4. Ablazing Grace: The Good News

we are going on a journey here at kingscliff seventh-day Adventist Church and if you look up the front we see two very large banners up the front and it says a blazing grace another look at the Old Testament story and that is what we're doing in our preaching here at the church for the next we've already had a really partway through aren't we but for 12 months we are going right through the whole Old Testament story and up here on the right you see the various sort of chapters or sections that we've divided it up into we see the beginning the family the exodus the land the Kings the exile and at the very end we're going to be really finishing up with the Messiah last week we had an awesome sermon by Ty Gibson which was looking at what chapter do you remember chapter three of Genesis so Genesis chapter three now this week we are also looking at Genesis chapter three and you might be thinking why are we doing that twice well last week I told ty very specifically I said you have to preach on the bad news in Genesis 3 but don't touch on the good news and I think he might have slipped a few little bits of good news in there but because I wanted the sermon on the good news and so maybe that was selfish I don't know so today we're looking at Genesis chapter 3 and we're looking at the good news and in fact what we're going to find is that the whole story of salvation can be found at least the the elements that make up the story of salvation can be found right there in Genesis chapter 3 so a quick little introduction I mean revision of where we've been so far the first sermon that we had in this series David preached it and the point that he left with you was the Old Testament tells the story that Jesus completes and you remember one of the ways that he he he arrived at that he looked at Matthew chapter 1 he looked at the big list of genealogies at the end and said there was how many generations do you remember between Abraham and David fourteen generations from Abraham to David then from David to the XL how many generations 14 and then from the Exile to Jesus the Messiah how many 14 and why was 14 a significant number because it's made up of two sevens which is the most significant number that we find in the Bible and we save 6 7 s + 6 is always about to come upon something climactic and we see in creation we see day 1 2 3 4 5 6 and then comes the Sabbath and here we see that the Old Testament story we have as a matthew broke it down - we have 6 sevens finishing with a kind of Sabbath but it's not a day like what we see in Genesis chapter 1 but we see the story of Jesus which all the Old Testament is leading leading up to and arriving at the story of Jesus so that was week number whet one week number two we looked at Genesis chapter 1 and we looked at creation and we saw that Jesus is very much like an artist and as he created this world he started by creating these various canvases he created the canvas in the sky the canvas in the water the candice of the land and then finally a canvas in time and on those canvases he then filled them with beautiful creative incredible things such as the birds and this in the air and the and the stars in the heavens we saw the fish in the water the the plants and and finally people on the land and what did he feel the time with he feels it with himself and so we see Jesus is the Crypt the great artist and he creates this perfect world and last week we're talking at Tri Gibson he started off not just by telling us the good news but he started off by telling us why it is to understand why the bad news is so bad he showed us just a little glimpse at how good it was the world that God intended and each thing that he created God said it was good he saw that it was he saw that it was good and then he created man and woman and he said it is very good okay you've been listening and he also talked about how the Garden of Eden was really the garden of pleasure okay physical pleasure mental pleasure emotional pleasure relational pleasure and it was a paradise that we can't even begin to get our minds can even begin to wrap our minds around just how beautiful that would have been and he took us to a verse and this verse is going to be very significant in our study today it says and the man and his wife were both naked and we're not ashamed now why were they not a shame do you remember what would each of them focused on they weren't focused on themselves but their love their heart was was filled with the rear and was reflecting the incredible love that God has for us and at the heart of love is others centeredness and so we see that each of them are just so wholly focused on each other that being ashamed isn't it's not even really impossible in that sort of a scenario but along comes mr. snake and we see that from the snake we see that the world turns completely upside down and instead of being filled with this this love we see that the that instead we are now filled with insecurity self-consciousness shame and guilt now one of the first things I want to share with you today is that when we read through Genesis chapter 3 you can read it's true on the surface and the story makes sense with a surface reading but also we can look much deeper and we can see that there is a much deeper spiritual reading that we can find there as well and for an example what would you say this with the surface reading what was the temptation in Genesis chapter 3 take the fruit and eat it but well is there a deeper spiritual temptation as well there was let's riff let's go over again the various things that the snakes said to Eve firstly he said has God indeed said you shall not eat of every tree of the garden is that what God said how many trees did God say you can eat all of the trees except for one tree the tree of knowledge of good and evil and so what is the serpent implying by this God is restrictive God is not about freedom but God is restrictive he's trying to keep things back from you second one you will not surely die what is this saying about God God is a liar number three God knows in the day eat of it your eyes will be opened and you'll be like God knowing good and evil what is he saying about God he's self-centered he's self seeking he's he doesn't want you to have this exalted experience because that's what he has and he's keeping it from you ultimately God is not does not have your best interest in mind but his own interest in mind and God is ultimately not not loving and so he says three-prong liar God is restrictive God is a liar God is self-serving and so while this on the surface level we see that the serpent this the snake Satan was trying to tempt Eve to just take the the fruit on a much deeper spiritual level the serpent was tempting Eve with a false picture who God is that God is ultimately not a God of love let's look at the second way that we see the surface reading of this text and you also see a much deeper spiritual understanding as well and we're not there yet I don't read that verse yet turn your Bibles to Genesis chapter 3 Genesis chapter 3 and we're going to read verse 6 and 7 Genesis 3 verse 6 and 7 so again we're looking at what's the surface reading of this and then what's the much deeper spiritual 3d and this is going to set a bit of a foundation for finding the good news in Genesis chapter 3 okay it says verse 6 it's just seven so when the woman saw that the tree was good for food that it was pleasant to the eyes and a tree desirable to make one wise she took of the fruit and ate she also gave to her husband with her and he ate then the eyes of both of them were opened and then knew that they were naked and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings on the surface level what is the problem that they face after they fall into the temptation nakedness now is that would that be a problem it reminds me of anyone seen the old mr. bean episode where he gets up on the big 10 meter high diving board and he jumps off and he's real proud of himself when he comes up with the water until he sees his swimmers like lying across on the surface of the water he goes over there and this little girl picks them up and walks off with them and in the sort of facial expressions that I only mr. bean can do we see this is a serious problem so surface reading of the text is it bad yes it's bad but the problem goes much much deeper than that and how do we know this well let's keep reading through verse 8 through 10 it says and they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden then the Lord called Alan Adam and said to him where are you so he said I heard the voice your voice in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself question was Adam and Eve were they naked at this stage in the story had they made clothing for themselves they made fig leaves for himself so they're wearing clothing and God comes into the garden and they have this overwhelming sense of nakedness and they run and they hide amongst the bushes is the problem of nakedness is it just on the surface or is there a much deeper issue going on here they're not naked in yet any more but they still feel the shame they still feel the guilt and why is this well what is nakedness it's it's a feeling of having a lack of privacy it's a feeling of being exposure I can't hide there's nowhere to go I'm stuck I'm stuck here now why would they have had this feeling when God came into the into the garden take you to something that we find in First Samuel 16 and verse seven and it says for the Lord God does not see as man sees but how does man see man looks on the outward appearance but God the Lord looks at the heart now in this situation on the outward appearance Adam and Eve that clothed themselves with fig leaves but here they come and they hear God coming into the garden and they realized that the searcher of souls the searcher of hearts the one who knows all things is in there and they realized that before him they are 100% and absolutely exposed to him and not only that they had this overwhelming sense of something that's gone wrong in their heart I'll put up a quote that we had last week and this is found in the book steps of Christ speaking of Adam it says he was perfect in his being and in harmony with God his thoughts were pure his aims holy but through disobedience his powers were perverted and selfishness took the place of love in that heart that heart that was once fully focused on others was just everything that thought about was how can I please the other people how can I please God how can I please Eve for Eve how can I please Adam suddenly there's this inward focus how can I protect myself how can I lift myself up how can I do whatever it is that brings the most gain to myself and Adam is there and Eve is there with this broken heart and they feel this absolute sense of exposure exposure before God who is coming into the garden and and and all they can do is like this instinctive thing that comes upon them they just race to the deepest parts of the woods and the gardens hiding behind the trees there's another quote I want to give you from patriarchs and prophets it says this the love and peace which had been theirs was gone okay the love that they felt from from Adam from even from Eve to Adam and the love which they once felt from God which was still there but in their minds they can't sense it the love and peace which that was had been theirs was gone and in its place they felt a sense of sin something's gone wrong with their heart something about them is now not right something has been corrupted they felt and a dread of the future you remember what God said if you eat from the tree you will surely die and a nakedness of soul their problem ran to the very depths of who they were the sin problem was carved right down at the very depths of their heart and they knew it and they felt this overwhelming sense of shame and of guilt and a long was coming God and all they could think to do was to run and adding to that was this new false picture that they have of God if they still had this picture that God was this incredible God of love then maybe it wouldn't have been quite so bad but remember to make the problem worse Satan had sold them the three-prong live which was God as restrictive God is a liar God as self saving and ultimately God is not loved imagine being so exposed and having the most powerful being in the universe coming into the garden and in your mind you now see him as a hateful angry wrathful person who's there to bring about your destruction what do you feel naked to the very depths of yourself you would so I imagine that they were there and when God comes in they come out from the trees maybe bent over sort of carrying just waiting and just a sense of of what's going to happen sense of dread about what's going to happen next and along comes God and instead of harshness God surprises them with gentleness and we see this in Genesis 3 starting from verse 8 and the heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden so if you want to get the sense that God is not doing anything different here God everyday would just come would come into the garden and walk amongst them and talk with them and you can imagine Adam and Eve just like racing out there and and seeing God I'm just being so eager to see him and God walks in into the garden and he says this in verse verse 9 go God comes into the garden and the Lord God called to Adam and said to him where are you now I don't see in those words where are you it's not an angry where are you but rather we see God here who who comes in he well in truly knows where they are but the story plays out that God comes into the garden and he's there and he's waiting for them to come out and for some reason Adam and Eve are absent and so it says where are you there's a gentleness in in God's response there verse verse 10 it says so he said so Adam says I heard your voice in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked and I hid myself and he said God says in response who told you that you were naked can we see how God is just sort of playing along with this story here and a very loving and gentle way who told you that we're naked have you eaten from the tree which I commanded you that that you should not eat is he condemning here he's simply inquiring have you eaten from that tree Adam how do you know that you're naked and Adam says says then the man said and here we see this sort of this sort of switch that takes place this this since selfishness which now occupies Adams heart sort of manifests itself and he suddenly thinks think he I don't remember God said in the day they eat from the fruit the fruit of the tree you will surely die and he thinks about that and he's like no I can't just say yes to this question and so suddenly he's in his mind just scheme's up this way to get out of this problem he says the woman who you gave me she tricked me she gave it to me and we see that all of the the guilt what does Adam do with it picks it up and he sits it on the woman and also on God as well because it's the woman that you gave me and there's there's no like confession here but rather there's an invasiveness here are trying to cobble oneself are trying to evade the the responsibility that that he should be taking upon himself and for Eve and he says it's Eve's fault and it is your fault so god again he plays he plays along with this and he goes oh is that what happened verse 13 so the Lord God said to the woman what is this you have done and the woman again in an instant this this it doesn't take long for this sinful heart to work out what to do and in the instant she schemed up this whole way for her to get out of the problem and she says the serpent deceived me and I ate again a responsibility shame guilt all of that is picked up and it's placed upon the snake there's not much sort of ownership of the problem here is there and so God is there and and still be not even in this situation you don't see God pointing the finger we don't see God condemning we don't see that any harshness from God but now God looks over to the snake and here's where we get into the section where we see the good news starting to shine and it's already good news in here the good news is simply the way that God responded to them when I see that like man there's hope there's hope for me so verse 14 so God then looks to the snake now does God us any questions of the snake he doesn't there's a history that goes very deep between God and Satan up to this up to this point and there is no need for questions they already know what there's that there is very clear what happened between those who and and God looks at looks at the snake and he says verse 14 so the Lord God said to the serpent because you have done this I see a little bit it's not quite as gentle here because you have done this you are cursed more than all cattle you and more than every beast of the field on your belly you shall go and you shall eat dust every but wondered why snakes just crawl around their bellies well here we see the reason and and implied in that is that this snake was not just this sort of now some people think snakes are really beautiful some people some people think that the terrifying and horrible but before this curse it appears that this snake had in some way was a majestic creature and that's what sort of makes sense why Satan chose the snake to be the mither the medium in the way for through which to communicate to Eve so cursed are you now in that cursor you more than all the cattle of the field and all and every bit over all the cattle and every beast of the field implied in that is that there is a curse that's going out not just upon the snake but upon all of all of the created world and if you wonder when you look at creation and you think man why is it that there's something built into this animal that just seems evil there's something wrong with it we are living in a world where creation itself has been cursed and it's all the result of Adam and Eve making that decision to not only have that full experience or knowledge of good but also of evil so he says and on your belly you shall go and you shall eat dust all the days of your life but then God switches the curse now is not coming primarily on the snake the actual animal but it's coming upon the power and the person the being behind that snake which is Satan himself and he says I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed he shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel enmity what is enmity mean hostility that's good yeah I like that any other words you can throw out what is that mistrust yep did have one over here hatred okay hostility hatred mistrust they're all right it's the the mutual hatred and hostility that exists between enemies okay and enemies is a very similar word to enmity there so we see here that God is saying firstly that there and and this is placed upon in a number of different relationships as we go through this verse firstly we see it is between and once my phone where it is again it is between you and the woman who's the you Satan so there's enmity there's this intense hatred and hostility between Satan and the woman who's the woman and straight in the from here it is it's it's Eve okay in the in the in the first part of that from you and the woman which then which then carries on to it goes on to say between your seed and her seed so between the descendants or the children of Satan and the descendants and the children of Eve hang on who are the descendants and the children of Satan ever thought that when you read this verse keep your finger in there and we're gonna race across to John chapter 8 verse 39 to 44 John 8 39 to 44 who are the descendants of Satan John 8 verse 39 to 44 here we see Jesus talking with the Pharisees and the the children of Abraham who they think they are and it says so John 839 they answered and said to him Abraham is our Father so here we have a group of people that think that they are descendants of Abraham and in turn descendants of the woman God's faithful people and what does God say in response jesus said to them if you were Abraham's children you would the works of Abraham but now you seek to kill me a man who has told you the truth which I have heard from God Abraham did not do this you do the deeds of your father of your father note that word there then they said to him we were not born a fornication we have one father god jesus said to them if god were your father you would love me for I proceeded forth and came from them nor have I come of myself but he sent me why do you not understand my speech because you are not able to listen to my word you are you are of your father the devil and the desires of your father you want to do he was a murderer from the beginning reference to Eden and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him who are the descendants who are the children of this of Satan of the devil it's those who follow him it's those who do the will of of Satan and who are the descendants of Abraham the descendants of the woman that ascendance the children of God there those who do the will and the works of God so we see here back to Genesis chapter 3 verse 15 we see on the first relationship where there's this enmity this this mutual hatred is between Satan and this and Eve then between all of her descendants and all of the Satan's descendants in other words between all the faithful people of God the followers of God and the followers of the Evil One and isn't that just a the story of the whole Bible God has a faithful people the rest of the world is is unfaithful and they're at war with each other that's the story of the whole whole Bible their third relationship let's go to back to 3:15 at the end of it so I'll put enmity between you and the woman between your seed and her seed now it says he shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel who are the two people here who do you think that he can it refer to all of the seed all of the descendants of Eve it's in the singular isn't it he here it is we see that that it's talking about some future descendants of Eve and and this is not now the it goes so it so very he shall he shall bruise your head and you this is talking to Satan shall bruise his heel we see here that as a result of this enmity that's going to finally come down to two three beings a descendant of Eve and Satan himself who threw this enmity one will get bruised on the hill the snake the serpent Satan will bruise the distended on the hill and think about it where the snakes spend most of their time on the ground so there's going to strike you where's it most likely to strike you on the heel okay but what happens from what is this descendant to do to the snake crushes his head bruises is here its head and so what we see here as a result of this battle the descendant is going to get injured is gonna get hurt it's gonna get tell me it wound it bruised but ultimately this Satan is going to be destroyed now I see here because this is this is being directed at Satan but who is over list who is listening in on this conversation Adam and Eve they're there and they're listening in and they're hearing that there's going to be enmity between them and the kingdom of Satan if god has to put this enmity between them what does that tell us about men fallen mankind's natural relationship with Satan if God had to actually do this supernatural act and put enmity between them that means that in the natural relationship between us fallen for fallen humanity and and Satan is isn't that that's a scary thing it means that the sinful evil the sin and the evilness within the human heart is such that it is completely aligned with the ways and the evil desires of Satan and that is a scary thing but here we see Adam and Eve they're listening in and in their minds hope starts to emerge and they're thinking we've made a mistake this is terrible but in these words we see hope and from the snakes from Satan's perspective he's listening in and he thinks this is it I've got Adam and Eve I've got the human race they're mine and he hears that word enmity and he suddenly realizes that God is going to do something supernatural that will empower the human race to stand up and to resist Satan reminds me of reminds me of James 4:7 where it says therefore submit to God resist the devil and he will flee from you the only reason we can do that is because of this promise that if we submit ourselves to God that he will empower us to resist the devil and ultimately will cause him to flee from us now this first gospel promise in Genesis 3 verse 15 is provides the backdrop of the entire Bible do you believe that let me prove it to you turn with me to the beginning of Genesis chapter 4 and it might be still on the same page Genesis chapter 4 so just after the the problem in the and the good news given in Genesis 3 we see Genesis 4 it says now Adam knew his wife and she conceived Inbal Cain and said I have acquired a man from the Lord then she bore again and this time his brother his brother Abel now do we have a woman here yes Eve we have descendants yes Kane first then Abel okay now do these descendants end up being hostile to one another very much so okay we see that one is faithful Abel is faithful to God Cain is unfaithful to God and as a result of this we see that Satan works through through Cain and actually kills off Abel I wonder what was going through the mind of Satan in that in in inciting came to do that could it be that he's thinking maybe in doing this I'm going to eliminate the descendants of Eve and in doing so eliminate their hope of having the sin problem destroyed and we see this when we get to the very end of chapter four it says it says in Adam verse 25 and Adam knew his wife again and she bought a seed and named him Seth for God has appointed another seed for me instead of Abel whom Cain killed notice that word seed it's the exact same word that we see in Genesis 3 verse 15 here we have Eve and the seed the one that was faithful the one that was hopefully going to redeem humanity is killed off and we see hang on God has given me another seed Genesis chapter 5 we see this huge list of names you see Adam Seth Enoch Kenan Mahalalel Jared Enoch Methuselah Lamech all the way down to Noah why is that included there in the Bible could it be that in the Old Testament there is his focus upon the descendants of Eve from your from your seed there will be enmity which will crush the devil and will bring about deliverance from the sin problem so if we go from Adam right down to Noah and all the focus is on this on this seed and what happens at the time of Noah look with me at Genesis chapter 6 verse 5 to 8 it says then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually and the Lord was sorry that made man on earth and he was grieved in his heart so the Lord said I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth both man and beast creeping thing in birds of the air for I am sorry that I have made them but Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord what has happened to the seed of Satan at the time of Noah how big is it it's the entire world and how big is the seed of the woman one person buddy how do you think Satan viewed that one person Noah man he would have hated he's he's turned the whole world into the descendants into the children of Satan and Noah alone is left and God says all right we need to destroy all these other other people and with this one we're going to start things up again and we go across to Genesis 9 verse 9 and it says and as for me so this is God speaking to know as for me behold I establish my covenant with you Noah and with your descendants or the actual word is seed taken straight from 3:15 after you and with every living creature in other words and then it goes on to say he's not going to destroy the world in the same way again where's the focus the focus is on the seed which is going to bring deliverance we go across to chapter 11 we see again the world is in apostasy the Tower of Babel and come to verse 10 and we see there's another genealogy this time from the time of Noah right down to the time of Abraham and we see a promise is given to Abraham that through your seed all the nations will be blessed we go then across to Matthew chapter 1 which we looked at in our introductory sermon to this series and again we see a huge genealogy this time from so we saw from Adam to no other than from Noah to Abraham and now we're seeing from Abraham right down to Jesus and then it goes on to say verse 18 so gen Matthew chapter 1 this is the net this is how this is how the New Testament begins it says now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows after this is verse 18 after his mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph before they came together she found she was found with child of the Holy Spirit then Joseph her husband being a just man and not wanting to make her a public example was minded to put her away secretly and while he thought about these things behold an angel the Lord appeared to him in a dream saying Joseph son of Mary of son of David do not be afraid to take to you Mary your wife for that which is within her is is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit okay so cut this angel comes to Joseph has this message there's a special child that's coming to Mary don't send her away feel comfortable feels it's the right thing to do to marry her verse 21 and she will bring forth a son and you shall call his name Jesus for he will save his people from their sins Genesis 3 verse 15 a promise is given the promise is given to Adam and Eve that one of their descendants will bring about deliverance from sin and we see 4000 years later around about 70 generations and finally a baby is born on whom rest the hopes of the entire world however not only does Genesis 3 tell us that there will be a victory that this Messiah will come that this child will come Genesis 3 also tells us how this child is going to defeat Satan how this child is going to once and for all deliver us from sin let's go back to Genesis 3 and verse 21 so God is finished with his discussion with Adam and Eve and the serpent and he then does something incredibly practical hands-on and in verse 21 so Genesis 3 in verse 21 it says also for Adam and his wife the Lord God made tunics of skin and he clothes clothe them now would it be easy to just skim over that verse it would be easy wouldn't it but there is a depth in that verse that reveals to us how this child is going to defeat the problem of sin so on the surface level what was the problem that Adam and Eve faced nakedness okay does this does this solve the problem on the surface level they have clothing now God makes them more durable clothing than fig leaves which probably would've got old and dry and fallen off not very effective now they have clothing of skin but not only does this clothing show them how he fixes the surface problem but it shows them the deeper spiritual meaning behind that the deeper spiritual truth of how God is going to fix and to clothe the naked nough summer a s-- and so I want to okay I want to make five and these are just gonna be quick five quick observations on the significance of this clothing of skin number one skin requires death would you agree with that how else you getting skin off animals unless you kill the animal there was a death that took place in this garden number two this victim was innocent how many guilty sinful animals were there I guess it was the snake but here we see the victim was innocent we're not told what animal it was but we see that the victim was innocent it didn't deserve this death number three this victim received what Adam and Eve deserved can you say that Adam and Eve God said if then the day that you eat eat of this fruit sure you will surely die they ate of the fruit they now had the same problem they deserve death this penalty was then put upon this innocent animal number three number four Adam and Eve were covered by the victim's innocence can we see that there was nothing wrong with this animal it was an animal without spot without blemish it was a perfect animal and that covered Adam and Eve and finally to be clothed they had to take off their fig leaves in order to put on the clothing of skin because I don't think that God would have came and said all right you've got these fig leaves I'm gonna split this clothing right over the top of them what would they have done the hell would had to come before God because says God was the one who clothed them take off the fig leaves and let God cover them with the innocence of this animal now how does this apply to Jesus John chapter 1 verse 29 you see how Matthew starts by referencing back to Genesis 3 John chapter 1 verse 29 says the next day John saw Jesus coming towards him and said behold the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world this shows me that this Genesis 3:21 about this skin this is also a background text for the rest of the whole Old Testament story and right through from Noah Noah had sacrifices we see Abraham he made sacrifices we see King David he made sacrifices right through the in the sanctuary system sacrifice sacrifice sacrifice what's with all the sacrifice because when we get to John chapter 1 we see Jesus come along it says he is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world all of these things were pointing forward to Jesus now what significance does that make it with what a significance is that for us well that means that these five observations that we made upon the the skin the clothing of skin in Janice three these five things can also apply to Jesus number one skin which represents the solution to sin requires dest do we see that in Jesus he died the death for our sins number two this victim was innocent do we see that in Jeep with Jesus he who knew no sin became sin for us number three this victim received what Adam and Eve deserved what is the result of sin it's death it's shame it's separation from God it's hostility with one another it's it's guilt it's insecurity it's all of those things and Jesus come to this comes to this earth and he takes upon himself the whole lot of it in an extent that none of us have experienced he goes to that cross he gets beat and he gets falsely accused he gets betrayed he gets those nails through his hands and through his feet the crown of thorns upon his on his head the sins of the world pressing upon his soul and then he experienced the separation between him and God and ultimately he experiences death Jesus is the victim who received not just what Adam and Eve deserved what every single one of us deserves and before Adam and Eve were caught were covered by the victim's innocence are we covered as well in first Corinthians it says that he who knew no sin he made him who knew no sin to become sin to be sin so that we might become the righteousness of God the sin which is ours was given to Jesus and he took the punishment of that and the innocence and the righteousness and the faithfulness of Jesus was then given to us and we are now treated in the way that Jesus deserves and point number five to be clothed they had to take off their fig leaves and if you remember last week - I was talking about all the things that we try to do to cover ourselves up and he talked about the workaholic the nerd the bad-boy the flirt the victim the hero the comedian the corrected the priest all these various things getting money for ourselves so we feel more valuable getting fame getting power all these things that we do to sort of try and cover up this and make up for this lack of value and self-worth that we have this is emptiness within us all of these fig leaves just like Adam and Eve needed to take those off God requires that we take it all off and we come before him in repentance and confession and opening ourselves up to being vulnerable and exposed before God and in the same way God then comes down in an intimate way just like he did with Adam and Eve he clothes us not with the righteousness of an animal but with the righteousness of himself Father in heaven what an awesome God you are a God of infinite love who instead of putting the blame which you had none upon someone else Lord you took it all upon yourself what an amazing gracious loving God that you are and the Lord has pray that this love that you have for us might transform us may you put within us that enmity against the devil Lord that ability to stand up and to resist and to oppose the devil in our daily lives help us to stand up against temptation help us to win the battles that we face Lord because you have ultimately won the battle against Satan you've crushed him under your foot Lord and you know that you're going to crush them under our feet as well and so the Lord oh just pray for all the decisions that have been made if there's someone here who's made the decision to accept your forgiveness for the first time while we pray that you'll be with them and bless them in a very special way and it was pray that as we go home that you'll just continue to impress upon us just this size and that the height and the depth and the width and the breadth of your love for us we pray in Jesus name Amen

Channel: Kingscliff Church

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Keywords: Kingscliff SDA Church

Id: t-P0v1uY0d8

Length: 46min 2sec (2762 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 07 2015