Adam Has A New Experience – Guilt, Shame, And Fear
When Adam realized things had changed after his rebellion, and for the first time he felt guilt and shame, he hid himself from God. He was exhibiting what was now the human condition that we all experience, guilt and shame.
Finally, God comes looking for him and asks, “what have you done???”
Adam Refuses To Acknowledge His Guilt
Now Adam exhibits another aspect of the human condition, he tried to blame it on someone else. He told God that Eve brought him into rebellion. And when God questioned Eve, she told him that Satan had caused her to rebel. What a picture of humanity! Out of our own human nature, we’ll always find someone else to blame for whatever sin we get caught in. But that is not acceptable before God, every person ALONE is responsible for his choices, whether there were extenuating circumstances or not.
They Try To Cover Themselves
Now comes a very important part of this story that a lot of people miss. As soon as Adam and his wife realized a great change had taken place in them, and for the first time felt the human emotions “guilt” and “shame,” they each took leaves and tried to cover themselves.
“…and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons.”
Genesis 3:7
But what God did next, is one of the most important points we must understand in order to understand salvation.
The Covering Foreshadowing An Atonement
The coverings of leaves was not acceptable to hide their shame. Instead, Genesis 3:21 reports that God took skins of an animal and clothed them with them. There’s a VERY important point here, don’t miss it. Whatever we use to cover our guilt with, is not acceptable. The remedy God provided was animal skins thus showing that the cost of redemption is going to be the shedding of BLOOD. Sin brought death into the world, and the remedy for sin has to be another death. As reported in the Book of Hebrews, “without shedding of blood there is no remission.”
Why is that so? Why does blood have to be shed to “cover” mankind?
God was showing mankind that there is NO OTHER WAY he can cover himself, or cleanse himself of the guilt of sin. Whatever mankind tries to cover himself with is useless. Redemption requires the death of another.
THE LAMB
A lamb? Really? What’s that all about?
God teaches us with pictures.
Throughout the Bible stories, the picture of redemption through the blood of a lamb was the only way of salvation. Here are a couple of dramatic stories portraying this:
Isaac and the Lamb
God called a man named Abraham to take his son Isaac up to a certain mountain and sacrifice his son. As they were walking up the mountain, Isaac sees the wood and realizes they’re going up to a sacrifice, but notices Abraham doesn’t have a lamb. So Isaac asks his father,
“Where is the lamb?”
“But Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, ‘My father!’ And he said,
‘Here I am, my son.’ Then he said, ‘Look, the fire and the wood, but where
is the lamb for a burnt offering?’” Genesis 22:7
Notice carefully the answer Abraham gives:
verse 8:
“My son, God will provide Himself the lamb…”
So Isaac walked up that hill, with the wood on his back (foreshadowing Jesus walking to Calvary with the cross on his back) and at the last minute, as Abraham goes to slay him, God tells him not to, but to sacrifice instead an animal that was nearby, showing that the death is going to be SUBSTITUTIONARY. God Himself is going to provide the lamb who will be slain, taking the judgment ON OUR BEHALF, and it will be a substitutionary sacrifice.
Another beautiful portrait of the same thing:
The Passover Lamb
Many years later, the Jewish people were in Egypt, slaves to Pharaoh who caused them much suffering. God sent Moses to bring his people out of that bondage. After Pharaoh many times refused to let them go, God told Moses that he would be sending judgment, an angel of death throughout all of Egypt, and every firstborn son of every family was going to die — EXCEPT the sons of the children of Israel if they followed carefully God’s directions. They had to do exactly what God told them. It required belief. It required obedience. He told them that each family was to take a lamb, slay it, and take a hyssop branch and dab the blood of their lamb on the doorposts of their homes. And when the judgment came, when the angel of death came through the streets of Egypt, every house that had the blood of the lamb on their doorposts, would be PASSED OVER and spared the judgment of death.
That’s what the Jews celebrate to this day when they celebrate PASSOVER. Notice that the blood had to be dabbed onto the top piece of the doorframe, and then on each of the upper sides of the door frame. Picture it. What does that look like? It takes the form of a cross.
The Lamb Of God
If you understand the story till now, then you should understand the statement of John the Baptist who was baptizing one day in the Jordan river. Looking up, he saw Jesus coming, and he said,
“Behold! The LAMB OF GOD, who takes away the sin of the world!”
John 1:29
There are many, many more picture-stories God has placed in the Bible. Jesus said,
“Behold, I have come; in the volume of the book it is written of me.”
Hebrews 10:7
Summarizing:
. Abraham was pictured as a father giving his son as a lamb sacrifice.
. Moses taught that only the blood of a lamb would spare God’s people from judgment.
Those were to be pictures of another Father, the God of creation, who gave us his Son, so that if we put the blood of THIS lamb on the doorposts of our hearts, we are redeemed, and will not come into judgment – BECAUSE Jesus BECAME that lamb who was nailed on a cross IN OUR PLACE, to endure the judgment due upon the sin of each of us. Therefore, if the judgment of our sins was taken by HIM, there is no more judgment coming to us whoever will receive and believe him, because as Jesus said from the cross,
“It is FINISHED.” John 19:30
The Final Solution:
Hitler tried to destroy every Jewish person in the Holocaust. His plan was called “the final solution.”
No. JESUS is “the final solution!”
Bringing life, not death.
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