Clearly the gospel record is wishing us to see this contrast by using the same language.

For a start, 7 days were employed to do what HE might easily have accomplished in just 1 day or even instantaneously. The seven days we know, speaks of the 7,000 year plan that HE has in mind with this creation.

Secondly, there is no "OOOPs" in heaven! It is not as if Jesus Christ was a "Mr Fix-it" created to undo Adam's faux pas. And neither was Jesus Christ "sitting on the sidelines" just in case He was needed. In other words, there was no 'Plan A' and 'Plan B'.

Jesus Christ was THE PLAN all along, but the Father is most definitely NOT the author of sin. The Serpent is the author of the first lie. Adam is the author of sin, even though Eve was the first to sin (?)... Or was she?

Adam was standing right there with her when she took of the fruit of the Tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil and ate of it.

It was he who had added to God's commandment of Genesis 2:17, "neither shall you touch it.... lest you die." But God had said, ..."thou shalt surely die!!"

So in this matter of transmitting the message to Eve of the commandment given in Genesis 2:17 [for she was created after this event], Adam had added an element not given by God, and he had diminished the certainty of the punishment.

3:5 Knowing ‘good and evil’ is of itself little value. One has to be able to discern between good and evil as Jesus did – see Isa 7:15

4:2 Cain was a ‘tiller of the ground’ so he was doing what God has commanded (Gen 3:23) – but the fact that he was doing the work God gave Adam was no guarantee that he was faithful.

In her repetition of God's words, Eve shows that our tendency to place rules between ourselves and God has been there from the start.  Notice the difference in the highlighted parts of these verses:

ch.2:16 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:
17  But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

ch.3:2  And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden:
3  But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.

Eve puts her own spin on God's words and even attributes that spin to God himself.  Here is the start of what later became the teaching of the Pharisees.  Paul refers back to this incident in Col. 2 (I quote several verses as the NIV is so helpful here)

20  Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules:
21  "Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!"?
22  These are all destined to perish with use, because they are based on human commands and teachings.
23  Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence.

What an exhortation to faith!

3:16 The sorry state of the woman in childbirth presented here is contrasted wonderfully in Luke 1:28  when Mary is promised that she will be the mother of Messiah.

4:1,2  That ‘she’ conceived starts the hope of the promised ‘seed of the woman’. Normally it is the man who is presented as having sons, even though the woman bears them. That Eve was looking for the promised seed is borne out by her comment ‘I have gotten a man from the Lord’

The serpent's lie, Ye shall not surely die (3:4), is perpetuated by the apostate church today.  The belief that man has an immortal soul, and that at death his soul floats off to heaven, maintains this deceit.  The term immortal soul is never seen in the Bible.  However, the Bible clearly states that man dies (Psa 49:10, 146:4).  All men (mortal souls) are sinners and suffer the result of sin, which is death (Eze 18:4; Rom 3:23).  The only way to overcome this fatal disease, which we have inherited from Adam, is through Jesus (1Cor 15:22). 

3:10When Adam and Eve were afraid and hid they showed the behaviour of anyone who views God with terror. Jesus drew on this – Matt 25:24 – when he talks of the man who hid his talent in the ground. Are we terrified of God or full of awe?

Gen 3:16  The second half of this verse is translated in an interesting way in the NET Bible:

"you will want to control your husband, but he will dominate you"

& well summarises the problems we wrestle with today. Neither position is correct, as shown by the apostle Paul's words in Eph 5:22-33. The word translated "control" here, or "desire"  8669  in other versions, occurs as "desire" in 2 other places in the OT. One is in Song 7:10 which has the usual sexual connotation, but the other is in Gen 4:7 where sin as a beast crouches at the door desiring to have Cain. The inference there is one of control & mastery.

3:18 Matt 13:22 explains that the ‘thorns’ are the cares of this life. Adam’s work could either turn him in upon himself, seeing gardening as simply a care. On the other hand he could see God working in his life for his salvation. Likewise our experiences can either drive us away from God or help us to see Him at work in our lives.

3:18 Matt 13:22 explains that the ‘thorns’ are the cares of this life. Adam’s work could either turn him in upon himself, seeing gardening as simply a care. On the other hand he could see God working in his life for his salvation. Likewise our experiences can either drive us away from God or help us to see Him at work in our lives.

The relationship, based on faith and trust that man had with Yahweh was shattered.   Now Yahweh would be alien from man because he (man) broke that bond.  How could Yahweh be brought once more into a relationship with man?  Yahweh had already made a provision.  His only Son would become the mediator between Him and man (1Tim 2:5).  Jesus was the Lamb of God, the perfect sacrifice, which was foreshadowed by the sacrifice of Abel (Heb 12:24).  Jesus' shed blood would allow true believers to be in covenant relationship with Yahweh through Him.  But, this revealed process began right after the fall of Adam and Eve.  It did not, as some so-called Christians believe, begin at the birth of Jesus.

3:1   Nakedness passes into Biblical use as an indicator of being astray from God. The word translated ‘subtil <06175>  is closely related to the word translated as ‘naked <06174> in Gen 2:5.

Gen 3:17-19 First Principles>The Atonement
1. Death was the punishment for Adam's and Eve's transgression. Adam and Eve were the human race. The race sinned, so it was condemmed to death Rom 5:12. We sinned in Adam because we belong to Adam's race. The human race was made sinful and men are sinners because
    1. We are descendants of Adam
    2. By actual transgression.
What is sin? It is disobedience to God 1John 3:4.
Because of sin, men die Rom 6:23 and this is the result of the fact that men ar descended from Adam. By the offence of one, judgement came upon all men Rom 5:18. All have sinned and come short of the Glory of God Rom 3:23.
2. The principles of the Atonement revealed in Eden - go to Gen 3:15
3. The Principles were brought out in the Law, for example by comparison between the Passover sacrifice and Jesus' sacrifice - go to Exo 12:3
4. Jesus' coming in relation to the Atonement - go to Gal 4:4
5. The atoning death of Jesus - go to John 1:29
6. How can we obtain atonement? - go to Rom 5:8-11
First Principles> For more First Principles topics, go to Acts 8:12.

Gen 3:21;Rom 4:7-8;Isa 53:5;Rom 13:14;2Cor 5:1-4;Zech 3:3-4;Psa 85:2 - the concept of shed blood as a covering for sin. Putting on Christ for the forgiveness of sins and the hope of eternal life. 

Gen 3:22,24;Rev 2:7;Rev 22:1-2 - Here we have the tree of life (and water of life - echo of the word or baptism?), but a sacrifice would be required, and from a tree of death would come life Acts 5:30-31.

3:6 The process that eve went through from seeing to taking is reflected in the behaviour of Achan – Josh 7:21 and David in 2Sam 11:2-4highlighting that Eve’s problem is common to all mankind.

4:2 'Selah' means 'weight' in the sense of 'value' - it is used - Job 28:16 where it is translated 'valued'. We should read the word when readings the Psalms and understand that it is an instruction in the text to value the things we have just read.

4:2 In saying that wicked men have turned his glory into shame the Psalmist is demonstrating that his enemies have been slandering him. This is the common way that enemies speak of those they hate when they have no real evidence of wrong doing.

4:2 & 5:6 speak of "leasing" - This is a Saxon word, from 'falsehood', from 'to lie'. Cardmarden adopted this word in his translation, Rouen, in 1566. It is in none of the Bibles previously to that time, nor in any after, and appears to have been borrowed by King James's translators from the above. [So says Adam Clarke].

In Psalm 3 and 4 David is obviously in great distress. Many times he repeats the words "save me" or "hear my cry!" How interesting, then, that in 3:5 David says "I lay down and slept". How could someone sleep whilst in a state of such trouble and anxiety? Again, in 4:4 he is quiet on his bed, and 4:8 he says "I will both lie down in peace, and sleep"!

Jesus did the same thing when he was in the boat on Galilee. He was in the same trouble as the desciples, being in the same boat, yet whilst they were anxious, he was calmly asleep. He rebuked them for their anxiety and called it "unbelief".

So also with David. In his anxiety he called to God. He meditated upon his knowledge of God, and realised that having asked his Father for help, he ought to believe in that help, because God had always helped him in times past. When he wrote the words of these Psalms, he was probably still experiencing his problems, yet he had conquered his anxiety through faith. Therefore in 3:6 he says "I will not be afraid", and in 4:5 "put your trust in the LORD". Having realised these things, he could confidently say "I will both lie down in peace, and sleep; For you alone, O LORD, make me dwell in safety".

3:6 As this Psalm speaks of the Absalom uprising – see first comment – and David’s flight from Absalom is a pattern of Jesus arrest we can conclude that Jesus would take comfort from David’s assertion ‘I will not be afraid of ten thousands’ when the ‘band’ came to arrest him in the garden of Gethsemane.

4:5 Sacrifices of righteousness are not animals. It is the sacrifice of a man who wishes to give himself to God. Such a man is at peace with himself (Psa 4:8) He benefits from at peace with God because he wishes to serve Him

5:5 That the ‘foolish shall not stand’ is like the ‘ungodly’ who will not stand (Psa 1:5) so the ungodly and fools are equated with each other – maybe this should cause us to take care as to who we call a fool.

v.3 - prayer in the morning - and at other specific times of day - is an emphasis of the Psalms:

5:3, 22:2, 55:17, 69:16, 88:13, 119:147, 130:6  See also Isa 26:9, Mark 1:35

David knew what it was to be afraid. But God had "enlarged him" (Ps4:1). That's a Hebrew word meaning just as the AV says, to make bigger, to enlarge.  God had helped him in the time of his distress,
and had enabled him to survive.

5:4 - wickedness cannot dwell with God. Only Christ and righteous angels etc. would ever be allowed in heaven. This is why we pray, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven" Matt 6:10. And this is why we have a mediator in Christ to bridge the gap of our sin to God's holiness 1Tim 2:5

3:5        David had fled from Jerusalem, when Absalom attempted to take the throne, as a man who had been sick – Psa 41:3– and arriving in Mahanaim2Sam 17:27 – he was provided with ‘beds … ‘ and so could rest. As he rested he thought through the implications of what God had said to him and took courage

3:8When David fled from Absalom he feared for his life, not knowing what was going to happen to him - 2Sam 15:26- but he did recognise that God was in control as this verse in the Psalm demonstrates.

3:6   David’s comment here is a reflection upon the words of his men – 2Sam 18:3 – where they, using the figure 10,000, value David as greater than that many men.

3:2      The uprising of Absalom in the record in Scripture follows hard on from the matter of David and Bathsheba. The two events have striking similarities. It is as if the record of Scripture is concerned that we see the uprising of Absalom as directly connected with David committing adultery with Bathsheba. So the ‘many’ who  say if David ‘there is no help of God’ presents the attitude of many in Israel who still have not forgiven David for that matter even though at least 15 years have passed since David took Bathsheba. How often do we hold grudges against our brethren and sisters for years?

His fan, that is his 'winnowing-shovel or fork', is in his hand, and with it he throws up the mingled wheat and chaff against the wind in order to separate the grain.

"Throughly cleanse" is an obsolete form of 'thoroughly'. The use of that word conveys the picture of the farmer beginning at one side of the floor, and working 'through' to the other, cleansing as he goes.

3:15 - 'for thus it becometh us to fulfil <4137> all righteousness <1343>.' The word used for fulfil is pleroo (4137) and the word for righteousness dikaiosune (1343).  There are two other places in scripture which use these two greek words together.  They are quite instructive:

Phil 1:11 Being filled <4137> with the fruits of righteousness <1343>, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God.

James 2:23  And the scripture was fulfilled <4137> which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him  for righteousness <1343>: and he was called the Friend of God.

So it seems that there is an involvement available for the faithful in that which seems initially in Matthew 3 to be relevant only to Jesus.  Food for thought I feel.

3:7 Vipers  Gen 3:1
      Fruits Gen 3:2

In the presence of the ‘seed of the woman’ John correctly identifies the seed of the serpent. This is the battle ground. It is set before Jesus began his ministry.

4:2 forty  Deut 8:2
      hungered Deut 8:3
The two quotations from Deuteronomy highlight that Jesus’ period in the wilderness, like Israel’s, was to ‘prove’ him – See Deut 8:2. Jesus learnt about himself from this experience. We, likewise, should learn from our trial. They are for our, not God’s, benefit.

2:6     Whilst here we read 'Bethlehem in the land of Judah' Mic 4:2 has 'Bethlehem Ephratah'. There is no contradiction. Both are describing the same place in different ways. Thus we see that a quotation from the Old Testament need not have exactly the same words but the meaning of the original passage is preserved.

3:1     John's message 'repent ye ...' is the message of the gospel. No matter how we might wish to present the message this is the fundamental aspect that must be understood before commitment to baptism can be appreciated.

4:1 Israel were 'led' Deut 8:2 in the wilderness like Jesus was 'led’ into the wilderness.

The first connection with Heaven that people saw with this 30yr Man was when God publically proclaimed Him as his Son (Matt 3:16,17). I presume the message to the shepherds in Bethlehem, and the star which God sent above the house where the family were, had been forgotten. If they had been remembered, perhaps the whole ministry of Jesus could have been linked in, and more made of His message. But that was not to be. Then Jesus was tempted like us, but never gave in to the temptations. Here are two good lessons with which we can start the year.

3:2 John’s message was clear and simple. It was not beyond anyone’s intellect to understand. It was also the message of Jesus – Matt 4:17. we might rightly develop a comprehensive description of ‘the things concerning the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ’ however Jesus, like John, presents a simple message – we are all going to die. Repentance is the only escape.

4:8     Jesus calls upon his disciples – Matt 16:26  – to resist the sae temptation as he experiences here.

Some people believe that Jesus faced an external tempter.  They believe that this was Satan, a supernatural being (fallen angel), the universal agitator of evil.  

If Satan exists, he (?) would have been created by Yahweh.  Divine angels, by nature, are immortal.  Thus, Satan, a supposed fallen divine angel, would be immortal.  That would mean that evil would exist forever.  But, that is not in Yahweh's plan. 

The faithful followers of Jesus will live forever in peace (Rev 21:4).  But all evil, including death itself will be abolished (Rev 20:10,14). 

The word Satan, which Bible translators chose to capitalize and personify, is nothing more than the innate human tendency to be oppositional to God's laws - the flesh opposing the Spirit.

And so, each person is tempted internally by their own desires and not by an external agent.  Jesus, being a man and having a human nature, weakened by forty days of fasting, was tempted internally. He overcame each temptation by refuting it with the power of the scripture.

3:13-17 Jesus was baptized. Some people say that baptism is not necessary, only belief.  It seems a strange assertion to say that baptism is not necessary when the Master Himself consented to do it.  It is also important to understand the reason.  But, some might object that Jesus was a sinless man, so why did He need to be baptized?  What righteousness was he fulfilling?  Yes, Jesus was a man - flesh and blood like you and me (Rom 1:3).  Flesh is corruptible and subject to death (Rom 5:12).  And yet, Jesus did not sin.  But still, He was a man who possessed sinful, corruptible flesh.  As such, he could not enter any spiritual perfect realm and truly dwell with Yahweh (1Cor 15:50).  And so, He, the sinless man, had to destroy that flesh by becoming a sacrifice for sin (2Cor 5:21; Heb 2:14).  He was successful and has now, by Yahweh's grace, transcended death.  In doing so, He has opened the door for others to follow.  He fulfilled all righteousness, through His baptism, by giving recognition that He, like all humans, bore sinful flesh.  He was showing that flesh needed be cleansed before a person could be put right with Yahweh.  For true followers of Jesus, that cleansing occurs with baptism into the death and resurrection of Jesus, after a sound confession of faith.

3:2 At this time there were those looking for the kingdom of God – Luke 23:51 – so John’s appearance would have been a cause of great joy – but not for everyone. For the religious leaders are already opposed to his preaching – Matt 3:7 – so we see that they were opposed to the message long before Jesus came on the scene. They saw the preaching of John as a threat to their position as they later did of Jesus.

Jesus Christ is the promised son through whom salvation is possible (continued from part one, see January 1st)

6. Christ had a oneness or same goal/purpose as God but he did not claim to be God...Matt 3:16-17;1Cor 8:6;John 10:30-36;John 17:21-23;Mark 15:34 (if Christ was God why would he cry out to his God?); 1Tim 2:5;John 3:16.

7. Christ is the second Adam but unlike Adam, he didn't sin and attained a spiritual body as the first born of the new (eternal life) creation...Matt 21:42;1Cor 15:13-14,1Cor 15:20-28,1Cor 15:45-49;Heb 5:7-9;Heb 9:24-28;Matt 26:25-29;1Cor 11:23-26 (Christ was betrayed, how we are to remember Christ and his sacrificial death, Christ will return).

8. Though Jesus was born circa 4 BC, the plan of salvation through Jesus always existed...Isa 46:9-10;Acts 15:17-18;Matt 25:34;John 17:5 ("..I had 'with' you  before the world began..." - the word "with" is the Grk word "para" and can mean "with, in the sight of, from, by, of" - The Scriptures make it seem as if others almost pre-existed Eph 1:4, God was envisioning the future beauty of Christ much in the same manner as an architect envisions his future creation) ,24 (God loved Jeremiah before he was born Jer 1:5-7); Heb 4:1-5 (reference to a millenial 7th "day" of rest/peace); 2Sam 7:12-14 (a future son, i.e. Christ who will reign forever on the earthly throne of his father David).

Matt 4:23 First Principles>Kingdom of God>Gospel concerns God's Kingdom
The Gospel preached by Jesus and the Apostles concerns the Kingdom of God.
1. Examples of teaching concerning the Kingdom of God
Matt 4:23, Mark 1:14, Luke 8:1, Acts 8:12, Acts 19:8, Acts 20:25, Acts 28:31
2. Invitation for men to participate
Matt 25:34, Luke 12:32, 1Thess 2:12, James 2:5, 2Tim 4:1,8, 2Pet 1:10,11, Rev 2:26,27
First Principles>Kingdom of God
For more about the Kingdom of God, go to Gen 12:1

t 3:7-8 Here are a couple of allusions to the garden of Eden. The ‘vipers’ answer to the ‘serpent – Genesis 3:1 and the ‘fruits’ to the ‘fruit’ of the tree – Gen 2:2 It is all a matter of who we listen to. That was the challenge for Eva and Adam and those that came to listen to John. It is also the challenge that we have to deal with all the time. To whom do we listen? It is as simple as that.