Atonement: The Fall Into Sin

These are comments on Sabbath School Study Lesson 3, The Fall Into Sin.

You’re free to disagree, and I realize many will, with my opinion on the emergence of sin. It is my opinion, held for quite some time now, that from a mathematical, statistical standpoint; in a universe governed through love and liberty; given infinite time and possibly infinite beings; the emergence of sin was inevitable. Inevitable doesn’t mean it is reasonable. Like many of us have probably heard or read in the past, there is no reason for sin, and if reason could be found, sin would be excused. I believe there is no reason for sin, but at the same time my opinion is that it was inevitable.

The one way, in my opinion again, that emergence of sin could have been avoided was if every being clearly understood the nature and consequence of sin. But God, being God, even though he himself had knowledge about sin, could not demonstrate sin to the universe without violating his own nature. To violate his own nature would mean God would no longer be God, and well, the universe would cease to exist. Without a knowledge of sin then, my opinion is that one being, given the infinity of eternity, would eventually choose (God allows that because I believe God places supreme value on liberty, even more than power, safety and security) to try the path contrary to God’s nature of love and liberty. Prior to demonstration of sin, created beings had to trust that God’s way was best.

What is God’s nature of love and liberty? I believe it is the attitude of self-sacrificing love. Self-sacrificing love frees all who practice it from the need to be loved and accepted by someone else. The paradox is that when everyone practices self-sacrificing love, the need for love and acceptance is automatically met. Harmony is disrupted and a wound is introduced when someone chooses to try the path of self-love rather than self-sacrificing love; when someone thinks that they are better able to meet needs on their own, or demand (through force, deception, coercion, etc.) that their needs be met by others.

The big problem (I’m sure there are others, but the one I want to focus on here) with self-love is that it breaks relationships within a community. Since the definition of sin that I favor is a broken relationship, self-love then is sin. Self-love can be manifested in many different ways. The one I focus on is the attempt by one person to meet his or her needs through their own efforts.

In the Garden of Eden I think that this expression of self-love was a cause of the Fall. When the Serpent comes to Eve (and really, the Biblical text strongly implies Adam was right there with her, standing by, doing nothing), the insinuation is that God has only provided partial satisfaction for a relational need; i.e., God has not provided intimacy (“knowledge” is associated with relationships and intimacy) with evil. The Serpent implies that God’s knowledge of good and evil are both intimate, and therefore Eve, too, should strive to be like God in that respect. The Serpent offers Eve a way to correct this deficiency, and Eve accepts, and Adam acquiesces. Adam and Eve choose to distrust God’s goodness and God’s way. The Fall is complete.

What Adam and Eve discover is that indeed they have become intimate with evil, but in the process have lost intimacy with God who is only good. God has knowledge about evil, but God is not intimate with evil; God does not have a relationship with evil. As created beings, the only way for Adam and Eve to really get to know what evil is all about is to experience it. The Serpent was right: they came to know evil, just as it had. They discovered that they had replaced a good relationship with an evil one. In their own power there was no way back.

Because God places supreme value on liberty, the demonstration of sin had to be allowed to run its course. But God, because he is love, could not leave Adam, Eve, and the rest of humankind subject to the ultimate consequences of sin. Thus the plan of restoration, the plan of at-one-ment, was put into action. This plan had always existed, because God knew that sin would eventually emerge.