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Darkness Precedes the Dawn
Through the long centuries, from the day our first parents lost
their Eden home to the time the Son of God appeared as the Savior,
the hope of the fallen race centered in the coming of a Deliverer to
free men and women from the slavery of sin and the grave.
Adam and Eve first received hope in Eden when the Lord de-
clared to Satan, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and
between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you
shall bruise His heel.”
Genesis 3:15
. As the guilty pair listened, hope
filled their hearts, for they saw in this a promise of deliverance from
ruin. They did not have to yield to despair. With His own blood the
Son of God would atone for their transgression. Through faith in
the power of Christ to save, they could become the children of God
once more.
By turning our first parents from obedience, Satan became “the
god of this world.”
2 Corinthians 4:4
, NRSV. But the Son of God
proposed not only to redeem the human race but to recover the
dominion they had lost. “O Tower of the flock, ... to You shall it
come, even the former dominion.”
Micah 4:8
.
This hope of redemption has never become extinct. From the
beginning there have been some whose faith has reached out beyond
the present to the future—Adam, Seth, Enoch, Methuselah, Noah,
Shem, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Through these the Lord has
preserved His revealed will. To the chosen people through whom the
promised Messiah would come, God gave a knowledge of salvation
to be provided through the atoning sacrifice of His beloved Son.
At the call of Abraham God promised, and later repeated, “In
you all families of the earth shall be blessed.”
Genesis 12:3
. The
Sun of Righteousness illuminated Abraham’s heart, scattering his
darkness. When the Savior Himself walked the earth, He spoke of
the patriarch’s hope: “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day,
and he saw it and was glad.”
John 8:56
.
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