Sin--Context for "Falling in Together"

My friend and the pastor of Redding Nazarene is teaching a Nazarene Theology 101 class. Since I was in town he asked if I’d teach the class while he was gone. Out of all the Nazarene articles of faith my week was the “sin” week.

A part of my story—visiting places and empathizing with the stories of crisis, tragedy, and genocide-- was waiting to re-look at how I understand sin. Since I’ve returned to the USA I’ve found myself reliving those visits and mining the lessons. I’ve needed to. Yet I've also had some significant "flash back" experiences. Sunday during a powerful worship service at Redding Naz I was right back there at Toul Sleng Prison--Cambodia. I could even smell the place. So teaching that class last week gave me yet another opportunity to look at a biblical understanding of sin in the context of my own experience. And yes, the last post came out of this. It is a different kind of post for me and the language there was my attempt to wrestle with the reality of sin at work in us. For those of you who felt concern or shock that I would use such language, just know I’m ok and that I’m not dining in darkness. A beautiful hope has significant life in me.

As I prepared for class on “Sin, Original and Personal” (the title of the Nazarene doctrine) I was struck by the individual emphasis. There should be a personal understanding of sin. Absolutely! In fact, maybe we all need to take it more seriously. I do. Yet, I was surprised by no mention of corporate sin. If we have a personal sin category in our church doctrine, shouldn’t we also have a corporate sin category?

In Ezekiel 18 God does an amazing thing. He claims that the sins of the parents will not be automatically cast onto the children. This was a new idea. “It is only the person who sins that shall die.” Yet I think about the power of sin at work on families, communities and nations that create whole peoples who participate in sin together. I think about the Israelites as they grumbled together in the wilderness and together failed to trust that God would be the God he promised to be. I think about Joseph’s brothers whose togetherness created great pain not only for themselves but also for their whole family. I think about the collective group of people who conspired and killed an innocent man—our redeemer Jesus Christ. There are so many stories in the Bible about people (plural) who venture together in missing the mark. There is something very real about the corporate power of sin.

As I learn about genocide one of the questions I ask with everyone is, “how could so many people get behind mass killing?” It was mass sin. It is amazing how powerful propaganda is. It is amazing how easily we are converted to a “great cause” even when it means killing or abusing our neighbor (and ourselves) in the process. Sin can curve a whole people in on themselves.

When I think about what is happening in the global economy I’m struck again by the corporate power of sin. I’m not disconnected from what is happening on Wall Street. I participate in the greed conscripted by the “American Dream”. There are personal issues to be addressed in these days. Yet if we fail to address the corporate issues too, we will have missed the elephant in the room. Sin is very real—personal and corporate.

I find myself in a place of incredible tension. On the one hand I’m holding this very real understanding of personal and corporate sin at work in humanity. Yet in the other hand I cannot loose my grip on the goodness of humanity, the Imago Dei in all of us, the Spirit of God who never ceases to whoa humanity to himself. I think we need both. I believe God is the creator of all that is good and the redeemer of all that lacks. This is true even when we were “falling in together”. There is so much more than sin on our faces. As Christians we are to develop an eye for more. It is all too easy to settle for seeing only sin and hunching over in defeat. It is much harder at times, especially when we are stuck to each other in sin, to be constantly on the lookout for the goodness still at work in us. Yet as both Jesus followers and Christ bearers that is exactly what we are called to do. And because of Christ at work in us we can! Just as we step into sin together we are enabled to walk steady in Grace together. We are to spread out our Hope—something that still has power to cleanse the filth on our faces.