat or television. It doesn't make God love us more; it just makes us more open to God and less cluttered with our own junk.”
He told the girls, “Your mom and I are going to give up all desserts until Easter. We want you girls to think of what you could give up, something that means a lot to you.”
Their oldest daughter said, “I will give up sweets.”
“Me, too,” the middle daughter chimed in.
The youngest daughter thought about the question a little longer, her six-year-old mind working the angles... She finally nodded with satisfaction... and said confidently, “I want to give up consequences!” (Deron Smith, Springfield, Missouri; www. PreachingToday.com)
Well, you can’t give up the consequences of your own actions. So you might as well accept them as Adam and Eve had to.
Skip down to vs.16, where God judges the woman.
Genesis 3:16 To the woman he said, “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you.” (ESV)
There are two things God tells the woman. 1st, there will be pain when she gives birth to a child. And 2nd, there will be a power struggle between her and her husband.
First, God says there will be pain in childbearing. Ladies, I don’t need to tell you about the pain that’s involved in having a baby. Suffice it to say, that after three kids of my own, I thank the Lord every day that He did not make me a woman. It’s like the little boy told the little girl, “Let’s play pregnant, I’ll shave, and you throw up.” There is pain in the whole process of having babies and raising children.
On top of that, there is a power struggle between the woman and her man. They have disagreements over how to raise the children. They have disagreements over how to spend the money. They have disagreements over what temperature to set the thermostat.
In verse 16 God tells the woman, “Your desire shall be for your husband.”
Now, if you skip over to Genesis 4:7, you get a feel for what that word, “desire,” means. There, God tells Cain, “Sin is crouching at the door; It’s desire is for you (same word), but you must rule over it.” In other words, sin desires to control Cain, but Cain must learn to control his sinful desires.
So the woman desires to control the man, but in Genesis 3:16 God says the man will rule over her. Instead of harmony in the home, the husband and wife will struggle for control of the home. Their sin brought the desire for each to dominate the other.
Some time ago, CNN reported on a man from Berlin, Germany, who took an unusual approach in trying to bring peace to his marriage. He used an old air raid siren to stun his wife into submission.
“My wife never lets me get a word in edgeways,” the man identified as Vladimir R. told the police. “So I crank up the siren and let it rip for a few minutes. It works every time. Afterwards, it's real quiet again.”
Police confiscated the 73-year-old man's 220-volt, rooftop siren after neighbors filed complaints.
As for his wife of 32 years, she said “My husband is a stubborn mule, so I have to get loud.” (“Man Uses Air Raid Siren to Quiet Wife,” CNN.com, 4-19-03; www.PreachingToday.com)
We laugh, but that is the sad state of many marriages today. Along with pain in bearing children, there is a power struggle between the woman and her man. That’s the consequence of sin for the woman.
Then there are the consequences of sin for the man. For God not only judges the woman, God judges the man.
Genesis 3:17-19 And to Adam he said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” (ESV)
Just as the woman will experience pain in childbirth, so the man will experience pain in his work. The word for “pain” in verse 17, is the same Hebrew word translated “pain” in verse 16. Both the husband and wife experience “pain” as a result of their sin. They just experience it in different realms.
For the man, the ground that once produced an abundant crop, giving him everything he needed to provide for his family, now becomes stingy with its fruits, offering thorns and thistles instead. Work now becomes painful, toilsome and exhausting, cumbersome and a chore. Man experiences pain in his work.
Then he passes away. Then he is gone! God told Adam, vs.19, “You are dust and to dust you shall return.”
A little boy was sitting in Sunday school, listening to his teacher describe how God made man from the dust of the earth and how after death our bodies will decompose, and we'll return to dust. The little boy turned to his friend, and he said, “You know, I think I got somebody under my bed at home. I'm not sure whether he's coming or going.” (Jim Nicodem, "The Father Heart of God," Preaching Today, Tape No. 152)
We live a life of pain, then we return to dust. It doesn’t sound very hopeful, does it? But there IS hope! For God not only judges the woman and the man.
God judges the serpent too, and here we find our hope. Here we find grace and mercy in the midst of pain.
Genesis 3:14 The LORD God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and above all beasts of the field; on your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life. (ESV)
The devil is disgraced more than any other creature. The one who wanted the highest place in all the universe now takes the lowest. The serpent is humiliated, and he is hated.
Genesis 3:15 I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.” (ESV)
Satan thought he could win the loyalties of the woman and her descendants, but now he finds that they will hate him. More than that, he finds that one of them will kill him some day. Satan will be mortally wounded – his head crushed – while the one who wounds him will get away with only a strike on his heal.
In the midst of discipline, there is the promise of a Deliverer. In the midst of sorrow, there is the promise of a Savior – One who will rescue us from the enemy of our own souls.
Who is that One? Who is that Deliverer? Who is that Savior? Is it Adam and Eve’s firstborn son, Cain? No. He ends up murdering his brother. Is it Abraham, the great Father of the Jews? No. He turns out to be a liar, afraid of Pharaoh. Is it the great King David? No. He ends up getting a woman, who’s not his wife, pregnant, and he kills her husband in an attempt to hide his own sin.
None of these can deal the fatal blow to Satan. They are all the seed of men, descendants of men, and therefore sinful like Adam himself. So we search all of history in vain for our Deliverer, until we come to the little town of Bethlehem at around 4 B.C. There, in a stable, a little boy was born of a virgin. He is NOT the seed of a man. He is the seed of a woman, the Son of God.
He alone is our Deliverer. He alone is our Savior, and He dealt that fatal blow to Satan on the cross. Sure, Satan struck Him on the heel there. They put nails in his hands and feet, but that wound was not fatal. Three days later, Jesus rose from the dead, victorious over the grave, victorious over sin, and victorious over Satan himself.
The Bible says, “Through death [Jesus]…destroy[ed] – literally, He rendered powerless – the one who has the power of death – that is, the devil” (Hebrews 2:14). Jesus dealt Satan that fatal blow 2,000 years ago on the cross. The Seed of the Woman crushed his head, and now he is in his death throws, and soon, very soon, he will be gone. Halleluiah!
Last year (2018), Jeremy Sutcliffe grabbed a shovel to decapitate a 4-foot-long Western diamondback rattlesnake after it spooked Jennifer, his wife. Then when he went to pick up the severed head, it sank its fangs into his flesh and released a near deadly dose of venom.
Jennifer, who happens to be a nurse, got him into a car and began to drive him to the hospital. About two miles into the drive, her husband began having seizures, lost his vision and, unknown to them, began bleeding internally. So she met up with an ambulance and then a helicopter, which flew the 40-year-old to the hospital as his organs were already shutting down. It was touch-and-go for the first 24 hours, but eventually Jeremy’s condition stabilized, and he lived to tell the story.
Harry Greene, a biology professor at Cornell university told NPR, “A severed viper head certainly can deliver a dangerous bite, as can the unsecured head of a recently 'killed' snake.” In fact, Greene says, “The typical rattlesnake can keep moving for a few hours at most after it is split in two.” (Vanessa Romo, “Man Kills Snake; Snake Tries To Kill Him Back,” NPR, 6-7-18);
Well, on the cross, Jesus severed that old serpent’s head, but you still have to watch out for him. He can still wreak havoc in your life, but know this: Jesus has already won the victory over Satan on the Cross.
Jesus is your Savior from sin. Jesus is your Deliverer from the devil. Jesus is your Rescuer from ruin. So, when Satan brings you down, or when you fall, confess your sin, to be sure, and accept the consequences of your actions. But don’t stop there. Move on to...
PUT YOUR CONFIDENCE IN GOD.
Trust the Lord to save you from your sin. Depend on Him to give you life itself as he puts you on the road to recovery. That’s what Adam did.
Genesis 3:20 The man called his wife’s name Eve, because she was the mother of all living. (ESV)
Literally, Adam named his wife, “Life.” Now, how could he do that when all he is faced with is DEATH? I’ll tell you how: He believed God’s promise of a Deliverer through the seed of the woman.
Adam believed God. He trusted the Lord, and God responded by covering up his sins. God covered up he and Eve’s guilt and shame.
Genesis 3:21 And the LORD God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them. (ESV)
God shed the blood of some animals; and through that shed blood, He provided a covering for their sin.
Don’t you know? That’s exactly what God wants to do for you. If you put your trust in Him, if you rely on Him like Adam and Eve, God will cover your sins, and He will take away all your guilt and shame. For, you see, God has already shed the blood of His own Son. Now, He stands ready to cover any who trust Him with His Son’s righteousness.
So stop running from the Lord. Instead, confess your sins to the Lord, accept the consequences of your own actions, and put your confidence in Him. Trust the Lord to save you!
One evening, a woman was driving home, when she noticed a huge truck behind her that was driving uncomfortably close. She stepped on the gas to gain some distance from the truck, but when she sped up, the truck did too! The faster she drove, the faster drove the truck.
Now scared, she exited the freeway, but the truck stayed with her. The woman then turned up a main street, hoping to lose her pursuer in traffic, but the truck ran a red light and continued the chase.
Reaching the point of panic, the woman whipped her car into a service station and bolted out of her car screaming for help. The truck driver sprang from his truck and ran toward her car. Yanking the back door open, the driver pulled out a man hidden in the back seat.
The woman was running from the wrong person. From his high vantage point, the truck driver had spotted a would-be rapist in the woman’s car. The chase was not his effort to harm her, but to save her, even at the cost of his own safety. (James S. Hewett, Illustrations Unlimited, p.37)
Many people are like that woman, and like Adam, perhaps some of you. You’re running from God, fearful of His judgment and afraid that He wants to harm you. But all He wants to do is save you from the Evil One, from Satan Himself.
Please, stop running from God. Instead, trust Him to rescue you from the enemy of your soul. Trust Him to save you from your sins.
