Genesis 3:16

In sorrow thou shalt bring forth children

Motherhood a blessing and an education

I. IN MATERNITY A WOMAN COMPLETES HER NATURE. Every sorrow of body or soul is made into a new thread in the web of affection which she weaves round the life of the child for whom she suffers.

II. SHE HAS ANOTHER BLESSING IN A CERTAIN EASE IN LOSING SELF. Men find it less natural to be unselfish. The mother almost spontaneously drops off the robe of self.

III. HER SORROW OF MATERNITY BRINGS A BLESSING TO THE WORLD. What silent, forceful lessons of the blessed life has motherhood given to the world!

IV. THIS SORROW HAS BEEN AN EDUCATION TO THE WORLD. The great thought of Christianity is that only through sacrifice of self can life be given to others, or life be realized by the giver. Motherhood permits woman to live her life in another life. It is the likest thing to God’s life.

V. THE SORROW OF MATERNITY IS A PROPHECY. Her joy in self-surrender for another life, and her better life so won is the joy in which the whole world shall he when, leaping from the womb of the past, it will break into the perfect life--born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God which liveth and abideth forever. (Stopford A. Brooke, M. A.)

Observations

I. ALL THE AFFLICTIONS OF CHRIST’S MEMBERS ARE DISPENSED UNTO THEM UNDER THE COVENANT OF GRACE.

II. THOUGH GOD HAVE THROUGH CHRIST REMITTED TO HIS CHILDREN THE SENTENCE OF DEATH, YET HE HATH NOT FREED THEM FROM THE AFFLICTIONS OF THIS LIFE.

III. ALL THE AFFLICTIONS THAT GOD LAYS UPON HIS CHILDREN IN THIS LIFE HAVE MIXED WITH THEIR BITTERNESS SOME SWEETNESS OF MERCY. As there is some mixture of mercy with the bitterness of the afflictions of this life, so is there a mixture of bitterness with the blessings of this life. It is the wife’s duty to be subject to the will and direction of her husband. The subjection of the wife to the husband must be, not only in outward obedience to his commands, but besides in the inward affection of the heart.

1. It is a duty to be performed to God, who will be served, not only with the outward man, but with the heart (Colossians 3:22).

2. Else the subjection must needs be burdensome, and the services done therein like that of Zipporah in circumcising her child (Exodus 4:25). (J. White, M. A.)

The sentence on the woman

His sentence on the woman is, in part, a reversal of the first blessing, “Multiply and replenish the earth.” God’s blessing alone went out at first with the command to multiply, but now sortie drops of the curse are to be infused into it in remembrance of sin. The race was still to go on increasing; but henceforth it was to be in sorrow. The very perpetuation of the species was to be accompanied with marks of the displeasure of God. The dark cloud of sorrow was to take up its station above each man as he came into the world. And, kindred to these pangs of her corporeal frame, are the other varied sorrows which overshadow her lot--the weakness, the dependence, the fear, the rising and sinking of heart, the bitterness of disappointed hope, the wounds of unrequited affection--all these, as drops of the sad cup now put into her hands, woman has, from the beginning, been made to taste. The sentence falls on her specially as woman, not as one with the man, and part of the human race, but as woman. The things which mark her out as woman are the things which the sentence selects, It is as the mother and as the wife that she is to feel the weight of the sentence now pronounced. A mother’s pangs (which otherwise would have been unknown); a wife’s dependence (which, in all save Christian countries, is utter degradation); sorrow, not joy, in that appointed process through which the promised seed is to be born into the world; inferiority, instead of equality, in that relationship in reference to which it had been said by her husband, “bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh”; not henceforth the husband “cleaving to the wife,” as at the first (Genesis 2:24), but the wife cleaving to the husband, and the husband ruling over the wife. Such are the sad results of sin! (H. Bonar, D. D.)

Woman’s subjection to man

The subjection of the woman to the man and his rule over her was a just check of that bold taking upon her, both to talk so much with the serpent and also to do as he bade her, without any privity and knowledge of her husband. And it is as much as if God should have said to her: Because thou tookest so much upon thee without advice of thy husband, hereafter thy desire shall be subject unto him, and he shall rule over thee. Yet this authority of the man may not embolden him any way to wrong his wife, but teacheth him rather what manner of man he ought to be--namely, such an one as for gravity, wisdom, advice, and all government is able to direct her in all things to a good course. And her subjection should admonish her of her weakness and need of direction, and so abate all pride and conceit of herself, and work true honour in her heart toward him whom God hath made stronger than herself and given gifts to direct her by. This, I say, this authority in the man and subjection in the woman should effect. But alas, many men are rather to be ruled than to rule, and many women fitter to rule than to be ruled of such unruly husbands. On the other side, many men for ability most fit and able to rule, yet for pride in the heart, where subjection should be, shall have no leave to rule. So fit we sometimes to the order appointed of Almighty God. Amendment is good on both sides, for fear of His rod, whose order we break. (Bishop Babington.)