Innocence Revisited
Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith. Galatians 3:24 NASB
Our tutor – It seems that the world of human relationships often strives to regain the feeling of innocence lost long ago in the mistaken choices of growing up. Since so few of us really have a clear understanding of the journey of becoming, we look back on those past days as though recapturing of a time of purity of heart will somehow make up for the many wounds suffered in the pursuit of maturity. Nowhere is this more evident than in our repeated attempts to find “true love;” a love that somehow keeps us centered in ourselves and at the same time releases us to the joy of life’s intimacy with others. Oh, if we could only know the unbearable lightness of being this side of the grave! And yet, with each passing heartache, with every broken promise, with all the spoken and unspoken disappointments, we find that “being” is often too heavy to bear. Lost youth, lost innocence. We long for that peace and joy of being completely at home with life.
So powerful is the myth of lost innocence that it is not only a progenitor of shattered expectations but also a conditioner of culture. From the Greeks to the Sioux, mythical history is replete with stories of the transition from innocence to experience, and the associated “fall from grace” that accompanies such a transition. In the words of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, we all want to “get back to the Garden.” However, this unrequited longing for a return to innocence is not what is required. A little deeper reflection shows us that the attempted pilgrimage to innocence revisited may be incapable of restoring our missing serenity even if it were to occur. The better choice for wholeness may actually be the one that we cannot avoid—the pathway of experience filled with suffering and sorrows. We might just find that joy is meaningful only against the backdrop of tears shed in the agony of despair and defeat.
Experience is a cruel tutor. But there is a cosmic purpose behind this cruelty. Paul spoke of this paradox in his discussion of law and grace in the letter to the assembly in Rome. He points out that in spite of the fact that the law was intended to produce godly living, it actually put a spotlight on our moral failures. What was supposed to keep us secure inside the fence of obedience actually resulted in the disaster of exposing our cooperation in the rape of innocence. We became our own victims. Paul confirms that the law is good. It demarcates the pathway of righteousness. Whole-hearted adoption of the law guarantees peace of mind and fellowship with God and Man. But intentions are easily dashed to pieces on the sharp rocks of desire. So the law served to call attention to the gap between our longing for peace and our pursuit of pleasure.
Law alone did nothing more than push us toward a hopeless maturity where we are fully cognizant of our failures but powerless to restore purity. In this arena, suffering is purposeful. Why? Because it pushes us toward reconciliation, not return to some lost paradise. God may have created human beings innocent, but there was no intention that they stay that way. Choice presupposes alternatives—real alternatives where things might go wrong. Therefore, reconciliation (theologically – “atonement”) must be a real option and given the history of our species, it is now the only option. As long as we wander about looking for a return to Paradise, we will remain abandoned souls. There is no return. That time is past. Now is the time for innocence to give way to rigorous examination. And to discover serendipity.
Topical Index: tutor, innocence, reconciliation, Galatians 3:24
The innocents are sitting ducks, that is what I (and native cultures everywhere, too) have found. We cannot raise kids innocent and realistically expect them to navigate, or even survive, the world out there very well, and the real reason is – as Skip touches that nerve so well – that we all carry the real enemy within, but that enemy is not even exposed until we rub up against that world. I am NOT advocating that you just throw your kids out there! I am saying that if we do not give them the tools to engage the sin within themselves and others, they are going to be defenseless.
I woke up this morn lamenting the profound lack of connection between me and certain precious people in my life, but realized that sin, as well as righteousness, lies BETWEEN people. People who are bent in certain complementary ways not only attract each other, their ‘bentness’ is built-in disaster for the relationship. My sin responds to your sin along the same pathways that love travels. My reluctance to reach out and touch you is at least partway responding to your reluctance to be touched. Part of this is righteousness; I have to respect your choices – but part of it is my sin. However, I am only halfway responsible for the fracture; you are the other half. Therefore, I cannot fix the whole problem all by myself. There is still your sovereignty, too. Complicated problem. The real question for me has been, how to walk upright in a world knocked sideways?
Our attempts to love are all flawed, but that is no excuse for trying. Our own propensity to sin is going to be activated – guaranteed – when it meets the propensity found in others, but we are commanded to love them anyway. This sounds like foretold train wrecks! And they are! This is a bumper car pavilion at the fair, and we are all about 3 years old. My stuff is going to bump into yours. The human notion of ‘purity’ from this defilement ranges from the nirvana of the East to the passionlessness of the body-severed West, but neither side of the planet can grasp the true answer to the problem which is to engage love and swim THROUGH the mess, for the flesh has no way to ‘fix’ fracture except to disengage even further.
Only Torah gives both the way to engage God, ourselves, and others on the other side of disaster, and the power – literally the choice range – to try again from a cleaner, stronger place, for Torah reveals not only the picture of love to follow, which is the Law, but the mechanisms of repentance, which returns us to that choice range. Only Torah gives us a picture of what correct engagement looks like so that we will not be deceived into thinking that the sin within is ‘love’ and so fall for the sin in others in the name of love. No flesh on this planet knows what love is, for all flesh is flawed, but all flesh still longs for it. Torah turns on the light and shows us how to reinsert the plug back into the wall so that love can actually work. The biggest mistake we make is to assume that love – connection- can happen without Outside help. Experience corrects that mistake, but revelation tells us what to do about it. We need both, now, post Tree, but we have all been granted both. Halleluah!
Thanls Laurita, great words as a reminder to start my week.
I should say no flesh STARTS OUT knowing what love is, which is why babies are an open slate, but that EXPERIENCE teaches us what it is (and is not). I suspect the only innocents that can understand love in its immensity (how to love flawed others) are the severely retarded, and that is because they are given that experience directly through grace. (Private thoughts upon reading about L’Arche.)
Almost. Just one thing. Research shows (and experience confirms) that we don’t come into this world as a blank slate. Memories begin in the womb. So we are born with inherited preconditions that had nothing to do with OUR choices. That doesn’t mean we can’t choose otherwise, but it does mean that we have to REWRITE, not enter information into the brain for the first time. And for some of us, these experiences alter our perception of the world before we arrive. See the data in Bessel van der Kolk’s book.
Thanks for the reminder that life begins at conception (and all that that means), but that we are a composite of all who came before, too. So you are saying we start out behind the line, so to speak. But that also means that we are likewise blessed by the good choices of those who came before as well as those who influence our early moments, too. Gotta remember the blessings!
Do you miss the lions roaring? I worked with wild animals for years and loved the roars, but miss wolves howling the most. The coyotes we now have in the woods behind us are a distant second best.
I knew you would enjoy Jean Vanier. He has it all together in ways I can only dream about.
I think the “least among us” reveal the biggest insights into what a human is (and is not). We lose much to distance ourselves from them. The books have been great! Thank you so much!
Good News!!
Justified (Not Guilty)
(If we notice the tense, we would no longer be so tense!!)
~ Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come. Now all these things are from God, who [Has] reconciled us to Himself through Christ and [Has] given unto us the ministry of reconciliation..
Reconciliation! — What a wonderful word!! What Good News! God and sinners RECONCILED!!
namely, [we need to see and to know] that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself..— not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation.
Holy God, yet sinful man (we all have sinned) but who shall “stand in the gap?” Who will be our Mediator?
Yes, Israel. – there is one God!! and there is and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus!
(1 Timothy 2.5)
Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
[Now] Redeemed. [Now] Reconciled. [Now] Righteous. [Now] Rightly-related. [Now] Rejoicing!!
Peace, peace, wonderful peace,
Coming down from my Father above!
Sweep over my spirit forever, I pray
In fathomless billows of love!
[How] Blessed is the one whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered!! (Psalm 32:1)
Thank you, Carl! This IS now! HalleluYah!!!:):)
Skip, thank you for this post. Like many of them, I have to read them twice (or more) to fully comprehend and reflect on them.You touched a lot of areas in just a few paragraphs, some of which included; longing, love, disappointment, suffering and then the gift of reconciliation with its corresponding serendipity. It was enjoyable to reread the verse again with your insights.
Back into the deep end are we? No paddling around in the shallows. I am struck, through the post and the comments, that we are salient, rational, thoughtful beings with a paradigm. Hopefully one that views the whole of life, the world and our experiences through the lens of our minds and emotional responses to past and present conditions carefully and accurately. Ok so now what? Do we simply react the way we are feeling or do we perhaps set those feelings and thoughts against another interpretive grid? Do we submit them to a higher order of response and purpose? That to me is the power of Torah and the blood of Messiah. He made us free to chose again, to choose (unlike the un-redeemed beast) freely. We can now choose life for as Moses warned us.”Today I have set before you life or death blessings or the curse…choose life that you might live”
You are a master at ignoring the elephant.
We are on a journey not into innocence, not into serendipity, not even into “true love”,
We are satisfied through our union with Christ and restoring our First Love in Him.
There is an awakening of “first Love” encounters with King Jesus. Desire has a focus, is your desire for Him alone? You will be pleasantly surprised if it is!! He does not disappoint the ones who come to Him. His beauty is costly to look upon so have your lamps full of oil, prepared in His presence for heaven only knows! He is so beautiful all else fades even all your other memories- no one can compare or even come close to the one who knows your name and calls you to come, come and seek His face, come see His beauty.
He created romance, He created dance, He created Love itself and invited us to experience it firsthand in Him. He is the master designer of all things beautiful, so extravagant in His presentation He can and will take your very breath away.
Please find Him, He is waiting to be found by you!
Dear Sharon,
Did you address your reply to me? I couldn’t tell.
Skip
My initial response is to you but always in light of it being viewed by your very interesting community who I hope to meet in heaven someday-unlike Jesus whom I am not willing to wait to meet since He is available now:)
Much Love,