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[#51] Genesis 3 Summary – The Redemption of Sin

By Jeremy Myers
1 Comment

[#51] Genesis 3 Summary – The Redemption of Sin
http://media.blubrry.com/one_verse/feeds.soundcloud.com/stream/285041924-redeeminggod-51-genesis-3-summary-the-redemption-of-sin.mp3

Genesis 3

This episode of the One Verse Podcast provides a summary of what we have seen from Genesis 3. There is still some new stuff in this episode, so if you have listened to all the previous episodes on Genesis 3, you will still want to listen to this one.

But if you are just joining us on the One Verse Podcast and have missed most of the previous episodes, this one will get you up to speed. Of course, since what I share today might be a bit challenging, you might also want to go back and listen to some of the episodes from Genesis 3 to get a further explanation and understanding of what we discuss today.

In this Summary of Genesis 3 we look at:

  • The basic question “What has gone wrong with the world?”
  • The fact that Genesis 3 does not talk about sin
  • What God’s response to Adam and Eve in Genesis 3 reveals what God thinks about our own disobedience
  • Three truths about sin that most of us fail to understand

Resources:

  • Take my online Bible and Theology Courses
  • Become a Member of RedeemingGod.com
  • Biddle, Missing the Mark
  • Subscribe and Leave a Review on iTunes

Downloadable Podcast Resources

Those who are part of my online discipleship group may download the MP3 audio file for this podcast and view the podcast transcript below.

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Do you like learning about the Bible online?

Do you like learning about Scripture and theology through my podcast? If so, then you will also love my online courses. They all have MP3 audio downloads, PDF transcripts, quizzes, and a comment section for questions and interaction with other students.

If you want to deepen your relationship with God and better understand Scripture, take one (or all) of these courses. They are great for personal study or for a small group Bible study.

You can see the list of available courses here, and if you join the Discipleship group, you can take all the courses at no additional cost. Go here to learn more and join now.

God is Redeeming God, Redeeming Scripture Bible & Theology Topics: Genesis 3, One Verse Podcast, redemption, sin

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[#37] Genesis 3 Introduction

By Jeremy Myers
3 Comments

[#37] Genesis 3 Introduction
http://media.blubrry.com/one_verse/feeds.soundcloud.com/stream/263474338-redeeminggod-37-genesis-3-introduction.mp3

This podcast episode provides the normal explanation of Genesis 3.

There is nothing really wrong with this traditional explanation of Genesis 3. When I was a pastor I preached through Genesis, and I went back and looked at my sermon notes on Genesis 3, and what I am going to share with you today is what I would have preached 20 years ago from Genesis 3.

But now I believe there are many more significant truth from Genesis 3 that we miss. I will point those out in future podcast episodes.

Genesis 3

In this discussion of Genesis  3 we look at:

  • The normal explanation of Genesis 3
  • The identity of the Serpent
  • How Eve added to the law of God
  • The consequences of eating from the Forbidden Tree

Resources:

  • The Lust of the Flesh (Luke 4:1-4)
  • The Lust of the Eyes and the Pride of Life (Luke 4:5-13)
  • Theology.fm – Helping you and your Theology Look Like Jesus
  • Subscribe and Leave a Review on iTunes

Downloadable Podcast Resources

Those who are part of my online discipleship group may download the MP3 audio file for this podcast and view the podcast transcript below.

You must join a discipleship group or login to download the MP3 and view the transcript.

Membership-become-a-member

Thanks for visiting this page ... but this page is for Discipleship Group members.

If you are already part of a Faith, Hope, or Love Discipleship Group,
Login here.

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Upgrade your Membership to one of the paid groups.

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Join Us Today.

Membership-become-a-member


Do you like learning about the Bible online?

Do you like learning about Scripture and theology through my podcast? If so, then you will also love my online courses. They all have MP3 audio downloads, PDF transcripts, quizzes, and a comment section for questions and interaction with other students.

If you want to deepen your relationship with God and better understand Scripture, take one (or all) of these courses. They are great for personal study or for a small group Bible study.

You can see the list of available courses here, and if you join the Discipleship group, you can take all the courses at no additional cost. Go here to learn more and join now.

God is Redeeming God, Redeeming Scripture Bible & Theology Topics: Bible Study Podcast, Genesis 3, One Verse Podcast

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Was Adam and Eve’s sin really about eating a piece of forbidden fruit?

By Jeremy Myers
25 Comments

Was Adam and Eve’s sin really about eating a piece of forbidden fruit?

Wesley RostollThis is a guest post from Wesley Rostoll. He lives in in South Africa with his wife and two kids.

Wesley left the institutional church about 5 years ago and has been exploring what some people call organic church ever since. He writes about what he has learned from the experience on his blog.

If you would like to write a Guest Post for the Till He Comes Blog, begin by reading the Guest Blogger Guidelines.

For most of my life I thought that the punishment that mankind and the rest of creation suffered for Adam and Eve’s one act of disobedience in the garden seemed incredibly harsh. When compared to some of the things I had done in my life, it seems like I have done far worse and gotten away with it.

So when God said to Adam that if he ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that he would surely die I read it more as a threat than as a warning.

Wesley RostollThe truth is this wasn’t a case of a petty or offended deity overreacting.

Despite the fact that most of us grew up believing that God could not look upon sin (see my thoughts on that over here), it was not God who hid Himself from Adam but the other way around.

After the fall we see God seeking Adam and Eve out, clothing them when they realized that they were naked and putting them outside of the garden for their own protection (Genesis 3:22).

Nevertheless, we see a drastic change in man and in his relationship with God after Genesis 3. And here is the crux of why that piece of fruit om the Garden of Eden was such a big deal.

When Adam chose to eat that fruit from the forbidden tree, he was essentially choosing independence from God.

Man would now decide for himself what was good and evil.

God tried to warn Adam that going it alone would surely end badly for him and that it was a path that would lead to destruction. It was intended for mankind to draw life from God and bear his image and likeness but the fall changed that.

It is easy to overlook the tragedy of Genesis 5:3. Hidden away in a genealogy list, it tells us that when Adam had sons and daughters they were born into his image and likeness.

Fortunately for us though he loved us enough to send a new Adam, one not born of man but of the Spirit (Matthew 1:18). Hebrews 1:3 tells us that this man, Jesus, was the exact representation of God. Jesus himself said that if you had seen him you had seen the Father. The good news doesn’t stop there either; Paul said that he (Jesus) would be the first born among many and that we who found life in him would be conformed into his image (Romans 8:29), which ultimately restores us back to what was lost in the Garden.

I do not think that it was an accident that Jesus chose the words he did when he said that he is the way, the truth and the life (John 14:6).

Likewise I do not think that it was a coincidence when he used the illustration of himself as being the true vine (John 5:5) and that those who were in him would bear much fruit.

Today our choice is not so different from the one that Adam faced. We can choose life and we can find it in that vine or we can choose the broad way that leads to destruction.

God is z Bible & Theology Topics: Adam and Eve, Genesis 3, guest post

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God Takes on Our Violence

By Jeremy Myers
27 Comments

God Takes on Our Violence

old testament violenceIf it is on the cross that Jesus most fully reveals God, and it is on the cross that Jesus became sin for the world, then this means that in the Old Testament, God also was becoming sin for the world.

Just as Jesus became repulsive on the cross by taking on the sin of the world, the proper response to reading about the violence of God in the Old Testament is to be repulsed. We are repulsed by the violence of God in the Old Testament because we are supposed to be repulsed.

God Takes on the Violence of Israel

The violence of God in the Old Testament is exactly the violence of God, but is God taking on the violence of Israel. Israel, much like any other nation in history, was a child of its times, and set about living and functioning in a way that resembled the surrounding nations. Often this led to acts of war and violence against other people.

And though this was not the way God wanted them to behave, when they set out in these violent and warlike directions, God took their actions upon Himself.

He took responsibility for their behavior. He did not condone or command their actions, but when they set out to live in a way that was contrary to His will and ways, He inspired the biblical authors to put the violent actions of Israel upon Himself, so that He could take the blame and the shame for their sin.

God fights against violence by recognizing it for the evil that it is, and by taking the pain and suffering caused by evil upon Himself, thus emptying it of its power. God defeats violence by absorbing the violence on Himself. By not responding to violence with more violence, but simply taking the violence onto Himself, the infinite spiral of violence unravels itself upon the scarred and bloodstained back of God.

If he can manage to absorb the violence onto himself rather than either responding with new violence of his own or hardening himself in a way that deflects the original violence back onto the world, he has a means of dampening the reaction and winding down the conflict.

… Evil is stymied because it simply cannot get the usual chain reaction as much as started. It punches itself out against the defenselessness of the [suffering] servant (Eller, King Jesus’ Manual, 161.

The Bible Says What God Wants

Look at it another way: If the Bible is inspired and inerrant, then it records exactly what God wanted recorded. And if we read the Bible backward, then we read Jesus back into those violent portrayals of God in the Old Testament rather than read those depictions of God forward onto Jesus.

When we do this, we can assume that whatever appears inconsistent with the nature and character of Jesus Christ as recorded in the Gospels, comes not from God but from agents who oppose the will and ways of God, or from those who simply do not understand what God is truly like.

But often these passages in the Old Testament will state that the instructions were given by God, and if we read these texts in the light of Jesus, then we understand that although God was not telling them to do such things, He nevertheless inspired them to write what they did so that He could take the blame for their sinful actions. Just as Jesus came to destroy the devil’s work, to become sin for us, and to reveal God to us through His entire life and ministry and especially on the cross, then this also is what God was doing in the Old Testament.

God inspired the Old Testament authors to write about Him in a violent way so that He could do the same thing for Israel that Jesus did on the cross. Just as Jesus became sin for us, God became sin for Israel, and in this way, hopefully, stops the cycle of violence from continuing.

violence in Old TestamentGod Takes on the Violence of All Humanity

Of course, God’s action of taking the blame for the sin of His people does not begin with Israel, but with the sin of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. From the very first sin, God takes the blame and violence upon Himself.

He does this in at least two ways.

First, He does not argue with Adam, Eve, and the serpent all implicate Him in their shame. Satan blames God for putting the tree in the garden and for wanting to keep the knowledge of good and evil to Himself (Genesis 3:5). Eve blames God by saying that she was tricked by the serpent (Genesis 3:13), who was in God’s garden. Adam blames God for giving the woman to him (Genesis 3:12).

God, like Jesus after Him, never utters a word in His defense.

But even in Genesis 3:14-19, God takes the blame for the evil that comes upon the world as a result of Adam and Eve’s sin. Many interpret these verses as God cursing the serpent, the man, the woman, and the ground.

And while a surface reading of the text does seem to indicate that this is what happens (although the word “curse” is never used in connection with Adam and Eve themselves), a more careful reading of the text reveals that God is more likely just describing the natural consequence of their decision to rebel against Him and hand dominion of the earth over to Satan.

Yet by pronouncing what will happen as a result of sin, God takes the blame for it.

t appears as if He is the one actively causing enmity, strife, sorrow, pain, thorns, thistles, and death.

People Sin. Bad Things Happen. God Takes the Blame.

This sort of pattern is followed throughout the rest of Scripture. People sin, bad things happen, and God takes the blame.

When people see God taking the blame for the violence and evil of His people (sometimes by “commanding” them to do it), they feel that they must somehow justify the violence and explain how it is really “good.” But this is the wrong approach. God is repulsed and saddened by the destructive violence, which is why He takes the blame for it. But He knows that by taking the blame upon Himself, He will hopefully stop the cycle of violence from continuing, for while a person might retaliate in violence against a violent neighbor, how does one retaliate against a violent God?

When we look at what Israel does in the Old Testament and are repulsed by it, we can know that we are feeling the right thing, for this is what Jesus did on the cross.

He became repulsive. He became despised, rejected, forsaken, and shamed (Isa 53:3).

So also with God in the Old Testament.

If we despise what He is described as doing and are tempted to reject and forsake those shameful depictions of God, then we are feeling exactly what God wants us to feel.

Rejection of the violent portrayals of God is good and godly because God is not violent.

God of the Old Testament and JesusHow can a God who says "Love your enemies" (Matthew 5:44) be the same God who instructs His people in the Old Testament to kill their enemies?

These are the sorts of questions we discuss and (try to) answer in my online discipleship group. Members of the group can also take ALL of my online courses (Valued at over $1000) at no charge. Learn more here: Join the RedeemingGod.com Discipleship Group I can't wait to hear what you have to say, and how we can help you better understand God and learn to live like Him in this world!

God is Uncategorized Bible & Theology Topics: evil, Genesis 3, God, Old Testament, Theology of God, Theology of Jesus, violence, violence of God, When God Pled Guilty

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