RE: The puzzle of Adam

Don W. wrote (in reply to George):
  George Murphy wrote:

  "...For if _all_
  humans beings are sinners for their entire lives, and have been all the
way
  back to whatever we understand the first group of humans to be, then we
have
  to ask _why_ humanity is in this condition. It's not enough to say "we
just
  are" because that implies that God created humanity sinful - i.e., that
God
  is the creator of sin...."

  Input from an opposite corner: One can rationalize the fall, but I don't
think it's ever going to sound reasonable. --So a genetic change occurs
that causes pre-humans to develop a conscience and become accountable
humans. But this change is not going to be big enough. That is, those
accountable humans (as we all can testify) are still dragging along the
baggage of the flesh that made their unaccountable ancestors behave in ways
that would have been sinful if they'd been accountable. So in one way or
another God made humans incapable of avoiding sin. That's reasonable.

  This inevitability of sin doesn't have to be a serious problem for
Christianity. People by nature are still separated from God and always have
been. They still need salvation, reconciliation: a Savior. No one can come
to God through his own devices.

  But there remains something of a problem: "...Why does God still blame
us?...." Can God legitimately condemn if no one ever stood a chance? For
this reason I've gone soft on hell over the years and would much prefer
simple annihilation for those who reject God. The problem is that this
softness goes against many of Jesus' clear teachings in the gospels.

  Putting this detail aside for the moment, we can say the world is the way
it is because it couldn't be otherwise and still be compatible with God's
objectives. The old paradigm says that humans are God's children, and when
they do wrong they must be punished. The new paradigm says that humans
collectively are adults with whom God seeks to come into a relationship; he
does not punish for shortcomings but overwhelms deficiencies in those he
loves by the power of his Spirit.

  Don (W)

Don Perrett:
For what it's worth, I like to think of it this way:
God did not create sin. Nor did he create circumstances for our downfall.
First I start with the premise that there were hominids before Adam and
there were even Homo Sapiens before him. Beginning with Adam, and
continuing through today, man was given a chance to know God on a personal
level through the power of the Holy Spirit. YHWH gave us an opportunity to
live in perfect blind bliss, connected and NOT separated, but WE chose to
know what was right and wrong. Had we followed our spirits/souls and not
our bodies/minds, we would have been just fine. But having free will, WE
chose to understand things that were not relevant to our survival,
spiritually and physically. In doing so, God did not condemn us, rather we
condemned ourselves. If one considers that God gave us free will, then I
suppose we could transfer blame to him, but what good is it to be a
puppet/robot. That would have defeated the very purpose of communion with
the creator. Throughout history, and even in the future (Revelation), it is
man's own actions that CAUSE the "wrath". God need not step in and perform
some sort of punishment. The laws of nature, physics, humanity, etc, were
pre-established. Breaking them has consequences. Everyone knows that
gravity exists, whether we understand it or not. If you jump off a cliff
you will most likely die from the impact. God does not need to step in and
PUNISH anyone for breaking this law. It is a law he created in the
beginning and therefore when broken it creates it's own punishment. So it
is with all God's laws. He may from time to time step in and save someone
from this apparent fate of death, such are miracles. Some laws have direct
and immediate consequences, such as gravity. Others have a consequence
which cannot be seen immediately, such as immoral acts, but will nonetheless
bring destruction and death upon us. Now God certainly could have changed
things in order to allow us to disobey the laws, but this again would not
have served his purpose. Imagine a universe without gravity. Everything
has it's place and is created perfect, not in perfect order, like the
thinking of old, but in perfect chaos, which abides by the laws (order) he
established. We too were given limitations, a specific range of values
within which we could operate. Unlike the rest of nature we have the
ability to disobey the laws of nature, physics, humanity, etc. Like a child
who tests the limitations set by his parents, so do we all when it comes to
God's limitations on us. AND this is the nature of our FALL. We were
given everything in the garden save one thing, and even this one thing, one
limitation could not be avoided. We just had to disobey. This is the start
of all sin. WANT. If everyone focused on our needs and only our needs.
Forget about the wants, the coveting, etc, then and only then would we find
ourselves without the need for anything. God fulfills our needs and if all
we want is that which we need, then we need nothing and if we need nothing
then there is no grief, fear, hate, anger, etc. All sin comes from the want
for something which we do not yet have. All the laws, Mosaic, Levitical,
etc are focused on one of two things, obedience and worship of God and those
which seek to control our wants/desires. Focus on God and not our wants of
the world and all will be as it should have been.

Thanks for the pulpit.

Don Perrett
Received on Sat Nov 27 16:47:57 2004