Victory Foretold (April 14th, 2019) - Mike Armstrong

And well, good morning, uh Harvest.

If you would uh take your Bibles now and open them up to the first book, uh the book of Genesis, uh, chapter three, uh specifically, I think that uh that song that John led us in right there just teased us up really well for uh today and what we're gonna be uh looking at over the next uh the next week or so with Easter coming.

Um but um but last uh Saturday, as you're getting your Bibles turned there, uh last Saturday morning actually was uh was an exciting one uh for the Armstrong uh household.

My my 10-year-old, along with a couple other uh boys from our church, uh captured their hockey league's uh championship uh in a 2-1 uh overtime thriller, uh no less.

And uh it was uh it was definitely a great day for us.

One of the cool things for me was I got to help out this year uh again as uh as one of uh the coaches.

Um but I found that um I found that one of the most challenging things just leading up to last Saturday uh and uh and even during the game was just like sort of managing the you know the expectations leading up to it and and and the the emotions and you know those types of things in the players.

Uh because think about it, it's not like you know the coaches could uh you know walk into the dressing room before the game and say, hey guys, all right, guaranteed win today.

Right?

Like it is it is happening.

All right, don't even worry about it.

It's as good as done.

I mean that would have been pretty dumb, right?

To say that to uh a bunch of uh of kids.

And uh, you know, no kill no coach can do that uh before a game for sure.

I mean, we had no business doing that.

We're playing the top team in the league, and we had clearly we had no clue what would happen.

We don't know uh the end.

Um assuring our team of certain victory, I mean, that would have been that would have been crazy, right?

Ludicrous.

Of course, there's no way for us to know at that point.

Well, as we begin our Easter series uh here today at our church, and we set our our focus on the events of the cross and and the resurrection, I think truly one of the most, like it's incredible, one of the most incredible things ever about all of that is that God actually did assure us of that victory.

Right?

It's it's amazing.

Like way, way before it ever happened.

How?

Like how was he able to do that?

Well, on one hand, it's because he's God, right?

He's our sovereign, all-knowing, you know, creator.

He knows the the beginning from the end.

He exists outside of time, and so he sees the timeline out in front of him.

He can see uh all of it, and so he knows exactly what's going to happen, plus he uh causes all of it, right?

Well, you know, why?

Why did he tell us though?

Well, because because he loves us, right?

Because he loves us.

I mean, immediately, immediately after everything goes completely haywire and sideways in Genesis chapter 3.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

We're gonna look at it here in a second.

God, in his mercy, just chooses to give his creation here, Adam and Eve, just a faint glimpse of how things would play out down the line of human history.

And it's triumph, right?

It's it's it's victory, the enemy defeated, victory assured.

As we're gonna see it today, it was all foretold to us in the beginning.

Pretty amazing that the Lord would do this.

And so if you are in uh Genesis chapter three, we're gonna be looking at verse 15 today, but I would actually invite you to stand with me.

We're gonna read the entire uh chapter uh here together.

So if you would stand for the reading of God's word, starting in uh verse one, I'll read through all of it.

It says this It says, Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made.

He said to the woman, Did God actually say, You shall not eat of any tree in the garden?

And the woman said to the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden, but God said, You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.

But the serpent said to the woman, You will not surely die, for God knows that when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.

So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate.

And she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.

Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked, and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths, 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.

But the Lord God called to the man and he said, 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.

And he said, Who told you that you were naked?

Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?

The man said, The woman who you have who you gave me to be with me, she gave me the 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.

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.

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.

To the woman he said, I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing.

In pain you shall bring forth children, your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.

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.

The man called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living.

And the Lord God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them.

Then the Lord God said, Behold, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil.

Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also the tree of life and eat and live forever.

Therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden, uh, the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken.

He drove out the man, and at the east of the Garden of Eden, he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.

Lord, your church comes before you, and as we look at Genesis chapter 3 and see where everything went so wrong, we're also gonna see here how you foretold us that as bad as it was and as hard as life is going to be, victory's coming.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

And so, Lord, as we start this three-message series here between today and Good Friday and Easter Sunday, Lord, I pray that uh our hearts would uh be stirred at just your goodness to us, Lord.

How you could have left us to squirm and and and and rot and and all of it, but Lord, you didn't.

You were you were loving and you showed us that it's gonna be okay.

And so, Lord, I pray that we would take uh comfort in these verses here today.

Lord, I pray that uh we would cling to you today, Lord.

I pray that as we uh get our minds towards the cross and and towards the resurrection, I pray that we would be humbled.

I pray that we would experience joy as well, I pray that we would worship with passion and fervor because Lord, you are an awesome God who is worthy of these things.

So, God, we pray that you would be glorified through the proclamation of your word here this morning.

Lord, teach us, help us to understand.

We pray all these things in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

You can take uh your seat.

All right, so we just read obviously that whole chapter there, and so we've you know probably got a bit of a sense now of the context and uh and some of the story there, but let's unpack that just a little bit more here to kind of give us some, you know, a little bit deeper understanding maybe of all of this.

Okay, everything started off uh real great, right?

God created uh Adam and Eve, and he gave them dominion over absolutely everything, and they walked in just uh a beautiful, perfect, sinless relationship uh with their uh creator in the garden, and everything was was great until until Satan showed up, right?

And Adam and Eve, they were lured by him and they were tricked into believing that God's ways for them, God's purposes, God's plan and design wasn't actually best.

They believed in the in this moment here that God was was holding back from them.

He was holding back his best.

And they were suckered into thinking that that they could find true joy, true you know, happiness and pleasure and meaning and fulfillment in life by stepping outside of God's boundaries and God's you know structure and design for them, and they decided that they should be the ones to decide what was actually best for themselves.

And so make no mistake, what we just read here is nothing short of mutiny.

We've all seen pirate shows and movies and all of that, and you know, there's always a captain in the you know of the ship and standing there at the wheel, and and what ends up happening is it usually starts with one crew member or there's a or there's a bunch of them, and he gets a bunch of people on his side, and they decide, you know what, we don't like this captain anymore, and so they go against him and they you know try and get him out of his place and force him to walk the plank so that you know they can be in charge now, they can call the shots.

It's exactly what took place here.

And that's really what any of our sin is.

And at that moment that they rebelled and that they ate of the forbidden fruit, in that very moment they were just, I mean, they were hit, right, with this with this crushing wave of uh of guilt and and shame and and fear as they, for the very first time, they they experienced just the kind of the sickening effects of sin.

Right?

And as they're kind of absorbing that and and and feeling that, they they simultaneously, you notice that here they they feel this deep urge within them to somehow fix their problem themselves.

That's what the that's what the loincloth is, right?

That's what the covering is.

They're like, uh oh, things aren't right.

We're aware now that we are broken, that we are naked.

And so, you know, now it's it's gonna be my job to fix myself, to fix my problem, to cover my own shame here.

And then what's also happening here at the same time is that they start to distance themselves from God.

You see that?

They they run away and they and they hide from Him.

And this, of course, has been the human experience ever since.

This is what we all do when we sin.

This is all of our experience every single time.

Now, maybe though you notice that uh the Lord goes right after them.

Isn't that amazing?

He just goes after them.

I mean, we just we just looked at that when we studied the book of Jonah not too long ago, and how you know Jonah was kind of this like scuzzy guy, right?

He was this prophet, and God says, you know, you know, go to Nineveh and proclaim the gospel, you know, you know, preach to them uh, you know, repentance.

That's what he's that's what he says.

And and Jonah says, uh-uh, no, I'm out of here.

And and he goes down, down, down.

You remember that language there in the first chapter?

He he goes down to the ship and he goes, you know, down away, and he wants to flee uh to instead of going to Nineveh, he wants to go to Tarshish, and he goes down into the deeper into the ship and he falls asleep.

And he's just he's running away, right?

He's running away from the Lord.

But all through that, the Lord just continues to pursue him, and and and Jonah, he does, he still doesn't really get it, and he's not really transformed, his heart's not not totally changed yet, and and and the Lord, though, he's not like, get out of here, man, you're not cluing in.

No, he just continues to pursue a relationship with Jonah, and that's just what we see right here in Genesis chapter 3.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

And so he starts by asking Adam some questions.

Now, interesting that he starts with Adam, isn't it?

He goes, Adam and then Eve, and then he goes, uh, Satan.

I think what that really shows us here is that the Lord holds Adam responsible for what happened here in the garden.

Right?

I've heard people talk sometimes, and sometimes it's a bit of a joke, but sometimes I wonder if it's serious, and you know, we we kind of blame Eve for all of our troubles.

Right?

You know, look what Eve did.

If Eve just hadn't eaten the fruit.

Okay, but we know there in the text that Adam was right there, right?

Standing there like a passive doofus, doing nothing, right?

Letting his wife be succored and taken to the woodshed by the serpent.

Right?

And so God holds him as the leader of the home responsible.

And he goes after him.

And I mean, men have been struggling with this ever since again, too, right?

Just brutal leadership in the home, and you know, too many times it's the wife who's the spiritual leader, and guys are too passive, and they won't.

Right, we see it here in the in the garden, and this is what God asks him.

He says to him in verse 9, he says, Where are you?

Where are you?

And then in verse 11, he says, Who told you that that you were naked?

Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?

And you ever wonder, like, why does why did God ask those questions?

Why?

Like, why does he have that?

So it's not like he doesn't know the answer to those questions, he he knows perfectly.

Well, it's because he's trying to you know elicit you know a specific response.

He's trying to draw out a confession from Adam.

Right?

Repentance, really, it's it's admission of guilt that you know the Lord wants to see Adam respond with.

Okay, but notice right here in verse 12 how Adam responds.

Not great.

Okay, verse 12, it says, uh, the woman, okay, wives love it when you call them that, right?

Okay, the woman uh gave to be with me.

Okay, so he throws the gift of his wife right back in the Lord's face.

Right?

It's your fault, Lord, if you hadn't given me this woman here, then maybe none of this would have happened.

Right?

The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me the fruit of the tree, and I ate.

Right?

I'm just a helpless victim here.

Right?

She's it's it's on her.

Why are you talking to me?

Right, she's standing here too, you know.

Pretty amazing that he would rather blame his wife and even God for the mess that he's made.

He tries to get out from underneath the responsibility of the sin that he has chosen to do.

Right?

And again, this is so us, isn't it?

We we don't want to own our sin.

We don't like to do that.

We don't we don't want to face it.

We feel fear, we feel shame, we feel guilt, we just we want to push it aside, and so we look to others.

Right?

This doesn't happen in our marriages at all, right?

Right?

If only my wife was better, if only my husband was better, if only they would change, then our marriage would be better.

But you see it, right?

You see it in yourself.

We absolutely see it here in Adam.

He's trying to squirm out from underneath the wrong that he has done.

But next year, God turns to Eve in verse 13, take a look, and says, What is this that you have done?

The woman said, The serpent deceived me, and I ate.

Yeah, that's that's a little closer to the truth, I think.

Right?

I mean, she certainly was deceived, but you can tell that she's still blaming the snake here.

Right?

She's still pushing that off.

She's not taking full responsibility over this uh either.

And then lastly, what he does, though, after he talks to Adam and after he talks to Eve, he turns his attention to uh the serpent, okay, to Satan.

And notice how he doesn't ask him any questions, he just goes straight into judgment.

And so here's what he says now.

First of all, though, first of all, let me just say this.

How do we know that this is Satan?

How do we know that?

Because at this point, all is told us is that it's a snake.

Right?

It's a it's a serpent.

You know, and so how can we how can we bridge that gap?

How can we how can we know that this is this is in fact the devil?

Well, the answer is that scripture interprets scripture.

Right?

The rest of scripture fills in the blanks here for us, as it does with actually uh all of the verse that we're gonna be looking at uh here today.

Okay, it says in Revelation 12 9, if you want to jot that down, it says, and that great dra and the great dragon was was thrown down, that ancient serpent who is called the devil, and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world.

Okay, so we see it there pretty clearly again in Revelation in 20, verse 2, it says, he sees the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan.

All right, and so that's how we know that this is actually uh Satan here.

So God turns his attention uh to Satan, he curses the snake.

We see that kind of uh rolled out in verse 14 there, and then comes this incredible verse, verse 15, that we're gonna be you know mining down into here today, where the Lord He gives us this preview, this hint, uh uh just a foretaste of what would become, right?

Of what life would look like for mankind, for Adam and Eve and all of their children, uh that's who we are, okay, from here on out.

And he tells us how this whole thing is gonna conclude.

Alright, and so if you've been waiting for me to get to the outline, here it is.

Here's the first thing.

Long ago, God assured us of victory.

How awesome is that! But for now, life will be marked by conflict.

A conflict.

We see that here in the first part of verse 15.

Take a look.

God says to Satan, remember, he's talking to him, he's cursing him, he says, I will put enmity.

Hey, what's that word enmity?

Hands up if you if you've ever used the word enmity in your life, right?

Like it's it's like we just don't use that word.

It's a great word though, right?

It means it really just means hostility, it means it means opposition, conflict, right?

And God says to him, I will put enmity, I will put conflict between you and the woman, between your offspring, or or seed, as the word is, or and and her offspring.

Okay, so this is referring to the the awful, dreadful uh spiritual battle that's been raging ever since this very moment between Satan, okay, and and his offspring, which is referring to you know his demonic forces, certainly, and and and maybe you know, even any any person that's that's serving his kingdom, you know, anyone whose father is the devil, as it says there in John 8 verse 44.

John 8:44

Okay, so the battle is between Satan and his offspring, all right, and and Eve's offspring, collectively meaning us as humanity, right?

Or or specifically God's elect.

Right?

Those who have have put faith in Jesus Christ as their savior.

Specifically, even the the the church.

Right?

That's what this is saying.

Now, again, the rest of Scripture uh bears this out, that this this conflict, that this this war is going to be raging now between us.

And Satan and his demonic forces.

What are some examples of all of this?

Well, one of the names from the scriptures that comes to mind as we think about this, I think for me, is Job, right?

You remember Job?

You remember just the grind that he went through, and you know, his life all fell apart, and you know, things were just stripped away and taken away from him.

And what we find out in the very first chapter of that book, fascinating book, we find out that God and and and Satan are actually having a conversation over here outside of uh of Job's awareness, even, where Satan is saying, you know, um, well, if you, you know, God, if you were to take away everything that he has, he will curse you and die.

And so God gives him permission to inflict some damage on Job.

And he does just that.

And his life is difficult and hard.

I mean, it is, I mean, that is bitter conflict right there.

How about how about Peter in the New Testament?

Remember what Jesus said to him in Luke 22, verse 31?

Luke 22:31

This is what Jesus says.

He said, Satan demanded to have you that he might sift you like wheat.

That doesn't seem pleasant.

Right?

Satan wants to, Satan wants to wreck you.

He wants to mess you up, Peter.

That's what that's what he wants to do.

Peter himself, in his first letter to the early church, 1 Peter chapter 5, verse 8.

1 Peter 5:8

This is how he encourages the early church and and and warns them.

And and us by extension, he says, he says, be be sober-minded, be watchful.

Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.

Right?

He's not just trying to like, you know, vaguely mess with you a little bit.

He wants to destroy you.

He wants to crush you.

And in here, Peter is is warning the church and and letting them know here, here's here's what's up.

Here's what you need to be aware of.

Be careful of this.

Be on be on watch.

You have an adversary who is against you.

I think one of the most obvious passages in the New Testament that we think about when we think about this warfare is Ephesians 6.

Ephesians 6, verse 11 and 12, it says this.

Ephesians 6:11

It says, put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil.

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, not really, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.

Listen, as much as you and I just naturally do not have this desire inside, naturally, we just want life to be easy.

Don't we?

We just grate against this idea of conflict and struggle and and and difficulty.

As much as we naturally want that, though, the Bible never suggests that it will be that way.

It never suggests it'll be easy.

Rather, it's it's actually very upfront about the opposite.

It tells you this is gonna be this is going to be brutal.

Right?

Life for the believer, for for Eve's offspring.

It involves this nasty, awful conflict with the devil and his offspring.

Have you experienced that in your life before?

Have you sensed that spiritual warfare that's there?

Now, I think the church commonly makes kind of two mistakes with all of this.

Sometimes we get kind of all kind of crazy and loopy about spiritual warfare.

And we're like, there's a demon behind every rock.

You know, and I've got to like pray over my groceries before I bring them to my house because there might be demons in that.

Like, literally, had a guy tell me that once.

Right?

And so we go too far with it sometimes and we blame everything on Satan.

Everything is his fault.

But I think truthfully, most of us, we make the opposite mistake.

And it's that we don't give him enough credit.

And we don't pay him attention really at all.

And we don't realize and we're unaware and we're oblivious as to all the little ways that he is, you know, roaming around seeking to devour and destroy us.

Now I want to be careful here again in how we understand what is attack and spiritual attack and white what might just be our flesh and our own sinful desire and all of it.

And to be quite honest, I don't really know where the line is between all of those things.

I just know that they both exist.

I know that we have a flesh that is so warped and broken and destroyed that it will want the grossest, most awful things that are against God.

And the scriptures clearly tell us that, you know what, Satan is also after you, and he will try and drag you away as well.

And so I think we need to be careful when we state, you know, absolutely certainly that this is the enemy for sure.

But I think we need to also, you know, ask the Lord for discernment and some clarity on these things.

You know, quite, you know, some of the, I think what I've experienced before personally is, you know, sometimes it's just kind of like little, you know, kind of these little kind of cheap shot attacks.

That's kind of how I would kind of look at it.

Right?

The devil is sneaky and he is patient and he knows us and he knows how to get us.

And if you ever, you know, maybe before you're like, you know, ready to head to small group, or you know, you're you're you're ready to go to church in the morning on a Sunday or something like that, you notice how like everything just goes to pot.

Right?

If maybe for you in the evening, it's like you're just over you're just filled with this overwhelming tiredness.

Like, man, the last thing in the world I want to go do is like see anybody right now, let alone like talk about what the Lord is doing in my life.

Right?

And that there's a there's this tiredness, like a spiritual warfare rush hour that seems to happen, you know, between six and seven before small group starts.

I don't know, that's just kind of what I've experienced.

I've seen some of that before.

I've had tons of coffee, but I'm just I'm super drowsy.

Is it possible that the enemy maybe attacks us in some of those ways?

Yeah, I think it's possible.

To be perfectly up front with you, I think on a on a per for me personally, I think I experienced a little bit of attack even this morning.

You know, just getting up this morning and praying for you and praying for you know our time in God's word and kind of going over all of these things and and just making sure that my heart's in the right spot before the Lord and going through it, and everything's really good, and I get to the end of that and everything's great, and then all of a sudden I'm just kind of kind of hit with this wave of just what feels like dread.

Right?

I'm like, man, like why is this this dreaded, awful feel?

Like, why do I feel this way?

And I start to immediately ask myself, well, am I am I am I anxious about something?

I don't I don't feel anxious about preaching today.

I'm pretty excited about it.

Is there some you know something that someone's done that's bothered me and I can't let it go?

Is it something like that?

No, there's nothing like that.

And when I find that I can't like really attach that dread to anything, it starts to make me think, well, maybe this is warfare.

Oh yeah, maybe because we're about to open up God's word and talk about warfare this morning, and maybe Satan's not all that pumped about that.

Right?

And so I start to think like this is these are the kinds of ways I think, I think that the Lord, the Lord comes after us.

Right?

Which, as we think about these things and we understand that that this is gonna happen, it really should lead us and and and to and help us to sort of adjust and understand and have have proper expectations about what life will look like.

I was thinking about it this week.

I've had the pleasure, I think it's a pleasure, um, to lead a number of youth mission trips uh over the years.

And have taken uh groups you know to places like Cuba and Scotland and Alaska and um Bradford of all places.

Okay, and and and mission trips are, if you've ever been on one, you know they're they're in some ways, as much as you pray and you prepare and you plan and all that, they're a bit of a crapshoot, right?

They really are like you don't know what is going to happen.

And one of the things that I learned very easily as I was preparing for my very first mission trip is to talk about expectations.

And so the very first thing that I would do with all of our teams before we ever went anywhere is our first team meeting would be talking about hey, what are your expectations for this trip?

What are your expectations on yourself?

On God, what do you expect Him to do?

What do you expect from your team members here?

What do you expect from our from our host team as we as we go into this country and we we meet with this church and we do these things?

What do you expect from them?

What do you expect from me as the team leader of this whole thing?

We would ask those questions and and we would hear the students' answers because we were trying to identify are these expectations that they have, usually they didn't even know that they had them.

They were they were kind of subconscious, are they realistic or are they not?

Right?

I remember as clear as day, one day asking this team, we were getting ready to head on a on a trip somewhere in Canada, not Bradford, but somewhere in Canada, and uh we were preparing for this, and I remember asking them, you know, what do you guys expect of me as your leader?

And I remember the leader, one of the youth leaders that was coming with me said, Well, I expect that if, you know, on any of the days that were uh that were there, that if we have you know questions and we're not sure what's happening throughout the day, and if you know I should be able to come to you and you should have an answer for us so that I can know and I can be, you know, have a good understanding of what's gonna be going on throughout the day and when we're going, where, and all that kind of stuff.

And I just said, you know what, you're gonna need to adjust that expectation.

I said, the reality is um I don't really know what's gonna be happening.

We're told kind of the bare bones of you know, here's what to expect, here's where we're gonna be staying, here's kind of what we're gonna be doing, but we're we're kind of going in a little bit blind here.

We wanted to know as much as possible, but that's the way it was.

And the amazing thing was we got to where we were going and we spent about six days there.

Worst mission trip I've ever been on.

In terms of organization, in terms of planning, in terms of execution, from where we stayed to what we ate to what we actually did, none of it, none of it was what we were told.

And you know what?

The team did amazing.

Amazing.

Because they were like, all right, we know we gotta we're gonna have to roll with the punches here.

So when they were told that things aren't gonna be easy, they were ready for it.

Ang and I, we do we do premarital counseling with couples who are getting set to be married.

We talk about expectations on day one.

It's the same idea.

Do you have any expectations of your of your of your wife when you get married?

No, I don't think so.

Are you sure about that?

Wife, do you have any expectations of your husband?

No, I don't think so.

Well, what if he comes in and he just throws his clothes everywhere?

Doesn't help out.

Pretty sure those expectations are gonna come rearing out, right?

They are.

Now listen, I'm not trying to belabor this point or anything like that, but instead to help us understand, okay?

That that we, you know, we will handle all that the enemy and all that the Christian life throws at us so much better if our if our expectations are in line with reality.

Okay, do you understand that?

Meaning that that our expectations are in line with what the scriptures say.

And what does the scriptures say?

It's gonna be brutal, guys.

It's gonna be bad.

And yet, so so many of us, though, are like, well, life should be easy.

And again, you've heard me even say this before.

We we act as though it's peacetime and it's war.

And and why is it, you know, why are my kids being so difficult?

Because the Lord wants to go after your kids, he wants to destroy your family, he hates them, he doesn't want them to get saved, he doesn't want them to grow.

Why is my marriage difficult?

Well, first of all, because you're a sinner, and the person you married is a sinner, and so there's gonna be friction with all of that, but also the enemy hates your marriage because your marriage, Ephesians 5, is to be a picture of the gospel.

Christ loves the church, church submits to Christ.

That's what husband and wife is supposed to be.

So guess what?

Satan doesn't like that.

He's gonna try and break that apart.

But it's supposed to be good, it's supposed to be for my happiness, it's supposed to be that so that I don't feel lonely and that it's just all fun.

No, it's not, it's not really for that, not primarily.

Now it's good, we know this.

It is good, and and marriage is great, and and having kids is great.

But listen, the enemy comes after that.

Expect it.

It's going to happen, it's happening now.

Personally, I don't know about you, but I I find I am so grateful to the Lord that that he would just lay all this out in front of us here as early as Genesis 3.

Right?

He tells us life is gonna be marked by conflict.

And again, while that may not be the news that you and I want to hear today, it does help us to know that this is this is what we should anticipate going forward.

So, hey, don't be surprised.

Not if, but when you experience difficult spiritual conflict in day-to-day life.

Okay, but lest we spiral into an awful depression, okay, about our faith and about our Lord and about marriage and parenting and all those things, okay?

Good news is coming.

Okay, let's also recognize here that the Lord is sovereign over all of it.

Right?

Over all the conflict.

Notice the verse again, look what it says.

This is God speaking.

I will put enmity between you and the woman.

I will do that.

Guys, I've got this, okay?

I am the one calling the shots.

Don't for one second, okay, get the idea that Satan just has free reign to do whatever he wants in your life, and you've just gotta kind of weather that and and hope you don't die.

That's not what this is.

Satan doesn't just get to pummel us according to every whim and desire that he has, okay?

The Lord allows what happens.

It's according to what he decides and how he chooses, and he uses these conflicts for our sanctification, right?

To to forge humility in us, to beat that stubborn pride out of our hearts and out of our heads, to grow us to spiritual maturity again, to kill that inherent self-reliance that we all have.

And he's trying to cause us to abide in him more.

Right?

God uses all of it, he uses all the warfare, all the conflict to accomplish his plans.

Okay, so so rest, weary Christian.

Okay, take heart, discouraged Christian.

Understand, ignorant Christian, if that's you.

That the fact is that as much of a whirlwind as this conflict and spiritual life can be, God presides over every single aspect of it.

And all of this really leads us to this last thing here.

Just two points.

Long ago, God assured us of victory, bringing hope in our darkest moment of despair.

Okay, it's verse 15 again.

Let's take a look.

I'll read the first part again.

It says, It says, I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your offspring and her offspring, and then this part.

He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.

Okay, that part right there, unreal.

It's awesome.

Right?

It's what it's what theologians have have long referred or referred to as the proto-evangeliums.

A couple different ways of pronouncing that.

But it really means, it really means first gospel.

Okay, the prototype of the gospel, the first one.

The very first reference in Scripture.

It's a teaser, it's a it's a signal to you and I, as the reader, that that a savior would come, he'd be coming to clear up this mess that we've made and achieve victory.

Amazing.

Derek Kidner calls this the first glimmer of the gospel.

Love that.

So when God tells Satan there, again, look at it, he shall bruise your head, it's to say that he, referring to a Messiah, okay, referring to Jesus, you know, the offspring or the seed of Eve.

We know that Jesus was born of uh of a woman, the scriptures tell us.

Jesus shall bruise, some of your translations might say crush, I love that, shall crush your head.

Okay, what does that indicate?

That indicates a death blow, right?

Right?

Total destruction and defeat.

Pointing to what?

Pointing to the resurrection, right?

What we're gonna be looking at soon, and even further ahead, I think, to the second coming and the absolute culmination of Christ's rule is judgment and and victory over evil.

Okay, I love Romans 16, verse 20.

Romans 16:20

Paul says in there, he says that the God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet.

He's encouraging the church with that.

Right?

And then that other part there, the the you shall bruise his heel part, you see that?

Right?

It refers to the to the damage that Satan would afflict by way of the role that he played in influencing evil men to crucify Jesus on the cross.

Right?

Though Jesus would die, it would merely be a bruising or crushing of the heel, so to speak, in the sense that it wasn't complete destruction.

Right?

It wasn't.

It was rather, it was a temporary setback at best.

Jesus would rise again.

Right?

And we know that he has done that.

And he'll return at the end of all time to bring Satan's influence and Satan's reign to a decisive end.

Right?

All of this here is God mercifully assuring you and I, assuring, foretelling to us that, hey, listen, victory's coming, guys.

It's coming.

Set your watch to it.

It is happening.

Done deal.

Now, would Adam and Eve have understood, you know, that that all of this was referring to Jesus and the cross and the empty grave and the second coming and you know all of that?

No.

No, they wouldn't have, you know, they don't they didn't have the benefit of you know that we have of being on the other side of history, and you know, now we have seen the details all fall into place according to the scriptures and all of it with those things.

But but make no mistake, they would have received this as, again, a glimmer of hope.

Right?

All right, can you imagine?

All right, as much as we just kind of like torpedoed everything here that God created for us in this amazing garden, this this paradise, thank goodness God's not done yet.

Right?

They knew that some kind of redemption was on the way.

I mean, have you ever thought about this before?

I mean, just imagine the hopelessness and and and the despair that would have overwhelmed Adam and Eve and that very moment that they sinned and and became conscious of what they'd done.

I mean, think about it.

You and I, we have no concept of what it would have been like to live in a sinless world.

You and I, all we know is sin.

All we know is living in a sin-tainted world.

We we we were we were born in sin.

We inherited a sinful nature from our parents.

You and I have all chosen time after time after time to sin against God ourselves.

We we know what it's like to live with guilt.

We know what it's like to live with shame and and and fear and all these you know man-made self-efforts to try and save ourselves, fix ourselves, make ourselves feel better, and we're you know, we're covering ourselves up with leaves, so to speak.

That that's that's what we that's our wheelhouse, that's what we know.

That's like everyday life for us.

But can you imagine what Adam and Eve would have been feeling?

Because, again, they were living in a perfect relationship, complete holiness, no, no barriers between them and God.

Walking in the garden with him, enjoying complete dominion over everything.

And then I mean, sickening is just the word that comes to mind as they start to realize here and become aware of what they had done.

And yet it's right here in this moment.

Right when God could have let the awful darkness of despair overcome.

Them and hang over them longer and weigh down even heavier.

And listen, they would have deserved all of it.

Right?

They would have.

They knew the game plan.

They knew what the rules were.

Instead of that, though, he just he lovingly, mercifully, graciously lets them know right away, guys, it's not over.

Not by a long shot.

This whole thing is gonna end in victory.

I win.

This thing was it was all foretold to us.

It was foretold to our original parents, right?

Adam and Eve.

All of that, that hope there, that's ours to embrace as well.

Of course, we're about to see all of this unfold in the next week as a church.

But even today, with you know, this being Palm Sunday, as was mentioned, you know, where the church traditionally observes and celebrates the triumphal entry.

And we did we just looked at this not that long ago as we worked our way through Mark's gospel in chapter 11, there, how Jesus he rode into Jerusalem on a cult, and it was under so much fanfare, and people were going crazy, and you know, it was palm leaves and it was hosanna's and it was all of these things.

It's the long-anticipated king of the Jews.

They knew a Messiah was coming.

Again, we know that they didn't understand all of it and everything, but but it was Jesus in that moment, he was inching closer and closer and closer to the victory that Genesis 3.15 alludes to.

Then as we gather this coming Friday to mourn Christ's death and what he had to endure and what he endured to pay the price for our sins, and how in that moment, just for a moment there, it seemed like hope was lost, right?

And Satan actually won.

That's what it looked like.

But then, Easter Sunday, which is the fulfillment of our hope.

Where that victory, again, it's cemented, it's revealed through the empty grave.

It is a statement, it is an exclamation point.

Listen, let's not forget that with all that's to come for us in the next seven days, it was all foretold to us here first in Genesis.

Humanity was given this wonderful glimpse of hope that a Messiah was on the way.

I mean, when you put all of these things together and you think about all of this and the privilege that we have to live at a time such as this in the grand scheme of history, I mean, does it not strengthen your faith in the Lord about how awesome he is?

Right?

His goodness to us.

We don't deserve it, right?

I mean, this should astound us.

This should wake up our stagnant and hard hearts.

This should cause us to realize that no matter what day it is, no matter what you and I are facing, whatever the circumstances would be, no matter how deeply we're struggling, no matter how nasty that spiritual battle, no matter how deeply we're tempted to just fall into despair, the truth is victory is won.

It's sealed.

It's ours.