Genesis chapter one. Genesis chapter one. We've been reading at verse twenty six. And God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness. And let them, now that was a strange word, let them, he's speaking in the plural, but he's talking Adam, let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air and over the cattle and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creepers upon the earth. So God created man. In his own image, in the image of God, created he, him, male and female, created he, them. There's the prayer again. Because God sees Eve in Adam. Verse twenty-eight, and God blessed them. There they are again. And God said unto them, Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth, and subdue it. have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. We've come to the sixth and seventh day of our studies in Genesis. We've spoken on the other days, the first day, but when God created light, second day when it created the atmosphere, dividing the waters from above, from that which was below. Then the third day the land appeared, speaking of the resurrection. The fourth day our attention was drawn to the sun, the moon, and the stars. The fifth day the abundance of life in the seas and in the air, the appearance of grass, flowers, fruit trees, and so on. Then you come to the sixth chapter where you have man, God creating man in his own likeness. We'll be saying something about the day of rest, which follows the seventh day. But there are a few things I'd like to point out before we get into God's rest, and that is the creation of Eve. We spoke last week of the creation of Adam. Now, we can't stop there. And so God tells us something about the creation of Adam and of Eve. You'll find it in chapter two. And so in verse seven, he tells us how he did create Adam on the sixth day. And this is what it says, And the Lord God, poor man, of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, a man became a living soul. That's what God did on the sixth day. And then when it comes to Eve, he tells us how Eve came into existence in verse twenty-one. And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept. And he took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh instead thereof. And the rib which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man. And Adam said, This is now bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh, She shall be called woman because she was taken out of man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh. They were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed. Sin had not entered to spoil that holy purity. And so you have Eve. Now, Eve was a fantastic character, very unique. You have a lot of things to say about Eve. You know, when you start to think to what God tells us about his creation of Adam and Eve, it certainly must cause those theistic evolutionists a severe headache. those who claim that we evolved from a little slime on a little pool millions and millions of years ago, but here God is giving us the beginning of man, and certainly he needed both man and woman. He spoke about how the animals were created and how the birds of the air and they all had their mate, male and female. Adam is created, but there's no mate for Adam. How is God going to multiply and fill the earth with human beings without a mate for Adam? And that's where Eve comes in. Going back to these portions, these scriptures we've read, some of these evolutionists, I suppose, and even atheists wouldn't dare say the Lord Jesus Christ was a liar, and yet there are five New Testament references to what I have read, showing that the Lord Jesus Christ put his imprimatur, his signature, to what we read in Genesis. Over in Matthew nineteen thirty-six, and I want to mention and read it to you, Christ says the Pharisees also came unto him, tempting him and saying unto him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause? And he answered and said unto them, Ye have heard, or have ye not read, that in the beginning which was made, he then, in the beginning, God made them male and female, and said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave unto his wife, They train shall be one flesh. Wherefore they are no more trained, but one flesh what therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder. Now, the Lord Jesus refers to this, and there are five texts in the New Testament about how God created Adam and Eve, and what his purpose and intention was. And if evolution is to be accepted, just throw away your New Testament and make the Lord Jesus Christ a liar. Because he makes it very plain that what you read in Genesis chapter six about the creation of Adam and Eve was from God, and you cannot deny. How wonderful the word of God is. You'll notice how Adam came into existence, or Mother Eve came into existence. God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam. Well, doctors today put people to sleep before they operate. God is putting, and he did, put Adam to sleep. And he performed an amazing operation. He took a rib. out of Adam's side. He didn't take what he was going to make woman of out of Adam's head for her to dominate the man. He did not take anything out of Adam's feet for the woman to tread upon men. He took the rib out of Adam's side, under his arm, to be Adam's equal and for him to love and to protect. I was surprised this week to find something, and you'd be surprised to know who wrote these words. It was Abraham Lincoln. At the age of seventeen, he wrote these words and put a tune to them and sang it at his sister's wedding. The woman was not taken from Adam's feet, we see. So we must not abuse her. The meaning seems to be. The woman was not taken from Adam's head, we know, to show she must not rule him. Tis evidently so. The woman she was taken from under Adam's arms. so she must be protected from injuries and harm. How lovely that is. And so God created the woman by taking a rib out of Adam's side. How amazing to think of that operation that God himself performed. I want to say this, but what happened to Adam and Eve is true of the church. Adam had a wounded sight, and the church owes her existence to another wounded sight. The second Adam, the Lord from heaven, yes, we owe our very existence, as Eve owed her existence to Adam and a wound in his side. So the church owes her existence today to our Lord Jesus Christ. That's an amazing thing. There's this difference. God didn't put the Lord Jesus Christ to sleep. They tried to give him an opiate to kill the pain. He refused them. The Lord Jesus Christ was wide awake. He felt every pain. He suffered. And he felt it all. And if you want to know some of it, you find in Isaiah fifty-five, he was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. He was chastised with a view to our having peace. And with his strength, we are healed. The Lord Jesus Christ suffered. But he bled and he died, and the soldier plunged a spear into his side, and there came the root blood and water. That was essential for there to be a church, a bride for Christ. How wonderful! As Eve owed her existence to Adam's wounded son, We owe our existence to our Savior's wounded sight. We came from His heart. When you think of this, how wonderful God's Word is. Did Adam desire a companion? You think he would have desired one. He saw all the birds and the beasts. They have their mates, male and female. Did Adam think, well, I'd like to have a mate? We don't know. But we know that God designed that he should. How could there be a human race unless there was male and female? And so God created Adam and also gave him a wife. You know, it's very interesting to think about this. God did not breathe into Eve's body, life he did to Adam. God breathed into Adam the breath of life, and he became a living soul. God did not do that to Eve. Where did Eve get her life from? From Adam. From part of Adam. A part of Adam that rib was alive, and Eve was made out of that which was alive. And the church owes her existence to the life of Christ. We are part of him. Does the New Testament not tell you that in Ephesians five, thirty? We are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. And so the Church is part of Jesus Christ. We are members of His body. This is where the Church gets her life through Jesus Christ. And you can't get it anywhere else. You can't get spiritual life by being good, joining the Church, and living a righteous life as some people think. you only get spiritual life through Christ. And when you accept Him as your Savior, you become part of Him, and He becomes part of you. We are the partakers of a divine nature, the Bible says. How wonderful this is. Then again, it was through the seed of the woman. But Christ came into the work. There couldn't have been a Savior. Through the seed of the woman, and the Bible makes it plain, it was Christ God has in mind. And thus through Eve a Savior came. The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head, and that was true. the seed of the woman Christ did brew, Satan. I'm going to say more about that in a week or two. How marvelous God's Word is. And so you have Eve. You know she was a woman of firsts. She's the first woman to be alive and to be on the face of this earth. Eve is the first woman She never was a child. She was never a little girl. No. She was not a daughter. She was created or made an adult. So was Adam. All the animals that we were reading about God creating and the birds didn't come from eggs. God didn't start with little ones. They were created adults. And God immediately told them, now he says, populate, multiply. And Adam was created in the image of God. He was created an adult. And so was Eve. She was created an adult. And so Eve, she was not a child, nor was she a daughter. and she never was born. God just made her out of Adam. And Eve was the first woman to ever be called a wife. What a wife she was. Eve was the most beautiful woman the world ever saw. Some talk about Cleopatra. No. You know, Eve was created by a perfect God. She was a reflection of divine perfection, perfection. No artificial beauty here with Eve. She must have been a most beautiful woman. Her features, her face, her form came from a beautiful God. who creates all things perfect. That's why I have no sympathy for the idea that God created the earth as is given us in verse two. As for God, his way is perfect. And my what a lovely woman Eve must have been. When Adam awakened out of that sleep, What did he see? He saw Eve. My, how wonderful. And this is what he said the moment he saw Eve. This is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. She shall be called woman because she was taken out of man. And Adam didn't complain and say, Lord, She's not as good-looking as I thought she should be. He was well satisfied. God never makes anything ugly. If there are ugly men and women in the world, sin did that. Eve was a beautiful woman. God created her. How marvelous. You read in the Bible about some beautiful women. Sarah was a lovely woman, a beautiful woman. So was Vashti. So was Rebecca. And so was Abigail. So was Esther. But the most beautiful of them all was Eve. She was a first in that she was without sin. Eve had no inherent fall nature. She was without sin, fresh from the hand of God, holy and pure. You know, that's the pattern God has left up till now. God wants marriages to be as much like this one as possible. We know sin came into the world and ruined the human race. This was the first wedding, and what a lovely wedding it was. God, Adam, Eve, just three. We know of no attendant. I don't know that angels attend or not. There might have been a giraffe with a long neck looking over to see what's going on. Maybe some other animals were around there, birds. But the only ones we read about being there when Adam and Eve were joined together was God. Isn't it nice when God attends a wedding and is happy? He's delighted to see one, not those creatures only, but one of his children, marrying another one of his children. Both say, both knowing Christ, are both living for Christ, their mortal being, each for the other, and both for the Lord. How marvelous. All this is, let a man leave his mother and father and cleave unto his wife. That's what's said right in Genesis. It's said three or four times in the New Testament. The one who does the leaving is the one who does the cleaving. Did you get that? Who did the leaving? The Lord Jesus. He left heaven's glory. He came into this world to win his bride, and he's the one that does the cleaving. I'm glad my living as a Christian doesn't depend upon my cleaving hanging on to the Lord. I'm glad he hangs on to me. The one that does the leaving is the one that does the cleaving. And the Bible makes that plain in Jude. Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy. I thought of this the other day when I saw all the snow up in Canada and other places in the north of the United States. Father and Son started out one day for a walk. It was kind of slippery. And Father said, Son, let me have your hand. No, Daddy, I'll hold your hand. He thought he had as good a grip as his daddy anyway. And so the father's okay. And he took the father's hand, they hadn't gone far, and before they hit a piece of ice. And naturally he let go his father's hand, and he went down. It was a bad one. But the little father hadn't learned this lesson yet. Father said, I told you. Then let me hold it. No, Daddy, I'm going to hold your hand. So he held his father's hand and he went down this time and he heard himself in the right place. When he got up he said, Daddy, you hold my hand. If you're a Christian or you're trying to hang on to the Lord, you better, after a couple of experiences of faith, Lord, you hold my hand. The one that does the leaving is the one that does the cleave. It's nice. He has a whole of me, not me dependent upon hanging on to him. Here you have God's first. And now we've come to the first of chapter two. In other words, we have seen God's work in six days, creative days. He looked over that fair scene, sinless. perfect. How wonderful, filled with light, life, love and order. No sorrow, no suffering, no tears, no death. Nothing to mar that lovely scene. And over it all, he looks at Adam and he commits the dominion of that lovely earth to them. God is so pleased as he looks at that lovely scene. Adam and Eve reigning over the earth he had created. And that's where our first verse of chapter two comes in. Let us read it. Thus the heavens and the earth were finished. And all the host of them. on the seventh day God rested seventh day from all his work which he had made and God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it because that in it he had rested from all his work which he had created and made here's the first rest Why would God need to rest after six days' work? It wasn't the rest from weariness or fatigue or overtax strength. No. Certainly it wasn't the rest of a defeated purpose. Why did God rest? He rested in his accomplishment, the completion and satisfaction of the work he had done during those six days. God rested. You'll notice there's no evening nor morning with the seventh day. Because God's rest is eternal. It has no beginning. It has no end. How marvelous. God blessed this day. There's no other day so designated as the seventh day god blessed it it wasn't called the sabbath he says the seventh day of course i know the word day was changed to the sabbath later on but god blessed that day and he sanctified it now today in certain circles the word sanctification means getting free from sin there's no sin here at all there was no sin the whole scene is full of holiness, and yet that day had to be sanctified. It gives the real meaning of sanctification in the Bible, set apart for divine use. And every Christian, when you're born again, you are sanctified. Not that you're getting rid of all sin, eradication of sin. You are set apart for divine use. God has set you apart in Christ. No mention in these verses we've just read of man resting. No. It doesn't say that Adam was told to rest. He wasn't commanded to rest. He didn't do any work. He didn't do any work. God was the one who did the work. And so here is God resting in complete satisfaction with all that he had to do. done. God rested. Yes, this was God's rest. But sad to say this rest was smashed by sin. But God brought in the flood and destroyed that wicked, godless generation of anteluvians. that blood was necessary because man broke that rest. But God had given. Now next week, Lord willing, we'll be speaking on Eden's garden. Now that doesn't come in the six days' work day. God didn't do any creating in the lovely garden of Eden. That doesn't mean to say when God rested, he ceased from all activity. For John five, seventeen tells us, and the Lord Jesus, as my father worketh hitherto, and I work. God vested in complete satisfaction with what he saw, of what he did. But God's been very active since then. I make no mistake about that. And this seventh day is not imposed upon the church or any Gentile. Not at all. Now, strangely, it may seem, twenty, nearly twenty-five years after this, you read about the Sabbath. Twenty-five years. And it's given in connection with twenty-five hundred years. And it's given in connection with the manna. God says, I'm going to give you enough manna on the sixth day so you won't get out and gather it on the seventh day, and when I give you a last over to the first day of the week, you've got the rest on the seventh. And the Sabbath day was not imposed with a warning of judgment if you're broken until the law was given, and it became one of the Ten Commandments. And I want to say something else. The law was never given to Gentiles. It has been never given to the church. It was given as a sign to Israel, the nation of the Jew. And the New Testament tells us the church is not obligated to keep the Sabbath day. Listen to this. And you read this over in Colossians two. Let no man therefore judge you in meat or in drink or in respect of a holy day, or of the new moons, or of the Sabbath days, which are a shadow of things to come. We are not resting in shadows, but substance, and that substance is Christ. You may ask the question, why, what day do we keep? The first day of the week. And that's the day the Lord Jesus Christ rose from the dead. The Lord Jesus was in the tomb on the Jewish Sabbath. But on the first day of the week, he arose a new beginning. We are not under law, we are under grace. And yet there are people today who believe and a lot of preachers preach that if you break the Sabbath day, you can lose your salvation. That's a lot of bunk. How do I know that we are not supposed to keep the Sabbath, old Jewish Sabbath, but the first day of the week? Christ broke the Sabbath repeatedly. during his earthly life, and that infuriated the Jews because he broke the Sabbath day. Furthermore, we observe the first day of the week because that's the day Christ rose from the dead. It's a new beginning. We're not under the law. We're under grace. How nice it is like today or yesterday. Some people keep yesterday as the sabbath or they look upon today as Sabbath but really yesterday was the old Jewish Sabbath and even today because of the centuries between now and then no one really knows whether this was the first day or yesterday was the Sabbath and those who believe in the Sabbath they have no evidence they just have to take the day before what we take because the Calendar has been so mixed up and messed up by popes and cardinals and emperors, but we do keep the first day of the week, the eighth day. This is a new beginning. This morning when we got up, this is the Lord's day, not the old Jewish Sabbath. And time and time again in the New Testament, the first day of the week is referred to for Christians to observe the first day of the week. That's the day Christ rose, and He has urged us to come together on the first day of the week to break bread. And the first day of the week when you come together, let every one of you lay by in store as God has prospered him. the first day of the week. Thus what we keep. There are some who stood, go back to the old Sabbath, and some even call today the Sabbath. No, friend, it is not the old Jewish Sabbath. This is the first day of the week, and this is what we keep. You know, it's very unusual when you think about the law. They had six days' work. Then they were supposed to rest. But now we get the rest first, the first day of the week. We get rest. Now he says you can work six days. On the grace we're created in Christ Jesus unto good works. You can't do a thing to please God until you first get rest. And that rest is in Christ. Now you have the creation rest. And I was struck this week, probably took this up a few months ago, Hebrews. In chapter four of Hebrews, you have rest referred to nine times. You have the rest of God in creation. That was broken. You have rest in Canaan. God told Israel he would drive out the inhabitants of the land. They could go in and take over, and that would be a time of rest. But they entered not in because of unbelief. And many years later, hundreds of years later, David speaks of another rest. Not the rest of God in creation, not the rest of the land of Canaan, but another rest. He was referring to the rest found in Jesus Christ. God was disappointed and angry when man broke that rest of creation. because he sent the flood. God was angry, and he spoke in his wrath when they broke the rest of Canaan. They enter not in because of unbelief. But his arrest, and if God was displeased and angry with man breaking, creation's rest and the rest of Canaan, how angry is he about those toward those who break the rest in Christ? They're rejecting Jesus Christ, and Christ rests, and it was after his work. Just like God rested after his. The Lord Jesus Christ, what a work he did. When he saw that all Scripture was now fulfilled, he said it is finished. He bowed his head and died. What a work he was doing on that cross for three light hours and three dark hours. He was working to obtain your salvation in mind. When his work was finished, he bowed his head down, the finished work of Christ. That's what God is resting in. God was angry with the others. But God is satisfied with what Jesus Christ did. They were typical of this rest, for this rest is eternal. Once you get it, it's yours forever. What a wonderful rest we have in Christ. Not in what I do. I don't trust when I owe it what I've done, preaching for over fifty years. That doesn't amount to a rule of pins. That doesn't contribute one odor to my salvation. I was just as much saved the night I got saved at the age of nineteen as I am now. All my life, labor, don't add one thing to my salvation. I rest in Christ for my salvation. This rest is eternal. It can never be broken like the other two were. This rest is eternal, resting in Jesus Christ. How wonderful this rest is. To the sinner, come unto me, all ye that labor are not heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Do you want rest this morning, sweet, holy rest? Undisturbed, untroubled, and unmerited and undeserved. Rest in Jesus Christ is a free gift. This rest is eternal. Unbroken and undisturbed rest. How wonderful this is. Christ said it is finished. He went back to heaven and he sat down on the right hand of God. He rested. There is no chair in the tabernacle or temple for the priest to sit down, but Jesus Christ is sitting at the right hand of the Father as works done, and he will never do it again. The results are eternal, but to those who are unsaved, the wicked are like the troubled sea where they cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt. There is no peace if my God to the wicked, Are you in a state of unrest? You have a right to be living in today's world with what's going on and what's coming. Is there any wonder so many people are committing suicide, so many are on? They're restless. Life is uncertain, unpredictable. But isn't it nice in the midst of this troubled world to have rest? that sweet, holy rest in the soul, the rest that Jesus Christ gives. With this I froze. One could speak of others. Rest, think of that dove that was released by Noah. And it flew all over, and he couldn't find a place. Now, the old raven, he found a place to rest on some floating carcass, and he could eat that stuff. But when God let out the dove. It found no rest for the soul of its feet. It returned to no one else. Friend, if you are a born-again Christian and the dove speaks of the Holy Spirit, you'll find no rest in this wicked, ungodly world. You can fly north, south, east, and west. You can go to Asia. You can go to the Middle East. You can go anywhere. You'll find no rest, sins everywhere. A man who had spent his life wandering, traveling, ended up in a lumber camp. And there he found Christ. And after he found Christ, he died. Beside his bed were these words written, like a bird on the deep, far away from its nest. I had wandered my Savior from thee, but thy dear loving voice called me home to thy breast, and I know there's a refuge for me. Do you know Jesus Christ? Are you resting in him? This is the pillow to rest your weary head on every night. This is the mattress to carry your whole weight. This is Jesus Christ. God's rest. God is satisfied. Christ is satisfied. I am satisfied as well. What about you? Shall we pray? Our Father in heaven, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, we thank thee for thy finished work, the finished work of thy Son, and the wonderful salvation, the wonderful eternal provision that was made in the work of Christ at Calvary. When he suffered and bled and died for poor lost weary sinners, he now lives at thy right hand to give daily peace and rest to those who will draw upon that mighty reservoir of rest found in a person our Lord Jesus Christ. save some precious soul this morning, and blessed by people, we ask, in our Savior's name. Amen. Shall we sing in closing that favorite hymn, Three Seven Three, just as I am, without one plea, but that thy blood was shed for me, and that thou bid'st me come to thee, O Lamb of God. I come. If you have trusted Christ this morning, or you'd like to be saved know something of this rest and we can help you try to take you in that room and show you how you can be saved will you come if we stand and sing three seven three God bless, I am with God, and I am with you. And I shall be with you.