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Meditations From a Branch: Genesis 3:20-21 Meaning & Commentary

Meditations From a Branch: Genesis 3:20-21 Meaning & Commentary

Lord’s Library contributor Jared Helms offers meditations from a branch, offering a Genesis 3:20-21 meaning with commentary. Check out Jared’s YouTube channel and two blogs: A Light in the Darkness and Blind Faith Examples, or send him a reader response email. Lord’s Library’s Ministry Leaders Series is a collection of contributed articles written by ministry leaders on key Christian topics.

Genesis 3:20-21: “And Adam called his wife’s name Eve; because she was the mother of all living. Unto Adam also and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins, and clothed them.”

The remarkable thing about Genesis 3:20 is that it exists. Adam did not die at the end of verse 19. He got to live on with the promise of future rescue from the disaster of his sin. It would appear he had this promise in mind when he named his wife. Adam and Eve had died spiritually that day, and they had begun to die physically. This threat of death was always with them now. Living had become a countdown to an inevitable end.

Genesis 3:20-21 Meaning

Only the promised seed and the wonderful work He would accomplish could give life now. Adam and Eve took hold of that promise right away. We still live in the reality our first parents created; we are still dead and dying in sin. What they look forward to as a promise, we look back on as a historical event. They would trust in what was to be; we trust in what has been and what is.

We have the great privilege of knowing the rest of the story and seeing that God’s very first promise, like all that follow, was yes and amen.

Ah, and God was not done lavishing mercy upon His wayward children, for He took it upon Himself to do what they had tried and failed to do, covering their shame. Beloved, God was not surprised by this disaster; He was fully prepared. He had an answer for it, and through the entire episode, He purposed to reveal Himself in ways hitherto impossible to the praise of His glorious grace. He provides for His children in the short term and eternally. Though we did not deserve it or even ask, grace abounded to the first sinners.

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Jared Helms

Jared received his Bachelor of Arts from Bryan College in 2012, and his Masters of Divinity from The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in 2017. He has pastored churches in Kentucky and Tennessee. Most importantly, Jared has walked with Christ most of his life. His interests extend from theology to church history, but he is particularly passionate about ecclesiology and homiletics.