February 13th - First Sunday in Lent
Next Sunday's Sermon Text will be from the Book of Genesis. It is, as follows:
Genesis 2:15-17
15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."
Genesis 3: 1-7
The Fall of Man 1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God really say, 'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?"
2 The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 but God did say, 'You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.' "
4 "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. 5 "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
The Gospel text for this Sunday is Mathew 4:1-11 and the Epistle is Romans 5:12-19.
Mathew's lesson describes the temptation of Christ by the devil in the wilderness. Paul talks about how sin came into the world through Adam.
But, for this Sunday we will go back and look at how it happened "in the first place." In other words, where and how did "sin" and "temptation" become part of our world? Once, this great story was background information for everyone. Nowadays, however, many are totally unaware of the basic meaning of the Biblical Story of the "fall." For instance, back, when I worked for the Red Cross people would often complain about having to work so hard or why work was so boring. "Why do we have to work?" they would ask. And I would remind them, with a bit of a smile, that it is all "because of sin." And they would look at me with incomprehension and assume that I was kidding. But, in a way, I wasn't.
So, while we all the know the story of Adam and Eve (a hundred times over) it is helpful to return to this idea of sin from time to time and then try to answer the question on everyone's minds, "why is the world the way it is?"
As jumping off point, I will raise the question put forth by Rabbi Kushner, author of Why Bad Things Happen to Good People, in his later book How Good Do We Have to Be?
Kushner writes, "I don't believe that eating from the Tree of Knowledge was sinful. I believe that it was one of the bravest and most liberating events in the history of the human race. Yes, its consequences were painful, in the same way that growing up and leaving your parental home can be painful, the same way that undertaking the responsibilities of marriage and parenthood can be painful and leaving you wondering, "Why did I ever give up my less complicated life for these problems?" But for the person who has experienced the complex, hard-earned satisfactions of human existence, there is no doubt that it is worth the pain."
More on this later ...
Genesis 2:15-17
15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."
Genesis 3: 1-7
The Fall of Man 1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God really say, 'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?"
2 The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 but God did say, 'You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.' "
4 "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. 5 "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
The Gospel text for this Sunday is Mathew 4:1-11 and the Epistle is Romans 5:12-19.
Mathew's lesson describes the temptation of Christ by the devil in the wilderness. Paul talks about how sin came into the world through Adam.
But, for this Sunday we will go back and look at how it happened "in the first place." In other words, where and how did "sin" and "temptation" become part of our world? Once, this great story was background information for everyone. Nowadays, however, many are totally unaware of the basic meaning of the Biblical Story of the "fall." For instance, back, when I worked for the Red Cross people would often complain about having to work so hard or why work was so boring. "Why do we have to work?" they would ask. And I would remind them, with a bit of a smile, that it is all "because of sin." And they would look at me with incomprehension and assume that I was kidding. But, in a way, I wasn't.
So, while we all the know the story of Adam and Eve (a hundred times over) it is helpful to return to this idea of sin from time to time and then try to answer the question on everyone's minds, "why is the world the way it is?"
As jumping off point, I will raise the question put forth by Rabbi Kushner, author of Why Bad Things Happen to Good People, in his later book How Good Do We Have to Be?
Kushner writes, "I don't believe that eating from the Tree of Knowledge was sinful. I believe that it was one of the bravest and most liberating events in the history of the human race. Yes, its consequences were painful, in the same way that growing up and leaving your parental home can be painful, the same way that undertaking the responsibilities of marriage and parenthood can be painful and leaving you wondering, "Why did I ever give up my less complicated life for these problems?" But for the person who has experienced the complex, hard-earned satisfactions of human existence, there is no doubt that it is worth the pain."
More on this later ...
posted by Anonymous at 1:52 PM
1 Comments:
I have to disagree with the learned rabbi. Eve and Adam disobeyed the command of God. Isn't this the most basic definiton of sin? Sure, we have to leave home as we grow up, and hopefully our parents led us to more and more independence and exercise of judgement as we approached the departure into making our own way. But the Garden was like a lot of peoples' idea of Heaven, a place we all want to get back to, so why did we leave in the first place? On their way out, an angel tells them something like "You will eat your bread in the sweat of your brow." (contradicted by the washing instructions in some later Book) and I have adapted this for out time as "He who does not sweat for a living must sweat to live."
Doug Miron
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