She’s Not Man Made!
Genesis 2:18-25
We live in a world with billions of people.
But yet we live in a world where millions of people are lonely.
We live close to hundreds and thousands of people,
but yet more people are lonely today than ever before.
People join clubs and organizations where they can be close to people, but still many feel lonely.
Loneliness is like a piano without keys,
Like a violin without strings.
Like a sanctuary without a congregation
Or a choir where no one sings.
Loneliness is like a blade of grass
Growing through a crack of cement.
Loneliness is like a camp ground
Without a single tent.
Loneliness is like a mocking bird
That cannot sing a song.
Loneliness is a feeling
That one does not belong.
Like a pansy in a corn field
Hidden where no one can see.
I know all there is to know about loneliness
Because it lives inside of me. (Copied)
God is aware of the problem.
In fact, He dealt with the problem at the very beginning.
That is why God fashioned a woman in the Garden of Eden.
I. The Need For Community!
Look at the record of creation in Genesis.
We notice that when God finished each day of Creation, He stated that it was good.
Everything God created during those six days, God said was good.
In fact, on the sixth day, when God surveyed all that He had created
He pronounced that it was VERY GOOD!
What a sparkle there must have been in the eyes of God as He looked upon the magnificent beauty of His wondrous creation.
But then in Genesis 2:18 we notice that God says that something is NOT GOOD!
Here in the midst of His glorious creation, God finds a problem.
No, it’s not a problem of sin, it’s a problem of loneliness.
God said that it was not good that man should be alone.
But how could man be alone?
When Adam first opened his eyes, following his creation by the hand of God,
wasn’t God right there with him?
Yes!
Didn’t Adam have an intimate relationship with God in the Garden of Eden?
Yes!
According to Genesis 3:8, God often walked with Adam in the early evenings through the garden.
Then how could Adam be alone?
There is a profound reality about God that we should note at this point.
God Himself exists as a community, as a trinity of Persons:
Father, Son, and Spirit.
And God has, from all eternity past,
and will, for all eternity future,
exist in a perfect relationship of love within the trinity.
It’s within the community of the Trinity,
that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,
who all perfectly correspond to each other,
who are all equal with one another,
find the love and the companionship that they need.
Here there is no loneliness.
It’s a perfect relationship,
which meets all their needs,
all their wants,
all their desires.
Now, God looked upon man and realized that Man needed that same community.
Man needed someone like himself.
Someone he could share his life with.
Someone that he could love, that he could have an intimate relationship with.
So God said in Genesis 2:18 that He would make “a helper suitable for him.”
That is, God would make someone that corresponds to him.
The term “helper” in the Hebrew has often been misapplied and misunderstood.
It’s been taught that the woman God made for man,
was to be some sort of junior partner,
an apprentice, a gofer.
The glorious man would accomplish great deeds.
But he would need someone to assist him occasionally, that was the woman.
And so historically women have been given limited roles in society.
But the Hebrew word that is translated “helper” doesn’t mean anything like that.
In fact, the word is most often used in the Old Testament about God Himself, as the helper of Israel.
And in the case of God, the helper is far greater than the ones being helped.
The word “suitable” means “corresponding to or matching.”
God is saying here in Genesis 2:18, that He will make a partner corresponding to the man.
That’s why verse 23 is so important.
Like the day of his own creation,
the man opens his eyes to look upon a very extraordinary being,
one that was like himself.
Someone that corresponded to him. as no other being could.
II Preparing for Community!
Now, it’s interesting that verse 21 doesn’t follow immediately after verse 18.
God said in verse 18 that is wasn’t good for the man to be alone.
So why didn’t God immediately put him to sleep and make woman?
Why did God first bring a parade of animals to the man?
One thing we need to realize, is that in the days of the Bible,
to name something was to understand it.
Once you understood it, you named it accordingly.
That’s why many people in the Bible, when something significant happened to them,
their name was often changed to reflect that event.
So for Adam to have named these animals, would have meant that he studied them, so he could name them appropriately.
How long that took, we really don’t know.
But it would have taken some time.
Time enough for Adam to realize that he was alone.
Here in the animal kingdom he would have seen the animals in pairs, but for him there was no one.
Here there was no companion for him.
God was helping him to understand his need for companionship.
God was preparing Adam.
Helping him to see his need for, and to appreciate, the gift that God was going to give to him.
Something else that is curious here, is the way in which the woman was created.
Why is Adam put to sleep?
Why is she made from his rib?
First: we need to notice that the man doesn’t participate in the woman’s creation.
Adam doesn’t make any suggestions about how she should look.
God and God alone makes her perfect, just as He did Adam.
Second: we also notice that the woman saw God before she saw anything else.
He created her and when she opened her eyes the first thing she saw was God.
Like Adam, she had a personal relationship with God.
Verse 22 says that “God brought the woman to the man.”
Third: we can’t help but notice that God used one of Adam’s ribs to made the woman.
Actually, the word is better translated “side.”
We are going to talk more about this on Wednesday evening,
And you will be amazed at how the creation of Eve is a beautiful picture of the
Sacrificial death of Christ on the cross and our redemption.
Why did God use Adam’s side to make Eve?
The side is at the center of the body.
Women weren’t made to be specialists.
That is, they were not made from a hand to fashion things.
They weren’t made from a foot to be a go-for.
They weren’t made from an eye just for seeing or an ear just for hearing.
They were made from the center of the body.
She was to be just like the man, to be as connected to all of life as he was.
Just think of that wonderful moment, when Adam opened his eyes and looked for the first time on woman.
Verse 23 says, “The man said, ‘This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman’ for she was taken out of man.’”
Adam was overcome with joy.
He was thrilled at what he saw before him.
She was God’s gift and what a wonderful gift indeed.
She was God’s answer to Adam’s need.
Now Adam could more fully experience the joy and happiness of God’s love,
as the two of them shared that love with one another.
Now Adam could more fully experience the intimacy of the love of God,
as they shared the intimacies of life together.
Now Adam’s life was complete, as God had met his need for companionship, for community, in Eve.
Conclusion:
We all need companionship and God has met that need by making us male and female.
Just as the God Head would not be complete without the Son, or without the Holy Spirit.
Man is not complete without woman and woman is not complete without man.
And even though our world today is trying to convince us that there is no difference between men and women, we realize there is a difference.
Just like the Father is different from the Son,
and the Son is different from the Holy Spirit,
but yet they are one and the same.
They are one, they are the same, they are God, but yet they are different.
It’s that oneness that makes the God-Head complete.
So it is with men and women.
We are the same, but yet we are different.
Men and women are alike in many way, but we are also different in many ways.
And it’s when we combine those differences that we become complete.
It’s like the character Jerry in the movie Jerry McGuire.
When he was trying to win back his wife, he looked at her and said, “You complete me!”
And that is exactly right.
Yes, I realize that we find our ultimate completeness in Jesus Christ, as we made Him Lord of life.
But in a very real and special way,
a man and a woman find a sense of completeness in one another
that can not be found in any other relationship.
A man can not find that completeness, that joy, that happiness, that intimacy
in his career,
in his hobbies,
in his money,
in his children,
or in another man.
A woman can not find that completeness, that joy, that happiness, that intimacy
in her career,
in her hobbies,
in her children,
or in another woman.
It can only be found in a man and a woman coming together as husband and wife.
That’s why Adam said what he did in verse 24: “and they became one flesh.”
Did their bodies melt together into one body? NO!
But they did become one, in that they found completeness in each other.
God meet Adam’s need when He made Eve.
Adam was no longer alone.
And in meeting Adam’s need in making woman,
God has provided for all of us the opportunity
to experience a taste of the love, joy, happiness, and intimacy
that is shared by the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Now Adam and Eve were complete.
They had a wonderful relationship with God and with one another.
All was perfect, all was complete.
Just as God intended.
But we all realize that it didn’t last.
Sin reared its ugly head and before we know it, their relationship with God was destroyed.
And that wonderful relationship between man and woman,
more often than not, has became anything but loving.
And from that time till now,
men and women have tried to find that completeness,
that fulness, that real joy and happiness
that they know should be a part of their life, but isn’t.
They have tried to find a way to deal with the loneliness of life.
But have failed time and time again.
All because they have been looking in the wrong place.
You see, if we are to rediscover the completeness that Adam and Eve knew.
Then we first of all, have to have what they had.
And I am not talking about having a spouse.
No!
Before they found completeness in one another.
They first experienced a oneness with the Father!
If we are to find the joy, the happiness, the intimacy,
the completeness that we have been talking about this morning.
Then we have to realize that it begins with making Jesus Christ the Lord of our life.
And in Jesus Christ, experiencing the Love of the Father.
For as we make Jesus Lord, He shares with us a very special gift, the Holy Spirit.
God comes to live within us and we are no longer alone.
We come to know His love, compassion, joy and happiness.
As we grow in this intimate relationship with God.
And God brings us into a loving family, the Church.
Where we can experience a oneness in Christ.
Where we are a part of a loving community.
Where we can once again discover the intimacy of the husband wife relationship.
No longer is there a sense of loneliness, now there is oneness in Christ.
God gave Eve to Adam, who completed him.
God had given us a Savior and a Church to save us and to complete us.