God’s Word for You
Genesis 3:14 A change in status
by Pastor Timothy Smith on Thursday, September 17, 2026
14 The LORD God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, you are cursed more than all the livestock and above all the wild animals. You shall crawl on your belly, and you shall eat dust all the days of your life.”
Now God turns to the serpent. This verse proves without any doubt that this animal was an ordinary snake that had been taken over or possessed by Satan. For Satan had already been cursed by God, had been driven from heaven, and had been sentenced to eternal punishment in hell. There would be no point in giving him a special curse among animals, or talking about crawling or eating dust to a demonic spirit such as Satan.
God speaks to the irrational brute animal, but through it, he speaks to Satan as well. The animal itself was not guilty but, like the pigs of the Decapolis, was only used by the devil. Nevertheless, God curses the animal. For just as the animals and trees and birds were punished by the catastrophe of the great flood, but not through any fault of their own (Romans 8:20), and just as thorns and thistles were going to appear on account of Adam’s sin (Genesis 3:18), so also the serpent is cursed.
Was it only this serpent that was cursed, or all serpents and snakes? Judging from the words spoken by God in this verse, we must recognize that all snakes and serpents are under the same curse, just as all mankind fell under the curse given to Adam and Eve. Therefore all serpents are cursed with crawling on their belly.
Does this mean that snakes had some other form of locomotion before this? Rather than getting bogged down in a biological debate about the ancient anatomy of reptiles, the text shows us that there was a change in the status of the serpent. God declares that crawling and eating dust was one of the marks of the curse. But the other mark is the one we should give closer attention to. This was the serpent being cursed beneath its former status. Recall that when Moses reported the creation of the animals on the sixth day, they were divided into domestic animals, wild animals, and crawling things. At the beginning of this chapter, Moses went out of his way to call the serpent the most crafty of all the wild animals. Now, the Lord says that the serpent will crawl. Now, while the Scripture does not say this directly, I believe that this is a change of status for the serpent from what it once had been (one of the wild animals) to what it is ever after (one of the crawling things).
Certainly the status of Satan and the other fallen angels had been changed. They had once been among God’s holy angels, but “they did not keep their positions of authority but abandoned their own home” (Jude 1:6), and now they are demons, deceiving spirits (1 Timothy 4:1), and can only “masquerade as angels of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14).
Likewise, the status of mankind has been changed on account of the fall. As God says, “Every inclination of his heart is only evil all the time” (Genesis 6:5). Man had been sinless and pure, but mankind is now sinful through and through, and left to himself, condemned.
So also the status of the serpent is a reminder of this change, for what was so mighty and clever among the wild animals, and, as Luther quipped, “had been a very pretty little beast,” is now a crawling thing, cursed more than the other creatures, and shunned by man. So just as “the nature of the serpent was entirely changed and made different” (Luther, p. 187), so also the status of the serpent was changed, to serve as a sign to man among the visible creatures that our status is also changed. So among the invisible creatures sin brought a change (the demons). Among the visible animals sin brought a change (to the serpent). Among the vegetable or natural creation sin brought a change (thorns and thistles). And in man, who has both a visible body and an invisible soul, there is a change, for we now have original sin and guilt that we inherit from Adam and Eve, and the cursed world in which to live out our lives.
There is only one difference. The demons and the devil can never change their status. They are forever damned. The serpents and snakes cannot change their status; they will crawl and eat dust until the end of time. “The creation itself is groaning until it will at last be liberated from its bondage to decay” (Romans 8:21). But for mankind? For you and for me? Jesus Christ died for us so that by believing in his death you may escape death. In fact, our stay in this world in the flesh is a little thing and lasts only a short time, but as our Lutheran confession states, “By faith we get a new and clean heart, and God will and does account us altogether righteous and holy for the sake of Christ, our Mediator. Although the sin in our flesh has not been completely removed (for we remain sinners until death), he will not count it or consider it” (Smalcald Articles XIII:1). And Isaiah rejoices to God (Isaiah 38:17), “You have put all my sins behind your back.”
In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith
Pastor Smith serves St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in New Ulm, Minnesota. To receive God’s Word for You via e-mail, please visit the St. Paul’s Lutheran Church website.