What Happened to Us in Eden? - Psychology of the FallNäide

FROM WHAT LENS DO WE READ?

This principle—that order affects everything—doesn’t apply only to creation. It also shows up, for example, in how we read Paul:

• from Galatians 3:28: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus”,
• or, on the other hand, from 1 Timothy 2:12: “I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet.”

They seem contradictory, but they are not. What looks like a conflict has an explanation. It needs the full context—and much of that context can be traced back to the creation accounts.

We don’t have to choose one over the other. We understand this better when we remember that Paul was, above all, an imitator of the Master—including in how he treated women. That came first, and it sheds light on the rest.

All this brings me here:

• When we review the Eden texts through these lenses, we discover woman as someone deeply precious—a gift to Adam after the experience of her absence. That’s why she comes last, as the crowning work of creation, fitting perfectly with the upward progression that placed her there and him next-to-last. Not to make her superior, but distinct and special.
• And Adam, too, was special—unique and first in his own way. We don’t have to choose! The same “stuff,” expressed differently in time and form, for reasons we can only glimpse—but which are magnificent and perfect because God is behind them.

What truly matters for us is the added value each of us carries by the order God Himself chose. That is what I’ve wanted to reflect on with you. And how this understanding changes the way you see yourself—and the other sex—is something we must each process, hand in hand with the Lord.

As men and women, we will need wisdom to distinguish between the indisputable facts and our human interpretations, so that we don’t twist something as good as God’s design into something bent by our own sinful inclinations—regardless of gender.

We have all sinned, and together we became worthless. Order is not the heart of the problem. As the Master Himself reminded us, what defiles a person comes from within the heart, never from outside.