Man’s Corruption 12/13/42
Scripture: Genesis 2: 16,17; 3: 1-19
Text: Genesis 3: 4 “ - the serpent said -- ye shall not surely ddie.”
Last week, we gave our attention for a while to thoughts of “God’s Creation.” I gave it as my opinion, in which I am influenced by competent scholars, that the book of Genesis is to be read, not as modern science or history are read; but perhaps as one might read poetry for the truth that lies in it. One of the great truths expressed in the first chapter of Genesis is the truth that the world did not “just happen,” but was created. “We have been called into being by a presiding intelligence and an originating will” [Marcus Dodds]. Another truth found in the story is that man is a chief work of God, tremendously important in his own right, intended and made in the image of something holy. And a third truth is that the creation, including man, is good.
This is a striking piece of perception on the part of the writer of Genesis. Man was created good. He was meant to be innocent of evil. The world that could be his was a harmony of all that ought to be.
I believe that this is a true insight. We need no persuasion as to the wrong in man’s life. We have it thrust upon our attention from every side. The mean and wicked ways of people are painfully, infuriatingly obvious. I expect to deal with this fact this morning. But God, nevertheless, created us all good.
I am not one of those theologians who hold to the theory of infant damnation. I do not for a moment believe in the theory that, in Adam’s sin, all mysteriously became wicked, before ever they were born, or that all were condemned of God.
I do not believe that a little child must be baptized in infancy to be sure that his soul will escape one of Dante’s hells, should he die young. I hold that the new-born babe is an innocent creature, and that God has created the babe good.
I do believe, with all my heart, in the baptism of infants and children; not as a magical rite of “fire insurance,” nor as a mystical rite of purification, but as an act of dedication by Christian parents. From my point of view, infant baptism means something like this. All Christian fathers and mothers should be eager to lay the foundation of their child’s Christian nurture from the beginning of its life. I think that the open declaration that a child is being dedicated to God is important in the experience of all Christian parents. Nothing can replace or perhaps equal the impression made on his life, as the child grows older, when he understands that his parents have believed that he was good as a babe, and have dedicated him to the Highest Good while he was still too small to remember it. Parents take a long, firm step in the Christian nurture of their children when they present them for baptism in this spirit.
One of the soundest reasons for taking such a step in the time of a child’s innocence is the certainty of man’s corruption. for man is certainly beset by evil, and none escapes it - neither does the newborn child, nor did the earliest man.
Turn again now to this simple story of creation in a garden. The Lord God commanded man that he should eat freely of the fruits of every tree in that garden of Eden -- except one; the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Now all the good-natured speculation as to whether or not the forbidden fruit was an apple, whether the serpent had legs before this incident, (together with numerous other “red-herring” considerations) is beside the point. As I said last Sunday, if the book of Genesis were proven by someone to be a myth, it would still be true in the vital sense that it was intended to be true. It is the truth that man can be tempted from good to evil; that he who is made in the holy image of God can, and does, see corruption.
There is no reason for blaming man’s trouble on a snake. It is more likely that the writer chose the snake for its part in the story because of his hatred for it, than that the snake is hated because it first got man into trouble. And I see no reason for assuming that woman is more cunningly wicked than man because she is said to have led him into temptation. (In fact, I think that a literal-minded reading of this story makes out a rather sorry case for the man, if he is supposed to have been led around by his wife before there was even an apron string to tie to!) To me, all of this is quite beside the point. I think it is “picture language” and that as “picture language” it paints what is profoundly true.
1) Temptations come to us all, subtly, like a serpent.
2) Temptation succeeds at first by exciting our curiosity, and arousing a desire to toy with what God’s goodness, for goodness’ sake, has forbidden us.
3) Then we resent the good, allow ourselves a feeling that God ought not to grudge us a little “fun.” We begin to think that we know as much about life and what is good in it, as anybody -even God. We become headstrong and self-willed.
4) It sometimes takes a terrific “burning” to make us aware of our error.
5) If, at length, we are burned badly enough to recognize our evil, there is a sense of shame and a knowledge of the faultiness of self, which only God can cover, and heal, and redeem.
6) Suffering must always follow wrongdoing. Once we have sinned, the path back to a free conscience lies through pain of mind and heart and often of body - pain often for others as well as self, sometimes for the innocent along with the guilty. And the scars, though they man heal, are still scars! The “mark” of Cain is no joke. It is a terrible truth.
I wish I might preach a sermon this morning of such illuminated power that we should all know that the evil of our world is not God’s, but is man’s. God created a good world and good people! But man has corrupted this good creation by the misuse of his own God-given free will!
Look what grows on the tree of knowledge. Here is one specimen of its fruit: the power to fly through the air, to visit new climes, to see loved ones quickly, to survey the world from the skies, to take sustenance and encouragement swiftly to those in need, to carry messages with great speed. What marvelous possibilities for good! And yet man must also use that knowledge of flight for evil - to rain fire and terror and destruction and violence and horror and death on his fellows. It is good! Yet man has also corrupted it!
Man can and does have the accuracy of insight to record the truth that God “hath made of one blood all the nations of men for to dwell on the face of the earth.” (Acts 17: 26) And yet man can have the self-concern and self-conceit of his little moment to deny that same truth shamefully. I once had a fellow of the white race tell me that he knew (I don’t know why or how he thought he knew) that a man with a black skin would be just as good in heaven as himself - but not here. “In this world he’s just a nigger!” “Maybe God thinks as much of the Japanese man across the street as he does of me, but around here, right now, I’m a lot better than he is!”
I thought when I heard him say it, (and I still think) that the man’s boastful attempt to speak some brutal sort of truth was a blasphemy against the holy. Either he lacked the courage to say that he didn’t believe in the God to whom he had paid a moment’s lip service, or else he set himself up in an impossible defiance of that same God.
Think what great strides man has made in the understanding of the ways of man - in learning psychology, if you please. And yet he can turn it with diabolical cunning to propaganda in order to manipulate the other fellow for unholy ends! Jesus showed us all how to meet all sorts of people with profit. He himself mingled freely with the sick, with those who had done wrong, with the poor, with the rich, with the priests, with thieves - with any sort of person. Yet we can say to ourselves, “I don’t want to associate with farm folk, or city folk; with section hands or bankers; with Mongolians of Jews or Aryans; with communists or capitalists;” -- and by our refusal to associate, to become acquainted, to build our common world together, we cut off the hands of Jesus!
The corruption of the world is of man’s making.
Man is incomplete in his abilities and his understanding. This is no reproach to us, for we are made that way.
(A mother who had lost her son in a tragic accident, said, in the shock of her first hysterical grief, “O there isn’t any God; there isn’t any God.” The mood soon passed. And let it be said that it is no reproach to her that she felt that way for a moment. Jesus, in a moment of agony, cried out, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”
But sorrow and corruption are not God’s. God is author of joy, hope, life.
Mature man takes his place in God’s family only when he can say, “God be merciful to me, a sinner.” Then he can be forgiven. Then he can be taught of God. Then he can be redeemed.
“God’s Redemption” is our theme for next Sunday.
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dates and places delivered:
Wisconsin Rapids, December 13, 1942
W.F.H.R., Wisconsin Rapids, February 5, 1943