When God looked at Adam, He saw an incomplete creature. Each of the animals God presented had a female component. Adam was one of a kind. Although in Genesis 1 we read the creation of male and female, in chapter 2, we find a few more details. God placed Adam in the Garden of Eden to tend it and instructed him on what to do. As God watched on, He saw no suitable helpmate for Adam. In this story, man was created from the dust of the earth, then God created woman from Adam and together they became one flesh.
Creation of Man
God created man in the image of the trinity. He formed him from the dust of the earth, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. He instructed him to have dominion over creation, to be fruitful, and to multiply. He provided herbs and fruit bearing trees to sustain him and warned him not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But God saw something was missing. Adam needed a helper.
Creation of Eve
The Genesis story says that God put Adam into a deep sleep. Then he removed a rib and closed him back up. God fashioned woman from man’s rib and brought her to him. Adam responded, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; She shall be called Woman because she was taken out of man.”
It doesn’t gel in our minds. It seems more like a fairy tale. The writers to the Hebrews says, “By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible.”
One Flesh
For this reason, a man leaves his parents and is joined to his wife. They become one flesh. There is no shame. They stand in fellowship with God in a union He ordained. A plain and simple story, one beyond our comprehension, received in faith. God is esteemed and man and woman live in unity of purpose. I think of Psalm chapter 2:1 “Why do the nations rage, and the people plot a vain thing?”
