But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not die, for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was a delight to the eyes and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate.
The way I’ve heard sin talked about in church, it’s always seemed somehow incorporeal, magical, maybe even just metaphorical.
Over time, I've come to see sin as something that is spiritual but also physical and tangible. I think it might be trauma. And if sin is trauma, then it's not something we can muscle through and pivot around. It's something we heal from.
Trauma competes with our identity and tries to tell us who we are: Eve was confronted with the distressing idea that God lied.
And, instead of going to the source and working to repair the relationship, Eve and Adam allowed their pain to transform their identity from beloved to betrayed. And you know what happens next.
We have a Creator who declares we are worthy. How would you treat yourself or others different if that message was central to how you acted today?
-- Katelin Champion
We invite you to take it one step further, and drop us a quick note about what strikes you in today's frame.
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