GENESIS 3:15
BY: REV. KENNETH SAUER, PASTOR OF PARKVIEW UNITED METHODIST
CHURCH, NEWPORT NEWS, VA
“THE FIRST DECLARATION OF THE GOSPEL”
Here we find ourselves looking at one of the most liberating and hopeful, and saving
passages of the entire Bible....right here in the first Book, the third Chapter, the 15th verse of the
Bible....after the fall of humankind we are hit head on with the Adamic Covenant or the first
evangelium....which means that it is the first declaration of the gospel. It is God’s unconditional
promise to Adam and all humankind that He will send a Savior to deliver us!
And that promise has been fulfilled through Jesus Christ....our Lord and our Savior!
The Lord God said to Satan.... “And I will put enmity” which means antagonism or
hatred “between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; He will crush your
head, and you will strike His heel.”
In essence God was telling Satan that he would be crushed by one particular seed or
descendent of the woman.
What a glorious promise: Some descendent of the woman was to destroy Satan. The
Serpant would strike the descendent’s heel and bruise Him, but the descendent would strike
the final and fatal blow!
The New Testament clearly tells us who the promised seed is....the Seed may sometimes
refer to the descendents of humanity or Israel, but the primary meaning of the Seed is singular: It
is Jesus Christ Himself!
As the Bible says in Galations chapter 3: “The promises were spoken to Abraham and to
his Seed. The Scripture does not say ‘and to seeds’, meaning many people, but ‘and to your
Seed,’ meaning one person, who is Christ.”
And the promised Seed is said to be the seed of the woman, not of the man. This points
toward the virgin birth--the incarnation--of Christ.
So the Devil from this point on--tryed to destroy the seed of the woman.
But notice that God never said which woman would bear the Seed, so Satan was left
guessing, and Satan has been trying to desroy the Seed of the woman throughout history....He has
been waging war against the Seed of God, the Savior of the world, ever since God promised
to save the world here in Genesis 3:15.
For example, there was the line of Abel, and Satan led Cain to kill Abel, but God gave
Adam another son, named Seth.
There was the line of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob....and Satan led Essau to threaten to kill
his brother, Jacob....but God protected him.....
Then there was the line of David, and Satan led several of David’s sons into sin, led them
to commit murder and disqualify themselves from the godly line....but God always kept at least
one son alive....and the list goes on and on.....
Then there was the line of the promised Seed Jesus Himself at His birth....Satan led
King Herod to slay all the babies in Bethlehem in an attempt to kill the promised child. But God
warned Joseph and told Joseph to flee with the child.
Then there was the line of the Promised Seed, Jesus Himself, on the cross.
Satan led the world to put Jesus on the cross and to kill Him. But God raised Jesus from
the dead.
Talk about emnity!
And now that Christ has come, Satan continues to do all that he can to turn people away
from Christ.
And even when we do
repent and turn to follow Christ--Satan does all he can to lead us astray!
And that is why we all need to be as wise as snakes and as innocent as doves!
Now we must not become too preoccupied with Satan....but we must at least be aware of
his presence.
As C.S. Lewis once put it, “There are two mistakes that Christains often make
regarding Satan....one is to not believe that he exists, and the other is to have an unhealthy
interest in him. For, with both, Satan is equally pleased.”
And we must be aware of Satan’s desire to squelch our relationship with God...to lead
us astray...or to stop us from having a relationship with God because....through Jesus
Christ....and Him alone we too.....become the promised Seed of the woman....as the Bible
declares in 1st Peter chapter 1: “For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of
imperishable, through the living and enduring Word of God.”
That’s right...our lineage as Christains goes all the way back to Genesis.....
And it’s a spiritual lineage.....it’s an imperishable lineage....but it is also a lineage that is
in conflict with an enemy...
As the Bible says in Ephesians chapter 6: “Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but
against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the
spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.”
Therefore we are called to “be strong in the Lord.”
We are called to be strong in the Lord who crushed Satan’s head by never giving into
the Devil’s temptations.
Christ became the Perfect Man, the Ideal Man, the Ideal Righteousness, in whom we all
must trust, in whom we all must follow, in whom we all must use for the pattern of our lives!
Christ crushed Satan’s head by dying for humankind...for you and for me....by bearing
our sin and our punishment for sin upon the cross, and paying the price that we owed.
Therefore, we never have to die and be separated from God.
The way to living forever in the presence of God is now open.
Because when Christ rose again, He triumphed over Satan, showing that death does
not have to be the natural experience of humans.
After all, death was never the purpose of God---God’s purpose is for us to live with him
in eternity....never even tasting death....and through Christ...those of us who believe....can and
will do this.
And through Christ...when we give our lives to Christ and are born of Christ....when God
looks at us...God sees Christ....
Therefore Christ has crushed Satan’s ability to accuse us---those who believe--at the
judgement seat of Christ---for through Christ our sins are washed clean---and there is nothing to
condemn us.
As the Bible declares in Romans, “Who will bring any charge against those whom God
has chosen? It is God who justifies.”
And Satan’s power to cause us to be separated from God has now been caste out through
Christ. Christ was actually separated from God for us....as we see in Matthew chapter 27:
“About the ninth hour Jesus Cried out in a loud voice.... “My God, my God, why have you
forsaken me?”
And through Christ, Satan’s power to enslave us with the habits of sin and shame is now
caste out....we can now conquer sin by God’s Holy Spirit....which dwells within each of us as
soon as we are born of God or born again....or born of the Seed of the woman.
And sin is what makes our lives miserable....giving into temptation....because once we
are born again of the imperishable Seed.....all things become new....we are no longer citizens of
this world...and the ruler of this world....we immediately become citizens of heaven....
But the struggle does continue.....
Therefore as the Bible says....in order to be the best Christians we can be...the most
productive Christians we can be for God’s kingdom....we must “Put on the full armor of God so
that” we “can take” our stands “against the Devil’s schemes.”
So that we can grow and mature in the Christian faith...so that we can have the life that
Jesus so desires us to have...and to have it abundantly.
We are called to “Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckeled around” our waists, and
“with the breastplate of righteousness in place.”
Christ is the truth, and we are to come to and put on Christ.....
The Word of God is truth, and we are to come closer and closer to God and our
knowledge of God through the daily studying of His Word, coming to Bible studies, Sunday
school, and Church.
And we are to live lives that are truthful both in speech and action.
Truth keeps us from flapping about from one thing to another, from being tossed back
and forth by every attack from the enemy, and it keeps us from becoming entangled by the
affairs of this life.
And it helps us and supports us in the battles and trials of this life.
On top of this we must also protect our hearts from ever being wounded and losing
focus....we do this through putting on the breastplate of righteousness.....which means to strive
after the very righteousness of Christ...to live righteously in this present world.
And this righteousness comes from God and is by faith.
And we are called to “have our feet fitted with readiness that comes from the gospel of
peace.”
Roman shoes or sandles were made with nails that gripped the ground firmly even when
the ground was sloping or slippery.
And as Christians we are to have our feet”fitted with readiness” to bear and share the
gospel.
Wherever our feet take us, we are to share the gospel which is the only way that the
world can become firmly grounded under the weight of desparate need and conflict.
As the Bible says in 1st Peter, “In your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be
prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you
have.”
And as the Bible says, “In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you
can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.”
Satan has fiery darts that can cause us to question our salvation, to question our call, to
question whether or not we are worthy, to cause us to question whether or not we can really
serve, or if a project can really get done....those arrows....if they hit us can cause us to become
discouraged, depressed, and defeated....but as the Scripture tells us, God is our help and our
shield.
And we are to “Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit which is the
Word of God.”
The helmet that protects the minds of Christians is salvation.
Unless we have been saved--we cannot be protected from the fiery darts of
temptation....without this helmet....our natural inclinations take over and we only want more and
more, we look at others with unhealthy desires, and we hoard even when others have little or
nothing!
This helmet stirs us to keep our minds on Christ, and it arouses us to focus upon Christ’s
mission to carry the gospel to a needy and dying world.
And as Christians we are to use the sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God by
living in the Scriptures. Remember that Jesus Himself overcame the onslaught of the Devil
by using Scripture.
And we are to “pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and
requests.”
We are to pray--always! Prayer enables us to maintain a constant unbroken
consciousness of God’s presence and care.
Prayer infuses us with the assurance, confidence, and courage we need in order to live
Christian lives which are filled with abundant joy!
God has given us a great promise in Genesis 3:15---God has promised that Christ will
crush Satan’s head....and that through coming to Christ....we too can be victorious with Christ in
this great battle of all battles....
If you have not yet joined the battle....now is the time to join....so that we can sll cry out
with Paul in his letter to the Corinthians, “Death has been swallowed up in victory. Where, O
death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But
thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
