Regifting

Have you ever been given a gift that you just really didn’t like? Or maybe you didn’t have a use for it. Wrong color wrong size, wrong everything. This happens a lot at office Christmas parties. You end up with something that you just don’t want. What do you do? You probably do what everyone else does, you wait for an occasion to regift the item. You pass it along to someone else with no thought of the person who gave it to you. How would it make them feel if they knew you gave it away? But what if the person who gave it to you knew you very well and knew that this gift was perfect for you, as well as something you needed? That is exactly what Adam and Eve did in the garden. You see God put them on the earth and told them to have dominion or rulership over it. Then not too long after, they gave it to satan. They basically took the perfect gift that God had given them and regifted it. How do you think this made God feel? Let’s see what happened as we walk through the story in Genesis. Genesis 3:1-13 “Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?” 2 The woman said to the serpent, “From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat; 3 but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat from it or touch it, or you will die.’” 4 The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die! 5 For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” 6 When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the

eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings. 8 They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 9 Then the Lord God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?” 10 He said, “I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself.” 11 And He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” 12 The man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate.” 13 Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” And the woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” So there it is, the story of how we ended up regifting the earth to satan. Mankind took the first thing that God gave us and gave it away. And there were consequences for those actions. You cannot break spiritual laws without having consequences in your life. And neither could Adam and Eve...and the serpent. Imagine with me what this scene must have been like. In the garden stands Adam, Eve, a serpent who is the embodiment of satan and God Almighty the Creator. God begins by questioning Adam and Eve. Where are you? Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat? What is this you have done?

God gives them a chance to answer before He pronounces judgment for their sin. Of course Adam tried to shift blame to Eve and Eve tried to shift blame to the serpent. But notice what happens when God addresses the serpent. He was not allowed to speak. God immediately renders a guilty verdict and pronounces judgment on the serpent...and on satan who was using him. This is because God knows who satan is. He is the father of lies. If he were allowed to speak, he would lie, and so God didn’t need to hear anything he had to say. Genesis 3:14 “The Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, Cursed are you more than all cattle, And more than every beast of the field; On your belly you will go, And dust you will eat All the days of your life; This punishment was directed at the serpent, who was the animal satan used to talk to Eve. Apparently, the serpent was not at all like the snake we see today. When God cursed it, by telling it to crawl on its belly and eat dust, it must have been a drastic change from its physical form at that point. Before this, the serpent probably walked on legs like all the other land animals. It must have had a beautiful form in order to have a relationship with Eve and her not be frightened of it. When this physical changed happened, can you imagine what Adam and Eve must have thought. We’re next! But they weren’t next, satan was. God shifts from talking to the serpent, to talking directly to satan who was using the serpent. Genesis 3:15 “And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the heel.”

God set into motion the plan of salvation and prophesied the coming of the seed of a woman who would destroy the work of satan in the earth. Jesus was that seed and sin was the work of satan He came to destroy. Genesis 3:16 “To the woman He said, “I will greatly multiply Your pain in childbirth, In pain you will bring forth children; Yet your desire will be for your husband, And he will rule over you.” Eve had a punishment for her part in the rebellion and it was in two parts. The first part was that there would be multiplied pain in childbirth and despite that, her desire would be for her husband. The second part that says “And he will rule over you” is because she had taken the lead role in rebelling against God’s command to not eat of the tree. She took the lead, and that was supposed to be Adams role. The bigger problem is that Adam just went along with what she told him to do, when she gave him the fruit. God created Adam first and charged him to be the leader, but it seems that he regifted that role to Eve. When a man hands over the leadership role to his wife, he has broken a spiritual law and it won’t be long until there are consequences. That is not how God intended the relationship to function. When a woman is forced to take over leadership because their husband isn’t leading, it causes animosity and the relationship begins to breakdown. What I’ve witnessed in my life is that women are drawn to men who are strong leaders. And it’s because of Genesis 3:6. Look again at the first part.

Your pain in childbirth will be greatly multiplied...And yet, your desire will be for your husband. Women desire a husband who leads with an understanding of rulership. So again, when God said “And he will rule over you”, He was reinforcing the natural order He originally set up. Men, you may have rulership, but remember, God has ownership. You will answer to God for how you rule over what he has allowed you to have. If God has allowed you to have a wife that you know you don’t deserve...treat her accordingly. She belongs to God. This rulership has been abused by men who have not embraced what Jesus said about how a man should love his wife. Just look at how women are treated in parts of the world that follow false religious systems. Women are treated as possessions and abused by men as very young girls. Ephesians 5:22-25 “22 Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body. 24 But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything. 25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her,” In these verses from Ephesians 5, it is very clear how husbands are to treat their wives. Like “Christ loved the church...and gave Himself for her.” Men, we are to love our wives so much that we are willing to die for them. And you should also be willing to live for the. What I mean by that is, you should live a sacrificial life for your family. And women...you are supposed to submit to your husbands. This is a direct reference to what God said in the garden. When this spiritual law is not followed, there will be problems.

But Adam’s punishment was different. Genesis 3:17-19. “Then to Adam He said, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’: “Cursed is the ground for your sake; In toil you shall eat of it All the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, And you shall eat the herb of the field. In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread Till you return to the ground, For out of it you were taken; For dust you are, And to dust you shall return.” Adam’s punishment was directed at the ground...what he was made from. From this point forward, it would grow thorns and thistles, and it would no longer respond to his words. Adam lost his voice of authority. He would now have to work to get the earth to give up what he needed...until he returned to it. The thing Adam was supposed to rule over was now going to rebel against him. This punishment was a direct reflection of what Adam had done to God, when he rebelled against God’s command not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Adam had rebelled against God’s words and now the earth was going to rebel against Adam’s words. Adam did not fulfill his leadership role in the garden and we see the same actions in the church today. Men are not leading their families spiritually. They have regifted that role to their wife or a church volunteer. And what has been the result of that behavior? Here is the sobering reality. Churches are dying from lack of leadership. The stats are as follows: Every year in America

about 4,000 evangelical churches begin. Of those started, 35% close before their 5th anniversary, leaving about 2,600 new churches planted annually. While churches are dying at a significantly higher rate, each year in the U.S. approximately 7,000 churches close their doors forever. All things considered, the number of churches in the U.S. is decreasing by about 4,400 churches per year, while our population is growing by about 3 million people per year. Now, you may be thinking, Pastor Randall, come on now, I came to church to hear about the Christmas story, and God’s gift of love to me. And all you have been talking about sin and punishment. Yep, that’s right, and here’s why. Because if you don’t understand the context of why Jesus had to come to earth, you will misunderstand His mission...and your own. The reality is, that this is probably the most misunderstood concept among believers today. If all you understand is that Adam sinned and because of that you were born a sinner, so you needed a Savior...so you could go to heaven and avoid hell...you have misunderstood the main point. While those things are true, they do not give you a full understanding of what is actually happening and they can give you a false idea of the main point. You see, the main point is not about you getting into heaven...it’s about heaven getting into you and you then fulfilling God’s will on earth.