Genesis 3_16 - The Fall, Feminism, and the Fight for Order
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Summary
God's curse on the serpent, and the judgment on the woman. God does not curse Eve or Adam, but the entire feminine sex. In fact, He does not even call her by her name, Eve. He calls her "the woman." This is significant because God's words are not directed to Eve alone, but to the entire female sex. And in the same way that a seed is corrupted, so are the branches and the leaves and the fruit that it produces.
Transcript
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By God's grace, we continue through Genesis, and I plan to move actually quickly through Genesis, or at least that was my plan.
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I'm trying to get larger portions of text, but last week we had two verses, verses 14 and 15 of chapter 3, and this week we get a whopping one verse.
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We're going to go through verse 16 today, and this is part of a three-part series that
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I titled, God's Curses on the Serpent and Judgments on the Sexes.
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Now, if you were here last week, you remember that we studied God's curse upon the serpent,
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where we saw in the darkest moment of human history, the fall of man,
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we see God concealing the greatest promise, the first messianic promise,
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the protovangelium, the first gospel right there in Genesis 3.15.
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We also learned about the serpent's sentence of humiliation to lick the dust on its belly.
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We saw how God relocated the enmity that was between him and man.
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And he located that enmity between the woman's seed and the serpent's seed.
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And we traced that spiritual, those two spiritual lines or two spiritual seeds that run through history.
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And we saw how it ultimately manifests in the ultimate seed, Jesus Christ.
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And we also saw how that Jesus becomes the new Adam, the new and better Adam, the new humanity.
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And out of his side, through his resurrection, when water and blood flows out, his church, just like Eve was pulled out of Adam's rib,
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we see the church being pulled out of Jesus' side.
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And this beautiful realization that we have a new Adam and a new Eve.
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And in the same way that Adam and Eve were called to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth,
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we see Christ and his bride being fruitful and multiplying and filling the earth.
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And so lots of beautiful parallels that were happening there.
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Now today we move on from the curse on the serpent to the judgment on the woman.
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And so very important text, especially in our generation.
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This sermon is titled, The Fall, Feminism, and the Fight for Order.
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To the woman, he said, I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing.
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Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.
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We always say that phrase, the curse of the fall.
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He pronounces judgment on the sexes, consequences for their sin, but he does not curse them.
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Now, Eve was made to be the mother of all the living.
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But now, childbearing will have multiplied pain.
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But now, we will see that she struggles with insubordination.
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In other words, Adam and Eve are not cursed, but their callings and their natures are now frustrated because of the fall.
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Second, I want you to notice that the text refers to her as the woman.
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Now, this is significant because God's words are not directed to Eve alone,
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but they're actually directed to the entire feminine sex.
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In the same way, the serpent possessed by Satan,
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you know, we see the serpent, this one serpent possessed by Satan,
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In the same way that in the way that God pronounces a judgment on the woman,
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it's not just to that one woman, but to all women.
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So she essentially becomes a representative of the feminine sex.
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Our first parents essentially were corrupted.
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And everything that comes from those corrupted parents is handed down to their children and descendants.
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In the same way that a seed, if a seed is corrupted, we know that the branches and the leaves and the fruit is also corrupted.
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So in the same way, ladies, that Eve was corrupted, you are corrupted.
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it. Now, third, some interpret these judgments as additional consequences, not mentioned
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originally by God. And it's kind of a fascinating thing to look at. In Genesis 2.17, God says to
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Adam, in the day you eat of it, you shall surely die. That's all we get from God. He doesn't talk
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about all of these other things, the childbearing and pain and the insubordination. He just warns
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them about this one thing of death. Now, I don't see these as extra penalties that God did not
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mention. I see these as extensions of death. They are extensions of death. In a world untouched by
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death, where sin has not entered, there would be no pain, there would be no sorrow, there would be
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no loss, there would be no insubordination or chaos. But once death entered into the world
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through sin, pain naturally follows. Chaos naturally follows. Pain is a fruit of a dying
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creation. Okay, I want you to catch this for a second. C.S. Lewis, in his book, The Problem of
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pain said, quote, pain is unmistakable evil. Every man knows that something is wrong when he is being
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hurt. Every man knows that something is wrong when he is being hurt. In other words, pain is a reminder
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of sin, which is a reminder of our need for a Savior. Pain. Every time you feel it, it's a
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reminder of sin. Every time you're uncomfortable, every time you wake up with aches and pains,
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every time you must go to the doctor, every time you're sick, every time you're emotionally hurt,
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It's a reminder of sin, and it is a reminder of our need for redemption.
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God says to Eve, to the woman, I should say,
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I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing.
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Now you might be wondering, well, since God says he's going to be multiplying her pain,
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like, is he saying that there was pain in Eden,
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It's not referring to pain that already existed.
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that was just introduced by sin and he's going to multiply it.
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It's not just that it's been introduced, it's also going to be multiplied.
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The same Hebrew word for pain is actually used in the very next verse for Adam
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when it says God tells Adam that he will eat from the ground in pain.
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It might not translate that in your English translation, but in the Hebrew it's the same word.
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And so, what we see here is that both men and women now experience pain connected to their primary callings.
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We, women, have a primary calling of raising children, bearing children, and now it's painful.
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And men have a primary calling of working for provision, and now it's painful.
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One is physical, one is often long-lasting and difficult, overbearing for men.
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Now, before sin, God commanded them to be fruitful and multiply and to fill the earth.
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A task that would have been very joyous and glorious and easy.
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But now, instead of multiplying with ease, God declares that their fruitfulness will come through pain.
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now ladies i don't think that it's just talking about the moment of birth
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i believe that this this word when you see it in the hebrew and you understand what it's talking
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about it's talking about conception all the way through child rearing is painful delivery included
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another dimension of this that i think few people pay attention to
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is the consequence of this judgment upon women is that it results in fewer children being born.
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Modern studies have shown that tokophobia, it's the fear of having children because of pain,
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is somewhere above 10% among women and the anxieties and fears surrounding the experience
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of childbirth probably go into around 25 to 30%. Very common. And in fact, it actually does
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influence their decision to delay or withhold pregnancy altogether. And so we are starting to
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see that these consequences not only bring about
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I don't know how many women I've heard that have had
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that a traumatic birth in which they almost died by pain because of this judgment and they now fear
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having more children as a result of it so again these consequences are not just about death
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entering the world but these consequences also limit life the world will be much different every
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family would be having 10 to 20 children maybe more 34 i don't even know would there be a limit
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I don't know, there would be a massive multiplication of children in a world without fallenness.
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Civilizations fail when they forget obvious truths.
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Now, I think we live in a generation where we've forgotten many obvious truths.
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the text also reveals their distinct masculine and feminine identities.
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because this is another great way to argue for the traditional family.
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i want you to pay attention to what i mean by this god's discipline only strikes where it hurts
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where there is responsibility god did not make work hard for woman because she was not designed
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to work the ground not that she can't do it she's not designed for it in the same way that men are
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and you know what he did not make child rearing hard for the man because you know what god did
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not make men specifically for child-rearing. Not that we can't help and do it, but it is not our
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primary calling. These consequences reveal their roles and responsibilities. It's fundamentals.
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So in a world where women are often lost in the pursuit of masculine provision,
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and where men are increasingly softened into effeminate domestication.
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This passage reminds us of a fundamental truth.
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Women were made to nurture and to raise children and bring forth life.
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Men were made to labor and provide sustenance for their families.
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It communicates identity and structure and goodness and order.
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Now, it's remarkable that we live in a time that we have to communicate obvious truths,
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not just communicate them, actually fight for them.
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People wonder why I fight feminism so often in my personal ministry.
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It's because the sexual chaos and disorder among men and women right now
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has brought such significant pain to our country and to our families and to our nation that we must
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fight for God's order. It is a biblical thing. If we don't fight for it as pastors, who will?
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Who will? If I'm not out there talking about these things and the other pastors out there
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in the world talking about these things, who's going to? The Buddhists? The Hindus? Who? Nobody.
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And so you have to understand that the men and pastors that are speaking about these topics are biblical topics.
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They're within the purview of what is righteous and right.
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It says, your desire shall be for your husband and he shall rule over you.
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Now, first, it's important to note that God's pronouncement upon the woman isn't causing her to sin.
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God is not saying to Eve, your desire shall be for your husband.
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It's not saying like that is a command, like you should do that.
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no it's it's saying because of sin your desires will now be bent toward insubordination and we
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know that because we can define the hebrew word he's describing the effect of sin on her nature
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ladies this is the description of your of the effect of the fall on your nature the word desire
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if you even look to the next chapter in chapter 4
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and you have the same exact word in Hebrew being
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at the door and its desire is for you, but you must master it.
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So you have this picture of sin lurking, and its desire is to control Cain.
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Its desire is to dominate Cain, and God says, you must master it.
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Now, experientially and pastorally, it's not so much that women want to dominate husbands,
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though that can be a reality. But more often in our generation, it's that women want to live
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independent of them. Women want to live independent of men. And I believe that's the heart of what we
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all know as the women's liberation movement. What are women trying to be liberated from?
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men that is what they were trying to be liberated from it is what they are trying
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today to be liberated from the authority of their fathers the authority of their husbands
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and so like cain's need to master sin a husband now has a need to rule his wife that's the parallel
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Now, as I mentioned last week, God uses poetic justice.
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And this is important because I want you to see what God is doing here.
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Essentially, God is saying, all right, all right, Eve, Adam,
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if the woman wants to rule and the man wants to follow and listen,
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then the fall will now amplify both of those things.
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That's essentially what we're seeing in this judgment.
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If women want to lead and men want to follow,
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it's what we see in Eve and Adam in the fall,
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And that's what we have in the relationships between men and women today.
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It's actually the same as Romans 1.24 where God says to those who love self,
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I'm going to give you over to self. You'll have more of it.
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In fact, at the root, that's what Romans 1.24 is speaking of homosexuality.
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I'll give you another man to love just the same
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Now, just because God allows their corrupting natures to suffer this type of marital chaos,
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we know that that's not God's will to have insubordinate wives and sinfully domineering husbands.
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I pointed out several weeks ago that God is a God of order.
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We saw even in chapter 1 and 2 of Genesis, the six implications of masculine rule.
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I pointed them out. It was Adam was created first rather than Adam and Eve being simultaneously created together.
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God delivered the rules of morality to Adam alone.
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We saw that Eve was created from man and for man.
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But now they are significantly more difficult to carry out those roles
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and our need for redemption in our relationships.
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Which leads us to the last phrase that we're going to cover
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now the hebrew word here means to reign over or to have dominion over
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and i believe that's true and right i believe that a husband
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ought to reign and have dominion over his wife now you can read into that a tone of
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maliciousness but i think if you read into it a tone of righteousness it can be said equally
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and true. Now, one theologian described the tone that I think is trying to be communicated in this
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judgment. He says, quote, what was once marked in the garden by to love and to cherish
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has in the fall become to rule and to dominate. Now, this can actually be seen in history.
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without christianity men rule over women with an iron fist look to islam if you want to see that
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their physical strength over women becomes a tool to exploit women sexually to control them from
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Likewise, without Christianity, women resist submission through feminism, emotional manipulation.
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And when those efforts fail, they use lust and they understand its power.
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and because of the fall both sexes twist god's design in their own way
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so men are brutal and women are emotionally manipulative or sexually manipulative
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and this is the twist of almost all counseling even in the church today dealing with those realities
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now in previous generations the problem was often chauvinistic men that was the problem
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of maybe like the early 1900s chauvinistic men today the greater crisis is effeminate men
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passive men and feminist women now we have a crisis i'm going to tell you about a crisis
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that will probably shock you, at least it should if it doesn't.
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According to Pew Research, in 1993, 76% of 18-year-old men
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said they wanted to be married, compared to 74% in 2023.
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That was a very small decline, 76%, 74%, 2% drop in 30 years.
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but among women the number the number plummeted from 83 percent in 1993 to 61 percent in 2023
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what that means is that almost half of today's young women do not desire to be married
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So, that was the front door and the fall of most political realities in America.
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The second was the right to work and to live independent of men.
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And the third wave was the right to dress like prostitutes and sell themselves online.
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Being total, sexual revolution, if you want to call it that.
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absolute control of men through sex that's what we've seen
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now you've seen for most of history women had no alternative to marriage because
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if you wanted food protection and children they needed a husband i mean just go back to 1850
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being a single woman would be extremely difficult
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you won't survive if you don't have a husband
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today for the first time in history women can work for themselves they can live alone
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now when you add pornography you kind of hook up culture and abortion to this mix
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you have a culture that's designed for the destruction of the family
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That's what we've witnessed in the last 30 years.
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In short, feminism is the enculturation of the fall.
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Feminism is the enculturation of the fall,
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It's the normalization or the institutionalization of feminine rebellion.
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It is so absurdly rampant compared to previous generations.
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We don't realize it because it's like a fish doesn't know it's wet.
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but if a man and a woman came from the 1850s to 2025 they would be absolutely shocked i'll say
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this if an atheist liberal god-hating woman from 1850 came to 2025 she would be shocked
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were more Christ-like than Christian women today
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Christianity is the only thing that can restore order in America.
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Paul outlines how marriage, in light of Christ and the church,
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becomes essentially the means of the reversal of the effects
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So for thousands of years, you had Adam and Eve,
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and you had a lot of pain between Adam and Eve and Christ.
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Christ comes back and restores the dignity of women like no other person who has ever lived.
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The state of women prior to Christ was not great.
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Christ dignified women at such an incredible level.
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If you want to look to nations that dignify women, you will only find those women in Christian nations.
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You're not going to find dignified women in third world pagan nations.
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And so when Paul comes here and delivers these beautiful instructions in light of the gospel,
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It restores the brokenness that was lost in the fall between men and women.
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Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord.
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For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is head of the church.
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Now, as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.
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Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her,
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that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word,
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so that he might present the church to himself in splendor without spot or wrinkle.
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or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.
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Without Christians embracing this, society is going to collapse.
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And by God's grace, we're seeing somewhat of a revival.
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I think we're in the death throes of liberalism.
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that finally people are going you know what being single is not great and you know what
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not having children is not great and you know what working as a woman and providing for myself
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is not great we're finally waking up but the number of boomers gen x and even millennials
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that got totally sideswiped by the lie of feminism
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Parents, raise your daughters to love marriage.
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And I think fathers, I think the reason women don't want to be married
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is because an absolute and utter failure on fathers.
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If you look at your dad your whole life as an absolute loser,
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But if you look to your dad as an absolute example of Christ,
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as a daughter, you can't wait to find a man that is like your father.
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And we cannot restore order without restoring the order between God and man.
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Father, we thank you, Lord, for the order that comes through the gospel.
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Lord, we ask that you would give us grace and wisdom,
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even here in our own marriages, in our own church.
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Lord, that you would help the women to be free of the judgments upon Eve.
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And Lord, that you would bring love to the men of this congregation,
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Father, we pray for a restoration of our society.
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Lord, that you would raise up many, many more pastors
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that would be the example to restore this nation.