The Un-promised Land
by the sweat of your face you shall eat bread until your return to the ground. Genesis 3:19
Sweat – So, how’s it working out for you? Is life a struggle? Are you eating bread by the sweat of your face? Adam did us no favor by disobeying God. Today, humanity is part of the life-long sorrow syndrome. You’re born, you work all your life, you die. That’s the implication in the Hebrew word ze’ah. Staying alive takes a lot of effort. We have to wrestle with the world to make it produce. We can make it give us a living, but it “ain’t easy”.
Two important lessons are derived from this verse. The first is that you and I are not cursed. God’s curse for Adam’s sin did not fall directly on Adam. The earth is cursed, not Adam. This is crucial. It underlines one of the dominant themes of Scripture. Sin has cosmic consequences. My sin is never simply about me. Scripture makes it abundantly clear that everything is connected to everything. Adam’s sin produced consequences for the earth itself. God didn’t send Adam directly to hell. He didn’t have to. Adam created his own hell on earth by destroying the perfect harmony between himself and his home. Sin produced a slow form of torture that Adam didn’t anticipate. All the rest of his life he would have to struggle to survive. He would survive, but now it would be a fight. If you ever felt as though life is a fight, that you have to pry existence from the world, then you stand in Adam’s line. Sin didn’t eradicate existence. It just made everything much, much harder.
Of course, that introduces the second great theme – restoration. Once you realize that sin brought us into the un-promised land, then you can appreciate God’s description of the Promised Land. The Promised Land is a place where the curse on the ground has been lifted. It is a place where the earth cooperates with human beings to bring about life in abundance. What do you think that phase “flowing with milk and honey” means? It means that in the Promised Land things happen naturally, according to the Garden guide to goodness. God tells us that in the Promised Land we will be the beneficiaries of crops that we did not plant with the sweat of our faces. We will gather in the goodness of the earth without toil and sorrow. We will experience harmony with the earth the way God planned it in the first place.
These two competing themes are critical to understanding the difference between blessings and curses. Blessings are a part of the Promised Land. They arrive when the universe conspires with you to bring about God’s best for you, your community and His creation. Curses are just the opposite. They are not voodoo. They are simply the inevitable result of sin’s disruption of the cosmic harmony. All you have to do to experience curses is be disobedient because the curse on the ground is built into a life of disobedience. If you aren’t in harmony with God, you are automatically thrust into the un-promised land where sweat is the only operating system.
God desires to make your life a blessing. That’s what He told Abraham in His covenant promise. God wants to pour heavenly rain on you so that you can water the parched land around you. You can live the Promised Land life in the midst of a thorn and thistle world. God’s blessing arrives through you for the restoration of others. Of course, you have the joy of experiencing this divine harmony, but don’t try to hold on to it. That’s like trying to catch a waterfall in your hands. Don’t be like the man who thought that the increase in his harvest meant he should build bigger barns. God’s operating plan for blessings is distribution, not accumulation. As soon as you begin to build a bigger barn, God demands an accounting. You probably won’t like the result. So, step into the Promised Land and then give the results away. God has a bigger shovel than you do.
Topical Index: Blessings
