Refractions and Reflections

---1--- First, I read a couple of REALLY great blog posts this week elsewhere, and I wanted to share them. Both participate in 7QT, so some of you may have already read them. The first, in fact, is the post in which the host of 7QT, Jennifer, shared the video of the forum she participated in this week on Exploring God. If you didn't watch the video, I highly encourage you to watch it. It's just really good. The second was a post on sin by Leah Libresco over at Unequally Yoked. I wrote on sin, too, the day before she posted it, so it caught my attention. She sets up an analogy wherein she compares general "sin" to "punching someone in the face." She goes further, in reference to the line in Amazing Grace, "'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear," and says: Punching people in the face is pretty bad, but what’s  worse  is punching them and not  noticing  and losing the opportunity to repent or make amends.  Then the relationship betwe...

Here's the thing about my never-ending search for truth. The center I usually start from is Jesus. Things tend to work out better when I do so, anyway. The last year or so I've been exploring the ways in which conservative Christianity - meaning fundamentalism - has been wrong. It seems my understanding of God and His mission in the world has changed so much...there have been moments when I have thought everything I grew up believing was wrong. For one thing, I grew up in a tradition in which (like most others, I think) there was a long list of things not to do - sins . Yeah, I know the theology of "sin" vs. "sins," and I know the views of Old Testament vs. New Testament and even the ultimate Law of Love (and liberalism). Honestly, for the last year or so, I have leaned heavily toward the latter option, pretty much to the exclusion of all else. But the last few days I've been thinking something different. In the Genesis account of the fall of huma...