Adam fathered a son

The Bible offers different genealogies. They are important for God’s people. There is a genealogy in Genesis, chapter 5, that the text says it’s of the generations of Adam. I want to examine one verse in particular.

Genesis 5:3

[3] When Adam had lived 130 years, he fathered a son in his own likeness, after his image, and named him Seth. (ESV)

This text stands out because one chapter before, in chapter 4, we learn that Adam and Eve had two sons, Cain and Abel (Gen. 4:1-2). Later in chapter 4, we also learn that Adam and Eve had another child, in place for their child Abel, whom Cain killed. What was that child’s name? Seth (Gen. 4:25). So the genealogy in Genesis 5 does not mention the fact that Adam and Eve had at least two sons prior to Seth (Cain and Abel). We notice the genealogy mentions that Adam had other sons and daughters (Gen. 5:4), but doesn’t mention whether they were before or after Seth’s birth.

This genealogy in Genesis 5, that doesn’t mention Cain and Abel, begs the question of whether there were other children born to Adam and Eve prior to Cain and Abel. Genesis 5 doesn’t mention Cain and Abel, so does Genesis 4 not mention other children that were born to Adam and Eve also? More specifically, were there children born to Adam and Eve prior to the fall?

The narrative of the book of Genesis, or anywhere else in the Bible, does not provide an answer for us.

And that is okay. Because the point of the genealogies is that they begin pointing us to the Son of Man, to Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who became a man for us, to rescue and redeem humanity.

God walks in the garden

Having made the first human beings, we have to consider that things on earth probably looked different than they do today. Probably a lot different. This is because sin had not yet entered our world. In other words, everything was perfect in the beginning.

There was no sickness, destruction, or death. No pollution of our planet either. Everything was new and thriving. But by Genesis chapter 3, we see how things began to change drastically.

Man disobeyed God and sin entered the world. Our first parents, Adam and Eve, went from being naked and not ashamed (Gen. 2:25), to naked and afraid (Gen. 3:10).

There is a detail in the text that I want to examine. It’s found in the following verse:

Genesis 3:8

[8] And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. (ESV)

This text tells us that God walked in the garden in the cool of the day. We have to wonder whether this was describing God’s actions literally or figuratively. In any case, this act of God walking in the garden where he had placed the man he created, signals that God wanted a close relationship with man.

God had made man in his image and likeness, and so man was to commune with God in the same way that the Triune God is in perfect community within himself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Since the beginning, God has always wanted to be in close relationship with human beings. Sin separated humanity from God. Eventually, God would deal with sin and death definitively in Jesus Christ, who came to earth to renew the world God created.

Jesus came to undo the damage and destruction that sin and death caused on earth. This plan is still being worked out, but God promises to one day complete his work of redemption through the renewing of all things.

We no longer have to be naked and afraid, and have to hide from God’s presence. We can partake in Jesus’s righteous and have a right standing with God. Jesus promises to cover us and not be ashamed of us. Just as in the beginning, we can now be in close relationship with God.

Let us make man

As God was making the world and everything in it, he made man on the sixth and final day of creation. I want to focus on what the text tells us about God in the making of man.

Let’s look at the text:

Genesis 1:26

[26] Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” (ESV)

We notice an inner dialogue taking place. In all of the other days of creation, and in all other created things that God made, he simply spoke them into existence. But things change when God makes man. God talks to himself.

We now know this is the Triune God (Father, Son, Holy Spirit), discussing the making of man. Let’s pause there for a moment.

No one person of the Trinity is going off on their own to make man. There is, instead, a calling to come united in the creation of man. «Let us». There is a perfect community here. Perfect unity in the Trinity (God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit). No one person of the Trinity opposed the proposition. The Triune God was in agreement as to the plan to make man, and it is out of this perfect communion, agreeance, and unity that man was created.

The Bible teaches us that God is love (1 John 4:8), and it’s this God of love, the Triune God, who came together to make man. Man was made out of love. Not out of lack, but out of abundance. Man was made thoughtfully, purposefully. Because of this, man can be secure in his place in the world. Because of this, man can also walk securely knowing that he was wanted.

Because of this, man can also come together to accomplish great things. Man can also call on his fellow men and say, «let us», and agree to walk in unity.