Focus text: Genesis 3

A pop quiz as we begin today’s meditation:

Who was the first recipient of the Gospel?

If you said Adam and Eve, you get partial credit. The first Gospel message is given to us in our first reading for today.

I will put hostility between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and her offspring.
He will strike your head,
and you will strike his heel.

Genesis 3:15 CSB

The first person to hear the Gospel, ladies and gentlemen, was the Devil!

But before I get into that, I want us to take note that this is in Genesis 3. Adam and Eve and the serpent are still, as yet, in the garden of Eden – and it’s the garden of Eden that has become ground zero for the Gospel.

We often think of the Gospel as a New Testament idea, something that only makes sense in light of the Cross and the coming of Jesus. That is not entirely wrong – after all, it is the New Testament that explicitly speaks of Christ and His redeeming work.

The reality is, though, the Gospel was not plan B after our first parents screwed up but it was always plan A. The Gospel started even earlier than the garden – it began in the mind of the triune God in eternity past when the Father chose a people, the Son covenanted to die for them and the Spirit as the bond of love between the Father and Son promised to apply the work of the Son to those the Father had chosen.

When Genesis 3:15 speaks of the victory of the woman’s Seed over the serpent, that might have been news to the Devil and it might have been news to Adam and Eve – but it wasn’t news to God.

Soli deo Gloria!

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