The second word we will be looking at is “Eve,” one letter longer than last week’s. We might think this is merely the woman’s name in the garden of Eden. Adam is Hebrew for man. Ishshah is Hebrew for woman, which is the name the man gives the woman after seeing her for the first time. He says, “For she shall be called Woman (Ishshah)” (Gen 2:23). We all know what happens in chapter three. Chapter three is the fall, where the man and the woman eat the forbidden fruit. They rebel against God. Last week we looked at God’s promise of the Gospel found in Genesis 3:15, but we look at Adam’s response to God’s promise/curse this week.

Following Genesis 3:15, God turns to the man and the woman and pronounces the curse of their sin. The woman is told she will have pain during childbirth and that her desire shall be contrary to her husband. The man is told he will have pain every day, labor, and toil for food. His hands will have to suffer from thorns and thistles. He is told he has to eat plants from the field (evidence that salad results from the fall). Man will have sweat on his face. The final words God says to Adam are “till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” (Genesis 3:19). His life will be one of toil and suffering until, in the end, he will return to the ground he labored to survive. Death, as God had promised. “For the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die” (Gen 2:17).

God’s curse speaks of pain, struggle, and death. Yet in the next verse, we find the small word with enormous implications. A word that encapsulates faith, “Eve.” This word means “life,” to be “alive.” God had pronounced death, yet Adam’s response is “life.” Adam turns not to the curse but to the promise of the Gospel that we looked at last week, the woman’s offspring that would crush the head of the serpent. Adam lives by faith, knowing that Eve’s offspring would defeat the serpent. Through Adam comes death, but through Eve’s offspring comes life. 1 John 5:11 summarizes this truth beautifully, “God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.”

Small Words, Big Meaning looks at one small word of Scripture each week. Read the whole series.