The Dominion Covenant, the New Earth, and the Defeat of Satan

In the opening of the Bible, we read, "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. the earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep" (Genesis 1:1-2). So, God's first step in creating the physical universe was to create the earth, but as a formless and empty ball. The physical universe was a place all of chaos. The remainder of the creation passage describes God's organizing and filling that creation, with both celestial objects and with life, culminating in His creation of man.

And then what was God's plan for man, as expressed in His creation mandates to that man? "Then God said, 'Let us make man in Our image, after Our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping them that creeps on the earth...  be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth" (Genesis 1:26, 28). So God's plan for mankind was that we would extend His work of converting chaos into productive order. Men don't have the ability to create ex nihilo, so the expression of that was to be the use of the other living things to become productive under the rule of God.

However, that plan was interrupted by the Fall of Adam and Eve into sin. The consequences of that Fall included the disruption of God's order, and descent into disorder: "The Lord God said to the serpent, 'Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and above all beasts of the field; on your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life. I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.' To the woman He said, 'I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you.' And to Adam He said, 'Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return'" (Genesis 3:14-19). 

Fist, notice who is speaking here, the Lord, i. e., Jehovah. This is the first appearance of this name, the covenant name of the preincarnate Son, who here first appears in His mediatorial role. After the Fall, all of the interactions between the triune Godhead and men occur through His mediation alone. He first curses the serpent, i. e., Satan, as the instigator of these events. The preincarnate Son curses the foe of the Church. Then He proclaims for the first time the covenant of grace, the promises to His church of His own work on our behalf, to defeat this foe and redeem us from the conseque4nces of the Fall. Then He turns to Eve, the first to sin, and pronounces a curse on the essence of her womanhood, childbirth. And last, He turns to Adam, the head of creation, and pronounces a curse on all of Adam's work in fulfilling his role as the viceroy of God. 

This first announcement of the hope of the Gospel will then be expanded in the rest of Scripture. For example, we have the promises of Yahweh of new blessings on agriculture in Isaiah. See, for example, Isaiah 44:3-4, which explicitly unites both childbearing and agricultural blessings with spiritual blessings: "For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour My Spirit upon your offspring, and My blessing on your descendants. They shall spring up among the grass like willows by flowing streams. This one will say, ‘I am the Lord's,’ another will call on the name of Jacob, and another will write on his hand, ‘The Lord's,’ and name himself by the name of Israel." 

The same prophet gives another promise of God with relates it back to the promise of Genesis 3:15: "They shall not labor in vain or bear children for calamity, for they shall be the offspring of the blessed of the Lord, and their descendants with them. Before they call I will answer; while they are yet speaking I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall graze together; the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and dust shall be the serpent’s food. They shall not hurt or destroy in all My holy mountain" (Isaiah 65:23-24). As men experience the restoration of peace to the creation, we will also see the curse carried out of that old foe, the serpent. 

In the New Testament, the Apostle Paul picks up the same theme: "For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience" (Romans 8:20-25). He personifies the physical creation as waiting impatiently for the Church to reach her glory, because the creation, too, will be released from the curse under which our sin has brought it. 

And Paul makes it explicit that these blessings flow from that first declaration of the Gospel in Genesis 3:15: "The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet." As the body of Christ, we the Church are credited with the victory of Christ through us, finally bringing the chaos we created back to the order which God intended. 

When will these times be seen? Only God knows. However, we can enjoy the hope today that they will come.