Men and From God, But So Are Women

Sermon for October 4, 2009 Proper 22 Text:  Genesis 2:18-24 Title: Men are From God, But So Are Women! A.  Gutzam Borglun liked to think big.  He was the man responsible for designing and sculpting Mt. Rushmore, to honor the four presidents depicted there in solid granite.  But he also sculpted on a much smaller scale.  The lifelike head of Lincoln that prominently presides over the Capitol Rotunda in DC is also one of his creations.   Borglun cut this particular work from a large, square block of stone in his studio. One day, when the face of Lincoln was just becoming recognizable out of the stone, a young girl was visiting the studio with her parents. She looked at the half-done face of Lincoln and her eyes registered wonder and astonishment.   She stared at the piece for a moment then ran to the sculptor. "Is that Abraham Lincoln?" she asked. "Yes" he responded, kneeling over to talk to the girl.  "Well," she answered, "How in the world did you know he was inside there?"  The opening 2 chapters of the Book of Genesis present a theological view of what is inside us.  Or, to be more precise, these chapters tell a story of how people are defined and shaped by their relationships -- the relationship between God and creation, humanity and nature, men and women, and husbands and wives.  The careful reader will notice that chapter 1 relates an account of Creation from one perspective; chapter 2 relates the Creation story from quite a different perspective.  Technically speaking, they represent different strands of tradition, each of them telling a different but related truth about God's sculpting of something-ness out of nothingness.  We should read each chapter from the perspective of what they have to tell us about God's relationship with both nature and people.     Chapter one teaches us that God creates and sustains all existence by His Creative Word.  It teaches us that God chooses not to be alone, but wants to be intimately involved with the welfare of humanity.  We learn from chapter 1 that God has created the Universe to be orderly (it was made in six days, or cycles), to be life-sustaining, to follow natural laws, and that this orderliness witnesses to a Creating and Sustaining God.  And finally, God made humanity to be the pinnacle of Creation (the rest of Creation is "good", man is "very good").  God made man to be in His image, to be in relationship with all the rest of Creation.  When the Gospel of John opens by declaring that Jesus is the Word of God, he is harkening back to Genesis 1, and is in effect saying that through the atoning death and Resurrection of the Lord, our proper created relationship with God, distorted by sin, lost through Adam and Eve, is restored.   Chapter two tells us about ourselves.  We are sculpted by a personal God out of the dust of the earth.  But we are differentiated from the rest of Creation because we have the very Spirit of God breathed into us.  We are able to relate to the Almighty Creator in a unique way.  God created man to be in joyous, fulfilling relationship with His Father God.  Such a relationship is like Paradise, and is allegorically called Eden.  God desires us to have an intimate and satisfying relationship with Him.  But then there is a problem. B.  It is God who recognizes and defines the problem.  "It is not good that the man should be alone."  We should notice that in the first creation story, every time God finishes another day creating order out of chaos, He describes the creation by saying "it was good," When God finishes Creation, complete with man who is made in the image of God, the divine describes it all as being "very good."  But here God says that something is "not good." The problem with this paradise is its emptiness - the man God created needs companionship.  In verse 19 God seeks to remedy this through the outpouring of a series of new creative energies.  God once again uses the "ground," as the raw material for creation.  While these new creatures share with the human a basic commonness of being, these late arrivals do not receive the additional gift of God's "breath of life." Nevertheless, they all do receive the gift of life from God's own hand.   As all these living things come together after their creation, God's first act is to establish them in relationship with the man. The man names each of the creatures brought to him, giving them both their character and their identity.  In the OT, the name of a person or thing identifies a characteristic of the person or thing.  For example, the name "Jacob", (he was quite a character whose story will come up later on in Genesis), means "cheater", and that is exactly what he did.  He cheated his brother out of both his birthright and his father's blessing, both of which were his by tradition to have.  In the Book of Exodus, we find out that God's name means "I Will Be With You!"  The name tells you the character of the named.  When a person names something, it also shows that this person has dominion over that thing.  Man names all the animals, signifying that he is in charge over God's creation.  But none of them fulfill the requirement of a "helper" or "partner" to the man.   Now the use of "helper" is not meant to reflect any kind of subordinate role on the part of the woman.   The word implies both equality and complimentarity in relationship.  We should notice that since naming gives the man power and makes the other creatures subordinate to his will, his partner could never be named by the man, since to do so means they couldn't be in partnership.   So rather than molding yet another separate creature out of the dust, God establishes that the man and this new creature will share a commonality of being. The woman is not created separately or given a separate name that would place her on a lower rung in the hierarchical ladder of creation.  Physically she and the man are composed of the same stuff - they share the common elements of earthly dust and divine breath.  The man is placed into a deep sleep before God removes the rib.  This is not God hiding a mystery from the man; rather, it is to demonstrate that God is truly and creatively doing a new thing.  The man himself reveals the equality of their relationship in verse 23.  The integrally connected partnership of the man (Hebrew "ish") and the woman (Hebrew "ishshah") are reflected in their shared name.   Little wonder the man exclaims "At last!" when God reveals the woman's presence to him.  Adam exclaims, "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh," a phrase which indicates kinship of character.  The emphasis is, once again, on the "one flesh" concept - the basic sameness, the equality of these beings which were both divinely separated in order to be divinely joined as one in covenant with each other.  The last verse, "Therefore, a man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife, and they become one flesh," says in its own way that the relationship between husband and wife creates a new family identity, separate from that which they enjoyed as part of their former relationship as children with mom and dad. C.  This passage makes three points that we should pay careful attention to:  1.  First of all, we should notice that God bends over backwards for the sake of human fulfillment.  Now if you have ever heard the notion that the OT is a testament of God's wrath and the NT is a testament of God's grace, then I am about to blow a hole in your theory!  The simple fact of the matter is that God's grace and love towards people is painted large all over the pages of the OT.  Did you notice how God related to the man in these verses:  "God said, 'It is not that the man should be alone." (verse 18); "The Lord God formed every animal…and brought them to the man to see what he would call them, and whatever the  man called every living creature, that was it's name." (verse 19); "The Lord God caused a deep sleep to come upon the man, and He took one of his ribs…and He made a woman (as a partner)" (verse 21).  The tone of these verses is not that of a wrathful, vengeful, fear-inducing God.  Our God cares about each one of us.  He didn't want Adam to be lonely.  And our God loves us so much that he shares with us His dominion over the earth.  God allowed man to name and therefore define the character of each animal, even though Adam had nothing to do with their creation.  And God wanted humanity to live in joy and harmony.  That is why He created woman as a partner for man.  God cares about us.  He isn't distant and removed from us.  He is as close as our very breathing, and He wants us to know joy and peace in relationship with Him and with His creation. There's a Spanish story of a father and son who had become estranged. The son ran away, and the father set off to find him. He searched for months to no avail. Finally, in a last desperate effort to find him, the father put an ad in a Madrid newspaper. The ad read:  "Dear Paco, meet me in front of this newspaper office at noon on Saturday. All is forgiven. I love you.. Your Father."  On Saturday, no less than 800 children named Paco showed up, looking for forgiveness and love from their fathers. Isn't it good to know that our Lord is there waiting for us like a loving Father, when we repent of our sin and come home, like the prodigal child?  Isn't it good to know that God is on our side, and that nothing can change that?  The Lord is in charge, even if it doesn't seem like it.  And He wants the best for His children.  He grieves when we grieve, and longs for relationship with each of us so He can bless us. 2.   Secondly, this passage teaches us that marriage is a covenant between a man and a woman.  Scripture is very clear on this.  We don't condone same sex marriages or holy unions.  The Anglican Church is a refuge for believers of every denominational stripe who believe that the Bible rejects the notion of blessing same sex relationships.  My former church is still struggling with this notion.  Now I don't have time today to open this can of worms.  But I do want to be clear that it is important that we combine this point with the previous point, to be clear about who we must be as Church.  We reject sinful behavior of any kind, whether it be in the context of same sex relationships or in the context of heterosexual relationships.  We also reject the sinful behavior of lying, stealing, gossiping, defrauding, or otherwise hurting another person in violation of Scripture.  But we never reject the sinner.  Because all of us sin and fall short of the glory of God.  And all of us are saved and transformed by the blood of Jesus.  God loves even the sinner, and good thing, because that includes us all!!  The church must never reject the sinner; we must only be clear about what is sinful.  And we always must be clear that the grace of God can heal and transform.   3.   And lastly, this passage teaches us that men and women are to relate as co-equal and complimentary partners within that covenant relationship.  This has been made obvious in this morning's Scripture passage.  It is a sad commentary to note that over the years, the Genesis account of the creation of woman has been used to put women down.  But nothing could be a more inaccurate interpretation of the Scripture.  Man and woman are created by God to be complimentary partners.  Complimentary means we don't have to have the same gifts, but your strengths fill the gap left by my weaknesses, and vice versa.  And partners mean we walk together through life, not one behind or ahead of the other.   Actually, the Genesis passage gives pretty good advice for married couples.  It makes clear that marriage is a covenant, where two partners join together because the whole is greater than the sum of the two.  Being in covenant doesn't mean we don't have disagreements.  But we do have an understanding of how we choose to relate to each other for the good of the relationship.  And perhaps most importantly, a good marriage is one that has God in the middle.  God created us to be in covenant together, and God will help us bind and nurture this marriage covenant for the sake of the spiritual growth of the couple.   I can't think of the marriage covenant without thinking of marriage counseling.  I remember on one occasion when the couple's conversation with me turned to a review of the marriage vows.   I stressed to them that we enter into marriage of our own free will, and promise to love and to cherish one another.  I asked them if they were entering into marriage of their own free will.  The husband-to-be looked over at his fiancé, and she responded, "Go ahead and say 'yes'".   God calls us to live in fulfilling relationship with Him and with each other.  When things go wrong, God is there to bring healing and wholeness through the community of believers called the Church.  When things go right, we find the "peace that passes understanding in Christ Jesus."  Amen. Keith Almond P.O. Box 4388 Leesburg, VA  20177 703-344-3569 almond_keith@yahoo.com