Old Testament Reading: Isaiah 11:1-6
New Testament Reading: Luke 4:14-21
The Seed of the Savior
“The Serpent, The Seed, and The Savior”
Genesis 3:1-15
Wayne J. Edwards, Pastor
What began just outside the Garden of Eden with God’s judgment on Satan ended 4,000 years later just outside of the City of Jerusalem with God’s forgiveness of our sins.
- Sadly, most Christians believe the story of our salvation began with the birth of Jesus Christ in a barn in Bethlehem.
- However, God Himself delivered the first gospel message to the serpent that deceived Adam and Eve into rebelling against Him.
- The first gospel message was God’s promise of Satan’s retribution and our redemption, showing the sequence of judgment and rescue.
“I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.”
Genesis 3:15
In Christian theology, Genesis 3:15 is called the “protoevangelium.”
- In Greek, “protos” means “first,” and “evangelion” means “good news” or “gospel,” making this the Bible’s first gospel announcement from God Himself. It was God’s first promise of a Savior.
- God said the “Seed” of the woman would crush Satan’s head. Since women carry the egg, not the seed, God was saying that a woman would give birth to a Son without an earthly father, pointing to the virgin conception of Jesus by the Holy Spirit and His birth from the virgin Mary.
- Not only was the Messiah’s physical body in that Seed, but also His spiritual body—the Church—those who received Jesus as their Savior and Lord.
- From Genesis 3:15 onward, the rest of the biblical storyline shows God’s faithfulness in keeping His promise.
- God preserved that Seed of Eve through 76 generations until, as the Apostle Paul said in Galatians 4:4, “In the fullness of time, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons.”
- We can be sure Jesus was the God-sent Messiah by measuring His life and ministry against the Old Testament prophecies the Promised Messiah would fulfill.
1. A Son to be Born – From Genesis and Numbers
- Eve thought her firstborn son was the Savior God had promised her. However, instead of crushing the serpent, Cain became the world’s first murderer by killing his brother, Abel. In that failure, Satan turned Cain against Abel.
- Seth, Adam and Eve’s third son, carried the messianic bloodline. In Hebrew, “Seth” means “the appointed.”
- Luke 3:38 traces the generational line backward from Jesus, the son of Joseph and Mary, to Seth, the son of Adam and Eve.
- In Genesis 4:26, after Seth’s son, Enosh, was born, “people began to call upon the name of the Lord.” This marks the formal establishment of a godly lineage, and that messianic line runs through nine generations, tying the Messiah’s future line to Shem’s descendants rather than Ham or Japheth.
“Man is appointed to mortal sorrow, but the blessed God shall come down teaching that His death shall bring the despairing comfort and rest.”
- From Noah, the line continues through Shem’s descendants rather than Ham or Japheth, tying the Messiah’s future line to Shem.
- According to Luke 3:23-36, Shem’s lineage leads directly to Abraham, the patriarch, with whom God established the first formal covenant of the Seed, and through whom the Savior would come.
- Abraham’s lineage continues through King David and finally to the birth of the Lord, Jesus Christ.
- Galatians 3:16: “Now to Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He does not say, ‘And to seeds,’ as of many, but as of one, ‘And to your Seed,’ who is Christ, who would be triumphant over His enemies.”
- By the end of Genesis, we learn that this promised son would come from Judah.
2. A Son to be Given – From 2 Samuel and Psalms
- In 2 Samuel 7:12-13, God told David, “When your days are fulfilled, and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise your offspring after you, who shall come from your body; I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.”
- In Acts 2:36, the Apostle Peter told the Jews: “This Jesus God has raised, of which we are all witnesses. Therefore, let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.”
3. A Son to be Born – From Micah and Daniel
- The City of David was Bethlehem, which means “The House of Bread,” the village where Samuel anointed the king from Judah’s tribe.
- Micah 5:2 – “But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days.”
4. A Son to Be Struck and to Strike
- According to the promise in Genesis 3:15, the future son of Eve would achieve a great victory – but at a very high cost.
- God told the serpent, “He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.” The serpent would strike His heel, but the heel of the Stricken would crush the serpent’s head, with both the strike and the crushing deadly.
The road of messianic hope that began in Genesis 3:15 and ended in Mark 15:37–39 is a long, winding path through 4,000 years of Jewish history. Yet the destination was always certain.
- As we follow the road from Eden to Golgotha, the Place of the Skull outside Jerusalem, we see that our God keeps His word to the letter.
- God said the Seed who would crush Satan’s head would be a son from Abraham’s family, from the tribe of Judah, and from the family of David.
- He would be born in Bethlehem during the Roman Empire.
- He would prove Himself the Savior sent from God through His ministry and miracles.
- He would be betrayed by His Disciples, rejected by the Jewish religious leaders, falsely accused and convicted of the charge of blasphemy.
- After being beaten and scourged, He would carry the top beam of the cross down the Via Dolorosa to Golgotha, enduring the scorn and humiliation from the very people He came save.
- At Golgotha, the Roman soldiers would nail Him to the cross, where, six hours later, after crying out, “It is finished,” Jesus would give up His Spirit and die. However, three days and nights later, Jesus would rise from the grave, proving He was the Seed of Eve; the Savior sent from God to redeem lost mankind from sin.
- The first Adam heard God’s promise of victory over Satan.
- The last Adam fulfilled that promise, for at the appointed time, the appointed Son accomplished the appointed work at the appointed place, for while Satan’s bite resulted in Jesus’ physical suffering and temporary death, Satan’s crushed head resulted in Jesus’ final victory over Satan, stripping him of his power over sin and death through the Resurrection.
