Scene 1: Creation
A. Gen1:26-28 – male plus female = image of God; to rule all earthly things in oneness
B. Gen 2 – major themes
1. Covenant Headship: Adam the primary covenant bearer as he is the receiver of the immediate breath of life (2:7), the one who receives the command to care for the garden (2:15) and who hear the warning concerning the tree of knowledge (2:17). He knows God immediately and directly through the Word.
2. Origin of Gender: God “splits” the man from the woman (Gen2:18- 24). Her point of origin is her husband. This is important for the New Testament understanding of “headship/authority”.
3. Eve knows the covenant through Adam: the sequence represented above means that whatever knowledge Eve had of herself as in the image of God and in covenant with him was mediated through Adam. (An analogy for this is the relationship between Sarah and Abram; the promise is made to the husband (Gen 12:1- 3) even though his wife is intimately and necessarily involved. There is no direct word to Sarah before the word of rebuke in Gen 18: 9 – 14.)
Scene 2: Satan Attacks the Image
A. The Woman is Deceived
1. Gen 3:1: the serpent speaks to the woman directly concerning the Word of God. This is a sinful trajectory as the snake had already been made responsible to the man through his naming of all the animals in Gen 2:19 – 20.
2. Gen 3:1: the woman fails to cleave to her husband in spiritual intimacy which was her first obligation towards him in the order of God (Gen 2:24).
3. Gen 3:6: the “woman is tricked/deceived” (Gen 3:13; 1 Tim 2:14). In failing to refer to Adam as her covenant head (1 Cor 11:3) she acted as though she had direct authority from God to speak to the devil (1 Cor 11:5). She did not enact the truth that her consciousness of being in the image of God was via her union with Adam, and not hers as a solo possession. In this way she dishonoured the divine order set for the first couple as husband and wife. (By reverse analogy, Sarah is commended in scripture for recognizing Abraham as her “lord” (1 Pet 3:6 citing Gen 18:12).
4. This meant that the unity established by God between the first couple had successfully been split by Satan. They were no longer one in the fullness of the divine intention (Gen 2:24); whatever their awareness at the time their spiritual intimacy had been broken.
5. Satan had opened up and taken ground in the first marriage by diminishing the original oneness created by God. (However united they were now as “flesh” (1 Cor 6:16) Adam and Eve were now not “one in the Spirit and Word”.) The dominion that God gave the first humans over all the earth was now no longer theirs.
B. Adam Rebels
1. Despite not being spoken to directly by the devil, as was his right as covenant head, Adam remains passively present rather than initiating (Gen 3:6).
2. He does not defend Eve’s intimacy with himself as established by God. He does not spiritually cleave to her as his wife (Gen 2:24).
3. He allows the ground of authority that belongs to Eve as his wife to be taken over by the initiative of Satan.
4. Adam accepts the fruit in direct contradiction to the prohibition that God gave him (Gen 2:17).
5. The scriptures describe this quite differently from the deception of Eve. “And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a transgressor” (1 Tim 2:14). “Like Adam, they have broken the covenant – they were unfaithful to me there.” (Hos 6:7). Adam is considered to be a (knowing) rebel, rather than a duped person, because:
a. He wilfully failed to be the covenant bearer for God to Satan and on behalf of Eve.
b. He relates to himself as one who can become “like God” (Gen 3:5) through the woman’s mediation of the word of the snake rather than on the basis of the direct Word God spoke to him personally. This means he now shaped himself according to the image his wife had become through her deception rather than the image he was given as created. This was the sin of idolatry, Eve was given a place of authority that belongs only to God (Rom 1:23).
c. By analogy with Genesis 16:1ff. (the incident with Sarah and Hagar) and Paul’s caution in 1 Corinthians 7:33-34, it would appear that Adam was more interested in pleasing his wife than pleasing God. He should not “have listened to the voice of his wife” (Gen 3:17).
d. Adam is the one who has most severely “dealt faithlessly with God” (Hos 6:7) as he is the one who received the primary revelation of God’s Word. His is the clearest covenant unfaithfulness (compare Gen 15:6; Rom 5:1).
C: The Image is Divided
1. Adam and Eve are now separated from God because of sin (Gen 3:8 -13).
2. Their mutual recrimination shows they are separated from each other (Gen 3:12).
3. They are now in conflict with evil powers (Gen 3:15).
4. They are alienated from creation (Gen 3:17- 19).
5. If the original divine plan to multiply oneness across thee face of the earth through the undivided image of God = male and female is to completed it will need to take on a new form.
Scene 3: The Interim of Israel
1. The Mosaic covenant and law represents an interim period in the history of salvation until the coming of Christ (Gal 3:23-25; 4:2).
2. During this period Yahweh is the husband of Israel(Isa 45:4; Jer 31:32) and she is the wife (Jer 2:2).
3. Characteristically, because of idolatry,Israelis an unfaithful or adulterous partner (Jer 3:8;13:27; Hos 3:1).
4. The prophets anticipate a time when Israel will enter into a faithful partnership with God (Hos 2:19-20; Isa 62:4).
Scene 4: Jesus as the Faithful Covenant Head
1. Jesus is the bridegroom come for the bride (Mark 2:19- 20) in fulfillment of the Old Testament texts about Yahweh’s covenant relationship with his people (Ezek 16; Isa 54:4-8; Hos 2:19-20).
2. A range of evidence shows that he is the successor of Adam. He is for instance traced back by genealogy to Adam as the first “son of God” (Luke 3:38), Jesus resists the temptation in the wilderness where Adam sinned in the garden, his dominion over the forces of nature (Mark 4:35- 41 etc.) and evil (Mark 2:21- 28) expresses the authority first offered by God to humanity in the beginning (In Paul’s explicit language Jesus is the “second Adam”, Rom 5:12- 21; 1 Cor 15:22; 45.)
3. Unlike Adam however Jesus is the completely faithful covenant partner to God because he always pleases his Father (Mark 1:11; John 5:30;8:29).
4. This means refusing to please the people where their will does not conform to the will of God (John 6:14- 15; Matt 16:22- 23).
5. The consequence of Jesus’ faithfulness to God is that he must die alone, rejected by his own people (John 1:10- 11) and with the status of a sinner (Luke 22:37) and a gentile (Gal 3:13; Heb 13:12). That is, he bears the status of a covenant breaker.
6. To the eye of sight, the claim of Jesus to be God’s Son, that is, his true image (John 14:10), is ridiculous (Matt 27:40, 43; Luke 23:35). It looks as if there is no oneness (John 10:30) between Jesus and the Father.
7. Spiritually discerned however, Jesus sacrifice is fully pleasing to God (Eph 5:2) and the perfection of his righteousness (Heb 2:10; 5:9).
8. In other words, the cross was not the splitting of the image of God but the union between God and sinful humanity in love for the purpose of remaking it in righteousness (2 Cor 5:21).
9. This truth was revealed in the resurrection of Jesus and his return to the eternal glory of his Father (John 17:5).
10. Jesus will soon return to consummate his intimate relationship with his people the church (Rev 19:7, 9; 21:2)
Scene 5: The Faithfulness of the Church
1. The relationship between Jesus and the church is understood by the apostles (Eph 5:32) to be the anti-type or full meaning of the order marriage in Genesis 2:24.
2. To enter into a saving relationship with Jesus is to become betrothed to him as “one husband” (2 Cor 11:2).
3. The language of betrothal points towards a future glorious consummation (Rev 19:7, 9; 21:2) when perfection will be reached on both sides of the relationship (1 Cor 13:10- 12).
4. In the meantime there is a call to covenant faithfulness (Gal 5:22;Rev 2:10).
5. Significantly this is emphasized in the case of Christian leaders (1 Cor 4:2; 1 Tim 3:2; Tit 1:6 – 7).
6. At a deeper level, Paul can use the language of Genesis to speak of the danger of covenant unfaithfulness: “I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds might somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ.” (2 Cor 11:3).
7. From this and the other relevant texts it is clear that the church is always feminine, a bride, in relation to Jesus. This means that she must always respect him as her covenant head and one mediator (1 Tim 2:5). Church to Christ is to be as Eve was called to be in relation to Adam.
8. All spiritual authority flows from Jesus downwards as the head of the church (Eph 1:22;4:15;5:23;Col 1:18).
9. This is explicitly set in terms that make it clear that the new covenant with Jesus does not annul the order established in the covenant of marriage: “Wives submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body of which he is the Saviour. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.” (Eph 5:23- 24).
10. Even if the husband – wife relationship is mutual in terms of obligations of love (Eph 5:21), nothing suggests that the order of reciprocity is identical (Col 3:18- 19; 1 Pet 3:1- 7). It is the diverse nature of the relationship between husband and wife, mirroring that between Jesus and the church, that constitutes the unity in diversity of marriage.
11. To claim identity in relationship would be to deny the reality of the marriage covenant itself. (Just as the church would never claim identity in authority between her and Jesus.)
12. None of this should be taken to violate the basic equality of husbands and wives or men and women before God (Gal 3:28). This is established because all believers, regardless of gender, ethnicity, age etc. have Jesus as their covenant mediator in the same way (Acts 2:17-18).
13. Nevertheless, in the Christian congregation it is plain that the marriage order is not to be overridden in a way that would be suggestive that a wife dishonours her husband as her covenant head in marriage: “the husband is the head of his wife…any woman who prays or prophesies with her head unveiled dishonours her head.” (1 Cor 11:3, 5); “As in all the churches of the saints, the women should be silent in the churches. For they are not permitted to speak, but should be subordinate, as the law also says. If there is anything they desire to know, let them ask their husbands at home. For it is shameful for a woman to speak in church.” (1 Cor 14:33- 35). “Let a wife learn in silence with full submission. I permit no wife to teach or have authority over a husband; she is to keep silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor.” (1 Tim 2:11- 12). (NRSV text).
14. Whilst there are some uncertainties about these passages, it is clear that Paul saw marital disorder as a major threat to the function of the congregation and that this was perceived as a recapitulation of the fall in Genesis 3. In other words, it is a matter of spiritual warfare.
Scene 6: How Satan Splits the Image of the Church
1. Satan will attempt to use on the new covenant people of God the same strategy that was successful in Eden and against Israel; this is covenant unfaithfulness.
2. The principal area of attack, following the pattern set in Genesis 3, will be marriage. Whatever subverts the order of God in marriage of the foundational manifestation of the image of God will spoil all other relationships – family, church etc.
3. Since mediation was of the essence of the way Eve was to relate to Adam as her covenant head in the beginning (and where he allowed her to fail) this will be a special area of satanic focus. (This explains the array of New Testament texts referred to above (1 Cor 11; 1 Tim 2) that concentrate on the interplay between the relationship of husband and wife and order in the assembly.)
4. Satan will do whatever he is able to substitute the role of Jesus as mediator of the new covenant in his blood (Luke 22:20; Heb 13:20) with the role of others who will seem to mediate spirituality.
5. Classically, this has taken the form of the insistence that pastors in the church and husbands in the home have a priestly status, they are go – betweens the people and wife and God. This role, given the gift of the Spirit to the church, is idolatry.
6. More subtly, is a doctrine known as “spiritual covering”. This states, in the form relevant to this paper, that in the case of a single woman or a wife with a non – Christian husband, a female needs to find a replacement for a Christian husband from amongst the men of the church. Characteristically, this will be a man in leadership who possesses spiritual authority to be a “covering”.
7. The first problem with this teaching is that it possesses no biblical basis. The only possible texts of relevance are in 1 Corinthians 11 where Paul is concerned with the proper manifestation of the image of God as male and female in the public assembly. Whatever the precise details of the text this point is clear when he insists that men and woman are necessarily distinguishable by their hair length (1 Cor 11:14- 15). Nothing in this passage, or elsewhere, suggests Christian women need to find a spiritual head to be their “covering”.
8. The doctrine is also dangerous. In cases where a woman feels incomplete as single she will be tempted to find “spiritual intimacy” with her “covering” in a way that belongs only to Jesus. The man in question is expected to function with an authority and mediatorial role between her and God that is the sole prerogative of the one mediator, Christ.
9. In situations where a woman is married to an unbeliever and partners for prayer and spiritual growth with a male, the temptation is to enter into intimacy with this man at an emotional bonding level that must be sought only in Jesus or with her husband when he comes to Christ.
10. In cases where the above boundaries are not recognized or respected we have a situation of “spiritual adultery”. No doubt this will be rationalised using the language of Christian discipleship, but the problem is thereby only denied and exacerbated.
11. The attempts to find outside of marriage what can only be found inside of marriage are self-defeating and detract from the dynamic of the Spirit is working through the Christian partner’s prayers to bring their husband to Christ. (Or to mature a Christian partner who is being denied the spiritual intimacy that belongs to them.)
12. Moreover, when the spirit of a man as “covering” is emotionally substituted for the spirit of a man as husband, or for the Spirit of the man Christ Jesus (1 Tim 2:5), this is a case of idolatry that opens up both sides of the relationship to deception by Satan as a judgement from God. (Paul clearly envisages God using the devil in this way (1 Cor 5:5; 1 Tim 1:20); but it is important to note that the goal is repentance not destruction.) Both the man and the woman will experience the presence and penetration of one another’s spirits and words (“intimacy” in communication in a “spiritual” environment) as if it were the Spirit of Jesus. As such it will be given an authority like that of God. Phenomenologically, it will be heard and received as the Spirit and Word of God. This is a very dangerous state of affairs.
13. In such instances, inner convictions, in a parallel form to those involves in illicit sexual intimacy, will seem very “right”. The depth of deception involved in both physical and spiritual adultery is extremely deep and stubborn. (Compare the notorious incident to do with the Baal of Peor in the Old Testament (Num 25:1- 9). This act or rebellion was viewed as particularly horrific and dangerous to Israel’s relationship with Yahweh (Deut 4:3; Josh 22:17; Ps 106:28) because it combined sensuality and idolatry in a potent mix.
14. This dynamic is also picked up in the New Testament, especially in Revelation 2:20: “You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess. By her teaching she misleads my servants into sexual immorality and the eating of food sacrificed to idols.” A variant reading of this text has “your wife Jezebel”, this alludes directly to the Greek Old Testament where in 1 Kings 20:25(21:25 in English) “Jezebel his wife led him astray…in following after idols.”. Even if this variant text is not original, the parallels that it points to between the original in Kings and the activity of the symbolic Jezebel in Revelation points to the wife- like influence that this woman was being allowed to exercise on the church in Pergamum. This itself was illicit.
Scene 7: Discerning and Disciplining Satanic Attacks
1. No action can be taken against Satan until his schemes are exposed.
2. The apostles were aware that they were opposed by a plot of immense subtlety (Gen 3:1; 2 Cor 2:11) and that this intrigue was not to be identified exclusively with men and women but the work of evil powers (Acts 5:3;13:10; Eph 6:12).
3. The first step in dealing with the plan of the devil is therefore discernment i.e. recognition of where he is at work. We must ask why the devil is able to sow so much discord into the life of the church and his work only is recognized after great damage has been done.
4. A basic answer to this at one level is pride. Those with conceit, especially new believers elevated to positions of leadership, “fall into the judgement of the devil” (1 Tim 3:6).
5. Relatedly, the key theme that ties together the whole narrative from Genesis to Revelation in relation to deception is submission. 1 Corinthians 11:3 sums up the sequence or order of covenantal headship that protects the people of God from deception: “I want you to understand that Christ is the head of every man, and the husband is the head of the wife, and God is the head of Christ.” If this order, which is an order of origin in creation and incarnation, had been respected in Eden sin would never have entered into the world. That is, Adam would have obeyed God the Word, Eve would have submitted to Adam and the snake to the man. Where there is a will to submit in the divine order there will be a discernment of spiritual origins, that is, it will be patent as to whether an impulse is from God.
6. Thus, where there is confusion in a church community regarding revelation, inspiration, discernment, prophecy, spiritual warfare and the like it must be the case that submission has broken down. Most obviously, this would be submission to leadership (1 Cor 16:16; Heb 13:17). The order of government that God has established in the church is not being respected (cf. Rom 13:1- 7). Such cases are however generally not difficult to recognize as they are overt rebellion.
7. More deeply, it may be a case where the leadership itself is not submissive to the Spirit and Word of God. Whilst Paul can warn his churches of his apostolic authority to discipline (2 Cor 12:11- 13:4), there seems to be no clear provision in the New Testament of a process to follow where corporate leadership is dysfunctional from within a congregation. Presumably, as in Revelation 2- 3, the believers must have anticipated some sort of divine sovereign initiative.
8. Finally, and not exclusive to the above, it will often prove to be the case that the order of God in marriage is deficient. The deepest intimacy of all is found in the willingness of Jesus to submit to the Father in love in going to the cross (Phil 2:5 – 8). The agony of the garden of Gethsemane and the cross (Mark 14:32- 42;15:34) is an agony of intimate suffering. Where husbands have suffered for their wives (Adam refused to do this as he did not risk Eve’s rejection) and won their spirits over in love (this is a reciprocal movement and obligation: Eph 5:22 – 33) we must suppose the depth and power of submission has been learned and discernment of the diversity of the spiritual being of man from woman recognized or “known” (cf. Gen 4:1; Amos 3:2) through experience of the differences of role God has assigned from the beginning.
Where this has not been learned maturely it is inevitable deception will arise in some form. For example, where a wife does not “fear/respect/reverence her husband” (Eph 5:33), and all of these terms are legitimate translations of the Greek word used , we must expect that the man involved will be open to deception through women who seek him as a “covering head”, however confused are their motives, and his. To be treated in this way by a woman will be very appealing. Additionally, what is happening between this man and these women will only be recognisable to those men and women who themselves are familiar in depth with the discernment that mutual submission brings.
9. The scripture says that “if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore such a one gently” (Gal 6:1). This would seem to involve recognising and naming the sin involved e.g. “spiritual adultery”, and then assisting the individuals to make progress in their relationship with the Lord and their respective spouses. Scripture gives some guidance in this matter, older women, for instance, are to teach the younger how to be “submissive to their husbands” (Tit 2:3 -5).
10. If such counsel is accepted and submitted to progress will be made, if not, the process of Matthew 18:15 – 20 must be followed. The undesired climax of this procedure is that the resistant offender is put outside of the church where submission is not raised as a possibility. This ensures deeper deception but in the hope that deeper pain at the hands of the Deceiver will lead to restoration (1 Cor 5:1- 5).