“in the beginning.” The English title we use comes from the Greek geneseos, which could have a variety of meanings—birth, origin, even genealogy. In any case, for those of us in Judeo-Christian faiths it is the starting point. We almost immediately think of that opening chapter of our story—creation born, flora and fauna come to life, man and woman brought to life by the breath, the ruach, of God. A good day or two, and then, well—the devil shows up and everything goes quickly down the drain. Temptation, deception, betrayal, shame, and ultimately punishment as Adam and Eve are banished from Eden. Onward.
But there is a kind of throwaway line in the story that many people miss. After Adam and Eve carry out the first “cover up,” we are told, before they were tossed into the harsh cruel world, God sat down and made them garments to wear—He “clothed them,” the scriptures say.
Does that not say a lot about God? He really is a parent. God certainly has days when He is angry at what His children have done, but that does not mean God stops loving them, caring for them, providing for them. Here, “in the beginning” sin was born (original sin, we theologians call it); God could have wiped the blackboard clean and given it another start. But nope, He decided—even in the midst of the discipline about to be carried out—not to send His children into the world without the protection they needed.
When this line caught my eye some years ago, it was a kaleidoscope moment. I often focused on the sin and guilt and shame and punishment part; and passed right over the truth that even then—in fact right in the middle of it—there was God’s care. The psalmist would remind the reader, “O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever” (Psalm 136:1). We do not dismiss what went wrong in Eden, but what if we also had a change of view and considered what went right? God did not stop the story when things got off to a rocky start—it just became part of the story—a story He actually plays a part in by revealing the intention to watch over His children and care for them, even when they stray.
The reason I begin with this reflection is that I find in my work way too many people live in the past. They become weighed down with their guilt, sin, mistakes, bad decisions. When that becomes a part of who you are—grafted into your heart—then it can begin to define you. You have a myopic view that only sees the sin, and it’s easy to transfer that view onto how you believe God sees you.
But give the kaleidoscope a turn or two, and remember that God is always making life out of mud pies, if we would but let Him. My hunch is the clothes God fashioned for Adam and Eve fit just right—perhaps God even took a step back after donning His firstborn creatures, with needle clenched between divine teeth, a smile and a pat and a “There . . . there . . . that ought to do it.” Why would He do such a thing? It was God’s way of saying, “Let us get on with life—exhale the past, inhale the future.” A change of view, indeed.
Do you need to turn over a new leaf when it comes to understanding God? None of us is perfect, and certainly when we sin, confession is good for the soul; but do we live in the past, or can we turn the past over and live into the present and future? When we hand over our dark places to God, He not only tosses them away (“as far as the east is from the west, so far he removes our transgressions from us,” the psalmist writes), but He also will “cleanse us from all unrighteousness” as the Apostle John would write—as if the past never happened at all. In other words, God forgives the repentant sinner and He does not hold it against you—perhaps you should do the same to the one in the mirror. Perhaps you need a change of view.3
A Prayer
Lord, help me this day to give You the dark places in my heart and soul. As I do, give me the faith to hold fast to Your grace and mercy, which restore me to the child You created me to be. Amen.4
3 Psalm 103:12; 1 John 1:9.
4 Any prayer without citation is written by the author.
God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth.”
—Genesis 9:12–13
As the axis of the earth shifts, we begin to see longer shadows at day’s end; shadows that bespeak the coming of shorter days and longer nights. Sometimes long nights can be unnerving, frightening. Light and dark have often been metaphors for good and evil—Jesus’s followers are called the children of light, whereas Satan’s minions are called children of darkness.5
It is, frankly, sometimes hard to see the light of God when the dark shadows of the world creep about us. I will not use this space to unfold some thoughts on the “whys” around the world’s darkness; I will circle back to that later. But for now, no one could argue that we do not have great darkness, great evil, in the world.
The story of Noah is known to every Christian from Vacation Bible School age to adulthood. We tend to focus on all the happy parts of the story—cute animals, two by two, strutting into the protective ark with a small band of family members. We talk about the flood, but we usually do not bring up the fact that the 150 days of rain that flooded the face of the known earth was sent to wash away the evil of the world—that humans and animals were perishing in those flood waters. No, we lean in not to those unsavory parts of this story, but to the protection of God, the resting of the ark on Mount Ararat, the dove returning with an olive leaf as if to announce the good news that the waters were receding. And then, of course, there is the rainbow . . . God’s promise that flood waters will not be used to cleanse the earth again.
At a distance, it is a good story—almost a fun story. Untold pounds of construction paper and crayons have been used by children to create happy memories about a God who protected Noah and the animals, and who protects us as well. But do we always feel protected? Do you? Do we, as God’s children, wrestle with different kinds of darkness and wish sometimes that God would wipe away the evil in the world once more? I confess I do.
Many years ago, I was at a church convention in Shreveport, Louisiana, when I was called by a social worker friend to the hospital bed of a child who was facing certain death. I did not know the child, but he had been assigned to my friend and her care after he had been mercilessly beaten to the verge of death by his foster care father. She told me all of this before I came into the room, so I had a moment or two to digest it, but the moment I came in—the moment I saw that pitiful, swollen, bruised and frail little body, surrounded by weeping nurses and caretakers—my heart just broke . . . it broke to pieces.
I was told there was no chance that this child would live, but they wanted me to baptize him before they turned off any life support. We gathered our composure
