Abdication the Greater Sin?

Women are the protectors (ezer), the warrior-princesses, if you will allow a usurpation of the phrase. In the Garden of Eden, Eve could be the one who steps in front of Adam when they meet the serpent...

With this warrior-princess view, it can change how you view some of the lessons from scripture. Looking back, often we think the systems, policies, reactions to circumstances that created new practices are infallible...especially if we believe those systems, policies and practices are working for us. This is superbly true if they're beneficial for our 'in-group'. Today, we concentrate our view of women's role on Genesis 3 ("he will rule over you") Greek scripture passages like Ephesians 5.21 and 1 Peter 3.7 that suggest women submit to husbands and are weaker (without strength). What if God views women differently as warrior-princesses--not literally in the military sense but figuratively as a protector and guide?

In Genesis 3, the serpent talks to Eve initially. Adam is there, mutely standing by. It's as if the couple were walking through paradise and met the serpent who was 'more crafty than of the wild animals.' The conversation continues between the two and we all know how it ends. Adam follows her example and eats the forbidden fruit. Later, Adam finds his voice and answers God's query of "Where are you?" As their transgression is revealed, Adam shamelessly shifts the blame to Eve...and to God ("...the woman You gave me..."). Despite his complaint, he escapes cursing; the serpent, the woman and the ground are cursed...and his immortality is removed. Men will rule over women, perhaps similar to US government structure of civilian Commander-in-Chief (the president) ruling over the military. Eve failed to protect Adam and their blessed status of unhindered communion with God. There are consequences to the abdication.

And when people get power, it's really hard for them to relinquish or share any authority. We see this in business and politics all the time. Rules are established to maintain our status.

When the 'sons of God' in Genesis 6 conceived children with the beautiful daughters/warrior-princesses, the offspring 'became the heroes and famous warriors of ancient times' (Gen. 6.4). [Aside: notice that the ground's curse seems to be removed after Noah's ark experience--Gen. 8.21.] This is also one of the first references to male warriors following one of Cain's sons boasting.

I wonder also if things continued to go awry when Abram/Abraham tried to protect the 'protector,' Sarai/Sarah, when he lied about being brother-sister instead of husband-wife (Gen. 12 to the Pharaoh of Egypt and Gen. 20 to the King of Gerar). Later in the Exodus account, Moses' sister, not initially identified as Miriam who is also Aaron's sister (Numbers 26.59 and elsewhere), watches protectively over baby Moses as he's rescued from the river by the Pharoah's daughter and suggests their mother as a nurse-maid. Still later, Zipporah, Moses' wife, protects him from killed by God by taking action to circumcise her son. Miriam is a prophet: the first of many female prophets (Exod. 15.20). But when Aaron is coerced into making the golden calf as an idol, Miriam is silent. After sometime in the wilderness, Aaron and Miriam let their jealousy of Moses' position cause complaining (Num. 12): Moses is not following the commandments--he has married a non-Jewish woman. They assert that God has also spoken through them, not just through Moses. And since they haven't broken that particular marriage rule, they should have equal status. God convenes a meeting with Moses, Aaron and Miriam and expresses His anger over their complaints about their status. When He leaves, Miriam is struck with leprosy; Aaron is not. She is only saved from imminent death because Aaron repents and pleads on her behalf and Moses prays. Seven days later, she is healed. Why was Miriam punished and not Aaron? Did God hold her, the ezer-protector, to a higher standard? As with Eve, perhaps there are harsh consequences for those who abdicate their responsibilities.

There may be more examples, and do let me know of countervailing examples, as you read the scriptures.

A Child’s Heart

I’ve heard others say there’s something magical about becoming a grandparent. “Your heart just opens up in a whole new way,” they say. I’ve experienced the magic in the past 18 months. I think for several reasons: I’ve had the privilege of caring for my grandson for several hours each week; I experience moments that I never experienced with my daughters because I was too busy working and traveling; I’m also at a point in my career where the problems of work plague my subconcious less and so my fuller attention is on my grandson when I’m with him; I’m also confident in his parents that he will be taught and will embrace great values so my role is to model them that shows him the legacy of character. A child’s heart is precious thing.

I also think it’s why Christ enjoyed spending time with them. He rebuked the disciples when they tried to hinder kids from clambering around Him (Mt. 19.13). He thanked God the Father for revealing truths to ‘little children’ (Mt. 11.25) and told us we had to become like ‘little children’ to enter the Kingdom of Heaven (Mt. 18.3). Welcoming a child is like welcoming Christ Himself (Mk 9.37) just as He said doing good for the least, last and lost was serving the King (Mt. 25). He warned anyone who caused a child to sin would be better off tying a giant wheat-grinding wheel around his neck and falling off a cliff into the sea (Mk. 9.42). Most of us can remember stories from Sunday School or Wednesday night kids programs and that’s probably why He taught us with lots of stories.

Rudyard Kipling may have said it best: “He who can reach a child’s heart can reach the world’s heart.”

We praise and honor—though not often economically—those who take care of the little children. We disdain, detest those who intentionally harm kids. Pedophiles and other child abusers—physical or otherwise—are on the bottom of the rung in the prison hierarchy.

However, we unintentionally harm them when we look to our own needs and ignore theirs by what we do...and more importantly what we say. At times, when it’s more important for me to be right...to be in control...to fix a mistake...to change something from what I don’t like to something I want...I can say things that hurt the child’s heart—even hurt an adult’s heart—even more importantly other people’s children’s heart...when I talk about ‘those people’s kids’. Those people’s kids are “precious in His sight” also.

God, help me that I focus on loving my grandson more than myself.

Helper, Helpmate = Protector, Guide

Terminology is important. What you call something colors your perspective. I learned this a long time ago with a Joel Barker video citing a bike seat and how its traditional title of “saddle” has influenced its design for the last 100+ years. So I was stunned when I first learned that we’ve been calling women by the wrong name. And it puts a whole new light on God’s desire for male-female relationships, especially in marriage. (This is not about marriage—a wholly different topic and its past-200 year mutation beyond economic purposes.)

Growing up, I’d heard the Genesis story and how Eve (Chavah ‘life’) was subservient to Adam (‘mankind’) because she was ‘just’ a “helper” (ezer). Some translations have “help meet,” “helpmate”; others say “companion.” Most of these imply a person of lower status. You might have grown up with the nomenclature of “the help” for servants, volunteers...and slaves if you grew up in 17th-19th century US.

If you’re familiar with church names, you may recognize that ezer is part of Ebenezer (ha-azer ‘stone of help for thus far the LORD has helped us’).

Ezer is also used in Psalm 89:19 where the Lord says, “I have granted help to one who is mighty” or “I have raised up a warrior” or “I have bestowed strength on the mighty”. Here the Lord is not subservient to the mighty; He’s not carrying the warrior’s armor, weapons or satchels of food. The mighty couldn’t be successful without the Lord’s ezer.

Exodus 18.4 has “...the God of my father is my ezer...”
Deuteronomy 33.7 “ oh, [Lord,] be his ezer against his foes!”
Psalm 33.20 “He is our ezer and our shield”
Psalm 121.1-2 “From where shall my ezer come? My ezer comes from the Lord!”
...and like a chant, in Psalm 115.8-10, three times “He is their ezer and shield”

Because God knew the Eden experience wouldn’t last, He wanted an ezer suitable for Adam while he journeyed on this earth. From the verses above, you almost have the image of Havah appearing like Xena the Warrior Princess or Diana Prince-Wonder Woman.

My wife doesn’t don battle armor to fight my foes. One way my wife protects me is with her inspired wisdom. And I’m grateful to the Lord for her. She is my ezer and it’s my duty to love her sacrificially and unconditionally, without causing her to stumble, to support her always...as Christ loved the church (Ephesians 5.23)

God in Our Midst

A family member of a friend was involved in an accident killing a pedestrian with her car. We may never know why, or what caused the person to walk into the midst of highway traffic. Both families are suffering now. Modernists, latter-day Epicureans, would search for an answer of cause-and-effect believing that it was only 'atoms colliding and swerving'--determinism--that can explain this. Believers may want to look for divine answers. The truth may lie in the middle.

Since ancient Greece, Epicurean ideology has grown to where most people believe God is not involved in the affairs of men. It drove the Founding Fathers of the US to ignore the scriptural dictum that all rulers are ordained by God (Romans 13.1). How could a loving God who is for us be against us by putting Mad King George in place as a ruler? And so, they committed that God would not be in charge of the affairs of men. We would control the collisions and swerving of atoms and separate church and state. We in the US have grown up under this philosophy.

Scripture tells us otherwise. From the early chapters, we have God walking in our midst in the Garden. I believe the power of the gospel of Y'shua Meshiach is that it demonstrates again that God walks in our midst. Post-Genesis, God could only show His lament and empathy at the suffering of His people through the prophets. With the Messiah, God the Son weeps with the mourners outside the tomb of Lazarus. God the Son suffers derision ("Can anything good come from Nazareth?")...and torture and death. Y'shua Meshiach is Emmanuel: God-with-us.

It is perhaps why the slaves could relate to the Messiah so well. He understood their suffering for no or little offense, and He shows that death is not the end. Rev. Cone writes about this in The Cross and the Lynching Tree. It may also explain why the faith in the black church endures through centuries of overt oppression and covert oppression, as detailed in Jemar Tisby's The Color of Compromise.

Even after Y'shua Meschach no longer walks on this earth, though He will return as conqueror, we can know we are still in His midst because His Spirit laments with us over tragedies like the one my friend's family is suffering through.

If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare even His Own Son, but gave Him up on behalf of us all--is it possible that, having given us His Son, He would not give everything else too?...Who will separate us from the love of the Messiah? Trouble? Hardship? Persecution? Hunger? Poverty? Danger? War?...No, in all these things we are superconquerors, through the One who has loved us. (Romans 8.31-37 Complete Jewish Bible)

Paul, the writer of Romans, does not say we will avoid trouble, hardship, persecution, hunger, poverty, danger, war; he says that God's love can reach through those tragedies to tell us we will get through this by walking with Him.

(c) S.A. Ward 2017