Genesis 3: Grace

Though the punishment for eating of the tree of knowledge of good and evil is death, Adam and Eve are not struck down. Interestingly, the serpent is correct in his assesment of God, "you are not going to die." Or as Jonah says mournfully (seeing that Ninevah the archenemy of Israel is likely NOT going to be destroyed) "I knew you were a God merciful and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in grace!" That grace is already at work here in Genesis, prolonging Adam's life for 930 years. Adam must recognize it too even as God speaks his judgment, he must realize that the judgment means not death but a "life," that he and the woman are not going to keel over on the spot, but become farmers, and his wife will bear children. In recognition of this grace and pardon, Adam names his wife, Eve, for he sees that instead of death, she will be "the mother of all living." And yet, I think that there is something more going on here than Adam recognizing that he has been given something of a reprieve. It is that, "something of a reprieve," not full pardon, not life everlasting in the garden doing good work and being taught by God. Things were not supposed to go this way. Adam and Eve were not supposed to die. They were not supposed to have bitterly hard labor. The last words in God's judgment are "you are dust and to dust you shall return," what a terrible defeat for Adam and Eve! What a terrible defeat for mankind! Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, they all die! The history of death in the Old Testament, as one after the other of God's friends die, is the biggest bummer ever! All this makes Adam's next words deeply surprising. The words "dust to dust" still ringing in Adam's ears, he does not name his wife "Mother of dust" or "Woman who did me wrong." No, he names her mother of all living. Does Adam know something? Is he a prophet? He must be because in Jesus Anointed (Christ) his words come true. Doesn't King Hezekiah make a similar prophecy under similar circumstances in Isaiah 26? Seeing the uselessness and vanity of Israel, "we brought forth wind...we have wrought no deliverance in the earth" Hezekiah predicts life from the dead for his people, for himself, "thy dead shall live, my dead body shall arise." All of this comes true in Hezekiah's descendent, King Jesus whose dead body did arise and who brings about our resurrection. In other words, Hezekiah was right, Adam was right about God, God is the god of the living. As Jesus teaches, "as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was said to you by God, 'I AM the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.' He is not the God of the dead but of the living." (Matthew 22:31ff, citing Exodus 3:6)