Loving Limits

DAILY BYTE

Given the reality that life is difficult, and at times even brutal, the pointed question that arises for people of faith is this: “Is this what God had in mind when God created the heavens and the earth, and breathed into us the breath of life?”

That’s a tough question to answer. Who of us can say with certainty which of the difficult dimensions of life are a necessary part of God’s good creation? But what we do know is this: many of the difficulties and crises and tragedies of this life are of our making, not God’s.

Greed, and lust, and cruelty, and hatred, and oppression, and injustice can make life not just difficult, but intolerable. These things are of human design and are part of the tragic crisis that we have fomented within the world. The crisis of humanity’s fall. The crisis of sin.

The story of the origin of this crisis is told in the Bible in Genesis chapter 3. We know the story well. About Adam & Eve, and a serpent, and the fruit of a forbidden tree, and the tragic consequences of disobedience that can make such a mess of the good things that God intends for us.

In the story, a luscious garden is set before Adam & Eve as a sumptuous feast for them to enjoy freely and unselfconsciously. There is only one limitation – the fruit of a certain tree is not for eating. On the great banqueting table that is Eden, this tree is the centre-piece. And God says, ‘Don’t eat the centerpiece!’

And that should have been the end of that. But then a serpent enters the story and starts asking questions about God. In other words, this was the Bible’s first theologian. Which is not to say that theologians are always bad news, but it is to say that theological inquiry is always inadequate and theological perspectives are always incomplete, because talking about God can never capture the essence of God. And Genesis 3 is a tragic case in point – because the serpent, whether malicious or just misinformed, gets it so wrong about God. But in the process sows seeds of suspicion as to whether God’s good intentions can be trusted.

A God-given limitation had been placed over Adam & Eve’s lives. “Don’t eat the fruit of this true, if you do you will die!” It wasn’t because God was being mean; it was because God was being loving. This limitation was part of the great gift of Eden. This was part of the sumptuous feast for them to enjoy. Accepting their limits was part of what it meant to be fully human. Because some things are not intended for human consumption, and to taste them makes us less not more.

Accepting our God-given limits enables us to live whole and holy lives. Rejecting these God-given limits brings chaos and mayhem. Like what happened to Adam & Eve. They chose to reject their limits. They tasted the forbidden fruit and their eyes were opened, but not in a way that brought clarity, but rather confusion. It was the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that they ate, but it was fruit that they could not digest. It was knowledge that they could not handle.

And immediately we see them exercising this knowledge in monstrous ways, judging what was good and bad, when really they had no idea which was which. We see them deciding that their nakedness was a bad idea, and that hiding from God was a good idea. Adam even suggests that the gift of Eve was a bad idea.

And so it began, and has continued ever since. A story that has repeated itself over and over again, as people in every age have decided that they know better than God, have sought to commandeer God’s place in the world, rejecting their God-given limits, and have ended up making a mess of their lives.

PRAY AS YOU GO

Forgive me, Lord for rejecting the loving limits that you have placed over my life. Help me to trust that the boundaries that you have set for my existence are for my benefit, and that within these boundaries there are wide open expanses in which to explore what it means to be fully human. Amen