15.3 Cruelty and Thorns
© 2016 Christ Revealed Bible Institute
The next two points of the curse go together as the mystery of iniquity as it works in power among humans on this earth.
Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you – …Cursed is the ground for your sake; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, and you shall eat the grass of the field. In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread (Genesis 3:16-19a).
This, like all other portions of the curse, operates at several levels of meaning at the same time. The first level is the literal. And yes, men abusing women and lording it over them is part of the curse; it is not part of Christ.
Hating Freedom
We are also looking here at two larger things: political power and economic scarcity.
There is a large question inside the study of political power and that is, why is it that millions of people will submit readily to the abusive rule of a handful of psychopaths? All those millions have to do is say, “No,” and tyranny ends, yet they not only refrain from saying, “No,” but actually support the psychopaths. The majority of humans hate freedom and want nothing to do with it. In their minds, freedom might be great for themselves, but NOT for their neighbors. Most (including Christians) want their neighbors curtailed.
The “Husband”
Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you. The goal of all cruelty is to win power over the woman.
Let me define the “woman” in the largest sense. The woman is that majority of people (app. 85%) who prefer to live their lives in peace and happiness, but who can be swayed one way or another by influential individuals. The other, approximately 15% are split in two, with half on the side of those who will not be ruled and will not rule over others and the other half those who will not be ruled but will always rule over others. The “husband” typically comes from that last small group.
The Cruelest
Take four men vying for power: one is the strongest, a second is the smartest, a third is the most popular, and the fourth is the most cruel. The first three will pause momentarily when things get nasty; the fourth never does. The first three will take a break now and then; the fourth never does. If everything else is equal, the cruelest will always win.
The founders of dynasties and what are called “great” houses throughout human history are always the most violent and the cruelest of all humans. Those most willing to end the hopes and dreams of more people for self-gain are those who become the “husband.”
A Libertarian Governance
Nebuchadnezzar pointed out, by the Spirit of the Lord, that God chooses the lowest of men to rule (Daniel 4:17). Yet God did NOT want such a rule over His chosen people, Israel, and tried His very best to establish a libertarian governance in which they could live free and prosperous. Israel refused because the curse, and not Christ, still filled their hearts. “Give us a king to judge us.”
God said to Samuel, “…they have rejected Me, that I should not reign over them” (1 Samuel 8:6-7). “God ruling” meant everyone walking in complete freedom inside the boundaries of respecting one another, that is, a libertarian governance.
The Beast
Read Samuel’s warning regarding political government in 1 Samuel 8:11-18. It is an exact description of the United States government today, in fact, of all human governments. We must understand the essence of modern political government today, however, for it is different than the violent ascension of the cruelest in times past.
But first, we must understand the beast of Revelation 13, for when God said, “Your husband,” He was referring directly to that beast, that is, in regards to our present experience. Now the beast which I saw was like a leopard, his feet were like the feet of a bear, and his mouth like the mouth of a lion (Revelation 13:2).
Human Government
This beast is NOT “the Antichrist.” There is no such thing as “the Antichrist.” When John carefully defined the spirit of anti-Christ, he defined a conflict between faith and unbelief. This beast of Revelation 13 has nothing to do with that conflict. Yet it is not hard to understand what God means by it.
We use the Bible to interpret the symbols God uses, for He gives us exactly what He means clearly. This vision takes us right back to Nebuchadnezzar and Daniel’s interpretation; for that reason we know that the leopard, bear, and lion, are speaking of the qualities of the violent governments of the Greek, Persian, and Roman empires. Revelation 13 is speaking of human governments.
The Entire World
However, John’s vision is different from any dream or vision or prophetic word found in the Old Testament. Of course, no prophetic word in the Bible is about “predicting the future.” All prophecy is a calling forth of Christ into the human experience. Johns vision continues in that same purpose. However, two things that are different are that John’s vision is first nothing more than John’s gospel in a third form, first as a history of Jesus, second as a letter of explanation, and third as a vision of prophetic word. But also, in the Old Testament, God dealt with one small tribe of people; in the New, God deals with the entire world.
Applies to All
Thus, as a prophetic word of Christ, John’s vision applies to all Christians in every nation and in every generation of the church age. If you want to know which human government is the beast of Revelation 13, the answer is “All.” Was it Nero? Yes. Was it the Pope? Yes. It was and is every form of human political government inside the church age.
Now, here is where economic scarcity as represented by the thorns and thistles joins together with the rule of the “husband” over the woman, that is, the rule of the most cruel. It takes two things to limit the scarcity of the earth: division of labor and trade.
Productivity and Trade
Try to make a chicken sandwich entirely by your own labor; it will take you many months, even years, to do so. And when everyone is trying to be self-sufficient, everyone WILL remain poor. But when I focus on the one thing I am best skilled at doing, and you focus on the one thing you are best skilled at doing, we will produce far more than anyone by themselves.
Let me define wealth. Wealth is an increase in productivity. Anything that increases productivity increases wealth for all; anything that decreases productivity decreases wealth for all. But – if you make one thing and I another, we must then be free to trade our production in order to prosper.
The Introduction of Money
If the world were a small village, then trade could be direct. But in any slightly more complex community, direct trade becomes cumbersome; in a large society direct trade fails. In order for trade, and thus division of labor, to work it’s increase of the scarcity of the earth, something else must come into the picture, a “representation” of value that takes the place of direct trade. That something else is money. Money itself is just a tool, neither good nor evil. The problem is the love of money; he who controls the money controls the power.
And thus we come to AD 1650.
Rising Up
You see, before AD 1650, along with allowing a relatively small amount of division of labor and trade, money also served the interests of the cruelest and most violent. But around 1650 that reality shifted, a shift that became complete by 1815. By 1815 money now ruled. The most cruel and the most violent were no longer needed.
And I saw a beast rising up out of the sea (Revelation 13:1). To understand this reality in history, we must understand God’s principle of “the fullness of times.” The beast is found in the human experience through all times, but God requires everything to come to its completion in what He calls “the fullness of times.”
The Triumph of the Bureaucrat
We are living, now, in the fullness of times when the beast stands in fullness upon the earth, having arisen out of the sea of humanity over the last 366 years. Money power, that is, the human effort to defeat scarcity, rules all human government, but always from behind the scenes.
And in the outward appearance of government, a different kind of human now rises to the top. No Julius Caesar or Genghis Khan or Napoleon could ever rise to power today. Today, it is the bureaucrat, the worst form of manipulating human. At least the violent could sometimes be called “great,” and many actually were great, in some way. All politicians and bureaucrats rise only by obeisance to money.
The Religious Class
It is the religious class, that segment of humans that are semi-sociopathic, yes, but always willing to kiss and to fawn and to show deference to the behind-the-scenes power of money, these are the ones that ARE all the named politicians and bureaucrats of whom you know in whatever country on earth you live. And as the religious class, they are the most dangerous, for their conscience does not let them sleep until you are made in the image money requires.
You cannot become a government official in any government in today’s world without first being willing to sell yourself. And you cannot sell yourself unless someone is buying. Genghis Khan did NOT sell himself; Donald Trump did.
The Curse of Scarcity
I have laid all this out in order to show you how the mystery of iniquity in full triumph in our world today comes directly out of Genesis 3 and the curse of death God warned Adam not to eat. Everything works together; everything fits.
But let’s look a little further at the curse of scarcity as God described it coming out of Adam’s belly as a river of death. …Cursed is the ground for your sake; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you, and you shall eat the grass of the field. In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread.
As beautiful as the earth is, it labors still under Adam’s death.
The Curse of Grass Seed
First, the Hebrew word is “grass,” not plant or herb. And yes, the human population exploded in number directly as a result of the cultivation of grass seed for human food – wheat, barley, rice, and corn. In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread. Wheat was the most plentiful grass seed in Bible lands, and continues to be the primary ingredient of bread. But although wheat allows for a great population increase among humans, it also contains a toxin that kills slowly and makes human life short and full of disease. Small people groups who live long lives do not eat grass seed. But that fact is just an interesting side note.
The Abundance of God
When God says, “Set creation free,” He very much includes the earth and the ground, also laboring under Adam’s death.
I love the earth and the tilled field and the garden. I love trees and orchards and vines. I love wood shops and metal shops and healthy homes filled with vibrant children. I love people walking together on this earth, loving one another and rejoicing in the bounty and abundance of God. I want to set creation free.
It is the river of life flowing out of my belly, out from the Mercy Seat of my heart, that brings life and healing to this planet, the abundance of God into the experience of all people on this earth.