Jesus Showed Mercy when He Made Eve on God’s Sabbath
In Dating the Flood (Conclusion) - God’s Sabbath, I list all of the actions God is recorded doing on His sabbath. Here is the list again:
- Making the Garden of Eden
- Putting Adam in it
- Leading the animals to Adam
- Putting Adam to sleep
- Creating Eve from a rib
- Interrogating Adam and Eve for their sin
- Making clothes from fig leaves
- Expelling them from the Garden
- Accepting Abel’s sacrifice
- Interrogating Cain
- Putting the mark on Cain
Based on God Walks on the Sabbath, I should also add one item:
 12. Walking with Enoch.
Of all of these actions, the one that jumps out at me the most is #5. I feel like I can leave all of the others alone, as reasonable actions for God to take during His Sabbath. In my view, Jesus was there in the Garden, and so would have acted as recorded above. Surprisingly, even the making of the garden seems more like a project of passion for God, enjoying Himself on His Sabbath. It seems much more an act of love than of work; not that work cannot be done out of love, but it was the creation of the world and mankind that God was resting from. It’s like when my son is done with his chores, goes to his legos and take a few minutes “a little somethin’ somethin’ ” to enjoy. What he made was no chore in his mind.
And I could on, but I cover my rationale for these in my post above. What I really want to cover now is Eve. Something about her stands out. I cannot say what. I might just have to leave it hanging, but I didn’t want to leave this out.
I have noticed that if Adam was physically born, then spiritually re-born, then Eve could have been, too. The difference is that Eve’s creation was just so specific, that I don’t think I can say that. It really seems that Eve was born from Adam’s rib in Genesis 2:
21 So the LORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and closed up the place with flesh. 22 Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.
As strongly as I have asserted that other things in Genesis are either symbolic, or utilize alternate meanings of the Hebrew words in the scripture, I don’t see the case to be made here. I see no other possibility at the moment within these verse, except that God literally opened Adam, literally took out a rib, literally closed it up, and literally made Eve from that rib. There are no symbolic definitions I can use to read anything else into it.
For example, Adam was in a deep sleep. Sleep often means dead, waiting to be resurrected. Clearly though, he was just asleep.
It was ‘deep’ sleep, so perhaps the it was not a normal sleep, but it seems pretty clear that Adam was not conscious.
Based on the physicality of God’s actions, I believe this was a Christophany, Jesus in the Garden, utilizing His creative powers again. Going with that, it says God “caused” the deep sleep. I’m thinking Jesus slipped Adam a mickey, or some herb that rendered him unconscious, so that he wouldn’t feel the surgery. Again, if there’s anything to read in between the lines, it’s just an enhancement of the generally accepted meaning.
Jesus took one of Adam’s ribs, “and closed up the place with flesh.” Whether this was the closing of an incision or the creating of flesh within the gap left, it does not seem to matter much. He had a rib, and made a woman from it. He then brought her to Adam. Now, I can easily accept any of the other actions listed above as something that is acceptable for a sabbath, simple to do, or constitutes an understanding reaction to another’s actions on the sabbath. However, this one was not absolutely necessary, was not a reaction to another, and was not simple. It was an act of love that God could have done before His Sabbath began. So, in the event that it is not enough to merely declare Eve’s creation to be outside the scope of God’s work in Genesis 1, I want to point out what Jesus Himself said about working on the Sabbath in Matthew 12…
 1At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry and began to pick some heads of grain and eat them. 2When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him, “Look! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath.” 3He answered, “Haven’t you read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? 4He entered the house of God, and he and his companions ate the consecrated bread—which was not lawful for them to do, but only for the priests. 5Or haven’t you read in the Law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple desecrate the day and yet are innocent? 6I tell you that one greater than the temple is here. 7If you had known what these words mean, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the innocent. 8For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”
In other words, Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath. More than that, let us look again at His a rationale for creating her…
 18 The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”  19 Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field. But for Adam no suitable helper was found.
Compare this to Matthew 12:7 above: “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.” Jesus was showing mercy on His Father’s Sabbath. The creation of Eve, though arguably a work of Creation, was most definitely a work of mercy. The Creation of Eve on the Sabbath honored God. Don’t you just love the unchanging character of God?