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Here we are again, just one week from concluding another study. I’m so grateful you’re digging into Scripture with me, and I pray the Spirit is showing you awesome revelation from God’s Word either from your own work or something I’ve written here.

This past week, I did things differently as I felt the Spirit leading me. You might remember I identified treasure in fourteen verses from Genesis 3:1-24. They proved to be too many to thoroughly explore, so I started reviewing the translation comparisons of those verses and asked the Spirit to help me focus before I dug into cross-references. Normally I reverse those steps: cross-references first, then translations. But I’m so glad I switched them: check out what He showed me below!

Last Week’s Work

OTHER TRANSLATIONS

First, I compared the ESV, AMP, NIV, and Good News translations for the fourteen verses I originally focused on. Unfortunately, I didn’t see a lot of difference among them. As I reviewed major parts of this story, though, I sensed a shift in the direction of my study: away from my previous focus on Adam and Eve’s learning curve, and toward God’s loving responses to what happened. In particular, the Spirit drew me to see how:

• Verse 9: God pursued them in the garden, asking, where are you?
• Verse 15; God planned to reconcile mankind to Himself through Eve’s offspring who would bruise the serpent’s head.
• Verse 21: God provided protection for them using garments of animal skins.
• Verse 24: God prevented them from living forever in the shame, fear, condemnation, deception, pain, toil, frustration, strife, and inequality of their existence by removing access to the tree of life.

CROSS-REFERENCES

Since the shift in focus, I reviewed the cross-references for verses 9, 15, 21, and 24, and found the most relevant connections to verses 15 and 21. Regarding verse 15, in Hebrews 2:14-15, death is mentioned as the method used to destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil. In 1 John 3:8, I found the reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. Two other references in Revelation mention a great dragon, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world, (Rev 12:9, 20:2), that was conquered … by the blood of the Lamb [Jesus] and by the word of [our brothers’] testimony (Rev 12:11).

In verse 21, protection from the elements is provided by animal-skin garments. In Isaiah, I found a similar reference to being clothed in garments of salvation and covered with the robe of righteousness (Isa 61:10). Romans 3:22-25 explains how Christians obtain this covering of righteousness: it’s available through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.

In all, I’m left with a very different picture of God from what I previously perceived. Before, my emphasis has been on the other characters: the sneaky serpent, and the innocent, trusting man and woman. But now, I see a God who gave the man and woman free will—the choice to follow His command or seek their own way. Even after they chose not to follow His guidelines, He still called out to them, He gave them cover for their nakedness, He prevented them from living forever in their punishment, and He provided, in due time, a way to repair the damage done. I am overwhelmed by these gestures of love He showed to them—and that He still shows to all of us—even knowing in our own power we can’t help but make the same kind of bad decisions.

Dig-In Challenges

This coming week, let’s wrap up our study of Genesis 3 and align with what we’ve discovered in Chapter 3:

1. PRAY: Read the prayer we created in Step 1.
2. ALIGN: Review our study notes and other work, focusing specifically on what we’ve learned in this process.
3. ALIGN: Then, considering those “lessons learned,” think about how the Spirit has convicted us through this study. In other words, where has He shown us misalignment between what we’ve discovered and how we practice our faith?
4. ALIGN: Next, let’s look to God’s Word for guidance to correct that misalignment. This is often—but not always—a verse from the study text or from one of the cross-references.
5. ALIGN: And finally, I’ll reflect on how I can change my thoughts or actions to align more closely with what I’ve discovered here. To really make this work, I commit to changing something and do my best to act on that commitment every day for at least three weeks.

That may seem like a lot to consider in one week. If you’re working with the Spirit, remember you can do this at your own pace. Don’t worry about keeping up with me—just do what you can when you can. I know the Lord will bless any time you spend in His Word!