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Doctrinal Value of First Chapters of Genesis
3. With regard to our redemption, the third chapter of ■Genesis is the basis of all Soteriology. If there was no fall, there was no condemnation, no separation and no need of reconciliation. If there was no need of reconciliation, there was no need of redemption; and if there was no need of re- demption, the Incarnation was a superfluity, and the crucifixion folly. (Gal. 3:21.) So closely does the apostle link the fall of Adam and the death of Christ, that without Adam’s fall the science of theology is evacuated of its most salient feature, the atonement. I f the first Adam was not made a living soul and fell, there was no reason for the work of the Second Man, the Iiord from heaven. The rejection of the Genesis story as a myth, tends to the rejection of the Gospel of salva- tion. One of the chief corner stones of the Christian doc- trine is removed, if the historical reality of Adam and Eve is abandoned, for the fall will ever remain as the starting point of special revelation, of salvation by grace, and of the need of personal regeneration. In it lies the germ of the entire apos- tolic Gospel. Finally, we have in Gen. 2 the doctrinal foundation of those great fundamentals, the necessity of labor, the Lord’s Day of rest, the Divine ordinance of matrimony, and the home life of mankind. The weekly day of rest was provided for man by his God, and is planted in the very forefront of revelation as a Divine ordinance, and so also is marriage and the home. Our Lord Jesus Christ endorses the Mosaic story of the creation of Adam and Eve, refers to it as the explana- tion of the Divine will regarding divorce, and sanctions by His infallible imprimatur that most momentous of ethical ques- tions, monogamy. Thus the great elements of life as God intended it, the three universal factors of happy, healthy, helpful life, law, labor, love, are laid down in the beginning of God’s Book. Three other remarkable features in the first chapters of Genesis deserve a brief reference.
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