Human Reaction; God's Response

           As soon as Adam and Eve felt the consequences of their disobedience, Genesis 3:8 tells us how they reacted. When they heard the sound of God on His usual stroll through the Garden to fellowship with them, they hid. Like that was going to work! It doesn’t work any better for us today when we know we’ve blown it and we think we have to hide from God.
            Of course, God calls them out on it and they have to fess up. Instead of owning their actions, Adam and Eve start playing the victims, and they invent the blame game. That, too, is a typical human reaction. It’s part of the contaminated human nature.
            What happens next may surprise you. God responds with the first prophecy in the Bible. He first directs it at the key player in the Fall—Satan. “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.”
            The Seed, of course, is God’s Son, Jesus Christ.  Those who are born of God through Jesus Christ—believers—are also His seed. Those who choose to reject God the Father and follow Satan instead are his seed. We’ve seen this hatred and division between Satan’s offspring and the Seed’s offspring throughout history. But now that Satan knows his time is short, he is ramping up the division, hatred, and persecution against Christians.
            Back then, however, Adam and Eve had no idea what or who was the Seed. With their spirit now contaminated through sin, they couldn’t possibly know or understand that the Seed would come through the supernatural process of a human woman (the virgin Mary) being supernaturally overshadowed by the Spirit of God. They didn’t know that a one-of-a-kind Man would be born into the world. Born of the flesh, Jesus would be 100% human. Born of the Spirit, He would also be 100% divine. In effect, the divine nature would also take on the human nature—the incarnate Christ becoming God in the flesh and entering our world.
            Since the bloodline of a child is determined through the father—or in this case, the Father God—Jesus would be the Perfect Man. As the Son of Man, He would be subject to temptation and the same struggles we have. Yet as the Son of God, He would choose to only do the Father’s will (John 5:19). Because He never disobeyed, He was sinless. This is why Jesus is the only Way—He is the only way to be restored to God.
            Remember, God gave the authority over the earth to the human race in the Creation mandate. But because of the Fall, that authority was forfeited to Satan. Satan became the god of this age—the age of mankind (2 Cor. 4:4). That is why this first prophecy is so important. It releases God’s will into the earth. At the appointed time, the Seed would come forth as part of another divine reset.
           Because God is just, He could not override the Fall and take back the authority over the earth. Choices have consequences. The wages of sin is death. So His plan involved sending Jesus into this world, for only a Perfect Man could justly pay the price for sin, dying on behalf of the human race.
            The Chronos Lesson: As humans, we can’t run and hide from God. Hebrews 4:13-16 says, “And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account. Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”
            As mere humans, we can’t run and hide from Satan, either. He is a spiritual being. But because he is also a created being, he isn’t all-knowing, all-powerful, or everywhere-present like God. For the time being, however, he does have power and influence over this earth. Therefore, every human being automatically becomes an enemy of Satan. It doesn’t matter whether or not a person believes in the supernatural realm. It doesn’t matter whether or not a person chooses to follow Satan or God. Satan still hates all mankind and seeks to destroy us because we are destined in Christ to be what he wanted to be.
            The solution is found in James 4:7. “Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.” To submit means to recognize that you are subordinate to God as part of His creation. It means to follow the principles of operation for this earth from the Manufacturer’s Manual—the Bible. We always have a choice. We don’t have to be under Satan’s influence in this world.
            When Jesus died and was resurrected, Satan’s authority over the earth was impacted. Satan no longer has authority over those who are in Christ—unless we allow it. That is why we need to renew our minds as to the power we have in the name of Jesus for our own lives. We do not have power over others. But we can learn to walk more and more like Jesus in order to bring light to those around us. It is the goodness of God that draws people to repentance (Rom. 2:4).
            This is a process, our journey with Christ, if you will. The Bible calls it sanctification. Your spirit was sanctified immediately and fully when you accepted Jesus as your Savior. It was also sealed from contamination for that future Day of Redemption—the 7th Day (Eph. 4:30).
            Your mind, however, needs to be renewed by the Word, and your body needs to be trained to align with God’s truths. Theologians call this progressive sanctification. At the wonderful moment of the rapture, when we are changed in a twinkling of an eye, our mind will be fully conformed to the mind of Christ and our body will be transformed into an immortal, glorified body like Jesus’ body! Our whole being will be sanctified completely—spirit, soul, and body (1 Thess. 5:23).