
Ephesians 5:32-33 MSG
This is a huge mystery, and I don’t pretend to understand it all. What is clearest to me is the way Christ treats the church. And this provides a good picture of how each husband is to treat his wife, loving himself in loving her, and how each wife is to honor her husband.
Genesis 3:14-15 NKJV
14 So the LORD God said to the serpent: “Because you have done this, You are cursed more than all cattle, And more than every beast of the field; On your belly you shall go, And you shall eat dust All the days of your life.
15 And 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.”
God didn’t curse the serpent. “Because YOU have done this…” (he lied, manipulated, and deceived) The serpent cursed himself. God simply stated the consequence.
Genesis 3:16 NLT
Then he said to the woman, “I will sharpen the pain of your pregnancy, and in pain you will give birth. And you will desire to control your husband, but he will rule over you.”
Giving birth was going to have some discomfort, but after the fall, it would be more painful. God says the woman will live in conflict with her husband. What was meant to be bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh is now distorted. Woman’s desire to control, and man’s propensity to rule is not biblical. It’s a result of deception, rebellion, and bad choices. God simply stated the consequence.
Genesis 3:17, 19 NLT
17 And to the man he said, “Since you listened to your wife and ate from the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat, the ground is cursed because of you. All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it.
19 By the sweat of your brow will you have food to eat until you return to the ground from which you were made. For you were made from dust, and to dust you will return.”
The ground being cursed is a result of Adam’s action. Tending and keeping a garden is far different than “struggling to scratch out a living.” God simply stated the consequence.
Genesis 3:22 NKJV
22 Then the LORD God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”
23 therefore the Lord God sent him out of the garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken.
24 So He drove out the man; and He placed cherubim at the east of the garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life.
Expatriate - an individual temporarily or permanently residing in a country other than that of their citizenship.
It was because of love that God removed Adam and Eve from the Garden. There was no curse or punishment. God simply stated the consequence.
1 Corinthians 15:22 NLT
Just as everyone dies because we all belong to Adam, everyone who belongs to Christ will be given new life.
Galatians 3:13 NLT
But Christ has rescued us from the curse pronounced by the law. When he was hung on the cross, he took upon himself the curse for our wrongdoing. For it is written in the Scriptures, “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.”
John 3:36 NKJV
He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.”
TIFAW
Changing your view of God’s way of correction from cursing to protecting changes everything.
Seeing how Jesus sacrificed His life for the Church changes everything.
Being empowered to love with sacrificial love changes everything.
Through Jesus, God is simply stating the life-giving consequence.