by Dr. Carrie Miles
During Holy Week, we often spend time reading and reflecting on Christ’s final days and hours. While that is a helpful spiritual practice, I’d like to invite you to also consider the creation story. Because at Easter, Jesus fulfilled the Creator’s promise about the special role that woman would play in redemption. This Holy Week, consider meditating on the creation account of Genesis, where the promise was first made, to the first woman.
People often ask me if we don’t encounter a lot of resistance from the men as we teach Bible-based gender equality in Africa. We don’t actually, largely because we come at the invitation of existing ministries. The leaders who invite us are eager to find biblical solutions to the problems they know we are addressing. We are not a “push” ministry. That is, we don’t push our message on anyone.
On our recent trip to Kenya, most of the people who came to our second seminar were from Teen Challenge in Nairobi, whose leadership has been eager to incorporate New Man, New Woman into their program. We weren’t quite sure why one young couple came to the seminar, however. Maybe because they were invited, or maybe because they were suspicious and wanted to check us out? The wife in particular seemed to have a negative attitude. When I sat with them at tea the first day, and asked what she did, she said, “Nothing,” and did not elaborate. I wasn’t sure at whom the hostility was aimed, and backed off.
So I was not surprised that this woman objected to our conclusion that woman was not cursed by God in Genesis 3. Interestingly, while in small groups men argue for woman’s culpability for the Fall, on the rare occasions that someone has disputed this conclusion in front of the whole class, it has invariably been a woman. (One young woman in Burundi a few years ago argued that yes, the text reads that it was the ground, not the people, that was cursed, but as the woman was made out of the ground, she was cursed too.)
I am glad when people argue about interpretation, because they really need to grapple with the Bible in order to own it. And sometimes, deep insights come out of the argument. Which is exactly what happened in Kenya.
The study on Genesis 3 points out that it is the serpent, and the ground, but not the people, that were cursed following the humans’ disobedience. Here are the verses:
14 So the Lord God said to the serpent: “Because you have done this, You are cursed more than all cattle, And more than every beast of the field; On your belly you shall go, And you shall eat dust all the days of your life. 15 And 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.”
16 To the woman He said: “I will greatly multiply your sorrow and your conception; In pain (sorrow) you shall bring forth children; Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.”
17 Then to [the man] 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 (lit. sorrow) you shall eat of it
All the days of your life.
18 Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you,
And you shall eat the herb of the field.
19 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.” (Gen. 3:14-19, NKJV)
In traditional religions, when someone puts a curse on someone, they do so because they want that person to suffer. The words of a curse are believed to literally come true. God, however, does not want us to suffer. He wants to restore us to the unity and harmony, with each other and with Him, for which He created us. The creation story points to Jesus, who specifically redeems each aspect of the Fall. God did not curse women, or men. Rather, he named the consequences of their sin, but also made a promise of redemption which would come through the woman.
14 So the Lord God said to the serpent…. 15 And 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 serpent as Satan/Tempter – who knows the sinful desires of our heart, and offers them to us – will be defeated. And the battle is between the serpent and the woman and her Seed. Through the woman will come the Redeemer who will restore us, buy us back from the slavery to the Fallen world.
This insight changed everything for the questioning woman in Kenya.
“Oh,” she said. “If redemption is there in the very beginning, it can’t be a curse.”
God wanted to undo what we had done before we even did it. God did not curse us, but wants to restore us to a perfect relationship, with Him and with each other.
This Holy Week, as you prepare your heart for Easter, remember and embrace the promise of redemption, which was promised to us even as we rebelled against God. May you accept your redemption and God’s gift of reconciliation more and more perfectly this Easter season.