The Fall: The Doctrine of Original Ignorance

The Sanctuary Downtown / Relentless Love

Many years ago, I worked in a facility with some people that were a tremendous challenge. Jacob was extremely self-centered. At times I would find him sitting alone in his own filth — “wretched.” Betty was the same but also prone to rage. She once bit my wife leaving bloody teeth marks behind... on her behind — “totally depraved.” Of course, I’m talking about the two people in the photo that is also the cover to this message: Jonathan Jacob Hiett and Elizabeth Ann Hiett. Psychologists say that an infant views their own parents as an extension of themselves, and Elizabeth really did bite my wife in her bottom when Susan bent over to fix the vacuum. I wasn’t lying! You might say, “Sure, but that’s totally different; they didn’t know any better; they weren’t grown up!” Correct. Maybe you’ve never met a “grown up.” That’s my point. Jesus said that we must become like little children to enter the kingdom. Is that because we’re actually grown up and he wants us to get ignorant, or because we actually are “little children,” and our problem is that we think we’re grown up? I love this picture, for both of them are trying to be grown up. And for that reason, they’ve broken the law — “Don’t get into Mommy’s makeup bag or play with Daddy’s razor.” Elizabeth didn’t comprehend the law, and so she’s still in the land of Eden (it means “delight”). Jon did comprehend the law; you can see it in his eyes. It’s called shame. When I see that look, something in me begins to burn FOR my son. I would descend into death just to be with him. He is my Eden. And it’s “not good that the Adam should be alone,” said God the Father. In later years, there were times when neither of them would look at me. And I’d wonder “Where are you?” And yet I knew, for I am just like them. They were hiding. Even in this photo, you can see how it begins: Jon is thinking, “How can I hide from Daddy?” and at the very same moment, “How can I impress Daddy?” He knows the good but not as he ought... not yet. The Good is more than rules about the bathroom. We all hide our true self in a false self, and yet our fortress becomes a prison in which we languish all alone (or at least we think we’re alone). Jesus was childlike, wasn’t He? He trusted His Father implicitly. But He wasn’t “childish.” Children are most childish when they think they’re already grown up. Jesus is who it is that we are supposed to be but can’t make ourselves become. Somehow, He is our true self... the New Adam, the Faithful One. “Faith means Trust.” Every child of Adam is born to trust, and yet none of us is born with “the knowledge of Good and evil,” that is knowledge of whom to trust — we’re ignorant, we don’t know. As we took the Life of Christ on the tree, He said “Father, forgive them; they know not what they do” — we don’t know, we’re ignorant. People ask, “What’s wrong with this world?” And we blame Adam and cite “The Doctrine of Original Sin.” Perhaps it would be better to cite “The Doctrine of Original Ignorance” and then say, “Please forgive them; they know not what they do.” It was over 400 years after the death and resurrection of Christ that Augustine formulated “The Doctrine of Original Sin” under the oversight of the Roman Empire, and based on a bad translation of Romans 5 and his own confusing relationship with his father and his own sexuality. In Romans 5:12, Paul writes that “death spread to all men because all sinned (not because Adam sinned).” Augustine explained that Adam did sin by eating the fruit, but we all inherited his guilt through sex. So, all babies are born guilty and will go to hell unless baptized by the church, according to Augustine. During the Reformation, “reformers” tried to correct this by arguing that all babies will go to hell... unless they grew up to have faith in grace — which means, trust in the Relentless Love of God our Father. This leads to all sorts of confusing and conflicted ideas. I shared a meme: Jesus is talking to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. He says, “I know this sounds crazy, but if you guys eat the fruit of that knowledge tree, my Dad is going to #*@%ing kill me.” Isn’t that what we have come to believe? We need to ask, what is the fruit on that “knowledge tree,” and what is Adam’s sin? Paul uses the Greek word “hamartia” from “ha” (not) and, apparently, “meros” (part or portion). We translate that with the English word “sin.” Sin can be a noun or a verb. So, it seems that a person can have sin (a portion of themselves that’s missing), and then become a “sinner” when they act out of that portion that’s missing. “Sin was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law (knowledge of good and evil),” writes Paul. “I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive, and I died.” When was that? I bet it was about the age of my kids that day on the bathroom floor. What was Adam missing in the Garden before the Fall? Faith that the Word of God his Father was Good. He had no knowledge of Good and evil. He had no faith in the Word of his Father. “Whatever does not proceed from faith, is sin,” wrote Paul. So, what was hanging on that weird knowledge tree in the middle of the garden? I think it was the Faithful One, who it is that each of us is supposed to be, but we cannot make ourselves become; it was the Eschatos Adam. God didn’t kill Jesus on the tree because we took the Fruit of Knowledge. We killed Jesus on the tree because He is the Fruit that we took. And according to the Revelation, this happened from the “foundation of the world.” Genesis speaks of two trees in one place or one tree that functions as two. On the tree is the Good in flesh. That’s Jesus. And on the tree is the Life. That’s also Jesus. “This is eternal life,” said Jesus, “Knowing God and Jesus Christ whom He has sent.” So, Adam, how will you know Him? “We know that ‘all of us possess knowledge,’” writes Paul in 1 Corinthians 8:1. “This knowledge (knowledge we possess) puffs up (it’s how we build a false self, an ego, a prison of shame), but love builds up. If anyone imagines that he knows something, he does not yet know as he ought to know. But if anyone loves God, he is known by God.” There are two ways of knowing and two things to be known. There is one way to know things on the timeline: You seize control of them, test them, and know them (science and technology). And there is another way to know things from beyond the timeline: You must surrender control to them, be tested by them, and be known by them; you must know because you are known. This is called faith. It’s “I” contact. How do my children come to trust who it is that I am? I let them sin against me (We knew this would happen when we decided to have kids). I let them sin against me, and then I write a story of Grace which creates Faith in who it is that I am (I hope to be like my Dad: Relentless Love). I let my children know me in the wrong way, and then I know them in the right way. “He consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy on all” (Romans 11:32). So, Bride of Christ, how will you know your Groom? That’s Him on the tree. You could take His Life trying to make yourself Good, but then He’d be dead, and you’d know all about evil. Or you could surrender to The Life and give birth to The Good — His Life in you, through you, and to you. Child of God, how will you know your Father? That’s His heart on the tree. Jealous of Him, you could take knowledge of Him and so crucify Him, or you could receive Life from Him, aware that you were fore-given Him . . . by Him (even before you took his life, He gave himself to you). If we try to make ourselves God, it’s sin and death. But if God makes us Himself, it’s Grace and Life, eternal. Unbeliever, how will you know God? That’s the Uncaused Cause there on the tree. And He goes by other names like Truth, Wisdom, Beauty, the Good, the Life, and Love. If you must know God as a “thing,” how could you be known by Him . . . and known as a person (an “I” in a “me”)? I think I believe in God because of “I” contact. In third grade, I had knee surgery and pain greater than any I have ever experienced. My father would sit by my bed, and as his eyes drilled into mine, he would say, “If I could take your pain, I would take your pain.” I remember thinking, “What’s wrong with you; no one in this world would actually want my pain.” I think that’s when I realized that there was something in my dad that was not of this world. I don’t think I would’ve seen it without the pain. My “me,” myself, was broken, and my father’s self was broken for me. And I saw I Am that I Am in my dad. In case you’re thinking, “I wish I had a good dad,” the entire point of this message is that you do. We take His life, and He constantly gives His life, saying “Take and eat, this is my body broken for you. This is the Covenant in my blood. Drink of it all of you.” Our Dad is Love. And you will know. Original sin is original ignorance of Love. You fell so that God could teach you to walk by Faith in Love. If you think you know something, you don’t yet know as you ought to know, for God is not a thing in this world — God is Love, and His Word is Faith rising within you — what you were missing. There’s no one to blame and everyone to Love.