Redefined

Childhood is a deep experience that transcends our primary years. The older I grow and the farther away from childhood my journey in this world takes me, the more convinced of this I become.

I grew up the 80’s in Southern New Hampshire, in the city of Keene. Keene was a bustling college town back in the day; known for its annual Zucchini Festival, towering elm trees, and one of the widest main streets in the world. I was the oldest of three boys. We lived on a dead end street in a quiet neighborhood on the eastside of town. There were a slew of kids living in the surrounding homes, and our summers were filled with every kind of outdoor activity. The street served more as the neighborhood common for our unofficial association of families than it did a thoroughfare, where we would spend our afternoons riding bikes, or playing Wiffle ball or street hockey. I look back with many great memories of life growing up in typical suburban America, where my world found haven in the comfort of close relationships and in the benign shadow of Mount Monadnock that towered off majestic in the distance.

There’s a feel to life in the safety of what we call ‘home’ that touches something deep within our souls. Its source tends to be found in the familiar and the routine. It’s in the soothing assurance of the predictable that measures out our days, marks our seasons, and provides a steady rhythm for life’s journey. Growing up as children, the experience of home is vital to our emotional and physical health. It provides benchmarks to which we continually reference our position as we venture out on the journey of self-discovery. We can find it in the simplest of things; from the sound of an old clock in the upstairs hallway to the smell of dad’s aftershave. I used to wonder why my girls would have me read them the same book before bedtime every night for six months straight. Now I understand that the familiarity of the story was somehow tied to their need for the familiar voice that was telling it. And deep within my heart burns a passion to be for them that constant and unchangeable mountain of their youth.

For Adam and Eve, life in Eden was filled with all the aspects of this wonderful virtue. The Lord had created an environment that was beautifully rhythmic; from the sounds of the birds and streams to the daily visitation of the sun and moon in the sky. It was in this setting that the man and woman were invited on their own journey of self-discovery. Into this setting would God himself enter. In the evening, with gentle predictability God would come and engage the two in relationship. They would come to expect him and anticipate his warm presence, this One who formed them from the earth. There in the safety of the known would Creator encounter creation, and there would the relationship move from casual to something far more intimate For the surroundings were as the encounters would become; the familiar was designed cultivate the familial.

Creator was revealed to Adam as Father… There was something in the relationship that had formed between Adam and God over the course of time in Eden that moved Adam ever deeper into the place of sonship. The same was true with Eve as a daughter of God. The abundant time, tender intimacy, unhindered trust, unconditional love, mutual honor, and candid openness that defined the relationships being formed are all what made them a family And in the comfort and peace of this terrestrial home built by Abba, the man and woman flourished and grew.

However, for us it isn’t this enduring utopian world that Eden is known for. For in our hearts we knew their story was too good to last. We just knew it. For the Liar would come; and he would attack their innocent hearts and wound them terribly. In their humanity they would yield to the Lie. They would receive the fruit of the serpent’s own tongue, and in that terrible moment darkness would fall upon them as the poisonous Lie entered their spirits and flooded their hearts with all the vileness of hell. Fear consumed them, death overtook them, and shame drove them from the One who loved them. The Lie corrupted their minds and altered their perception of themselves and the world around them, and in their hearts they were orphaned from Abba.

We just knew it was too good to last, didn’t we? For their story is our story.

And my story is not unlike many of yours; for out from among the shrubbery of my own safe world as a child the Liar would come; and in the trauma of certain events he would offer me his fruit. In the trauma of sexual abuse, of divorce, and of countless other painful events of my life the Lie would be offered; and in my woundedness and ignorance I would take it and eat it. There in my heart the Lie would succeed to color my world. It would govern my thoughts and determine how I saw, and the familiar would become alien and hostile. There the Lie would speak to me. It would tell me I didn’t belong. It would tell me the world was no longer a safe place. And it would tell me that God wasn’t good…

…Perhaps your story would make mine pale in comparison; I have heard many that do. Or perhaps your story bears the signature “Ozzie & Harriet” seal of perfection. But whether we grew up in a wonderful home with loving parents or in an alcoholic home where nothing was certain, the truth of the matter is that the Lie comes to all of us. It only takes a moment. It could have been in the department store at age six when for a split second Mom disappeared from sight and terror flooded your heart. It could have been on the playground at recess when the girls laughed at the haircut your dad gave you over the weekend. It only takes a moment, and it only takes a seed; a single thought planted in your spirit and death begins to grow like a tree. All of us have been attacked and all of us have been wounded; and as a result most of us have been left orphaned someplace deep within our souls….

…Christ came to restore what was lost in Eden. He came to reveal the heart of God as Abba Father toward his children. He came to reconcile us to the One we ran and hid from, and he came to destroy the Liar who caused it all in the first place. Perhaps the answer for the discipleship problem in the Western church is in exposing the orphan spirit that has cut us off from our heavenly Father. Perhaps the secret to authentic discipleship is in somehow restoring authentic sonship.

This book is an attempt to take one radical step toward that end. The following pages are a journey back to the time of the great orphaning of humanity; for we were all there. We were there when the darkness came. We know just what it felt like to have the guilt hit like a freight train. We experienced the panic…and we ran. We threw up walls around our hearts and distanced ourselves from those who love us so that we wouldn’t have to deal with the potential of being exposed to more hurt, and we put on the fig leaves and managed the problem to the best of our ability so that we could get on with life. But it hasn’t been life. It’s been the farthest thing from life…

...We invite you to take a stroll with us, back to where it all started. Brace yourself for what you are about to see, for it is not what you have thought. Prepare to be transformed at the primal roots of your understanding of God, the world, and of yourself. You are about to discover things that will forever change the way you live life. For there in the Garden, where it all started, you will be invited to gaze steadily into the face of God and behold the smile that reinterprets this story. That same smile changes everything about your story as well. Join us in our journey before the annals of time to discover the Abba of Eden; and along with him every provision we have needed to fulfill our true destiny as his children.