saved through childbearing if they continue in faith, love, and holiness with
propriety.”
Did this
verse ever hit you the wrong way? Make some question spin around in your head?
Why does this verse make is sound like women will only be saved through child
birth. What about the women that die not being old enough to have a child? What
about the women that just cant have any children? And clearly it contradicts
the rest of the Bible saying that something other then Jesus can make you
“saved”. This verse is a good example of one of the reasons why relying on
English translations isn’t always the best. There is a lot about the culture
and language of the bible that I never understood; still don’t really
understand. While I was in Israel, I got the wonderful opportunity of studying
a little Hebrew and studying about culture according to the Bible. One of my
favorite things I learned was having to do with this verse.
In the
Greek, this verse is translated to “The child birth”, which would lead me to
believe it is talking about “The child birth” of Jesus Christ. Women are saved
through The child birth of all child births. God revenges her through “the
ultimate revenge”. Satan deceived the woman in the garden back in Genesis, so
he’s up one on her. However, the woman is brought back up by bearing The child,
Jesus Christ. Jesus grows up, redeems the world through His blood, and bruises
His heel crushing satan’s head in the gates of hell!
between your offspring and hers; He will crush your head, and you will strike
His heel.”
A couple
days after we had this teaching, a few of us were discussing this lesson. We
were discussing it as we were riding in
a bus on our way to tour Nazareth. We got to the church that is now on the spot
where Mary was first visited by the angel telling her of her future child (Luke
1:26-38). As soon as we entered
courtyard in front of the church I saw a statue. The statue was of Mary, and at
first you wouldn’t notice anything else. Taking a second look, however, I
noticed that Mary’s heel was literally crushing the serpent’s head! We came to
this statue seriously minutes after talking about it on the bus.
… just another
instance of God being “ironic”.
