Christ in the Old Testament

Genesis 3:15 – Jesus will crush Satan

And I will put enmity
between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
he will crush your head,
and you will strike his heel. (NIV)

Today’s Reading: Genesis 3:1-5, Hebrews 2:14-18, 1 John 3:1-10, John 1:1-5

I like starting the day with a powerful scripture like this one. Remember from yesterday that God is speaking to the serpent Satan after Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden fruit. The serpent tempted Eve into disobeying God introducing the first sin into the world. This would be Satan’s primary role in all of our lives – to tempt us to serve ourselves instead of God.

Our verse today says that the offspring of the woman will crush Satan’s head and Satan will strike his heel. From all accounts, this is the first reference God makes concerning the death of Jesus. These words of Genesis have been considered as the “protoevangelium”, that is, as the first announcement of the Messiah the Redeemer. Satan would deal a potentially fatal blow to the Messiah but would ultimately be defeated by the Messiah.

Satan did indeed strike the heel of Jesus but it wasn’t a fatal blow. Yes Jesus was crucified and Satan played a large role in that process. But when Jesus rose from the dead he crushed Satan’s head. In Hebrews we read that “by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil— and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.”

When Jesus rose from the grave proving that he was indeed the Son of God, his death set us free dealing the crushing blow to Satan. Satan has lost his power over us because we should no longer fear death for in Christ we are guaranteed eternity with him. Fear and in particular, fear of death can keep us from serving God to our full potential.

Jesus was the perfect sacrifice for our sins and the writer of Hebrews tells us that set us free from our slavery to death and sin. John tells us in 1 John 3 that Jesus came to destroy the devil’s work. And as a result, we are free to live in obedience to God and not be afraid of death. And lastly, John 1 says, “In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.” Jesus brought us eternal life.

Have you ever been afraid? I think we all have had those moments. But some of those moments stick with you because you were exceptionally afraid. Were you afraid of the dark as kid? Or maybe you did something really wrong and your mom said that Dad would deal with you when he got home? Or you wrecked your parents car and you had to make that phone call? Or as an adult you make a big mistake and you had to meet with the boss? Or you were told you have cancer?

In those moments when you were most afraid, you might describe that moment as a paralyzing fear. You just recall being frozen in your tracks. Fear is paralyzing but Jesus came so that we could live life to its fullest. Jesus frees us from the fears of this world so we can do our best work. We are free to take risks and follow Jesus with all of our heart because Jesus crushed Satan’s head and conquered death.

Today’s Prayer: Pray that fear loses its grip on you. What keeps you up at night? What is your biggest fear? Is it holding you back from living life to its fullest? Pray that God will help remove that fear so that you can follow him more completely.