10/07/2018
Genesis 2:25-3:7
Chris Breslin
“Genesis 3 paints the scenario that is the hinge point of history. Humanity grasps at its own peace at the expense of the peace of all. The relationships that were declared tov me-od (very good)in the beginning all are decimated. Here lies the wreckage of that fateful moment of original sin, the moment when humanity chose not to trust God’s way to peace. Instead, humanity chose its own way. The consequences of humanity’s king of dominion- the kind of rule that governs with self-interest above the interests of the other- are sin, separation, and death.” -Lisa Sharon Harper
“If I say the word sin to you…it’s going to sound like as if I am bizarrely opposed to pleasure, and because of the on-going link between sin and sex, it will seem likely that at the root of my problem with pleasure is a problem with sex. So I won’t do that. Because that isn’t at all what I mean. What I and other believers understand by the word I’m not saying to you has got very little to do with yummy transgression. For us, it refers to something much more like the human tendency, the human propensity to [foul] up. Or let’s add one more word; the human propensity to [foul] things up, because what we’re talking about here is not just our tendency to lurch and stumble and screw up accident, our passive role as agents of entropy. It’s our active inclination to break stuff, ‘stuff’ here including moods, promises, relationships we care about, and our own well-being and other people’s, as well as material objects whose high gloss positively seems to invite a big fat scratch. Now I hope we are on common ground.” -Francis Spufford
“Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind… it is Pride which has been the chief cause of misery in every nation and every family since the world began.” -C.S. Lewis
“In any situation, the villain is the person who knows the most but cares the least.” -Chuck Klosterman
When we were children, we traced our knees,
shins, and elbows for the slightest hint of wound,
searched them for any sad red-blue scab marking us
both victim and survivor.
All this before we knew that some wounds can’t heal,
before we knew the jagged scars of Great-Grandmother’s
amputated legs, the way a rock can split a man’s head
open to its red syrup, like a watermelon, the way a brother
can pick at his skin for snakes and spiders only he can see.
Maybe you have grown out of yours–
maybe you no longer haul those wounds with you
onto every bus, through the side streets of a new town,
maybe you have never set them rocking in the lamplight
on a nightstand beside a stranger’s bed, carrying your hurts
like two cracked pomegranates, because you haven’t learned
to see the beauty of a busted fruit, the bright stain it will leave
on your lips, the way it will make people want to kiss you.
–The Beauty of Busted Fruit, Natalie Diaz
Scripture:
Songs for Today’s Worship Gathering:
Mercy Now by Gauthier
Thy Mercy, My God by Stocker/McCracken
Father, Let Your Kingdom Come by The Porter’s Gate Worship
Come Ye Sinners by Hart/DeConto
Brokenness Aside by Leonard/Jordan
Fortunate Fall by Assad
Doxology
Further Reading:
Confessionsby St. Augustine
Playing God: Redeeming the Gift of Powerby Andy Crouch
The Very Good Gospelby Lisa Sharon Harper
Original Sinby Alan Jacobs
The Christian Imaginationby Willie James Jennings
I Wear the Black Hat: Grappling with Villains (Real and Imagined)by Chuck Klosterman
The Fall and Sin: What We Have Become as Sinnersby Marguerite Shuster
Unapologetic: Why, Despite Everything, Christianity Can Still Make Surprising Emotional Senseby Francis Spufford
Restoring the Shamedby Robin Stockitt
The Soul of Shame: Retelling the Stories We Believe About Ourselvesby Curt Thompson
The Lost World of Adam and Eveby John Walton
Way of Love: Recovering the Heart of Christianityby Norman Wirzba
Simply Christian: Why Christianity MakesSenseby N.T. Wright
