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Subject: SJ: The Layers of a Human Being Author: Eugene [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] Date Posted: 23:27:27 01/17/03 Fri There is no doubt that my view of human beings would affect all my beliefs about how one is to live with Christ. To me, rather than saying that a human being is made up of several parts, I think a human being is layered in nature. It seems kind of ridiculous that I have just claimed humans as holistic beings and, now, I am cutting them into parts again. But, if this makes sense at all, the layers are not "naturally" parts of a human being. That is to say, as human "nature" was originally created by God, there was no layer. Layers happened at the fall of Adam and Eve. In the very core of a person, is the one made in God's image. He/she is made to love God, with passionate emotion, with deep intellect, with keen sense of oneness with God, with all the physical activities and with communal grace to other co-creations. When this core was created, he/she is not divisible -- not only were all aspects harmonized, but there is no distinction between the inner being and his/her outward appearance. He/she could not "behave badly", because there wasn't even awareness of wrong. Human nature in God's image is real, good, and beautiful, and this nature (who he/she is)was perfectly reflected in his behavior (what he/she does). But on top of this core is a layer built when we fall from grace. It is the original sin. It covers up and distorts the God image within us. It separates us from God and from each other. It takes on "life" of its own, and chokes out our lives. From outside of this layer, we no longer see the real core in others and ourselves. What we see are behaviors -- the result of interaction between our God given nature and our sin "nature". Most of the time, we do not see who others are; rather, we can only judge them by what they do. Without digging deep, we see the same thing about ourselves -- not beings created beautifully by God but the twice distorted reflections in a mirror. Now, time for the crucial question: So what? How you see others and yourself affect how you act towards God and His word. But I will save that for another day.... [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]