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Journey Through the Scriptures in 2008
By jason | January 2, 2008
One of my new years resolutions for 2007 was to read through the entire Bible in Eugene Peterson’s The Message. I actually made it through and plan to continue the reading plan this year - reading through the Bible in the ESV this time.
Something I want to try this year is to become more disciplined in my journaling as I read through the scriptures. So this year I’m going to use Wayne Cordeiro’s SOAP format to guide me. And with this I want to post some of these along the way (with some editing between my journal to SubvertingMediocrity).
So here you go:
Genesis 3.20-24
Scripture
20The man called his wife’s name Eve, because she was the mother of all living. 21And the LORD God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them.
22Then the LORD God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever—” 23therefore the LORD God sent him out from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. 24He drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.
Observation
This is a really phenomenal passage on several different levels First off while there is some question as to what happened to God’s statement, “if you eat of the tree you will surely die” (because they didn’t die) there can be no doubt that God shows great mercy in this passage toward the man and woman (nb: I’d argue that this is an instance of God relenting to display his mercy).
To this point we have no record that the man and woman have repented of their sin and rebellion. So God’s actions don’t seem to be conditioned by their repentance or lack thereof.
The first act of grace comes as God made garments of skins for the man and woman. This is interesting because never said it was bad for them to be naked. They felt this internally after their rebellion. So God clothed them not for himself but because of their own sense of need.
What an act of kindness on God’s part. The first thing he does is respond to their felt need. This is significant especially as I consider that their real need, arguably, is that they not eat of the tree of life to perpetually live out their disconnected fate.
Not only does he cloth them but he does so by killing animals. so here is the first act of an innocent dying to make provision for mankind. Why does God do this? We’re not told.
But God’s second act of great mercy occurs when he moved on to consider the dilemma of the man and woman eating from the tree of life. And so he expelled them from the garden.
While this had to be a bitter experience it is clearly an act of grace, mercy, and kindness on God’s part. The garden, to this point, was a place of God’s creative goodness. Their experience hereafter is quite different. so it must have been difficult to think of leaving this place. And being expelled surely magnified the consequences for their sin and rebellion. No longer would they experience the blessing of the garden.
But if they were to remain and eat of the tree of life their tortured state of disconnection would be their perpetual plight. So this act on God’s part has a sweetness as it is ultimately another display of his grace.
Application
What an exquisite display. God met both their felt need and their real need (unfelt need) in this moment. It makes me wonder how we, as a church, can do the same in our city. How can we touch people in our community at both the levels of felt and real needs. What would it look like for us to do this?
In some ways I think of our Christmas Project. We were able to connect with some pretty significant felt and real needs. We provided gifts which helped give a sense of hope to the parents. We heard responses of great gratitude and hope because of these simple gifts.
We met real needs in providing for utility assistance and through spiritual conversations. Being able to share more than gifts was a great way for us to connect with the deeper needs of these families, connecting with the God who made them.
Prayer
Lord help us see how we can meet real and felt needs in our community. Help us become more aware of our surroundings, our community. give me wisdom and insight as I seek to lead us to become a blessing to our city.
And Lord, pour out your grace to us as you did to our first parents Adam and Eve. We need your grace, mercy, and kindness today as never before. Sustain us, as your people, by your grace.
Topics: Spiritual Growth, The Scriptures |
January 2nd, 2008 at 11:28 am
i really like this SOAP. Gonna give it a try.
January 2nd, 2008 at 11:17 pm
SOAP is great! Is there actually anything wrong with soap in real life? If you drop it does it become dirty? Do you have to wash off the soap, if so what with? Just some deep thoughts, but those are good too Laser.
January 3rd, 2008 at 10:33 am
Yeah, soap’s good. You might want to think about using some every now and again you dirty beast!
January 3rd, 2008 at 11:45 am
We have to do weekly SOAP Notes for our therapy sessions in the clinic but ours stand for Subjective, Objective, Assessment and Plan. I never thought about adapting it for journaling purposes– I like it! Thanks, Pastor!