Scripture
Genesis 3:16-17
[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.”
[17] Then to Adam He said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree about which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat from it’ Cursed is the ground because of you; In toil you will eat of it All the days of your life.
This is 77th Lecture on Genesis.
In the last lecture, I talked about the curse that God gave to the serpent regarding Adam and Eve’s eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Since the serpent lost its legs and had to go upon its belly, among all animals it fell to the lowest.
Genesis 3:15 mentioned that ‘the seed of woman’ shall bruise ‘the serpent’ on the head, and it contains a very important spiritual meaning.
The ‘Message of the Cross’ explains that the way of salvation that was hidden by God for ages is only through Jesus Christ.
From the very beginning of the journey of human cultivation, every human being is given the light of hope by God the Father.
God has also shined His light into the darkness at every critical moment in the history of the 6,000 year-long period of human cultivation.
God revealed His will through the prophets who sought after the heart of God, and He has fulfilled it when it was time.
It is still the same today when sin and evil has reached its highest level and all things are looking so dark in a spiritual sense.
God is working so that flame of the Holy Spirit can burn and shine brightly with power throughout the whole world.
It is the same for every individual.
1 Corinthians 10:13 says, “No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it.”
Since God knows each one’s measure of faith, He allows only the temptation common to man.
In other words, He doesn’t require an elementary student to solve a college-level math problem.
He gives a problem at a level that can be solved by anyone who has finished that course-level of study.
It’s obvious in the math example that a student should re-take the course if he cannot pass a test at that level.
The same applies to the training of faith.
God gives proper tests according to different levels of faith and then increases the measure of faith.
His test is not intended to fail the students, but to increase their level of faith.
Therefore, when you encounter a test of faith, I hope you will never be taken aback or confused, but overcome it with joy and thanks.
Dear brothers and sisters.
Now, let me explain what kind of punishment Eve received for the sin she committed.
First off, God said to the woman in Genesis 3:16, “I will greatly multiply your pain in childbirth, in pain you will bring forth children.”
Here, ‘the pain in childbirth’ refers to the pain and difficulties that a woman has to bear from when she becomes pregnant until she delivers her baby.
Now, God said “I will greatly multiply your pain in childbirth.”
It tells us that Eve had to have given birth in the Garden of Eden, and that she had previously suffered from some pain every time.
Just as God told them to ‘be fruitful and multiply,’ Adam and Eve gave birth to many descendants for ages.
But at that time, Eve was a living spiritual being, but she had pain in childbirth.
Of course, it was very faint pain.
By the way, there was a spiritual reason why God made the living beings feel the pain in childbirth.
Until the human cultivation to get true children is over, God the Father feels much pain.
By the same token, by making the living beings feel at least a minimal pain in childbirth, He allowed them to understand that children cannot be acquired for nothing.
This pain has been multiplied since the time of conception.
Just as God said, “In pain you will bring forth children,” more pain followed women during the pregnancy and childbirth.
Besides, this verse also includes the meaning that their work and responsibility increase in raising their children.
Mothers in the Garden of Eden don’t need to work hard to raise children, and yet children grow up well.
It is because there is no harm such as diseases.
All children are born healthy, and they grow up well to look the most beautiful.
However, the situation changed.
Adam and Eve became men of flesh, and the land they lived on was also cursed.
Adam and Eve couldn’t get anything if they didn’t work hard for It.
Especially, they came to realize how much they would have to labor and toil to acquire and raise children.
At last, they came to understand the heart of God the Father if only just a little bit.
In raising children, the effort that people make cannot be compared to the effort that God makes.
People just make efforts and toil for 2~30 years until their children fully grow up.
Of course, they care for their children for their entire lives.
Since the beginning of human cultivation, God the Father has worked very hard to get His true children.
God says in Isaiah 49:15, “Can a woman forget her nursing child and have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, but I will not forget you.”
God the Father is looking at souls with a much more earnest love than that of the fleshly parents who care for their children.
He wants all the people to reach salvation.
The forefathers of faith felt and understood this deep heart of God the Father.
And they threw themselves into leading sinners to salvation and to make them children of God.
In point, the Apostle Paul said in Galatians 4:19, “My children, with whom I am again in labor until Christ is formed in you….”
And he also said in 2 Corinthians 11:29, “Who is weak without my being weak? Who is led into sin without my intense concern?” and by this he showed his burning love for souls.
It is never an easy job to lead a sinner to be reborn as a child of God and become a true child.
It requires a great deal of effort and toil from God the Father, our Lord, and the Holy Spirit.
Our Lord Jesus, who is the Son of God, gave up His life for sinners.
The Holy Spirit Himself intercedes for souls with ‘groanings too deep for words’, and He helps their weakness.
The servants of God and workers of this church toil and work hard for the souls who are entrusted to their charge.
Among the insect regarded insignificant by people, there is a spider which gives up its body for its child.
It is the spider called, ‘Clubiona spider.’
When it is a time to lay eggs, the female clubiona spider rolls a small leaf and lays her eggs inside.
It is to build a closed place and protect its babies from danger.
Since the mother spider is also locked inside the leaf, however, it cannot get food for her offspring.
Then, the mother spider feeds her own body to her young.
Eventually, the babies survive after eating the body of their mother.
We gained eternal life by eating the flesh of the Lord and by drinking the blood of the Lord.
Since we received such great love, we should work harder for the salvation and nurturing of souls.
Dear brothers and sisters.
Now in Genesis 3:16, God said to the woman, “Yet your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.”
First God said, “Your desire will be for your husband,” and it means her love for her husband Adam changed in a fleshly way.
How could it be punishment then?
Actually the punishment of this kind is so huge.
If you have suffered intensely as a result of fleshly love, you can understand what it means.
Let me try to illustrate this for better understanding.
Let’s say a man and woman love each other and they get married.
When they were deeply in love, they didn’t see the faults of the other, instead all things looked good.
However, this fleshly love changes.
After the marriage, as time passes, they begin to see one-another’s’ shortcomings.
Instead of seeking for the benefit of the spouse, they want the other to work to satisfy their hearts.
Each has this same manner of thinking.
They don’t realize that they have changed, but instead they still think that the other has changed.
They have conflicts while sharing ideas; they even hurt each other’s hearts.
They feel uneasy and saddened.
They become irritated with each other, and they may even burst into fits of anger.
If these things happen between those who used to love each other greatly, how frustrated and shocked they may be to realize what is happening!
They may be hurt terribly in their hearts.
As Adam and Eve became the men of flesh, their love also changed in a fleshly way
When God questioned Adam about him eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, Adam passed the responsibility and blame off onto Eve!
If Adam had loved Eve spiritually without changing, he would have covered Eve’s transgression and her weakness.
But he rather said that the reason for his fault was due to his wife, Eve,
If only Eve herself had kept the spiritual love, she would have had time for self-restraint and she would only have had to have said, “Because of me, I have caused great trouble for my husband.”
However, Eve was not like this.
As if she were the victim, she made an excuse that the serpent tempted her.
This was what Adam and Eve did right after they committed sin.
Therefore, once they came down to the earth, which is a fleshly world, how quickly must they have come into the flesh.
Instead of honoring and serving one another, they looked for their own benefit, and they wanted to be served.
For this, God established strict order between Adam and Eve.
That is, God said to Eve, “He [her husband] will rule over you!”
Of course the order was once that Adam was the primary and Eve was the helper and mate.
However, the concept of this order changed.
A fleshly order that a stronger husband can rule over a weak wife by force was established.
The relationship between husband and wife who don’t know the truth is just like this.
Often the husband considers his wife to be his possession, and he tries to control his spouse as he pleases.
The husbands of the world become proud of the fact that they keep a firm grip on their wives.
They even fiercely shout at their wives and try to make them surrender to him when the wives don’t listen to them.
They may even resort to the use of violence.
Is here any family that is exactly like this because the husband doesn’t believe in God?
If wife can love the husband in the spiritual way, the husband can change thanks to the power of her love.
If they are in fleshly love, however, they feel good when their husbands are good to them, but if husbands make their lives difficult, they dislike and hate their husbands.
You may have no Idea just how many husbands and wives live in pain because they don’t know the truth.
Regarding this, Apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians 7:28, “But if you marry, you have not sinned; and if a virgin marries, she has not sinned. Yet such will have trouble in this life, and I am trying to spare you.”
Apostle Paul knew too well how painful fleshly love is.
That’s why he said, “it is good for a man to remain as he is,” and he said that it is more blessed not to get married.
If you are already married, all you have to do is just come into the spirit together.
Then, you will seek for the benefit of each other and you will serve each other; how happy your family will become!
I pray in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ that all the families of Man may be restored to this beautiful and happy relationship like this.
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