Priesthood of the first man - Adam

It is quite notable from the study of priesthood across all cultures that priests acted as the ultimate authority. They were comsidered to carry the duty of kings and even prophets. Priests have taken up the mantle of speaking to God on behalf of communities. In the previous chapter we saw God being the first High Priest.  He took up the mandate of interceding for man to Himself. God Himself was the first to offer sacrifice for man's own sins. We see an element of great service when the sovereign and holy God goes down to the point of providing for what man needed for his peace. In this chapter we are studying who took up the mantle of priesthood and the first person in the history of man to be a priest.

The first person to be entrusted with the priestly duty was Adam. We see in Gen 2:15-17 that God gave him the duty of total submission to God's command. Adam failed in his priestly duty because instead of drawing the whole creation to God he drove them away from God. Since he could not totally submit to God he could not in any way bring the other creations to God. When he considered the distraction from the enemy and lacked confidence in whom God had made him to be, he failed terribly. It was a factual truth that he was naked and God himself created him naked and placed them in the garden of Eden - Gen 2:25. At first they had confidence in whom God said they are. They were naked but were not ashamed of themselves because they trusted that God had made them that way and God had said it good. They BELIEVED God for who He said they are. God had said Adam is like Himself in everything. 

The enemy understood so well that Adam was like God but he only needed a space for Adam to doubt his very identity and essence. In his subtlity the serpent came with a series of questions to understand whether Eve knew herself or not, whether she believed God or not. It was Adam's duty to make Eve aware and confident of herself according to God's word. Did God really say you should not eat from every tree was the first question to cause doubt in Eve's mind. It was the opening for the devil to enter her mind. The moment Eve answered he knew exactly what to go for. He immediately responded to Eve's answer in Genesis 3 (KJV) 4. And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: 5. For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye SHALL be as gods, knowing good and evil. 

The statement '...and you shall be' suggested that at that time they were not like God. From this point we know that Eve ate of the fruit and on taking it to her husband, who was supposed to be a priest unto God for Eve, Adam ate the fruit. It was supposed to be his duty to atone for his wife who had fallen. But on being tempted he ate with his bride and as a result he fell together with his bride. He fell in the same unbelief of his wife. He was the one who had received the word from God, he was to teach his wife, in a case where his wife did not understand and fell he was supposed to continue teaching her until she comes to the full knowledge of Him who has called them and make her know “...his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:”  2 Peter 1:3 (KJV)

We see a great failure in the priesthood of Adam. In his trial he failed into unbelief and therefore through his unbelief, as the father of mankind he gave birth to a generation of his kind - Gen 5:3. Adam became a fallen man and so every child he bore was fallen by default. Through his unbelief every man that came after him was a sinner even though they did not sin efter the similitude of Adam. It is also through his unbelief that death now reigned. Adam totally separated man from God. He was supposed to be the bridge but he failed at that task. Priesthood has the big responsibility of uniting creation to God. Adam couldn't hold up to that standard. He brought death upon all men because of his unbelief. It was his unbelief that brought the sin issue into the world. So then after Adam there was still need for atonement.  Before he fell they had a relationship with God. God was the high priest and Adam was a priest. They had a communion of priests.. Now a dilemma was here. God loved Adam and Adam had sinned. If God Adam he would kill what he hated and kill Adam whom he loved and if he saved Adam he would save whom he loved and still save what he hated. Salvation is always God's dilemma. How will he deal with this situation? Who would save Adam and bring him back to union with God? What would be the end of Adam's generation which has fallen because of one man? If the priest has fallen what can those who depend on him do? 

“If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?”

  — Psalms 11:3 (KJV)