This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Genesis 1-4” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, September 6, 1992.
About this sermon
The careful chiastic structure of Genesis 3 shows how God’s order of authority actually works. Feminists are right to protest real abuses of that order, but wrong to protest the order itself, an order Christ comes to restore, not abolish.
Sermon transcript
We are reading from Matthew’s Gospel, chapter 19, and we are beginning with verse 1. Listen to the word of God. And it came about that when Jesus had finished these words, he departed from Galilee and came into the region of Judea beyond the Jordan. And great multitudes followed him, and he healed them there.
And some Pharisees came to him, testing him and saying, Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause at all? And he answered and said, Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, For this cause a man shall leave his father and mother and shall flee to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. Consequently they are no more two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.” And they said to him, Why then did Moses command to give her a certificate and divorce her? And he said to them, Because of the hardness of your heart, Moses permitted you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it has not been this way.
And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife except for immorality and marries another commits adultery. The disciples said to him, If the relationship of the man with his wife is like this, it is better not to marry. that he said to them, Not all men can accept this statement, but only those to whom it has been given.
For there are eunuchs who were born that way from their mother’s womb, and there are eunuchs who are made eunuchs by men, and there are also eunuchs who made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. He who is able to accept this, let him accept it.” Then, moving down to verse 23, And Jesus said to his disciples, Truly, I say to you, it is hard for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven. And again, I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. And when the disciples heard this, they were very astonished and said, Then who can be saved? And looking upon them, Jesus said to them, With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.
Then Peter answered and said to him, Behold, we have left everything and followed you. What then will there be for us? And Jesus said to them, Truly I say to you that you who have followed me in the regeneration when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And everyone who has left homes or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or farms, for my sake, shall receive many times as much, and shall inherit eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and the last first.”
We would ask, Lord, that you would strengthen us, that we, in such strength as you give us, might be a strength to others. Father, we pray for those churches that would derive strength from such strength as we would offer. We pray for the churches of our Presbytery, and we pray especially for those in which we have been most directly involved. We pray for Christ Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Washington and the ministry of Dan Knox. We pray for Reformation Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Morgantown. We ask, Lord, that Larry Semel, the pastor there, might be blessed by you and strengthened in service in your name.
And Father, we are asking as well that there may be strength for us in the strength that you give to others, that they might be willing, out of love, to render service to us in our need. So may it be throughout your kingdom throughout the household of our God, that this mutuality is observed and delighted in. And in this, Father, may there be the unity of that bond in the Spirit expressed in and through your people. We pray these things look into you that, by root of your word, we might be strengthened to these ends. For Jesus’ sake, amen.
There are a couple of matters that deserve our attention as we seek to firm up these facts that are presented to us in the account of the fall of our first parents. One matter that deserves further attention is the very controversial question of order order with authority within the creation structure. That is one matter that deserves further consideration. And that is the issue that we will be focusing on this evening. Now, I want to place the other issue in front of you so that you know where we’re going in our next message on Genesis chapter 3. The other issue is the question about Adam’s role in the fall, a very difficult matter of how is it, if in fact Eve partook of the fruit, that the weight of the sin falls squarely upon Adam’s shoulders. That is a consideration for us in our future messages. Once more, we want to set our sights upon this very controversial question, that of the order within the creation and the question of authority in its relationship to that order.
And I realize that this is a very sensitive matter in our times. It is a matter that has been greatly misunderstood. It is a matter that has even been abused. But it is a matter which demands our attention. We set our sights upon it in order to set matters straight, hopefully. Surely you will admit that this is not an issue about which the Bible is silent. It is one then that cannot, it should not, be neglected. And if it is neglected, if it is mishandled, then it spells disaster for the Church of Jesus Christ. You’re seeing some of the evidences of that in our present circumstance.
To begin with, then, with respect to this issue of order and authority in the creation, we want to refresh ourselves with regard to what was said in chapter one in Genesis. First, we have laid out for us in Genesis one the spheres or the kingdoms of authority, or those kingdoms or spheres in which authority is going to be expressed.
That, in the first place. The spheres or the kingdoms in which authority is going to be expressed. In fact, those spheres and kingdoms in which authority is going to be assigned by the creative work of God. Then there comes to expression, as we move through Genesis 1, the establishment of those authority with respect to the individual spheres. So we have it. In days 1 through 3, reading from Genesis 1 verse 2 through verse 13, in those first three days, the separation of the light from the darkness, day one, the creation of the expanse of heaven above us and the gathering of the waters that surround us in day two, and then in day three, the appearance of the dry land. Those are the spheres Those are the dominions, those are the kingdoms. But then we have in days four through six, verses fourteen through thirty-one of that first chapter, the establishment of, the creation of, the authorities that are to govern in or who are to rule the respective spheres. And those authorities are then set before us. in an ascendancy with respect to their authority.
First we have the heavenly bodies ruling the light and the darkness, then we have the birds and the fish, as it were, ruling the heavens and the sea, and then we have the creatures that populate the land, the earth, the animal kingdom, and finally we have human beings created, towards the end of that first chapter, in the last analysis, we have human beings set out as those who are to have an authority, not just with respect to the land as their sphere, the narrow sphere of the inhabited earth, but rather those who have as their sphere all those spheres then that God has created, he himself placing them over all of his work. So there is an ascendancy as you move through Genesis 1, an intensification and a clarification with respect to the authority that is set before us here. But before we leave Genesis 1, it is important to remind ourselves of another fact, that even within the family of humanity, We have an authority pattern set before us here in Genesis chapter 1.
Verse 27 tells us that God created man. Now, that’s man generically considered. That is humanity in the first order, as you look at that 27th verse. But then the revelation of God goes on to delineate. God creates man, to be sure, that generically, but then delineated as male and female, and the order there is significant. It is not to be countermanted, it is not to be sloughed off as something that is immaterial and unimportant. The order there is important, male and female. Here is the point. The spheres are under the authority of those creatures God has made to govern them, but all of God’s work are under the authority of mankind, under the authority of humanity. But within humanity, within mankind, we also find a natural ordering in which the male now is given a priority.
Now, if all we had was Genesis 1.27, You might not think so much about this, but you see, this structure of things is everywhere in Scripture reinforced and affirmed. It doesn’t matter whether you’re dealing with the Old Testament or the New.
I will grant you that the statement in verse 27 is limited and compact. It is not expansive. It seems to be something that is quite compressed in the presentation here at this point in the revelation God has given us. And I would admit that we would be building our case out of weak wood if we had only verse 27 of Genesis 1. to hang our case on.
But as I say, the structure of things that we observe here in Genesis 1, and particularly in verse 27, is everywhere reinforced and confirmed throughout Scripture. And we don’t have to turn too far in scripture to see just how much it is reinforced and confirmed. And that’s the point, isn’t it? We go on to the secondary account of the creation and what do we encounter there, but a more explicit statement with regard to this natural ordering of things and the authority that is imbued.
Now, we’re not going to deal with Genesis 2 this evening. We are focusing rather on Genesis 3 and what it teaches us with respect to this very important question. Now, I must say at the outset here, as we prepare ourselves to go into Genesis 3 with this question in mind, I must say for anyone to miss the blatant appeal, the plain and obvious appeal And the plain and obvious appeal to and play upon the natural created order in Genesis 3 is a sign of some sort of obtuseness. What amazes me most about the people who are arguing most strongly against the conclusion that the Bible presents a natural ordering of things is that they tend to be those who are very much taken up with matters that relate to language, literature, structure in language and literature.
They are very much into narrative structures. Yet it is precisely at this level that the revelation of Genesis 3 is most striking and most powerful. Will you notice the structural development of the story? Again, it is blatant. It’s almost as if God, in giving his revelation to Moses, is dealing with this question that so perplexes our age, anticipating all that we are going to be thinking about and discussing. I want you to notice the structural development of Genesis 3. A structural development that is always reinforcing the natural order with respect to authority.
First, we have the temptation itself. We begin in verse 1 with the serpent. Here we have a creature, a reptile, under the authority, supposedly, of humanity, that is, male and female alike. First of all, the serpent. Then comes the woman. The woman is to be exercising authority over the serpent, but she is also under the authority of her husband and under the authority of God. Then comes the man, who does have authority over his wife and over the serpent, but is always under the authority of God.
You see how things are developing? I think you can see the order. I think you can also see the force that the fall brings to bear upon the created order, as the fall is described here. The serpent exercises authority over the woman, the woman exercises authority over man, and man now presumes to exercise authority over God.
The natural order is therefore assaulted and overturned by the fall. But we go on. We move on from these opening verses in Genesis 3 to what we might call the middle verses and the confrontation subsequent to the fall between Adam and Eve and God who seeks them out. God’s authority remains intact. He comes, first of all, to the one whose authority was naturally next in line.
He comes to the man, who then turns his attention to the woman who is next in line to him, and then the attention is turned to the serpent. If we have in the opening verses of Genesis 3 an ascent of a ladder, serpent, woman, man, God, then in these middle verses in Genesis 3 we have a descent of the ladder, God, man, woman, serpent.
In literature we call this a chiasm. And the structure for those who know literature is obvious, and that’s what makes me so confused by those who know literature, when in fact they deny the obvious structure of this passage. The chiasm is this, A, B, C, D, D, C, D, A. Serpent, woman, man, God, God, man, woman, serpent. The focus of this chiasm, of this literary structure, is the natural order and the authority within it, in fact, the authority inherent to it.
But if you need further proof that we are dealing with something here quite fundamental to the text, I want you to note the further progress in the chapter. We’re tending now towards the latter verses, say from verse fourteen on to the end. And once more, the latter comes into view.
Remember, we started with serpent, then woman, then man, then God. We’re going up the ladder with respect to the natural order and the authority and view. Then we come down the ladder when God comes to confront our first parents with their transgression. We have the descent of the order, God, man, the woman, the serpent.
But now I want you to notice the latter verses, as I said. As God, in addressing the situation, first of all, speaks to the serpent, you will notice verse 14, First addresses the serpent, then the woman, and then the man. He works his way back up the ladder. And finally, he addresses himself. Look at verse 22. Then the Lord God said, Behold, the man has become like one of us. Don’t you want all the letters? It’s A, B, C, D, D, C, B, A, A, B, C, D. He goes through it three times, so you won’t miss the point. And the crux of the issue is the natural order and the authority inherent to that order. It’s hard to imagine. a stronger, literary affirmation of that natural order and the authority inherent to it.
Now, it should be clear to us, it should be clear to us, that the natural order and the authority inherent in that order are not evils in themselves. It should be clear to you, should it not, that the natural order And the inherent authority structure within that natural order are not evils in themselves. The abuse of that natural order is an evil. The abuse of authority within that structure is an evil. that the order and the authority structure themselves are not evil.
Is there a fundamental confusion at this point? I realize the pressures that women are under and have been under. I’m aware of the abuse. I’m aware of the tragedies, many of which are criminal. I’m aware of the pain, the anguish. I’m aware of the selfishness of men. I’m aware of the tendency, the sinful tendency to dominate just for the heck of it. But you see, many women are making a mistake presently.
For they think that the evil is in the order and within the authority structure itself as God has created it. And they fight against that natural order and they rebel against that natural and proper authority and experience only deeper frustration and further tragedy.
So let’s be clear on this point at least. The evil is not in the natural order, neither is the evil in the authority structure as God has created it. Now, if I have said that, of course, I want to go on to say this. The natural order and the authority structure inherent to that order, if they are not evils, are positive goods. They are positive goods. They are blessings. And they are wonderful, as are all God’s blessings. Now there is an additional point or two that we need to make.
With respect to the affirmation of the natural order and the authority structure inherent to it, we must realize that Christ’s work in part involves a restoration of these things. As positive goods, As blessings, we must realize that Christ’s work, in part, involves a restoration of the natural order and a reaffirmation of the authority structure inherent to it.
Well, that is why I read for you this evening a portion of Matthew 19. You see, Jesus in his argument with the Pharisees over the question of divorce is saying we must get ourselves back to the original intention of God, the original order, and even the authority inherent to that order. And we are not going to be waylaid by the provisions that were made in the Law of Moses in route to this restoration. Let us remind ourselves of what God intended from the creation. And let us realize, we ourselves, that Christ, in part, intends his work to involve a restoration of that natural order and the authority inherent to it.
So as far as the Church is concerned, when we look back to the creation, we also see the pattern for the new creation. And this leads us to our final point. It will be admitted that the natural order is not the eternal order. But it will also be admitted that the natural order reflects the eternal order.
The natural order having been created after the pattern of those things which are eternal, And I will remind you then of what Jesus says to his disciples at the end of Matthew 19, specifically verse 28, that in glory, in the regeneration of all things, there are twelve thrones reserved for the heads of God’s people. And who are those heads? But the disciples to whom he is speaking. Those disciples are in fact male, and they are male for a reason.
So although the natural order is not the eternal order, the natural order does reflect the eternal order. And in the eternal order, that authority structure is maintained. It is not only here in Matthew 19 that this is asserted by Jesus himself, but later in the book of Revelation we have a picture of it.
There are twenty-four thrones around the throne. There are twenty-four seats around the throne, and who sits in those seats? The twenty-four elders. And again, those 24 elders are male. The evil is not in the order. It can’t be. The eternal order is reflecting that structure that has come to expression in the natural order. There are 12 thrones. There are twenty-four seats for the elders in glory who sit around the throne of the Lamb and around the throne of the Father. Now, the world can do what it wants, and it will. You can count on that. But as far as the Church of Christ is concerned, We are compelled to affirm the natural order and the authority inherent to it, but more, we are compelled to defend that eternal order that is maintained for and in the house of God.
I realize the difficulty of the subject. I realize the pressures of the time. I also am aware that there are many women who take great offense at messages like this. But I plead, I plead with them and with the Church of Christ, please do not turn your back upon the obvious. that which cannot be avoided, that which is assaulted, neglected or ignored only to the detriment of the Church and to the detriment, truly, of women themselves.
Let us pray. We know that there are hard matters. There are matters in which we might feel as if things are being taken from us, in which we are being robbed, in which we are being denied. There are matters, Lord, in which we feel we have been victims, victimized and abused.
Lord, we would not close our eyes to the abuse or to the evils. even those to which women have been subjected, even by the Church of Christ. But Lord, we ask that at the same time we would be absolutely committed to your revelation, that whether we be female or male, we would submit ourselves to that revelation as the very word of our God. Oh, help us, Father, not just in this matter, but in all matters, that we might prove to be your servants that willingly, so that we would be a glory to you, a help to others, and an encouragement to your church everywhere.
The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.