June 17 Daily Devotional

Bible Reading

Genesis 2:18-25

¹⁸And the LORD God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.
¹⁹And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.
²⁰And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.
²¹And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;
²²And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.
²³And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
²⁴Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
²⁵And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.

Devotional

In this beautiful world, fresh from the hand of God, there was man and there were the animals. God brought the animals before man. With a keen insight Adam observed each kind of creature and gave it an appropriate name. These, God said, are your dominion. Look at them. They are yours to be used and enjoyed as a good steward for Me. And each one had a mate.

Did this experience contribute to Adam's sense of aloneness in the world? The animals were perfect as they came from the hand of the Creator. But they had no soul. They were not made in the image of God. Man could not communicate with them the deep warm personal thoughts and emotions within him. He could not say to the horse, 'Would you like to watch the sunset down by the river?' and expect to receive an answer, 'I'd love to!'

John Milton commented, 'Loneliness is the first thing which God's eye nam'd not good.'^* God made man to be a social being. And the heavenly Father, demonstrating His love and understanding, proceeded with His plan for creation and made woman to meet his need.

Loneliness is bad. God has said this and we can affirm it from our own experience. Yet, because it is bad we shun it and we reach out from ourselves and our isolation to other people, to one person in particular and to God Himself! Man was not made a complete, independent, self-satisfied being. Aloneness or complete independence was not normal or good for him. So God made woman!

Into Adam's aloneness God placed a creature appropriate for him, one exactly right for him. The man and the woman together would form a family unit-"a permanent unit, exclusive and beautiful according to God's design!

^*Tetrachordon