Ants

I vaguely recall this poem we dissected for a class period in Senior English titled "Ants." It went like this:

Adam had'em.

Like all good poetry, it rhymes. I suppose it was an exercise in critical thinking more than anything else, but as it turns out, the poem also has a relevant spiritual message. Turns out, if the reader so responds, "Ants" is a clever way of talking about sin. Now if I recall my grad. school training correctly, I'm not supposed to be a Calvinist. So when it comes to TULIP, I don't believe in TOTAL depravity, but just depravity. Ants = sin. Adam had'em, and so do I. Here's another good one, supposedly attributed to Luther.

"The old Adam is a good swimmer."

Now there's a good one for us dunkers. You can immerse all you want, but turns out, it is pretty hard to drown the old man - and I'm not talking about your dad. Maybe we need to start holding them under longer... So, yet another clever way of saying that humans typcially (I type that tongue in cheek) have a problem with sin. Seriously, what's the deal with sin?

Here's my reflection based on something I just read by Will Willimon (see sidebar). Sin is, by all accounts, something every person has, struggles with, falls into, lives in, etc. I started to write, "Sin does appear..." or "Sin seems" but that would contradict what I want to say. Here's the thing about sin: it is real. Now, granted, I may not have to convince any of my readers, but it's likely that you readers know someone who does need some convincing. I would argue that we live in a world that is increasingly in need of some convincing on this topic. However, I think we have some flawed logic in what I have experienced in terms of methodology (how we do what we do) and epistemology (how we know what we know).

Example: I have friends who do not believe in God, or, while they have some form of belief, do not follow The Way. Now why should I expect them to act any differently than they do? If they cuss, drink, are sexually immoral, and live a generally immoral lifestyle, why should I be surprised by that? Wouldn't you live that way, if you didn't believe in God?

Now there's the question that gets us. "Surely not I!?!?" you exclaim. "I would still be a good person." Well, maybe so. But what blinds us, and ultimately leads us to think we would still be good without a knowledge of God through Christ happens to be the very same thing (knowledge of God through Christ). I don't know how we got skewed into this thinking but stick with me on this one - I promise I'm not saying that knowledge of God through Christ is a bad thing in any way.

Somehow, in our pseudo-Christian American culture, we came to the conclusion that everyone is generally good. We have scientific results to back up the reality of something called conscience. The problem is, and what Christians assumed, is that our consciences are part of the image of God that God put in us at creation. Well, maybe that's true. But I have a feeling that somewhere along the way, our consciences became more of a social construction. If I'm not a Christian, I don't have a Christian conscience. I may have a conscience, but its standard for morality is only a social construction. Watch TV, listen to music, go to the movies, consume your media of choice, and you'll find out quickly that the Christian conscience and the American conscience are growing apart quickly. The point is that we can no longer appeal to the innate human condition of conscience as evidence of the human sin condition.

Instead, I say that we ought to appeal to Christ as our evidence of sin. Sin is only secondarily about not doing something right or doing something wrong. Sin is primarily about separation from God. I believe that Christians have been arguing from conscience about sin being a matter of morailty (bad method that sounds good). What we ought to be doing is talking about sin being a matter of broken relationship with the Creator. And here's where epistemology comes into play. We know what we know about sin ONLY because of Jesus. It is only through the language and culture of Christ that we can adequately describe what sin is and what it does to us.

So all this time, maybe we've been doing it backwards. We think if we can convince people they are sinners, then they will feel a need for Jesus. But how can we convince them of their sin if we do not first give them a language in which to adequately speak about it? If I say to someone who is not a Christian, "You are a sinner." What does that mean to them? It probably means exactly what we are seeing in so many churches today. It probably means that they need to learn how to be moral people who are nominal at best and who never learn how to develop a meaningful relationship with God. It means that if they want to stop being sinners, they need to do things that make them feel like not sinners, as in going to church and giving money and taking communion.

So what is the solution? I'm not really sure. What I think is that we need to focus our discussion of sin more on what it means to have a relationship with God through Christ and how sin prevents that. I think we need to focus less on sin as a morality issue. I think we need to stop assuming that sin is best argued as a matter of conscience. And most of all, I think we need to realize that sin is something we understand and talk about only through Christ. Our discussion of sin does not lead us to Jesus, rather our discussion of God and His Son lead us to sin.

Updates

My wife got her hair cut and it looks great! I cannot even begin to describe how truly hot she is. You just need to see it for yourself.


I've decided I don't mind working at Super Suppers. It has somehow helped me understand women a tiny little bit better, but at the same time, make me feel less inclined to communicate with them. I suppose that only affects my wife, but don't worry baby, I'm not going to quit communicating with you. Props to Jonathan Jerkins for the somewhat related idea that the worst work environment is either all women or all men.


The Red Sox took three out of four from the Yanks this weekend. Too bad it didn't count for squat. What will make this pain even worse is when Jeter gets the MVP over Ortiz. Once again, an undeserving Yank (although more so than last years fiasco) takes the prize over a deserving Big Papi. I can't even begin to tell you what a difference Ortiz made to the Sox this year. So I won't.



I still don't have the Box live. As a result, I still miss Charles.



Finally, after two wonderful experiences with young married couples yesterday, I think it's funy how much we all enjoy reassuring each other that we're all in the same boat. This is why most tv shows about married couples are so popular. It's not the new material - mostly because the material is not new. It's all just a different persepctive on the same problems. They are popular because all married people can relate. It's kind of nice to know that you're not the only one who argues with their spouse about _____________. In fact, if we're not dealing with ________ right now, it's funny to watch someone else successfully deal with ____________ in less than 30 minutes. With that in mind, my top five marriage-centric television shows (with the disclaimer that many marriage-centric shows could arguably be called family-centric as well):

5. The Simpsons
4. Mad About You
3. Home Improvement
2. The Cosby Show
1. Everybody Loves Raymond

(Aussie) Irrelevancy

I may not be the only blogger, but apparently, I am the only one who cares...


In other news, it's now Day 7 of the Derek Webb crisis. Authorities are still searching for his whereabouts as they cannot free him until they find out where he is.


What is it about women that creates such drama? I work with all women (well, except for the gay guy and the husband of the owner) and those ladies are crazy. They get stressed out about everything and then start yelling at each other. Except they only mean half of what they say (read, yell) and are mostly just letting off stress by creating a more stressful atmosphere, as if that helps or makes sense. So what am I really saying here? Basically, that I am a guy.


Working at Super Suppers does not make me want to eat food less, except for Chinese. Must be all the raw vegetables. Or the dog meat.

Aussie Jealousy

I know I'm not the only one blogging about this...




But crikey, Steve Irwin is dead. And I'm not kidding when I saw the world has lost a great man. First of all, how can you be surprised that he died? I do not want to be mean about this, but it was bound to happen. There was a slim chance that he was going to live to a ripe old age, but the odds were against it. Also, how can you say that it was ironic that he died not doing something dangerous? The way I see it, when you are around anything than can and might stick a barb into your heart and kill you, it's dangerous.

Second, how can you not love the crazy things this guy did?!?! I'm not even mad about the baby incident. Besides Crocodile Dundee, Nicole Kidman, Sir Marcus Oliphant, Angus Young, Mel Gibson and Ned Kelly, he's got to be the one of the greatest Australians ever.

He might have been a lunatic, but in one sense or another, we all envy the things that this man saw and did. Even more than that, though, this guy had a passion. And not the daytime soap kind, but the kind that totally consumes your life to the point that it is SO extravagant that other people cannot help but notice it. The world saw him live and die for his passion. I don't think I have to explain where I am going with that one...