Different by Design (Part 1 of 2)

God could have created a gender neutral humanity, but he didn't. Now, we have in the first session essentially done the hard work that is necessary in the building of a house, long before ever you get even to the ground floor. There has to be the laying in of all of the irrigation, all of the essential supplies, all of the stuff that, frankly, has no aesthetic appeal to it at all, unless you are a very fixated engineer. But for the average person, they said, can we cover that over as quickly as possible, and let's at least get up into the basement, if not into the ground floor.

Of course, without the hard work being done and the care being given to all of those foundational engineering elements, then to proceed too quickly to the basement, the ground floor, and above will only be to create difficulties later on. And that's the reason that I have labored, and in some senses perhaps belabored, our opening session, because you, those of you who are mothers, are going to either instill this in your children, or somebody else is going to instill something else in your children. And a generation will grow up, your boys will grow up to be men, your girls will grow up to be women, and they will grow up to model, to display the things that they have taken on board as the underpinnings for femininity and for masculinity.

And remember that they're growing up in a world where Freudianism and the kind of product of early nineteenth-century thought has now come to great fruition and is just flushing across the structures of education and the involvement of boys and girls in their relationships with one another. And therefore, it's good and important to go back to basics, to go back to the very beginning, and to notice how God is described here as putting together humanity, Mr. and Mrs. Adam. If your Bible is open, in Genesis 5, you will notice the description there. This is the written account of Adam's line, when God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. And notice the immediate change to the plural verse 2, he created them, male and female. When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God, he created them, male and female, and blessed them. And when they, plural, male and female, were created, he called them Adam. Now, I want you to notice just three things. Now, try and work through the three things in a way that gives perhaps more cohesion than there was in the first hour. First of all, I want us to notice that we are different, male and female, different by design.

Different by design. I'm going to refer frequently to these opening verses of Genesis, and now to verse 28 of Genesis 1, God blessed them and said to them, Be fruitful, increase in number, fill the earth, subdue it, rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground. Man and woman together are given the responsibility and the privilege of ruling over the rest of creation. It is together, verse 27—you will notice of chapter 1—that we reflect God's image. So God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created him. Male and female, he created them. This is very, very, very important, so that although Adam bears the name man as the head of the race, he comes, his creation is first. There is no question about that.

We can feel bad about it or do whatever we like with it. But as head of the race, it requires both man and woman to express God's image. In other words, the only way we can understand what it means to be truly human is by looking both at masculinity and at femininity. Now, that's not to say that the unmarried don't possess the image of God. Because if what we're saying here is what the Bible is saying, namely, that it is in the complementary nature of male and female that God's image is manifested in their interwovenness, then it would be wrong for us in saying that to suggest that somehow or another a single man or a single girl is somehow less than an expression of true humanity. Because the marriage picture is only one of a number of pictures that are used—there is a governmental picture and so on—to express the nature of God's revelation in this way. So nobody needs to run home and say, Well, I'm not in the image of God because I don't have a husband or I don't have a wife or whatever else it is. The fact of the matter is that God's creation of humanity is expressed in the genders that are uniquely fashioned.

And that is why you have both. Now, having said that, there is clearly a distinct truth about the image of God that is represented and expressed and safeguarded in marriage. And the two shall become one. And in this co-mingling, in this co-union, there is something that is revealed about God that is mysterious. It is the revealed secret to which Paul refers in Ephesians 5. Remember, he says, This is a great mystery. He says, This is a mysterious thing, this two becoming one.

And I'm talking about Christ and the church. And here in the co-mingling of male and female, there is this amazing, mind-boggling notion of God having manifested himself in humanity. And in the distinctions that exist between male and female, there is a diversity that is unified, and there is a unity that is diversified. And the distinctions between men and women are inbuilt human characteristics programmed in, designed purposefully by God. Different but complementary, and different by design. That's why in verse 31, God saw all that he had made, and it was very good, including the essential differences between men and women. Now, it is obvious that men and women are clearly not identical. You say, Well, that's the most brilliant thing you've said so far.

That's incredible. Where did you get that insight? Well, every small boy suddenly realizes, I don't look like my sister, and she doesn't look like me. Why? Just because somehow or not I got pushed further along the sliding scale of sexuality? Or because God uniquely fashioned me in terms of masculinity?

Now, you say, Is that important? Well, it's important on far more levels than the purely physical. Men and women are clearly not identical, and therefore, they don't have to function identically. If men and women are not identical, why do they have to do identical things? Why is it that a man would somehow feel that he couldn't possibly be truly a man unless he was doing what women do? Or that a lady is not really what she needs to be unless she can do what man does? Where do you think that notion comes from?

It doesn't come from the Bible. Traveling in upstate New York this year, I came on roadworks all the time, and sometimes I was stuck at the roadworks waiting, and sometimes I was in the front of the line as it happened, going back and forth on a particular journey. And I think on every single occasion, the person that was standing there with a big stop sign and a helmet was a girl. Now, that's fine if that's what she wants to do, but I said to myself, Is this really what the feminist lobby was trying to achieve?

So that, you know, my daughter could grow up to hold a stop sign, wear jeans and working boots, and drive around on a giant caterpillar? That's okay. That's okay. But the presupposition that is built into it is that somehow or another, unless the girl is able to take charge of that situation, somehow or another, there is a precinct to her that, unless she is able to embrace it, it will mean that she is less than she is supposed to be, or she has not championed life in the way that she needs to. No, says the Bible, the difference is clear, and the differences are important. They're important in life, they're important in marriage, and they're important in ministry. And the complementary nature of things comes to the fore in the portion that we just read, didn't it? The Lord God said, It's not good for the man to be alone.

I'm going to make a helper suitable for him. Now, the way in which this unfolds is quite incredible, if you look at it. In order to build a woman—and that actually is the verb in Hebrew—in order to build a woman, God has to make man incomplete. He takes something out of man, so man now is incomplete.

He is then made complete in receiving back what was taken out from him. The female is built in separation from her true origin or context, so that she will only come home, return to where and what she should be, in her understanding of her femininity in light of the reality of masculinity, whether that is living in singleness or whether that is living in marriage. And any view that sidesteps that is deficient in relationship to what the Bible is saying. Physiology alone teaches us this, that we are so unbelievably different by design. Second thing we should notice is this, that the difference by design is in order that there might be harmony. The difference by design is in order that there might be harmony.

If you like, in order that everything may fit the way God intended it to fit. Now, I'm not here to give a talk on human physiology or sexuality. You'll be relieved to know, but you don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that human physiology seems perfectly suited to all that it would mean, physically, to be commingled in a one-flesh union as an expression of the reality of our masculinity and femininity. And that anything other than that is certainly a deviation from it and, the Bible actually says, is a perversion of it. So that marriage, by its very definition, is heterosexual. It is monogamous. It is a one-flesh union.

And you don't need a textbook to figure it out. Now, what you have in the opening two chapters of Genesis, of course, is two complementary expressions of what has happened in creation. Genesis 1, 1, up to the third verse of chapter 2, is a kind of comprehensive description that reaches its climax in the creation of man. Verse 27, so God created man, male and female he created them. Then, in verse 4 to 25 of chapter 2, you have this further expression of it, where it is impossible to say anything other than the fact that man's preeminence is established over all of the rest of the creative order.

And in that section, in chapter 2, the responsibilities, the functionality of male and female is defined. The duty of man is given there in verse 15, the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. So that man is created and is given this responsibility of work. Not that he is the only one who needs to work, but nevertheless, in the divvying up of tasks, God says to him, Now, Adam, what I want you to do is I want you to get out there, and I want you to look after this garden that I have given to you. And at the same time, he said, What I'd like you to do is take all of these creatures that I have fashioned for you, and I would be very, very grateful if you could do the scientific task of looking at them and then of naming them.

A demanding but a delightful privilege. And there he goes, pointing at the creatures and figuring out what they're all going to be called. But in this process, it reveals Adam's need of a mate.

Verse 20, Man gave names to all the livestock and the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field. But notice, for Adam, no suitable helper was found. He wasn't content to be the zookeeper in Jungle Book, you know?

He wasn't happy just to hang around with the apes and the monkeys, and I had to watch the dolphin do their thing. There's no suitable helper for him to be found. Man was lonely, and the woman was created on account of man's loneliness.

No suitable helper was found. Woman is a suitable helper for man. Man, incidentally, is a suitable helper for woman. But the emphasis here is on the need and nature of what it would mean for this feminine creature to now be taken out of this masculine creature in order that she may be a helper suitable for him. She is created, if you like, in order to make him complete. Now, some ladies immediately have a problem with the idea of a helper suitable. Is the problem with suitable, or is the problem with helper?

I'm not sure. Well, I'm not just here to be your helper. No, you're not. You're here fashioned in the image of God in order to glorify God and enjoy him forever, and so am I. But having said that, there are certain things that we both need one another for. Helper, you see, doesn't equal subordination.

For example, in the Psalms, it's not uncommon for us to read, for example, in Psalm 33, we wait in hope for the Lord. He is our helper and our shield. He's our helper and our shield. Does that mean, then, that God is subordinate to us? Clearly not.

But he is prepared to fulfill the role of helping us in our need. Man was prior to woman in creation, but his priority does not mean superiority. So you're writing down little things. You can write, priority doesn't equal superiority. You know, hey, I was here first, like you're trying to get your car into a space in a car park. I was here first, therefore. Well, it doesn't work that way in terms of man and woman. Man can't get up in the morning and go, I was here first, get the breakfast. To which the lady may reply, I was here second, get your own. Priority does not mean superiority. You need a helper, Adam, it's clear, for a lot of reasons. You've done a nice job on the animals, I must admit that, but your flowerbeds are a complete disgrace.

Whoever said that those things would go like that. I tell you, this lady is going to be a big help to you, Adam, she really is. Frankly, without her, you're no use. You need her in more ways than you understand. So do you think that for him to be given this wonderful helper is for him to get up in the morning and create a list, stick it up on the equivalent of the fridge with her name at the top, Eve, to-do list for today, help, let's get going?

Clearly not. Shirley is coming to her and saying, Eve, what am I supposed to do now? Eve, can you help me with this? Eve, where do I put that? Eve, where are my car keys? Eve, you know I can't do math, help the kids. Eve, I don't know what color it should be. Eve, could you give me some trousers?

Eve, help, help me, Rhonda, help, help me, Rhonda. So priority doesn't equal superiority, but God is a God of order, and therefore if he's a God of order, there has to be order. And since he's God, and since he's the designer, he designed it with Adam first and then Eve.

Problem? Well, for some, yes. But the priority thing does not imply some kind of female inferiority. In fact, one reason, I think, for the priority of man is made clear in 1 Peter 3, which we may get to in our closing session today, is made clear in his responsibility for loving and caring for the woman. But without the woman, man knows himself to be deficient. Since she'd been taken out of him, he knew himself to be complete only when he lived in harmony with her. In the same way, without the man, the woman is also incomplete.

Having been taken out of him, she was only complete when she was put back with him. There's a wonderful picture. It's a mysterious picture.

I'm sure we can't unpack it. So they are different, but they're equal, as we made in the image of God. Together, they submit to the purposes of God. Together, they enjoy harmony. In the home, in the church, men and women need each other.

They need each other. And everything that undermines that reality is ultimately unhelpful and is untrue. But that, of course, is the great issue of homosexuality in our day. I don't need a wife. I don't need a wife.

I don't need a woman around here. I can live with Rodney, and he and I are equally good at the task of parenting. After all, wouldn't you much rather have your children in a loving homosexual relationship than an unloving heterosexual relationship? Sophistry of the best kind.

We're not going to break one clear instruction of Scripture in order to try and uphold another instruction of Scripture. So feminism and the fight for equal rights have tended to obscure all of the proper and delightful differences, haven't they? Take Vogue magazine and go through it. And how many times do you turn the page and say, Is that a fellow or a girl in that advertisement?

Is that a girl that looks like a chap, or is that a chap that looks like a girl? Is that by chance? No, it's by design.

It's by design. Because it is the ultimate rebellion against the creator. Man is saying, God, you didn't make us, and even if you did, you clearly didn't make us different by design. And we reject your ideas of harmony, we reject your ideas of wholeness, we reject your ideas of family, we reject your ideas of femininity. And we are expressing this in multiple fashions. And our girls are growing up within our homes, trying to find their footing, and trying to find their framework, and trying to find their future.

And unless you, as the mom, are clear, we're in real trouble. God designed men and women with equal value, dignity, and worth. But we're different, and those differences are important in life, in marriage, and in ministry.

You're listening to Truth for Life with Alistair Begg. Our study today is about God's design for women. If you'd like to enhance your study of this topic and learn the extraordinary story of a young woman named Esther, I want to point you to the series titled The Unseen God. This is an Old Testament narrative, and Alistair unpacks the remarkable events told in the book of Esther. You'll hear how God led an unassuming young Jewish girl to advance his kingdom by becoming Queen of Persia. Again, the title of the series is The Unseen God.

You can listen to all 15 messages for free online at truthforlife.org, or you can purchase a USB with all 15 messages included at our cost of just $5 at truthforlife.org slash store. The Bible teaches us that God gave men and women separate and distinct roles, and each of us plays a different part in our relationship with one another. This subject is explored further in the book we want to recommend to you today. The book is titled Women and God, and in this book the author unpacks the distinctive characteristics God gave to women. As you read the book, you'll learn how these unique characteristics are essential to God's overarching plan for all of humanity and for the building of his kingdom. Request your copy of the book Women and God when you give a donation at truthforlife.org slash donate. I'm Bob Lapine. Thanks for listening. If God designed us to be different so that there would be harmony, why is there so much antagonism even in Christian relationships? Join us tomorrow for the conclusion of today's message when we'll find out more about why we're different by design. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life, where the Learning is for Living.