Grace of God Series (Part 7)
Paradise Lost and Disgrace - Genesis 3:6-13

What’s wrong with attempting perfect performance? What’s wrong with
wanting everything to be perfect? We no longer live in a perfect
world—but it once was perfect—in the garden of Eden:
· it will never be perfect again this side of heaven (Rev. 21: new heaven
and a new earth)
· a person can be renewed (every day) and we can be perfected (complete
or whole) no matter what sin is committed (whether you’re like the woman
at the well with adulterous relationships or anything else)
· Genesis 1: everything God saw was "good" and it was "very good" after
humans had been created

What did we lose at Eden?
1. God made a perfect universe governed by perfect laws. Everything was
created perfectly and had provisions for its maintenance...ecological
balance...everything cared for even when it might be abused...
· perfect man and a perfect woman...perfect gender identity and an
awesome spiritual, emotional and mental balance...(Gen. 1:26: male and
female)...we ought to get real upset when anyone attempts to tinker with
what God called ‘male and female.’
· we don’t know how long the relationship Adam and Eve had with God
without sin lasted, by the way...Bible doesn’t choose to tell us
· when all of this was lost there were profound implications! Adam and
Eve could accomplish the purposes set by God only by making the right
choice to stay with God, their creator.

This troubles some...why did God make us this way! How do you want
someone to love you...a spouse, Mom or Dad? Do you want it to be forced
or chosen? How else would you have had God do it...we’re not robots or
puppets and I think we’re usually pleased with that process!

Genesis records for us "the Fall" in Genesis 3. Adam and Eve questioned
God’s character and lost sight of His gracious provisions which were
given....it was the idea that God was "holding something back from them"
whereas prior they had only seen what God had given them in such bounty!
· Do we believe God when He says it’s not in our best interest to eat
from this one tree?
· They chose not to believe God and not receive God’s way and listened to
Satan. They distrusted God and decided for themselves!....and we make
the same choices every day?
· Adam and Eve wanted to be "above nature" but not "under God." They
wanted to be like God in the sense of being equal to Him
· they tried to become more than what they were and actually became less
than what they were.

Romans 5:18-19: "So then as through one transgression there resulted
condemnation to all men, even so through one act of righteousness there
resulted justification of life to all men. {19} For as through the one
man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the
obedience of the One the many will be made righteous."

The fall changed everything and it’s clear what Paul was seeking to say,
isn’t it? The original is gone and it can never be regained again
through our efforts, no matter how hard we try.

Romans 8:19-22: "For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly
for the revealing of the sons of God. {20} For the creation was subjected
to futility, not of its own will, but because of Him who subjected it, in
hope {21} that the creation itself also will be set free from its
slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of
God. {22} For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the
pains of childbirth together until now."

· would we have had hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, etc., if sin had not
come upon the earth? Some suggest that we lost natural and ecological
perfection because of the fall
· a lot of Christians have a lot of anger and frustration to have "bad
things happen to good people"....we must face the fact that this is an
imperfect and unfair world!
· we also lost physical and emotional perfection – our bodies suffer
greatly because of what happened in the Garden of Eden...no diseases...no
faulty gene pools...
· we won’t even begin to discuss Adam and Eve’s mental powers which we
also lost...but think of the implications when you fathom Adam’s ability
to literally name every living creature!

2. We also lost the perfect relational situation...this may be where we
are most out of balance today...they had an openness and transparency
with God and each other...we’ve built up walls and defense mechanisms
since so we can hide behind our true selves...we have very little honesty
and vulnerability today...we’re afraid to reveal ourselves to even those
who mean the most to us!
3. We lost spiritual perfection - which affects all the rest.
This is the most fundamental loss of all. God created us with a vacuum
to be filled by Himself...Revelation tells us we were created to
fellowship with Him; Genesis: created in His own image.
· We were created with a sense of God-centeredness and sin caused it to
be come self-centered. We were created to be the "sons of God" and sin
defaced it...it was supposed to be Son and it has become sin.
· compare Genesis 1 and 2 with chapter 3 and you must be struck with the
terrible losses we suffered due to sin coming into the world. This
explains why we must have grace...and there is no way back! We can’t go
back and retrieve the perfect! We live in paradise lost!

· we’ve not lost our memory of paradise or our desire for paradise or our
need for it!
We’d like:
· for our children to be perfect little angels and do everything we want
them to do (we find out they have a mind of their own)
· we’d like for our parents to have been the perfect parents
· we’d like to have no dysfunctional families
· we’d like to be perfectly balanced emotionally, mentally, spiritually
and physically
· It is not going to happen...sin took it away when it was here...man’s
choices along the way through these many years have increased it

Most important mission of the church? To seek and to save the lost. 2nd
most important mission? We must be a people who make it easy for people
to come to God, not hard.
· We must be a people who make it easy for people to talk about problems,
and sin!
· People who offer grace, not disgrace!

Disgrace: grace which has been distorted or imparted so that it does the
absolute opposite of what it should do. Grace encour-ages life and
healthy growth while disgrace produces unhealthy personality growth.

Let’s give ourself a test
Disgrace Grace
1. Having problems is sinful Sins are part of human condition
2. Emotions are sinful Neither good nor bad (what I do
with them)
3. Compulsive disorder is sinful There is a difference between
compulsive disorder or
disease and sinful behavior
4. Having fun is sinful There are many ways to delight in
God’s goodness
5. Spirituality equals perfection We’re to live within grace and not
legalism
6. Sexuality equals sin Our sexuality is a part of who we
are as people and is
to be enjoyed within boundaries
7. Success (or lack) is sinful Prosperity or poverty is not due to
deficient spirituality
8. Becoming a Christian Accepting Christ enables and empowers me
to face issues
fixes everything within me
9. If I am not healed, it due to sin Having illness is not due to my
lack of faith
* The more checks you have on the left indicates a ‘shame based’
spirituality and relies upon living up to the standards of others; on the
right, more grace oriented and a healthier spirituality based upon God’s
teaching.

· Seeing some of this in print causes us to wonder "why did I ever
believe that!"
· Many of were raised by parents who taught us that it was wrong to
display emotions...had trouble hugging children be-cause they couldn’t
remember but a handful of occasions growing up when they were either
hugged or held or told that they were loved. And don’t ever display
grief, if you’re a man, they were told.
· "Be a big boy." A pet dies and we’re told "not to cry."
· How did we come to believe things like that!

We are a product of our physical environment; the touching, smiles, tone
of voice, etc., offered to a young infant teaches and trains that person
in their development; when those things are absent or negative, the child
also learns and is trained and they will soon live out those patterns of
behavior...and these things tend to repeat themselves in the next
generation.

Dysfunctional families tend to repeat themselves...they can break the
pattern through counseling and training, but they think it is normal.

Four concepts of life which are affected by grace or ‘disgrace:’
1. Concept of self. Gen. 1:26: made in the image of God. This fact
should make our concept of self positive and special! Should cause us to
be filled with grace! We will determine our ‘self esteem’ from the people
who mean the most to us and present the most loving or unloving ‘mirrors’
from which we see ourselves....how do you feel about yourself! It goes
back directly to the mirror your home life gave you. We have the
audio-visual playback ability to replay all the things that we had done
or said to us. Grace provides acceptance whereby disgrace provides low
self-esteem. It’s ‘ok’ to love ourselves if we view ourselves in
relationship to God.

2. Concept of God. We get our earliest image of God through our parents.
I have spent a great deal of time with some individuals helping them get
a true image of God because they have an image physically that is mixed
up...Father: can be both negative and positive to many people.

3. Concept of others (how we see and relate to them).
Do we see them as friends or competitors? Do we expect others to treat
us with respect or disdain? Are they out to lift us up or let us down? Do
we live by the golden rule or do we do unto others before they do it to
us?
· It really disturbs me at this time in our history—the amount of
disrespect in our society—which is a definite sociological change in
America. The home is a window in which we look at others and how we think
they see us....people raised in disgrace think everybody sees them in a
certain way and it just might not be true!

4. Concept of reality and the world.
Doors open both ways and our families greatly determine what gets into
our home and how we feel about the world. Parents are the ‘door keepers.’
Did you realize the spoiled child can have just as many hang-ups and
problems as the abused child—both are given a faulty viewpoint of life.
Life should have with it consequences for our actions!

Last modified: April 18, 2006