Lower Than

DEVOTION

GENESIS

LOWER THAN

Gen 3:14-15

14 So the LORD God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this,

"Cursed are you above all the livestock and all the wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. 15 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

Are we really talking about a serpent such as a snake, which crawls on the ground? First of all we have to know snakes do not eat dust, so is this phraseology symbolic or actual fact. Did snakes talk? Did Satan employ an upright form that appears much like the snake of today to tempt the woman? Is Satan now in the form of a snake because this is the curse God put on him? It is doubtful any reptilian form has anything to do with any of this at all. What we do notice is although the man blamed the woman, and the woman blamed the serpent, that old serpent, the devil had no one to blame but himself. God did not even ask him what he did or why he did it. This gives us a very up close and personal view of the nature of Satan. His only purpose is to engage revenge on God. He only wants to destroy the relationship between God and his creation. Without asking him why, because God knew why, and did not need Satan to either admit or try to pass on the blame, God passed his judgement on him. What form he took on has no real bearing to the truth revealed here for us. But what we could observe is that Satan, who was once Lucifer, one of the greatest of all the angels, more beautiful than all the other angels, is now condemned to be not only lower than man, but lower than any of the livestock and the wild kingdom. Once he had a rightful place in heaven in the presence of God and now he is considered lower than any of the animals God created. What we also note in this curse is that God told Satan that the seed of the woman would crush his head. It is interesting God did not say anything about the seed of the man and the woman, as in their children. He made note it was the seed of the woman, the offspring of a woman without any reference to a man. This can only mean Mary, the virgin whom the Holy Spirit came upon and she gave birth to the Son of God. Jesus is the one who crushed the head of Satan. We are reminded of an older song written by Bob Dylan in which he sings that we have to serve somebody, we are either going to serve God or serve Satan, but we have to serve somebody. There is some truth in those words. Unless a person comes to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, admitting their sinful state, repenting of such, asking forgiveness of sin and accepting Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, they are in fact serving Satan. This is told to us by none other than Jesus when he was commissioning Paul.

Acts 26:17-18

17 I will rescue you from your own people and from the Gentiles. I am sending you to them 18 to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.'

NIV

 Jesus is the only way to overpower the influence of Satan in our lives.  Satan will always be about being at war with humanity because we are the creation of God and he does not want us to have the eternal life God intended us to have from the very beginning. Satan did in fact strike the heal of Jesus getting him crucified, but that was the purpose for which he came, so Satan loses even in his efforts to win. What we learn here is not to pay any attention to the prince of lies, the liar of all liars. Knowing evil does not make us as wise as God. Knowing the difference between good and evil does not make us like God. He has lied from the beginning and he will always lie. He is incapable of telling the truth. Why would we give him any of our attention? There will always be enmity between us. We have nothing in common with this snake of a being, the lowest of beings which hisses at us. When Jesus told us his grace was sufficient, he was saying that his divine influence upon our lives and how that is reflected in the world is enough. We do not need all the things, the lies that Satan attempts to get us to be an influence in our lives. We do not need the influence of Satan, someone who is lower than all the livestock, lower than a cow, a pig or a sheep, lower than any of the wild beasts, such as a hyena or even a worm. We need the influence of the Son of God if we are going to be pleasing in the sight of God. We will serve somebody, and we choose to serve God rather than someone who is "lower than".