DYNAMIS!
A publication of St. George Orthodox Christian Cathedral
Wichita, KS
Genesis
3:17-19
(2/27-3-12)
The Curse: Genesis 3:17-19 SAAS, especially vss. 17,
19: “...cursed is the ground in your labors. In toil you shall eat from it all the
days of your life....till you return to the ground from which you were
taken.” God does not temporize with a single one
of us that He has made! Out of
unimaginable love and concern for the betterment and best of us, He states His
expectations and, then, He never varies.
He means what He says. Being
His creatures in His creation, we are free to respond to Him by obeying, forgetting,
or disobeying - simple as that.
Prior to our responses, God is kind - He describes the
consequences of forgetting or disobeying.
However, following upon our sin, the Lord never compromises or
negotiates. There is no wavering on His part. Hence, Genesis teaches us to look
squarely at the consequences of sin, the
curse. With the exception of
Christ our God, no human being ever has fully defeated the curse that arises
from sin.
But, do not despair in the face of labors, pain, thorns,
sweat, and death (Gen. 3:17-19).
The Apostolic Gospel addresses the curse with overflowing hope surging
out of the Mystery of Christ. This
blessed hope is expressed simply in the rest of
Saint Gregory Palamas, looking at
both sides of this divinely established reality, ie:
the curse and the hope in Christ, reminds us to approach the curse
realistically and the hope wisely.
“For the transgression of the commandment became by all means the
cause of death to both the soul and the body, either now during this age, or
during that unending punishment.
This is real death, the soul’s withdrawal from divine grace and
its attachment to sin.” Of
course, the Good News of the Apostles and the Church confronts the curse with
God’s way out of sin and death by encouraging us to turn to Life Himself and
commit ourselves to Him.
In the Christian Mystery, given in Baptism and Chrismation, the Church repeatedly speaks of “...a
robe of light...the light of salvation...and Illumination.” The purpose of the Light that Christ
throws into the deep center of the heart is to expose this real death to our blinded sight - a death which Saint Gregory
frankly tells us is “...more dreadful than torment in Gehenna. That is why we flee it with our every
power,” renouncing “everything that destroys us and separates us
from God and from everything out of which such a death exists.”
Saint Gregory goes on to say that “...just as the
death of the soul is real death, so too the life of the soul is real life. The life of the soul is union with God,
just as the life of the body is its union with the soul. And just as through the transgression of
the commandment, the soul, being separated from God, is put to death, likewise
its reunification with God, with obedience to the commandments, grants it
life.”
Standing, then, between the curse and the hope given in
Christ, what is to be done? Listen
to Saint Gregory carefully: “...the time of this life is a time for
repentance,” for turning ourselves about, trimming
“...everything...which prevents the ripening of the fruits worthy of the
divine harvest...wealth, luxury, vainglory, everything that is destructive and
transient, every disgusting and evil passion of the soul and body, all imaginary
rabble of the mind, every rumor and spectacle, and every word able to bring
harm to the soul.” Turn to
the beauty of Christ!
Shine in my heart
with the true Sun of Thy Righteousness; enlighten my mind and guard all my
senses, that walking uprightly in the way of Thy statutes, I may attain unto
life eternal.
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