January 3

Genesis 3; Matthew 3

Genesis 3

Ready:
Lord in Genesis 2 you have setup roles and responsibilities clearly for mankind and it is under and by your authority that you set us out to rule this earth.  You delegated this to us and you have given us marriage and you have provided wonderfully.

Reading Thoughts:
As I read Lord I see your plan unfold even in the midst of our failure and the wickedness of the adversary.  I see a scene where your people that you gave authority to subdue and rule the earth and all that is on it defect and they place themselves under another authority, a false authority.  They surrender their role to Satan and they delegate to him the very role that you delegated to our first parents.  I see here how Satan became the ruler of this world and the prince of the power of the air. We were tasked as the rulers of the world but we gave it away in treasonous distrust and disobedience.  I see Adam’s miserable failure, just like mine would have been.  I see Adam fail to name his wife and to lead her and to protect her and I see him failing to subdue and rule the crafty beast who would come with a message counter to what Adam knows as truth.  I see the apathy and selfishness of Adam and his failure as a husband and a man. I see this crafty beast manipulating both Adam and Eve and in so doing he offers temptation through the very command that you gave.  He attacks Eve by causing her to question what God had commanded Adam prior to her arrival and she then seems to inform Adam of what she now believes based upon the wisdom of the world.  She buys the wisdom of the creation over the wisdom of the creator.  I see Lord that you placed a guard in the garden after their fall to ensure that they did not become permanently separated from you in order to make for the plan of redemption that you had purposed before this scene began.  Clearly Lord you could have placed the guard to begin with but you had purpose in our fall.  You had purpose in the wickedness that you knew was to beset us.  Let us be sorrowful yet always rejoicing O Lord for you have purpose in suffering!

The key verses are these-

“7 Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.” (Genesis 3:7, ESV)

“9 But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?”” (Genesis 3:9, ESV)

The theme is this- 
The tragic transfer of authority from man to Satan and the corruption of humanity in enmity toward God leading to expulsion from the place of communion with God…all for the very purpose of God to redeem a people who would know God in the riches of his glory!

Rumination Thoughts:
     v1-5.  Here Lord is the beginning of the corruption of humanity and our fall from innocence.  The enemy goes to the woman.  Eve had not received the command directly but through the advice of her husband she was told of this command (it seems).  So we see that Adam took to heart the command of God from the beginning.  We know that Eve received it from Adam because the command came prior to her creation.  Satan exploits this and goes to her to ask if God really said that.  He attacks both authorities over her at once in this.  He offers to her in that moment ad chance to rule over herself and to make her own determination of good.  I see plainly that she is the first to sin but is she?  Where was Adam?  Why did he not name her yet?  Why no child yet?  Why was he allowing the serpent to converse with his bride?  Why was the serpent not beheaded immediately. These responsibilities of Adam should have been clear but were not laid down like the law regarding the tree.  Eve was responsible to keep the law but it was Adam who bore the burden in this.  Adam was responsible for Eve.  Her sin is his sin by his failure to keep her safe.  Did he fear her opinion of him if her were to suggest that she not speak to the serpent?  What went through his mind?  Is it like what goes through mine when I see danger and I am too weak to take it head on?  The deceptive benefits of sin were shining and glowing and it would have taken a submission to the authority of God and a trust in his perfect provision to resist and to flee from the devil.  Satan bids us to believe his version of reality rather than God’s.  His is based on our supposed freedom but is really bondage to him.  We are a slave to the one whom we serve (Rom. 6:16).
     v6.  Appropriate verse number.  Here is the culmination of the fall of mankind.  Eve, deceived and believing in the benefits of the forbidden fruit in spite of the promise and warning from God through her husband, takes and eats.  Adam is right there with her watching and doing nothing.  He follows her lead and he eats as well, full knowing that this is wrong.  So they have surrendered their will to the enemy and they have thus dethroned God from their lives and now serve sin.  Man became self absorbed and broken and separated from God in that moment.  Yes their eyes were opened…
     v7.  This part was no lie.  They now understood what evil was…it was them.  They know that they are guilty and they are ashamed.  They are also aware of themselves like never before.  They no longer see the beauty in the other because they are too busy looking upon themselves in shame and uncertainty. They cover themselves and they are self absorbed.  I can picture the serpent slinking into the distance a bit and relishing the moment.  He owns the pinnacle of God’s creation and thus he rules the earth.  Satan had no chance until the command was given to Adam.  It was the command that allowed Satan opportunity to deceive.  No command means no challenge to obedience means no failure…and no knowledge of the riches of the glory of God.  This will be developed when we come to Romans.  This was no surprise to God.  He was not an absentee God unknowingly dethroned by a crafty beast that somehow operated outside of his awareness.
     v8-11.  The picture here is of guilt, and shame, and fear rather than trust.  The two had enjoyed fellowship with God but now feel a threat and know that they are responsible for something terrible. Rightly so…recall that God warned him that he would die the day he ate of the fruit.  God highlights our separation by calling for Adam as if he does not know where to find him.  He further makes it clear that it is Adam who bears responsibility in this mess.  God called to the man.  God knocks on the door of my home to inquire of the state of affairs and whomever answers is given the reply “where is Jeff?  I need to speak to him.” O Lord let me know this responsibility to the core of my being.  Let me bear this burden with resolve and with your power.  Let me understand whom it is I report to and that I have duty and responsibility.  Lord let me not be slack and let me not fear my wife or children and let me not fail.  I need more than what Adam had O God.  I need your indwelling Spirit to guide me and empower me and inform me and I need to meditate on your Word and be informed by truth.  Grant me strength to lead and to love sacrificially and let me take up arms against the enemy at first sight.  The enemy is a pitiful scoundrel God, it is you who bear the sword and have the power to kill my soul.  Let me not extend to the enemy the fear that is due to you.
     v12-13.  The pitiful excuses and the shunning of responsibility and the throwing of the bride under the bus!  The blaming of God himself!  Notice that no longer is there talk of the goodness of the fruit and the logical argument that convinced them.  All this is gone.  The lie was a lie.  The benefit disintegrates in their hands and the truth is now standing physically before them in the light of day.  There is darkness in their hearts plainly exposed.
     v14-19.  The curse upon the earth and mankind and the enemy is pronounced.  Living the design that God had graciously given us will now be a challenge and we will labor not in joy but in toil.
     v20-21.  Its about time.  Now Adam give his wife a personal name.  God then clothed them by killing an animal for a covering.  Note that God did not kill them as he had promised when the command was given.  “In the day you eat of it you shall surely die”. Nope- he killed a substitute.  From this moment the righteous God of creation has a problem.  Where is his justice?  How is it right to kill the animal instead of the guilty party and how does that help? Why does he not leave the plant as a covering?  What is he saying?  This was likely the first thing on earth to die.  Sacrificed to remove the shame of mankind.  Is there a reason that the record inserts Adam naming Eve right here the moment before God sacrifices an animal to cover them?  It seems awkwardly placed.  Is Adam repenting?  Is he expressing faith?  Is there hope that God has a perfect plan for all of this?  Did Adam appreciate his role and understand the implications before the fall? Can he see plainly that God has spared them and does he now repent and step up?
     v22-24.  Here God again converses within the trinity and gives us a window into heaven. It is plain Lord that the enemy was not lying about becoming like God in the knowledge of good and evil. You plainly affirm that this happened.  The enemy used truth and twisted it into deception by supposing that it would be good for them to distrust God.  To the contrary, you now take arms to ensure that man does not remain in this state of brokenness and corruption.  It seems necessary that man fell in order to know of evil and the meaning of righteousness and so your plan of redemption is better O God than a garden of Eden with no serpent.  Better that we know you than that we be ignorant O God but it is our own failure and sin that you have used to bring us unto yourself.  Our worst and the enemies worst is used by your omnipotent goodness to bring us to yourself more fully. You display your authority and power and you protect us in our plight and you ensure that we will now be on the road of redemption if we will but trust and obey with the faith that you have given Adam in his repentance.  Our first parents are expelled from the Garden but they take with them the gift of faith and repentance and provision.

Response:
Lord you setup our understanding of the world and the way sin and truth work.  I know that the world is under the authority of the devil and that it works to deceive me and to get me to remain under his rule.  I know that you call me out from the world and you bid me to repent and to trust you rather than myself.  You offer me a loincloth of skin and you give me a promise of hope.  You call me unto the responsibility for my family and you charge me to keep them safe and to teach them in your way. You teach me that this life will not be a pleasure cruise but that I can have peace and joy and redemption when I trust you.  I am on a long road to a place better than the garden O God and you are leading me by the hand.

Reaction:
Let me not look back and let me not listen to the lies.  Give me boldness and love and let me lead as a servant leader in my home.  Let me interpret the world according to the truth and let me see through the lies of the fruit before me all over the place and let me hunger not for food that feeds only my body but let me hunger for thee O God.  Your curse is my teacher and let me hear plainly the message to rely on you and to seek you and to know you.

Matthew 3

Ready:
In Matthew 2 Lord you work all circumstances and you ensure that your plan comes to fruition and you make it clear that there is an important mission that this child is on and it is on our behalf. 

Reading Thoughts:
The story here seems to have a number of characters.  There is John the Baptist, the crowds coming to be baptized, the pharisees and sadducees, and then Jesus (with an appearance of the rest of the trinity).  John is fulfilling his prophetic role of announcing the arrival of the Kingdom and according to Isaiah 40 he is making the path for Jesus to come and give the answer to the dilemma John presents.  John is announcing that we are sinners and that we are like grass that fades but that God is mighty and eternal.  We are not like him and he is coming and we have a problem!  We need to change our ways! There is a group that is mostly investigating what he is saying and John calls them out as unrepentant phonies who rely on their earthly heritage for their supposed righteousness. Jesus then busts onto the scene and there is a dramatic presentation of the Father and the Spirit participating with this baptism.

The key verses are here-

“8 Bear fruit in keeping with repentance. 9 And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham.” (Matthew 3:8–9, ESV)

“14 John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” 15 But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented.” (Matthew 3:14–15, ESV)

“16 And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; 17 and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”” (Matthew 3:16–17, ESV)

The theme is this-
The preparation and the initiation of the ministry of Jesus Christ, savior of his people.

Rumination Thoughts:
     v1-2.  This message of the Kingdom of Heaven being at hand must have been something odd. Wouldn’t people expect something more grand than a weird guy in the wilderness yelling at people? The message becomes clearer as we move along since he ultimately settles on it being the announcement of the arrival of a person- Jesus.  John is calling them to repent.  Presumably they would be repenting of sins according to the Jewish law of Moses and this would make sense if there was an imminent arrival of God in their midst and they have been in a wandering from his law.
     v3-6.  Matthew narrates here and gives us the insider information that John was prophesied about in Isaiah and the chapter there tells us about the fleeting nature of the creation and of all flesh and the enduring nature of God and how he will bring good news with his mighty hand.  It sounds like lots of people were hearing and listening and being baptized by John.  People were confessing sins and wanting to be free of their guilt.
     v7-10.  Here John deals with the religious establishment.  These two groups (pharisees and sadducees) were Jews that held to the Mosaic law and they are the spiritual leaders of the day.  John calling them a brood of vipers would have been dramatic because these were the men of God that the people would go to on Sabbath to learn from and to worship with.  These were the pastors and the evangelists of their time.  Yet John calls them vipers and tells them that they are unrepentant.  Jesus will use these same words in his encounters with them later.  There is a big clue that John gives here when he suggests that they will lean on being descendants of Abraham.  This would be a reference to the covenant that God made with Abraham and his offspring to bless them and to give them an everlasting kingdom.  This became license to the religious of that time and they considered that they had no responsibility in this covenant other than to follow some customs and rules (when people were looking).  The huge statement here is regarding the rocks being made into children of Abraham.  This is us!  We are the stones that the Holy Spirit exchanges for flesh and give us life and circumcises our hearts and makes us children of God by his work and not by the law.  This is made clear in Romans 2:29, Jeremiah 31:31-33, Ezekiel 36:26-27 and elsewhere.
     v11-12.  John’s baptism is different than what the Apostles will do.  John’s baptism precedes the resurrection and is therefore only symbolic of the washing of sin as in the purification that happens in the sacrifice at the tabernacle.  John is helping people to acknowledge their sin and seek cleansing. He says that Jesus will come and he will do something much greater.  Jesus will baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire.  Interesting though that Jesus does not baptize anyone.  He instructs baptism but until Jesus dies and rises- there is no true baptism to take place!  Jesus will bring a baptism that represents the judgement of God killing the flesh in a union with the death of Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit granting new life in the believer who is born anew into the Kingdom of God as his child by promise, not by earthly heritage.  This is a union in death and in resurrection unto life.  This is the baptism that he instructs his apostles to perform after his resurrection.
     v13-17.  This is the amazing scene where the Son of God acknowledges why he is here on earth among his creation.  Jesus here submits to the Father and agrees to take on the sin of his sheep as he wades into the water of the Jordan and prepares to be symbolically killed by his creation.  Jesus never sinned.  He is the holy and righteous Son of the most high God and yet he asks John to baptize him. John is baptizing sinners needing to repent and be cleaned!  Why is Jesus doing this??  John recognizes the problem and refuses initially.  But Jesus, like he will later do with Peter, lets John know that this must be so. Jesus is asking that John submit to his role and symbolically slay Jesus with the judgement of God as if he were guilty of the crimes that his people were responsibly for. Jesus received a baptism of death in the river and when he come up we are told of a scene that foreshadows the most amazing truth of this universe.  The Son has been obedient unto death and the Father reveals his identity by raising him from the water and resurrecting him unto life.  Jesus comes up and the Father expresses his great joy and approval in his Son who has committed now to go to the cross.  The Holy Spirit comes upon him and we know that this Jesus comes with the authority and power of God and that he will die and rise and that he pleases his Father.  We know that we must listen to every Word he says like it is treasure from heaven.  Tying this into the ascension- the Spirit did not come until Jesus died (was plunged into the water) and rose and the sky opened to receive him in the ascension (though he did not leave this first time).  This will be the case later in the story. His identity is not made sure by the declaration of the Father until he is raised from the water.  This will be the case again later.  This baptism in the Jordan is the cross of Calvary 3 years early.  Jesus has set his face to Jerusalem and he will march to his death in obedience and love.

Response:
Thank you Lord for the sweetness of this passage and the joy that it brings my soul.  Thank you that you came to seek and to save the lost.  Thank you Jesus that you gave up your rights and you took on my sin and you died the death that would have killed me forever. Thank you for this foreshadow and for the way it clues me into the ministry you are beginning.  You are not here to teach good ways of living or to provide self help tips.  You came to die for your people in order to reconcile them to God! Everything in your ministry was to support that alone.  I cannot attain righteousness just as the pharisees could not Lord.  I need your righteousness and I need the new life that you gave me by your grace when I surrendered myself to you and trusted you.  Please continue to teach me in this story of the life of Jesus told by Matthew.

Reaction:
Lord you have raised my affections and given me a song.  I have a picture of this baptism scene in my mind that really happened in a real place where I can stand today if I had the resources to get there.  I can imagine watching this unfold and knowing what I know it would have been a tearful and absolutely unbelievable thing to see.  I don’t know if anyone saw or heard the dove or your voice O God that day but we have heard the testimony from Matthew and I am thankful.  Let me not trust in a label or in my obedience Lord but let me trust in the death and resurrection of your Son that has taken this heart of stone and made me new!

Soli Deo Gloria!