Pronouncement of Judgment, No. 2

BD19-02

© Berean Memorial Church of Irving, Texas, Inc. (1971)

Please open your Bibles to Genesis chapter 3, returning to verse 15. We are looking at the second part now in the series of the subject of the pronouncement of judgment upon the sin in the Garden of Eden. Man has sinned by the only sin that was possible for him to commit in the Garden of Eden, and that was to say, “No” to what God had directed him to do, namely, not to eat of a particular tree. By negative volition, he has become guilty. Now, we have been observing how God has proceeded to declare judgment against those who were involved in the fall into sin.

So, the serpent was judged first. Although he was an animal, and as such not accountable, he was a tool of Satan, and consequently suffered judgment because he was used by Satan. The serpent was condemned henceforth to be the most detestable of all domestic and wild animals. He was destined henceforth to crawl on the ground with dust in his mouth, a position that forever marked his curse, and reminds of the doom of Satan himself.

Now God is ready to proceed to judge the woman and the man, but before He does that, as is His custom, true to His character, God offers grace before judgment. He offers this grace here in Genesis 3:15 in the form of the first declaration of the gospel. Satan and humanity have been declared to be at odds with one another. He is seeking mankind’s doom. Satan has a seed—a family. Everyone born into the (human) race is born into his slave market of sin. The woman has a seed who is Jesus Christ as is indicated by the personal pronouns that follow that it’s one particular person. He was born outside of the slave market because He was born without a human father. The old sin nature is passed on through procreation. In order for Christ to be born without a sin nature, that is a sinless human, to (keep from putting) Him in the same position that Adam was in, it is necessary that He be born without a human father—thus, the virgin birth.

The first gospel promised, therefore, stresses this central strategic fact of the virgin birth. It is essential to have a savior and to provide a sinless humanity. We have indicated last week that the liberal ministers are very understandably moved by Satan to belittle the doctrine of the virgin birth, and to minimize its important—to outright reject it as an invention, as a fable, and not a reality. The basic attitude, we have gathered, as we read statements of what liberal ministers make on this subject, is that they view Jesus Christ as the illegitimate son of Mary who was a prostitute, and whose son was born by various possible fathers.

Now the fundamental minister, we’ve pointed out, has a certain problem of conscience in joining in fellowship and in Christian service with the apostates who hold this view of the virgin birth that the Word of God stresses in the very first declaration of the gospel, and along with it of course the accompanying deity of Jesus Christ. The Bible forbids this kind of association, so you can understand why this is a problem for conservative ministers.

It is a real problem in joining such forces in order to save souls. Save souls from what? From a hell that doesn’t exist, supposedly. Based on a gospel from a Bible which was written by men and therefore is full of error. And inviting men to stand on a platform in evangelistic campaigns, and to lead in prayer. In prayer to whom? To a prostitute’s son, illegitimately born. Or to stand on that platform and join in prayer while someone else leads in prayer to that son.

Now I hope you’re gotten the feeling of the raw, stark horror concerning this issue of the virgin birth and what its implications are. Now I don’t care whether you are in sympathy with the attitude of the fundamentalist minister who has reservations and therefore says, “I’d rather not be part of the team that includes the apostate and the heretic.” Whether you agree with him or not is beside the point. I just want you to understand what it is that disturbs him. He has, on biblical ground, I think you will admit, a legitimate problem.

It may be no problem for you. You may be in a position that you could jump into a campaign like that and be part of the team and be in fellowship and contribute with your services, and it could be no problem. You’re your own priest. But I want you to understand that there is a very grievous legitimate problem when it comes to calling Jesus Christ a prostitute’s son and to join forces with people, who, while they are religious leaders of vast segments of denominational groups, nevertheless hold this position that the Word of God condemns.

Some have been wondering what motivates (them). That’s a legitimate question. Why would ministers who know this be motivated to be involved under apostate sponsorship? What is it that propels you to do that? Well there are two things. First, the concept is “the end justifies the means.” The idea goes something like this: If we can get the liberal ministers to cooperate with a united evangelistic campaign to reach souls, he will then, by being on the sponsoring committees, and in the chairmanships and directorships, he will bring his people out to the meetings where they will hear the gospel and then be saved, and be won away from the liberal minister.

But there is this problem that the converts, those who are really converts, have to be sent back into the spiritual darkness. Even Dr. Graham says it would not be fair, when these ministers cooperate with this campaigns, if we did not send these converts back to them.

One Dallas seminary student this week came up and said, “I thought you were just talking about liberal churches, or churches who aren’t too good about preaching the Word, but I talked to a seminary wife this week who was on the staff typing up the cards of the Graham meetings, and she was the end of the line. She was the last person to process the card, and I couldn’t believe it when she told me where these card were going, including …” he said, “… to Mormons, as well as Jehovah Witnesses, who have a very defective view of the person of Jesus Christ himself.” He said, “I see what you mean now. The converts have to go back, no matter where. That’s the policy.” Well, that’s right, and that’s fair, if you include the apostates on the committee to begin with.

There’s a second thing. Why do ministers do that? The second thing is ministers. The average sincere minister will do anything to increase church membership. And if he cooperates, he is promised (and statistics have been far from bearing out the realization of this promise), but he is promised that he will increase his church membership. And he will in most cases do anything, because this is the one mark of success: how many people he has out there.

Now you wouldn’t know this, but if you moved around professional preacher circles, when preachers are by themselves, one of the favorite questions they ask one another is, “Is your work growing?” Now what they mean by this is, “What’s your body count?” Now you’ve heard about body count in Vietnam. Well the professional preacher has his body count. He means, “What is your body count, along with the chairs that those bodies are in, the size of the floor space they’re on, the heat they’re generating, and the offerings they’re giving.” And I usually look puzzled when that question is asked, and I say, “Yes, I’d say that most of my members have grown about five to ten pounds in recent months.” That’s usually the truth too.

The growth that counts with God is not this inanity of body count. The thing that counts with God is spiritual maturity structure, and where you’re going with that. And I’m happy to say around Berean Memorial Church, we (have) a lot of that kind of growth. There’s a lot of extensive evidence (of) growth in spiritual maturity structures. But that’s the only thing that counts with God. God does not deal in the body count technique. Otherwise, the most humiliating fact of all is that Jesus Christ was such a fantastic failure when it came to body counts. But He was a fantastic success with the Word of God in spiritual development of the people who were ready to respond, and that’s what God’s interested in.

There’s a third defense. A writer for one of these college organizations that works with college students said there was one other explanation, and he called it “sovereign acception.” He said, “There is, in the case of certain evangelists, we believe that God accepts them from the principals of the Word of God (about) association with unbelievers in Christian enterprises. “Sovereign acception,” (where) God accepts certain people from the principals of His Word because thereby God gains certain ends. This again is a variation of “the end justifies the means.” And he refers to the Old Testament prophet who was told to marry a prostitute, and so on, violating a principal of the Word of God. Yet this has no real relationship. It’s no real analogy because, to begin with, we’re not sure that we have a declarative statement that God has made a sovereign acception. We have no further revelation beyond the Word of God to guide us. And in the case of the prophet Hosea, the declaration was clearly made and evidenced, and God was working it to a certain end. But I leave it with you to decide whether you feel that there is justification for the view of “sovereign acception.”

Now, of course, there is no question that in the Graham meetings, particularly, the gospel is presented. And there is no question that Mr. Graham has the perfect right to play ball (to) whatever degree he needs to accommodate to a lot of different personalities and groups that are working together. The issue is when those personalities and groups start calling Jesus Christ a prostitute’s illegitimate son, then we draw the line. So, don’t misunderstand what we are saying. We’re talking about who the people are who are in leadership, sponsoring, and who, by their presence, are being dignified as religious leaders in the eyes of people who don’t know the difference, unless somebody has (sounded) a little alarm to point it out.

The virgin birth is the first thing that God stresses in Genesis 3:15 relative to our salvation. He does not stress death of the seed. He does not stress the blood and the death that it represents. The first thing God stresses is a humanity that is sinless. And if it’s a big thing with God, we dare not treat it blasphemously, because without it, all is lost, and Satan wins. You may be sure that Satan is behind every movement to dignify those who belittle and who treat blasphemously the virgin birth of the Lord Jesus Christ.

So, in Genesis 3:15, we have this dramatic declaration. The prophet Isaiah was led to take this promise and to expand it in three very definite ways that I want to show you this morning. First is Isaiah 7:14, if you’ll turn there for a moment. Isaiah 7:14 tells us how this seed of the woman is going to come into the world. Isaiah 7:14 says, “Therefore, the Lord Himself shall give you a sign.” A sign is something to identify the promises savior. It connotes something of a miraculous nature, just as the beginning of the church age was given a sign—a signal. We were told when we would know that something was happening in reference to the Jewish people.

Isaiah 28:11 foretold that the Jews, who has possessed the Word of God for centuries, would receive the gospel in, of all things, Gentile tongues. It was told them that when they found themselves receiving the gospel in non-Jewish language, it was the signal that God’s curse upon the nation of Israel had begun. By the same token, which they didn’t understand at that time, it was the signal that the church age had begun. Well, when did the Jews receive the gospel in Gentile languages? Obviously on the day of Pentecost. So, that was the first time that the gift of tongues was exercised. Here was the first legitimate expression in known languages of the world where the gospel was preached to Jews, who had gathered in Jerusalem from all over the world, and they were hearing the gospel in Gentile languages.

That was a sign. The gift of tongues was a sign, particularly a sign to the Jews. And it was a sign that the curse had begun upon the nation, and it was their opportunity of grace to escape the curse and the judgments that were coming by turning to Christ now, and to receive the savior whom the nation had crucified. So, the gospel was given to the Jews at the same time as the curse, so that, again, curse could be turned to blessing.

In like manner, here was a sign in Isaiah—a sign that would identify this savior who had been promised in Genesis 3:15. The sign was this: “Behold the virgin shall conceive and bear a son and shall call his name Emmanuel.” The word for “virgin” in the Hebrew looks like this: “alma.” Now this word in the Hebrew means “virgin” but it also can mean simply “young woman.” There is a Hebrew word that means specifically “virgin.” It’s “bethula.” “Bethula” means strictly “virgin.” There is no question about it. It means only that. It doesn’t mean “young woman.”

So, here in Isaiah 7:14, we have a word that can mean “virgin” or “young woman.” Which does it mean? When the Revised Standard Version (of the Bible) came out, it was a liberal-sponsored Bible, and therefore it threw the weight of its decision to say, “… a young woman shall conceive.” At the time, one of the local ministers came and said, “We’re going to have a rally against the Revised Standard Version of the Bible because of the way it translated Isaiah 7:14. It used the word “young woman” instead of “virgin” because they want to get away from the fact of the virgin birth.”

Well, I pointed out to him that it was true that they had done that, but on the matter of simply scholarship, the word “alma” means either young woman or virgin. So, while it was not a good translation on their part, there was a defensible position, but there was a reason why we know what God meant here. I pointed out that that would be the thing to stress to people, that we know what God meant—which of those two He meant. And the reason we know is because this word is quoted in the New Testament, where the word “parthenos” is used. This means only virgin.

Now when God the Holy Spirit led the writer to quote this from the Old Testament, when he quoted in Matthew 1:23, quoting Isaiah 7:14, the Holy Spirit led the writer to use the Greek word that means only virgin, the same as “bethula” means only virgin. Therefore, we know what God the Holy Spirit meant up here (in Isaiah 7:14). He meant “a virgin shall conceive.” Then we’re also told that she would bear a son and call his name Emmanuel.

So, this child which was to be born would be a sign because he would be virgin born, and his name would be Emmanuel, which is “God with us.” So, Isaiah 7:14 took Genesis 3:15 and it expanded it. How was this savior going to come into this world? By showing us it was going to be a virgin birth.

Then, in another place, in Isaiah 9:6, if you’ll turn there, he tells us what this savior is going to be like. “For unto us a child is born. Unto us a son is given.” “A child is born.” The Hebrew looks like this: “yeled.” (This) means simply “born one.” One who is born—a child who is born. By the very fact of using this term, he indicates that this being is going to have a beginning. It refers, of course, to the humanity of the coming savior. This humanity came from the seed of the woman, and it was the product of the virgin birth conceived by God the Holy Spirit. Luke 1:35 tells us it was God the Holy Spirit who conceived this supernatural body—the born one, someone who had a beginning.

So, there was some part of the savior who was going to come that had a beginning. But there is another word here you will notice in Isaiah 9:6 that says, “Unto us a child is born. Unto us a son is given.” The word “son” in the Hebrew is “ben.” The word “son” here is a mature being—someone who is mature. This mature being is not said to be born. He’s said to be “given,” indicating that at the time of birth, he already existed before birth. (This) refers, of course, to the deity of Jesus Christ.

So, “child” (“yeled”) speaks to the humanity of Jesus Christ. “Son” (“ben”) speaks to the deity of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is to be born in His humanity; He is to be given in his deity, because he already existed. Deity cannot be born. So, the One who is to be the gift of God from the Father to us, which John 3:16 speaks of, is to be God. So, Jesus Christ, as the seed of the woman, was to come into existence as the unique being called the God-man. He would be true deity, and he would be true humanity. The pre-existent deity of Jesus Christ would join to the sinless humanity of a virgin birth. So, Jesus Christ is undiminished deity; true humanity; one person forever.

Then this verse goes on with various descriptions concerning this person. Isaiah 9:6 is telling us what this savior was to be like. He was to be a God-man. He was to have the government on His shoulders, in the millennium at His second advent. He is to be wonderful. He is to be unique person—a God-man of the universe. He is to be counselor. He is to be a perfect advisor because He has perfect discernment. He is to be the mighty God because He is true deity. He has perfect discernment as a counselor in His humanity because He is deity. He is the everlasting Father, of the Father of eternity. He is the source of eternal life. And He is the Prince of Peace which means He will provide between man and God. This does not mean that He will provide peace from war. He will do that in the millennium, but not now.

There’s a third passage in Isaiah which tells us a little more about Genesis 3:15. Isaiah 53:9 tells us what the savior will do. “He made His grave with the wicked, and with the rich in His death.” We’ve already looked at this and noted that the word “death” here is “deaths.” It is plural. It is not singular. “He made His grave with the wicked … in his ‘deaths.’” In the Hebrew, it is “bemothaw.” It is very definitely a plural word. He had two deaths. What does that refer to?

Well, we’ve looked at this verse before. It simply means that Jesus Christ died spiritually on the cross, and he died physically. He suffered physical pain from 9:00 o’clock in the morning, when they put him on the cross, until noon. At high noon, the sins of the world were poured out on Jesus Christ entirely—past, present, and future (sins), and He died spiritually. This was His first death. He was separated from the Father and from the Holy Spirit, in His humanity.

He bore our sins from noon until 3:00 o’clock in the afternoon when He was forsaken in His humanity, and He was alone upon that cross in intense agony. And so, for this period, darkness covered the land and this hill of Calvary (Matthew 27:45). Finally, at the end, we hear His cry of agony, “My God, My God,” addressing the Father and the Holy Spirit, “… why hast thou forsaken me?” (This) declaration indicates to us what had happened during that last three hours on the cross—what His situation was during those last three hours on the cross. It was separation from God the Father and God the Spirit in His spiritual death (Matthew 27:46). He addressed deity as “My God.” Why? Because fellowship was broken with the Father. Sin—our sin—had broken the fellowship and He could not be addressed then as “Father.”

When His mission was completed, that is in the paying for the sins of the world, then Jesus Christ died a second death, physically, which is the other death here in the word “bemothaw.” Death by crucifixion was very slow. It was an agonizing process. It usually took up to three days to a week. They did it in two ways. Some people they just tied on the cross and left them there to starve and die of exposure and dehydration. Others they nailed to the cross which was considerably more agonizing, and those were the ones they gave the stupefying drink to, that they tried to give the Lord at first but He rejected, at the beginning of His crucifixion period. They gave the drink in order to enable the person to stand the inflammation of the wounds, the tetanus effects, the tearing of the bones from their joints, and the exposure. It was agonizing, but it usually took at least three days for the person to die.

Now the Jewish leaders, you remember, wanted Jesus off that cross before the Sabbath began, so they asked Pilate to hasten the death of Christ and the two thieves by breaking their legs and getting their bodies of the cross. Well, the soldiers broke the legs of the two thieves and thus precipitated their death. But when they got to Jesus Christ, they found Him already dead, and they verified this by thrusting a spear into His side. When they reported to Pilate that Christ was already dead, Pilate was amazed.

The reason He couldn’t believe it was because he had crucified plenty of people. He has seen plenty of people crucified. During the Spartacus revolt, the roads to Rome were literally lined for miles with crosses, every hundred feet or so, with somebody crucified, hanging there. It was a common sight, and they knew that people did not die quickly from crucifixion. (Pilate) couldn’t believe that, in six hours, Jesus Christ was dead. They had to break the bones of the others, but not of Christ.

Well, the cross did not kill Jesus Christ. He died strictly by choice. John 10:18 says, “No man taketh it (speaking of His life) from me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received from My Father.” As you look at the incident of Christ upon the cross, you will notice that He was strong enough near the end, near 3:00 in the afternoon, to ask for a drink. His head was unbowed. John 19:28-30 tells us that He said (in a loud strong person—not as an exhausted person, but shouting in a loud voice), “It is finished,” meaning that spiritual death had now been paid for. And it says that He bowed His head. He was not on the cross with his head dangling helplessly in those final moments. He was spiritually alive, as a matter of fact, at the end of this six hours. He was restored to fellowship as is indicated by the term “Father.”

In Luke 23:46, when He did dismiss His spirit, He addressed God as His “Father.” “When Jesus had cried with a loud voice, He said, ‘Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.’ Having said this, He gave up the spirit.” So, we have every indication that, at 3 PM, the substitutionary sacrifice was completed. He dismissed His spirit (that is, His life) with a loud voice. He was not exhausted. He was in full command of Himself, but physical death was now necessary to be followed by the spiritual death that He had already experienced. It was necessary that He now experience death (in order) to perform certain duties: to fulfill Scripture, and to prove the reality of propitiation by the fact that three days later the Father would raise Him back to life, thus demonstrating to us that God was satisfied with what the Son did.

So, for three days, the body was in the grave, the soul was in the paradise section of Hades, and the human spirit was with the Father in heaven. On Easter Sunday morning, all three parts (body, soul, and spirit) came back together again, and He was the resurrected God man.

Isaiah has expanded Genesis 3:15 with three vital facts: 1) He would be virgin born; 2) He would be a God man; and 3) He would die physically and spiritually, providing salvation for all.

Now, coming back to our passage, there are two wounds here in Genesis 3:15. We are told that “He (Christ) shall bruise thy head (that is, the head of the serpent, as the serpent represented Satan), and thou (Satan) shall bruise His (Christ’s) heel.” He, the seed of the woman would bruise the serpent’s head. The Hebrew word looks like this: “shuf.” This means “to crush.” The serpent’s head, the vulnerable spot, would receive a mortal blow. God, of course, is really speaking to Satan who would be given a fatal blow at the cross. This is exactly what happened to him.

In Hebrews 2:14, it says, “For as much then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He himself likewise took part of the same, that through death He might destroy him (Satan) that hath the power of death (the devil).” John 12:31 says, “Now is the judgment of this world. Now shall the prince of this world be cast out.” The Scriptures indicate clearly that, on the cross, Jesus Christ and Satan came to grips, and Satan received a mortal blow.

Now the final execution of this blow will be at the Second Advent when Jesus Christ destroys the world system of Satan. “Thou (referring to Satan in the disguise of the serpent) shall bruise His heel.” Again the same word “shuf” is used. This word indicates a strong blow. This is going to be inflicted, but it’s not going to be a mortal blow. This blow that Satan inflicted upon Jesus Christ is described in such places as 1 Peter 2:24, “Who His own self bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we being dead to sins should live under righteousness by whose stripes ye were healed.” 2 Corinthians 5:21 says, “For He hath made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God.

These verses, and many others like them, are describing Satan’s wound of Jesus Christ. Satan would seek to spoil the sacrifice of the Son of God on the cross. (Satan would seek) to dissuade Him in the Garden of Gethsemane, which he tried to do as he realized what was before him. (Satan would seek) to goad Him off the cross with his detractors who said, “If you’ll come off the cross, we’ll believe that you are the Messiah.” And if He had come off the cross, salvation would have been eliminated. Satan put all kinds of pressures upon Christ in the moment of spiritual death when He was separated from the Father and the Holy Spirit. The seed of Satan, unbelievers, crucified the woman’s seed and inflicted this wound, but not a mortal wound.

So, Adam and Eve were being given the offer of the gospel before they were disciplined. With this statement, which they didn’t fully, perhaps, enter into, God explained to them sufficiently for them to understand that He would make a gracious provision for them. And that there would be one who would deal with the problem of the spiritual death that now had engulfed them. God never judges without first offering grace so that discipline can be turned into blessing. Always remember that whatever discipline you may experience, it is possible for you to turn it into blessing by the simple act of confession. (The discipline) may cease, but if it continues, it will be for your blessing. Nobody is in hell who was not given the opportunity of grace before being condemned, either at the point of God-consciousness or the point of gospel hearing.

So, with this offer being made, God then proceeds to take the man and the woman and to bring systematic judgment upon them. He goes down in that inverse order, first the woman and then the man. Out of this you and I experience certain things today that we would not have experienced (otherwise). Women experience certain things today because of what happened in Eden. Men are going to experience things tomorrow morning that they never would have experienced if it had not been for what had happened in the Garden of Eden.

Genesis 3:16

Let’s take a look for a moment at what happens to the man and the woman. In Genesis 3:16, first of all, unto the woman He said, “I will greatly multiply thy sorrow in thy conception. In sorrow thou shall bring forth children, and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.” Alright, what discipline (is there) for the woman? It is two-fold.

(First, there is the discipline) of suffering, particularly in child-bearing. Had it not been for the sin in the Garden of Eden, children would have been born without any pain. Unto the woman, He said, “I will greatly multiply thy sorrow (thy pain), in thy conception.” The specific pain imposed is that relative to bearing children. It was originally God’s plan for the woman to bear children. In Genesis 1:28, He made that distinction, but it was not his intent that she must bear them in pain. So, every experience of labor pain is a reminder of Eve’s negative volition to the will of God. This cursing, however, was again turned to blessing in the fact of the Savior who was to be borne by this woman for her own salvation. 1 Timothy 2:15 says that in the very process of childbirth, salvation would be provided for the woman who had sinned.

There was a second discipline. She would be given an insatiable desire for fulfillment by the man. The word “desire” in the Hebrew is “teshukah.” The word means “longing.” It means an overpowering craving for a thing, something that she just fantastically deeply craves. It’s something that she cannot satisfy. It comes from another Hebrew word, “shuk.” “Shuk” means “to run after.” “Teshukah” comes from “shuk.” It means “a desire that causes her to run after” the man.

Have you ever known any girls who run after boys? That is no accident. Have you noticed how rather universally girls run after boys? When we run summer camp, one of the things I have to caution our young teenage staff about is that girls the “teshukah” quality. They usually smile at me and they don’t take it seriously until they’ve been on for one season, and then they come back and they shake their head and they say, “Boy, when those girls get here, they’re really wild.” But I tell them how girls tend to chase, and they have to keep a certain dignity and reserve at arm’s length, because they might be tempted to think that there’s something more to the approach than there really is.

This is where it came from. This was instilled as a judgment upon a woman that she would have a desire for a man. As a matter of fact, this word means a compulsion bordering on a disease. It is something (to which) you just really can’t say, “I’m going to stop it.” So don’t go home and tell your girl not to be boy crazy. Instead, explain to her her waves of libido and give her enough doctrine so that she knows how to ride the waves and keep things under control until she is old enough to start dating and making expressions in reaching out and having this fulfillment realized. It refers to a longing in her soul, first, that then finds physical fulfillment.

The woman has violated her place as responder when she assumed the role of aggressor in Eden. God’s pattern is that women are responders. They are made to be responders. They are not made to dominate over a man. They are not made to fill the role of aggressor. But men are to be aggressors. They are to be aggressive toward the woman. But this drive was perpetuated into the human race through Eve. It is to be a drive which is directed, it says, “thy desire shall be to thy husband.” This is to be focused upon a particular man who was designed by God to particularly fulfill that particular woman. Man is given the leadership. He is the aggressor.

“He shall rule over thee,” is the final phrase in Genesis 3:16 to declare what his relationship is going to be. The desire that only the woman’s right man can fulfill keeps her in a subordinate role. And the “rule” means that the husband is going to be responsible to initiate love, care, protection, and everything necessary to draw her response. So, if a woman’s responses are not there, it is because he has not been the aggressor, in the spiritual sense of initiating and drawing forth from her that which God placed to begin with—a desire to be fulfilled by her particular man. The Bible condemns, therefore, for women to be leaders, or to be authorities over men, mainly because it destroys their femininity.

So, a woman must be careful not to respond to a false aggressor. This is the trouble that every girl faces. The world is full of false aggressors, people who are not her right man. So, with other men, there can be no soul attachment possible, so she will never experience fulfillment if she enters marriage with the wrong man. This is a grave hazard for teenage girls who will respond to this drive unless they are given some proper direction.

It is a very grave hazard for woman who has moved up into her later 20s and begins to get nervous that she’s never going to be pursued. This again calls for the practice of faith rest, because she’s wrong. God, in His plan, did not make a mistake. In time, she will be pursued for the fulfillment that he has for her. If he has celibacy for her, then that will be her particular right man and that will be her fulfillment in her service.

And this is especially hazardous for a woman who has recently been divorced. This drive gets more women who have been divorced in trouble than anything else. Anybody who has experienced the tragedy of divorce should never date for a year. They should spend their time in the meantime finding enough doctrine to put into your soul to get you oriented in your thinking. The worst thing someone who has been divorced can do, the most insane thing you can do is to date. I have case history after case history where people have been in that position, and I’ve said, “OK, you’re in a bad spot. The divorce is out of line with God’s plan. You think you have entered a better plan, a more perfect plan. But you have entered a worse one, unless you had legitimate ground,” which in most cases, scriptural ground they did not have.

You’ve entered a worse case and what will happen now, if you do not very carefully take yourself and say, “Now I’m going to get stabilized with God.” So, I caution these people not to date, and I’ve seen them go both ways. Some said, “OK,” and they stayed off the dating bit and they got squared away. Others went right into dating, and they were no sooner into dating than they were in mating, because there is this “teshukah” quality in a woman. If she is stupid, she will never grasp this, and she will forever get herself into trouble.

Now do your best to alert your daughter that this quality is in her. Explain it to her. Fill it out from Scripture. Show her where it came from, and show her that it is a great thing. When a woman gets with her right man, then she can play very legitimately toward him a certain role of aggressor—not in dominating and ruling, but in her fulfillment toward him, she can pursue with an aggression that which she draws back out of him in fulfillment of the desire that God has placed in her.

As a matter of fact, this is the very word that Song of Solomon 7:10 uses of the man. It speaks about the man having the “teshukah” quality, where she says, “I am my beloved’s, and his desire is toward me.” This is the very same word “teshukah,” which “is toward me.” He too has a desire and a physical desire for his right woman. But it comes, not because she plays aggressor, but because first he plays aggressor, she plays responder, their signals lock on each other, and then she is free to reach toward him because he is her beloved, and his desire is drawn toward her. But she is born with this compulsion to seek this fulfillment.

The love of a particular man for his particular woman then turns this discipline of this desire into blessing. She finds fulfillment for her soul and fulfillment for her body, but she has to be careful not to respond to the wrong aggressor.

Dr. John E. Danish

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