Thursday, September 8, 2022

Nakedness and Kindness

 Notice what God didn't do when Adam and Eve were ashamed when they discovered they were naked. He didn't shame them. He didn't say, "well why would you be ashamed of that? Every animal on the planet is naked. What's wrong with you?" He didn't force them to remove the makeshift fig leaf coverings either. He didn't try to convince them of the ridiculousness of being ashamed of being naked, and that they should just continue on as though nothing was wrong. God didn't do any of this. Yes, He told them what the consequences of eating the fruit would be, but this had nothing to do with their delusion about needing to be covered up.

     What did He do? He made them better clothes.

     God took Adam and Eve where they were at, not where they should have been at. They were paranoid and delusional by that point in comparison with the other animals around them. God worked around it, taking their newfound neurological or psychological illness into consideration when dealing with them. He knew there was going to be no way to convince them of the truth, that they had no reason to be covered, short of rearranging their neurons and ending the people they were against their will, and so He didn't even try at that point. He took them where they were at, in the state they were in, and He was kind to them, doing the best thing possible for them by making them better clothes and getting them away from the tree of life so as not to make their new illness worse and cause even more suffering.

     You always have to work with who a person is in that moment. Not who they were or who you think they should be. I know of a person dear to me who can appear mature one moment, a four year old a few minutes later, and a young teenager not long after that. You cannot work with the four year old persona the same way you work with the mature persona, or even the teenage persona. You cannot work with a person you knew ten years ago, or even five years ago and expect them to be the same person you knew. You can't just demand that a person with atypical neurological or psychological behavior act and think as though they are neurotypical. If you do, you will make the issues worse, not better.

     Love demands that you be kind to a person where they're at, and let go of what you think should or shouldn't be done by them or for them. It is the kindness and compassion which makes the difference, not the moral right or wrong which might be enforced on them.

     God didn't enforce the universal nudity on Adam and Eve after their brains malfunctioned. He just made them better clothes than they could make for themselves and worked with them and their descendants from there, taking them where they were at, being kind to them, and minimizing the damage and suffering from their disorder as much as possible without violating their free will.

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