Every Longing Heart
Sunday, November 30, 2025
Today’s Reading: Genesis 3:14-21, Romans 5
The brokenness that hurts our hearts takes its root in Genesis Chapter 3. Paul explains, “...sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned…” (Romans 5:12 NIV) That’s big. You may want to reread it. Everyone has sinned, including me. So death is coming for me, as it has for all creation since the Fall. I know that’s a dismal reality, but bear with me.
As we consider the Creator and His creation, I’d like to share something that has helped me think through these matters. We tend to anthropomorphize the Creator of the universe, meaning we view Him as though He were a human. This is why we feel we can ask questions like, “Isn’t that kind of mean?” or “Why would He do that? I don’t understand.” While I think He has grace for our honest questions, we have to remember He is NOT like us. He is outside of our conceptual framework. So, a new perspective helps. But first, a disclaimer — no analogy for God is perfect. This one has some deficits, but it is generally very helpful. Here it is:
Think of God’s attributes more like physics and less like personality traits.
Let me explain. We don’t say gravity is unkind when someone falls a great distance. Gravity just is, and we can choose to work with it or against it. In the same way, God is not a being who chooses to make just decisions, express love, and reveal what He decides to be true. God IS justice; God IS love; God IS truth. He doesn’t “verb” His attributes. He IS what He is. He revealed Himself as “I am that I am.” (Exodus 3:14 NIV) We don’t have time here to warn against the ideas of God as an impersonal force or to further explore the orthodox ideas of God as a “person” of the Trinity or that we are made in His image. I hope, though, that this mini-lesson in theology does help us move past the “that’s not fair” part of the universal nature of the Fall. If I may, it’s almost like the disobedience of Adam and Eve changed the “spiritual physics” of our universe. Sin brought death — to everything.
Notice, though, that even as God explains the curses over the serpent, the woman, the man, and the earth, He interjects a future Hope in the very same breath as His judgment! The first prophecy of a coming Savior came directly from the mouth of God Himself. “He will crush your head.” (Genesis 3:15 NIV)
God is holy. Holiness is His “physics,” so to speak. He is perfect in all His ways. The consequences of the Fall are painful. His judgments can be painful, but He never disciplines without also offering hope. We see it with Israel over and over.
I cling to this Hope. The serpent-crushing Savior is my only hope. In the same moment that the law of death was entering the world, God gave us a glimpse of a future Hope to be spared from that death. God already had plans to reverse the effects of the Fall. That plan was Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. Through Him, we can be set free from the law of sin and death (Romans 8:2). There is HOPE!
No one is too far gone, because actually, we were all too far gone. God’s grace through Jesus is the only thing that offers eternal hope. And this hope is not in vain. It is not the strength of our own faith that saves, but the One in whom we put that faith. He is good and true. There is eternal Hope in Him.