When the power went out during an electrical storm, with no lights to see our Hungry Hungry Hippos tournament, some friends and I resorted to playing a spirited game of Which Historical Figure Would You Most Like To Punch in the Face?. The usual answers arose: Josef Stalin, Hirohito, John Wilkes Booth, Caligula, Jimmy Fallon, etc. But one friend's answer - Adam and Eve - made me think. My friend reasoned he'd backhand them both for messing up humankind by their disobedience to God. But I was hesitant about that answer.
Adam and Eve didn't need a bash in the face to remind them they'd erred; they were banished from a paradise as decay and death entered the world. But that wasn't my only reason for not punching Adam and Eve in the face. Of course, if sin had never entered the world by their actions, we'd never know death, illness, injustice, grief, loss. But - and maybe I'm just too accustomed to a world that sucks - how boring would the history of life on this planet be?
This may stem partly from the fact that the only world any of us knows is a hard world, but, what triumph would we know? What victory? How would we shed tears of joy in gripping God's hand to overcome an addiction? How would we see the beauty of any choice to do right, a choice great or small? And above all, we wouldn't know the greatest story ever told of good versus evil - the agonizing, beautiful, harrowing, joyous true story of Jesus Christ and His sacrifice upon the cross, His triumphant defeat of death and sin.
I don't like the way the world is, but I consider it more than just a silver lining that we all have walk-on parts in that epic story.
OHMS,
Cpt. Bud Sturguess
"Then Job answered the LORD and said:
"I know that You can do everything,
and that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You.
You asked, 'Who is this who hides counsel without knowledge?'
Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand,
things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.
Listen, please, and let me speak;
You said, 'I will question you, and you shall answer Me.'
I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear,
but now my eye sees You.
Therefore I abhor myself,
and repent in dust and ashes.""
-Job 42:1-6
Adam and Eve didn't need a bash in the face to remind them they'd erred; they were banished from a paradise as decay and death entered the world. But that wasn't my only reason for not punching Adam and Eve in the face. Of course, if sin had never entered the world by their actions, we'd never know death, illness, injustice, grief, loss. But - and maybe I'm just too accustomed to a world that sucks - how boring would the history of life on this planet be?
This may stem partly from the fact that the only world any of us knows is a hard world, but, what triumph would we know? What victory? How would we shed tears of joy in gripping God's hand to overcome an addiction? How would we see the beauty of any choice to do right, a choice great or small? And above all, we wouldn't know the greatest story ever told of good versus evil - the agonizing, beautiful, harrowing, joyous true story of Jesus Christ and His sacrifice upon the cross, His triumphant defeat of death and sin.
I don't like the way the world is, but I consider it more than just a silver lining that we all have walk-on parts in that epic story.
OHMS,
Cpt. Bud Sturguess
"Then Job answered the LORD and said:
"I know that You can do everything,
and that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You.
You asked, 'Who is this who hides counsel without knowledge?'
Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand,
things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.
Listen, please, and let me speak;
You said, 'I will question you, and you shall answer Me.'
I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear,
but now my eye sees You.
Therefore I abhor myself,
and repent in dust and ashes.""
-Job 42:1-6
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