Blessed Meetness
Notes
Transcript
Genesis 2:21-23 ESV
21 So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. 22 And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. 23 Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.”
I am a firm believer that one is more prone to enjoy that which is given to him when he earnestly desires what is given to him, beforehe receives it.
Now, for someone to desire something, two factors need to be present. The first factor is that something must appear to be appealing to a person. The second factor that is needed is that after something seems appealing, the one who is appealed then recognizes that what seems to be appealing to him, he does not have.
Thus, therein is the formula for desire. And what is so interesting about desire is that there is usually a time when one did not really desire the thing that he now desires. There may have been something indicating that there was something missing, but whatever it is that was missing did not appear to be desirous to him at that time.
For example, as very young children, most little boys don’t care too much for little girls. They have long hair, they giggle a lot, they talk differently, they sound differently, they want to play with dolls… To most little boys, little girls seem to be pretty strange creatures.
Now, don’t get me wrong, there are always times when a little boy might think that a girl is kind of pretty, but for the most part, they don’t see what all the fuss is about.
But then the adolescent years come, you know, 12, 13, 14 years old, and suddenly girls are all that a boy will think about. Something happens in them, and suddenly, those same strange girls now seem incredibly appealing.
Those same boys who used to think that girls were so strange are now staying up late at night pining, thinking to themselves, “Oh! If she would only notice me!”. Desire has effectively set in. Indeed, earnest desire has effectively set in.
And because that is the case, when that girl that that boy is pining over finally does give him the time of day, he feels like he’s floating on cloud nine. He is enjoying her reciprocating his attempts to charm her, because that is what he earnestly desired.
As we continue in our exposition of Genesis, chapter two this morning, we see something very similar to this as we read one of the loveliest accounts in all of the Bible.
As we begin our reading, we look first of all to the very first word in our reading, that word being the word, “so”. Now, I know that that probably doesn’t seem like a very exciting start to our exposition of this morning’s text, but it is indeed imperative for us to speak on this single word in order to fully appreciate the entirety of the text.
Now, because we begin with the word “so” we know that what will follow in our text today comes about as a result of that which came before it.
Back in the eighteenth verse of this chapter, God had made the observation that it was not good for man to be alone, and because it was not good for him to be alone, He was going to make a helper fit for the man.
Then as we proceeded on to the nineteenth and twentieth verses, we observed the account of how God had effectively produced desire within the man as God revealed to the man that unlike the rest of the created order, he had no helper.
Now, like we said last week, man had a natural longing within him, a longing that prohibited him from fully experiencing his God-ordained bliss. But what it was that he was longing for, he didn’t know.
But now that God had revealed to him that he had no helper, he knew what it was that he longed for. He longed for one who was like him, one whom he could fully experience this bliss with.
Now that this has been revealed to the man, now that he recognized that he longs for a helper, God decides to act. We see this in the first part of verse 21, which reads:
Genesis 2:21a ESV
21a So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man,
The first thing that we notice here is that what takes place is God-induced. Our reading says, “So” or, because God had manifested to Adam what he longed for, and because Adam now desired what he longed for, “the Lord God caused…” Thus, we see again God’s sovereignty, what He desires is what happens.
And that which the Lord God had caused, our reading tells us, was “a deep sleep to fall upon the man”.
Now, when the text speaks of a deep sleep here, it is more than just sleeping heavily. You know, when I think of sleeping heavily, I think of getting a really good night’s rest. And when I get a good night’s rest, I’m practically dead to the world, nothing is going to wake me up until I’m good and ready to get up. But this God-induced sleep which is referred to in the text is much more than that.
There is at least one other instance in the scriptures that I can recall right off hand where God had placed someone in a deep sleep like this. Over in the fifteenth chapter of the book of Genesis, we read of God causing a deep sleep to come over Abraham.
Now, for anyone who is familiar with that chapter here in the book of Genesis, you know that that is the chapter when God made His covenant with Abraham. There were the animals that God had commanded Abraham to gather; the heifer, the goat, the ram, the turtledove, and the pigeon, all of which had been cut down the center of their bodies, leaving them in halves. And while that might sound strange, this was all part of the traditional covenant making ceremony in ancient times.
After Abraham had accomplished this was when God caused the deep sleep to come over him. And as he slept, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch, both manifestations of God, passed through the animal halves. What this showed is that God established His covenant with Abraham, and as Abraham slept, God revealed that He would keep His covenant with Abraham by performing both His part and Abraham’s part.
It was a sign that God was gracious, for while Abraham could not fulfill his end of the covenant though he earnestly desired a covenant with God, God revealed to Abraham that He would fulfill the covenant for him.
And as God causes this deep sleep to come upon Adam, what He reveals is that He is gracious to Adam. He is gracious to Adam in that though Adam desires a helper, he cannot bring her about, and so God is going to graciously do it for him.
And we see God’s gracious formation of the man’s helper in the last half of verse 21 and in the first half of verse 22, where we read:
Genesis 2:21b-22a
21b and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. 22a And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman
We are all familiar with what happens here, while Adam was in his God-induced sleep, God took one of Adam’s ribs and made that rib into a woman.
Now, why did God do this? Why would He take something from the man and make it into the woman?
Well, first of all, as we have already discovered earlier on in the series of sermons, God created everything that He had created in six days. Therefore, He did not form a separate species when He created the woman, therefore, (and this is the second reason why God made the woman from the man), in order for her to be a helper to the man, she had to be of the same substance of the man. Thus, God made the female from the male, and together, both sexes form the species mankind.
But you may wonder why she was made specifically from the man’s rib. And as I was looking through my commentaries on these verses in preparation for this sermon, I came to find Matthew Henry’s commentary concerning this very helpful. Concerning why the woman was made from the rib of the man, he said:
“She was not made out of his head to rule over him, nor out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near to his heart to be beloved”.
Thus, she was created by God to be the beloved of the male. To be loved, cared for, and led by the male. And God created the female to lovingly, willfully, indeed, joyfully submit to her husband. And that together, they would multiply each other’s God-ordained bliss.
We see then that which God had done with the female after making her out of the man’s side in the last part of verse twenty-two, when it says that God made the woman:
Genesis 2:22b ESV
22b and brought her to the man.
Here we see the marriage ceremony. God had made the woman; He was her Father. And now God, the woman’s Father, comes to give His daughter away to Adam, the man.
Now this is an incredibly precious moment. As God the Father gives the woman to the man, as He brings her to him, one who is made to be his helper, what it shows is that God had ordained this marriage. And because He had ordained this marriage, He had then given His consent to give this woman, Eve, to this man, Adam.
And for this, Adam, the man, is extremely thankful. We see this thankfulness in his exclamation upon receiving the woman to himself.
Let’s look to that exclamation, first of all, in the first half of verse twenty-three, where we read:
Genesis 2:23a ESV
23a Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh;
“At last!” Adam exclaims. “At last is there one who is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh”. I love this response by Adam.
He had longed for something, but he knew not what it was. Then when God had revealed to him that which he longed for, he desired it. And it seems as though the moment that God presented the female to the male, that he immediately knew who she was. She was the helper whom he longed for and desired.
And because he has desired her, and now he has her, he says, “At last I have her!”. He says, “At last! There is one who is bone of my bones, flesh of my flesh, of the same substance as myself! Finally!” he says, “There is one like me! A helper for me, graciously provided by God for me!”.
He describes her further in the final part of our reading, the last part of verse 23, where we read Adam saying:
Genesis 2:23b ESV
23b she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.”
Here, by Adam, the female is called “Woman”, a she-man. Being taken from the man, the woman is just as much man. And that is because “man” is not a gender, “man” is a species. A species consisting of males and females.
She is in every respect as much man as the male is, all that differs is her sex from his sex. God said that man was made in His image, and when He declared that, He was not speaking of only males, but males and females. Thus, she was taken from the man to complement the man. And she was made in such a way as the man would complement her.
And thus, we see what likely appears to be miraculous and awe-inspiring as we recognize that God placed the longing in the man, that God stirred up the desire in the man, and God fully satisfied the desire of the man.
So has God ever been and so will He ever be. Working in accordance with His own good pleasure, that for the born-again child of God, is ever good.
May we ever worship His majesty!
Amen?
