Published 2002-4
Bud Powell
Trinity Covenant RCUS, Colorado Springs
And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed
and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
Gen. 3:15
This promise
is the foundational promise of Scripture, the foundation in history of the
Covenant of Grace. It is a promise that has no condition, a promise that
Jesus would come to put away sin. Although spoken to Satan, who had
beguiled the woman and brought sin into the world, the words are a promise to
Adam and Eve and to all their descendants.
What is
often missed is the phrase, “I will put enmity between…thy seed and her
seed.” The seed of the woman is Jesus, the Son of God, and those who
believe in Him. The seed of the serpent are those who do the works of the
devil, works of hatred and deceit, as Jesus told us in John 8:44.
The most
interesting thing is the source of the enmity. It comes from God
Himself. There can never be peace between the seed of the serpent and the
seed of Christ, because the enmity comes from God Himself.
The modern
world thinks it can unite opposites, and bring peace between God and the
devil. Some even think that opposites are united in the mind of God, in
spite of the biblical truth that God cannot deny Himself. This is the
main reason for sloppiness in doctrine and life, for how can truth be known if
both a truth and its denial can both be true?
If September
11 taught us anything, it is that evil cannot be pacified by good feelings and
beaming smiles. There are people who hate righteousness and hate
righteous people. That hatred is even greater if the righteousness is
perceived to be hypocritical. But even the hatred of hypocrites has at
its roots the hatred of righteousness, because no distinction is made between
hypocrisy and weakness.
For several
generations, proud and arrogant religious leaders have tried to persuade Americans
that there is really no difference between religions, that they are all just
various paths to the same god. It wasn’t and isn’t true, but people could
accept it, feel good and warm about themselves, as if they were open-minded and
full of love and kindness. Those who believed that Christ is the only
savior were called arrogant and proud and narrow. It was an old trick of
the devil: accuse your opponent of what you are yourself, just as Satan accused
God of using manipulative words.
If peace
could come so easily, the death of Christ was a monstrous waste. After
September 11, maybe America will have a second look at the subject.
