Interactions with God #116

I have written before regarding my issues with sleeping. I am not a good sleeper. I wake up in the middle of the night fairly often and have trouble getting back to sleep. When this happens, I usually talk to God. Most nights are really dull and uneventful. I just end up complaining to Him by asking “why am I awake?” On occasion, He will take my hand and lead me into a train of thought that runs quickly down a rather large rabbit hole. This is exactly what happened one night while still unemployed in 2010.

Upon realizing that I am not going to go back to sleep, my first comment is usually “Hello Lord”. Then, while lying there staring at the ceiling, I start thinking and then asking questions. On that particular night, after my usual greeting, my thoughts turned toward the beginning. The beginning of man. Yup, Adam and Eve. 

I thought about how they were hiding from God because they realized they were naked. It suddenly occurred to me that they were naked before they ate from the tree, and naked after they ate from the tree.  So, why was it a problem afterward? “Hmmmmm, fascinating Captain” So, I asked Him…”What changed?” His answer came in a swirl of thoughts. First starting with one word…

”Sin”. 

Yes sin, but what does that mean? 

We have all been led to believe that the word SIN means doing something wrong. Yet, good Christian leaders have taught for years, that the word actually means “missed the mark”. It is an archery term. So, Adam and Eve ate from the tree and committed the first sin, missing the mark. Missing perfection.

They missed the mark. They did something imperfect. But why would they NOW be bothered by being naked? 

“Sin entered the world.” 

Yes, but what does that mean? Missing the target? Does that make nakedness bad after they sinned? 

“No”. 

Hmmmm. 

I realized that SIN might mean more than just missing the mark. Adam and Eve saw they were naked and hid. They SAW they were naked. So clearly, nakedness, was something that was true but yet not noticed before they ate from the tree. 

What did they get from eating from the tree? 

“The knowledge of Good and Evil”. 

Ok, so they now saw what was good and what was evil. Again, is nakedness evil? 

“No, they saw the difference between them and myself.” 

Oooooh! 

This was rather interesting. We have been taught for years how Adam and Eve were “perfect” and until sin entered the world everything was hunky dory. If that was so, then why would they have “sinned” by eating from the tree in the first place?! 

They weren’t perfect. They were already naked after all. So when they ate from the tree, they gained understanding that they were different from God…vastly so. This in itself seriously damaged the relationship they had with God. This would be the same as if we had a dog that all of a sudden became aware of the differences between themselves and us. 

DOG: “Hey, why is my food on the floor and they eat on the table?

“Wait a minute! My food is this brown balls of crunchy stuff and they have steak and cheese!!!“

“OH MY GOSH! I AM NAKED!!!”

It would go something like that. Then, the poor animal would fall into a great depression and become suicidal…make sense? Ok, in reality, the dog would be greatly upset for a few minutes and then go…”Hey look! A cat!” and speed off while barking incessantly.

God told me years ago that “the problem was on my end”. His side of our relationship is secure, the problem is on our perceptions of God due to us seeing our own yuckiness. This yuckiness is greatly accentuated when compared to His AWESONESS. 

Yes, this was a big rabbit hole. Well, now you can understand why sleeping is a problem for me… Maybe I shouldn’t have said “Hello”.

Ok, so after chewing this bone (pun intended), I began to argue with Him. “Wait a minute! If this is what happened, then the word SIN does mean much more than just missing the mark!” Considering the thought for a few minutes, I realized that sin isn’t just missing the mark. It is also the distance between the target and where the arrow lands. The distance of the miss itself! It is seeing the distance that is the problem. The distance between us and God.This seemed really profound, but it was after all 2:30am and my brain was stressed because of life in general. I let go of the thought process, rolled over, and finally fell asleep.

Later, when morning came and I got over that first wave of “oh bummer, I am still here”, and knowing I had another whole day to job hunt and do nothing useful to the universe, I decided to investigate this crazy thought further. I went to the internet.

Sure, there is a bunch of garbage on the internet. There is also a lot of great info if you have the patience and the time to sift through it. Which I did. I don’t remember how long it took, but I know it was a while. But, I found it. Yes, I did. 

First off, I found that the word SIN came from an old English word, SYN, and it does mean “missed the mark”. But what I also found, when digging further, was that the word actually does mean “the distance from where the arrow lands to the center of the target”. Holy Cow! This was huge! 

“But wait! This word is old English. The bible was written in Greek and Hebrew.” So, back I went to my search.

Most all of the sites had a traditional definition for the word Sin in either English, Hebrew or Greek. You know, “Doing something wrong”. When searching under the etymology of SIN in Ancient Hebrew, that is where I found a gold nugget of truth. The ancient Hebrew word for SIN, as I found on an Ancient Hebrew language website, was said to mean…get this…”knowing the difference between God and Man.” Yes, that is what it said. For the life of me though, I have been unable to find that site again. 

Sure, this could be a bunch of horse poo. However, considering the timing of my conversation with God the night before, and my finding evidence of it, the likelihood of its truth was compelling. I believed it was God. I still do.

So why is this a big deal? Well, consider Adam and Eve. They ate from the tree, gaining knowledge of the difference between themselves and God. God being good and them being, by a huge measure, not as good… basically “evil”. Of course, because of God’s grace, it wasn’t a problem prior to their access to this new information. God didn’t care. He had made them naked and lower than Him to begin with! The problem was on their end. They now felt unlovable and insecure. What they did next is telling. They hid and then created a pathetic covering for themselves. 

This is what we still do! We hide and cover ourselves, then wander through life whistling a tune like nothing is wrong. We don’t want to look at God. We don’t want to be seen by God. We deny His presence and/or existence. WE reject Him. Why? Because we are afraid He will reject us. He won’t. He has been promising that He won’t for thousands of years. But, people don’t believe it. I still struggle with it. I am a toad next to Him. Ok, that is being kind. I am the smudge of a toad after it has been run over by a car…on a hot street…three weeks later. Yet, He still LOVES me! Yea, that is bizarre. 

But it’s true. He does love me. In fact, the dude is love sick for me…

for us…

for you.

We have nothing to hide. 

So, instead of hiding…

Go find Him.