Journeying in Genesis: Don’t Follow the Cursed

“The LORD God said to the serpent,

‘Because you have done this,

cursed are you above all livestock

and above all beasts of the field;

on your belly you shall go,

and dust you shall eat

all the days of your life.’”

Genesis 3:14

God didn’t ask the serpent questions. Satan is the son of destruction. His judgment is sure. Let’s learn from what God says to the serpent.

First, he is cursed above all. Proverbs 26:2b says, “…a curse that is causeless does not alight.” When God curses, it is right and it indeed alights. Following Satan is for fools.

Then God says, on his belly he shall go. When we think of a serpent, we certainly picture a creature that has no legs and travels quite splendidly on its stomach. This provides a  spiritual analogy as it travels as low as one can go. Satan wants mankind traveling that same way. Proverbs 30:18-19 mentions things too wonderful and hard to understand. One is the way of a serpent on a rock. It is stunning how they move when visible. It is frightening how they can slither through the grass unseen. Lord, give us eyes to see.

And finally, dust he shall eat all his days. In nature, snakes eat things other than dust. But spiritually speaking, there will be no consuming heavenly or eternal things, just a filling with things of this world which are temporary and cannot satisfy.

How blessed we are that God warns us to resist the enemy, and be aware of his strategies and destiny! As sinners we deserved the same demise. Yet in Christ, we are freed from the curse, lifted to live uprightly, and blessed to feast on those things that provide eternal satisfaction. What a God!