Annunciation Eve

 Tucked away in the story of the Fall, just so you notice it without noticing it, are a tiny little couple of verses with a huge promise.

“Cursed are you above all livestock and all wild animals! You will crawl on your belly and you will eat dust all the days of your life. And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.” (Gen 3:14-15)

Blink and you'd miss it. But it's there. It's a promise worked out before time began. As our mythical ancestral mother, streaks of Fruit of Knowledge still on her cheek, is told she's barred from the Garden, yet then God announces in code how one day we'll get back. When that serpent from before time, from force of habit, will strike at the wrong heel. And the Son that was always to come from Eve's line will crush his head.

It's a lovely reversal. Just as sin first entered the world through a woman's disobedience - and then the man followed, in his gormlessness - so redemption first comes into the world through a woman's obedience. Mary's "Yes" to God reverses Eve's "It wasn't my fault. The snake made me do it." Where Eve let sin in, Mary will let in its cure.

And I like to think, when Mary's Son smashed down the doors on that Holy Saturday in Hell, that Eve wiped the apple juice from her face, grabbed hold of Adam and said, "Come on then. Our lad's done it. Just like his Father said." And marched on out behind the descendant she was promised. Heading for the garden she lost so long before.