Before the Slithering Snake

It is to make us fully human that Christ has come.  At first glance such a thought runs a bit counter to what the church has taught us about ourselves.  Over the years we have been thoroughly indoctrinated with the idea that we are born sinners.   The 51st Psalm has shaped that view which has been with us since Augustine.  "Indeed, I was born guilty, a sinner when my mother conceived me." (Psalm 51:5).  The Apostle Paul would much later write, "...all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God," (Romans 3:23) but being or becoming a sinner is a different thing than being conceived and born in iniquity.    

What we have tended to do as we develop our understanding of ourselves in relationship to God is to justify our sinful actions by declaring that we are only human. The implication of such a statement is that if we were not human we would not sin.  It is our humanity that does us in.  Yet, consider for a moment what Genesis tells us.  After every act of creation is complete, the Word concludes by saying, "God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good."  (Genesis 1:31). The comment about being very good is an amplification of the previous words about various acts of creation simply being good.  There is a contradiction here that we have so many times chosen to ignore due to our theological sell out to original sin.  

To embrace the tension of the contradiction means dismantling some of what has become the foundation of our understanding of what it means to be spiritual.  In contrast to being conceived and born in sin, Genesis speaks of our bearing the imprint of the Holy One and being seen by Him as being very good.  This does not negate the choices we make which obliterate our spiritual identity, but instead, it suggests to us that being fully human is what we were before the slithering snake spoke in the Garden.  To speak of ourselves as being fully human does not point to our sin, but to our beginning in the Creator's hands.