15. Specifying the Disaster

© Christ Revealed Bible Institute

What was the rebellion of Adam all about? And how is that rebellion replicated all through Christian thinking?

The entire issue for Adam was control.

Eve had nothing to do with Adam’s decision. The serpent had nothing to do with Adam’s decision. God had nothing to do with Adam’s decision. Adam’s decision took place entirely and only inside himself according to his own judgments and valuations and for his own purposes.

Adam was entirely sovereign; that means he was free of all other entities, and in his decision, he was free also from all other influence. In making his decision, Adam knew everything he needed to know for that decision. He knew the issues. He knew the consequences. He knew God’s intentions. He knew his place in the scheme of things. He knew the result of his action upon the human race. He knew the redemption of Jesus. He knew the serpent’s deceit.

This must be so for Paul’s statement to be true – Adam was NOT deceived.

Control is outward; contempt is inward. Contempt always results in control (at the least the desire to control); control always comes out from contempt. – Adam despised Eve.

However, something else is inside in order for control to be exercised outwardly. Control means that you have to hurt this other person in some way in order to gain their compliance to your dictate. Compliance is given because of the fear of pain or loss. In fact, contempt is the female of two; the other side of contempt is arrogance, a sense of superiority. Arrogance wants to establish the superiority of the arrogant in the eyes of all others. Contempt wants to establish the inferiority of all others in its own eyes.

Adam chose contempt and arrogance at the same moment and from the same facts. The difference is that contempt is the expression of Adam’s frame – his human weakness created for the tenderness of Love – and arrogance is the expression of Adam’s heart – created for the authority of Love, but not yet filled with the inward knowledge of God.

Adam’s decision and action were all in a moment – that’s how it works. Nonetheless, because Adam’s perception and mental capacity were likely more than ten times that of the most brilliant of humans, his assessment of all facts was complete.

Adam was not deceived; God did not lead Adam into confusion. Adam was not “struggling” with knowing “which way to go.” Adam’s decision was based on the facts of his view of the serpent versus Jesus.

Adam saw, inside the tree of life, a man just like himself, weak and incapable, hanging bloody bruised and naked upon a cross of wood. Adam saw, inside the tree of knowledge, an angel far superior to himself in outward appearance, strong and capable, beautiful and wise.

Jesus was a man, no different than Adam. The serpent was a “god” by Adam’s judgment.
Those are the facts of Adam’s assessment, but neither one was the issue. Neither the serpent nor Jesus in their appearance were pressing upon Adam for his immediate loyalty. Both, in their entirety, were nothing more for Adam that an assessment of facts.

Nonetheless, the vast realms of reality behind each of those outward appearances were primary material in the decision Adam made. But they were not the issue.

It was not Adam’s heart that made the decision; Adam did NOT follow his heart. Nor was it his emotions. Neither was it his mind or intellect. The place of Adam’s decision inside himself was his forehead. Now, it is very important to understand what that means.

The issue for Adam was Eve. Adam saw Eve in the same way and for the same reasons as a holiness preacher sees all those Christians “out there” who do NOT measure up, including his own flock.

Just a bit ago my wife disagreed with me and I disagreed with her on a minor issue.

If Adam had been by himself, he would never have needed to think about controlling others. Eve did not cause Adam to sin, but Adam’s decision was a social decision.

When I am by myself the issue of who is right, that is, whose interests will prevail, never arises and thus I am never in a position of establishing “I am right.” And I never imagine or even know that it might be an issue. “I am right” is entirely a social construct. It exists only in the presence of other people. “I am right” is the human forehead. Let me establish why that would be so.

Consider sheep. A sheep, and specially a ram, is a horned animal that is part of a subset of horned animals that fight one another for control of the “woman” by knocking forehead against forehead in savage blows of strength that can result in the horns getting tangled together.

Now horns, in all symbolism, represent power over – the horns of power.

Even though the horns are on the top of the skull back from the forehead, when two rams hit each other forehead to forehead, it is clear to the observer that the forehead is the joining place of the two horns of power. And the forehead, with its horns, is the place giving the blow and receiving the blow. And the fight is not about sex first, about who gets to procreate, that’s just a side benefit. It’s all about control, about who gets to run the show.

In my younger years, when I conflicted with another male about who was in control, it always seemed to me to be forehead against forehead. And loss experienced by either one resulted in the casting down of the eyes; whereas victory resulted in the lifting up of the forehead. This may not have always been outwardly visible, but it most definitely describes our perceptions in that moment.

I do have to admit that I won my fair share of such challenges in the direction of males who were my equals whereas I always lost in the direction of males or females who had taken the place of being “above me” in “God’s” hierarchy of authority. I always lost to those who used God as their horns of power.

With Adam it was just one other person. Yes, the face of several other people is much stronger than the face of one. Nonetheless the issues remain the same.

Through my years of experience inside of classrooms filled with teenagers, I have made this observation. The teacher is not important. The school is not important. Learning is not important. A future career is not important. Failing a test is not important. Being punished by the principal is not important. The law is not important.

One thing and one thing only is important to those students sitting in rows in those desks, one thing that rules them, and that is the face of all the other students around them. What will they think of me?

Now, in saying that, I don’t mean that those other things do not have their weight in any teenager’s decision nor that some cannot navigate all that power while holding to their own personal vision. Still, even those who refuse to be ruled by the power all around them are strongly buffeted by it.

One time, a strange-looking (to the students) teacher entered my classroom. In that very moment I happened to be looking across the breadth of my students. I watched, say, 23 pairs of eyes turn instantly – NOT to the teacher coming through the door but to the one young man in that group of 24, who did not care what anyone thought about him. Every other student in the room could not know how to react to this new situation unless they saw first how he would react.

He, however, did not look at anyone else, not even at the teacher coming through the door. He was sitting with his forehead slightly tilted up and with a bemused look on his face, the kind of look that says, “I’ve got this one.”

In that moment, I saw a clear picture of how power actually works.

Here’s the thing. For a young person trying to make their way through all that confusion, nothing can hurt them more than the punishment coming against them from their peers. The principal, their parents, the teacher, the police, the report card, these things can hurt them only a little bit. But the cruelty of pain coming from their peers goes way beyond all those other things put together.

Why did the parents of English aristocracy send their little boys away from home to a boarding school filled mostly with other boys, and especially older ones who loved to abuse the new little ones coming in? Where those little ones would have to navigate such a horror without preparation or help? They did it so that the boys would be shattered, so that they could be shaped as they grew older by learning to abuse each next set of little boys, in order to become the power-over people that would enable the British empire and its aristocracy to dominate the whole earth.

I am laying all this out so that we can better understand what is taking place inside Adam’s perception of himself in that moment. It was all about control.

Control is what goes out. Inside is arrogance and contempt. What caused the arrogance and contempt inside of Adam? He had not yet sinned. Sin and death had not yet entered the human experience. God had led Adam in all goodness and love continuing right into that brief moment.

Paul tells us what caused the arrogance and contempt out from which came the impact of control, and that is – unthankfulness. Adam, in a second’s time, refused to give thanks, but rather accepted a sense inside himself of unthankfulness. Unthankfulness is the source of all evil, especially in our world today.

Unthankfulness is the internal assertion that God is screwing things up in such a way that threatens my place in the sight of others and my comfortable security inside of “I am right.” Unthankfulness is the fount of all hostility against God. – “You lying Jerk!”

Now, even though it was only Eve in front of his eyes, his own woman with whom he had just enjoyed a whole lot of wondrous and godly sex, still, Adam’s perception was strong enough to take in the fact that inside of Eve were lots of other people, including quite a number of males more than willing to challenge Adam’s place of dominance in any forehead against forehead clash. Right from the start, Adam knew that he had to get it right in order to keep his new-found sense of arrogance and contempt.

So, the first thing in Adam’s moment was a complete assessment of the facts related to the outward appearance of an angel as the image of God versus a man as the image of God.

Then, the second thing in Adam’s moment was his forehead against the face of Eve, that is, his own perception of what Eve thought about him, a perception rooted in contempt for her weakness and stupidity in being deceived. And inside that split moment, came all the swirling issues of the dominance of “I am right.”

That second thing was the issue, an issue rooted, not in heart nor in mind nor in emotions, but rather in the center of power, of arrogance and contempt, which, in fact, included more than his forehead. Adam’s perception of his own sexual prowess was very much swinging into the mix. And the truth of the matter is that sexual excitement in a man occurs much more in the forehead than in the reproductive organs. Sexual prowess, then, is as much a part of the forehead as the horns of dominance, though it shares a lesser place.

Again, this is all very important for us to understand. You see, here is something Paul said that should be interpreted in exactly this way.

All those who wish to put on a good show of appearance in the flesh compel you to be circumcised, but only so that they would not be persecuted for the cross of Christ. And not even these who circumcise themselves keep the law; but they want you to be circumcised so that they can boast in [their victory over] your flesh – I wish also that those turning you upside down would just castrate themselves (Galatians 5:12 & 6:12-13).

Yes, exactly what I am saying.

So, in one moment, three things happen inside of Adam. First was an intellectual assessment of the appearance of two opposing images, both standing in as the “image” of God. Second was the issue, that is, all these “others” and “my” place of dominance coming out of arrogance and contempt. Then the third thing in that moment was also an intellectual assessment, a very rapid perusal of a different set of facts in front of Adam.

And the human mind, especially one that worked as well as Adam’s, is quite capable of a rapid and fully accurate assessment that takes into itself all relevant facts and makes an instant decision based on that assessment.

Now, it was the assessment of the outward appearance of a glorious angel versus a weak and beaten human male (one of those males who were inside of Eve) that launched unthankfulness inside of Adam. That unthankfulness morphed immediately into contempt and arrogance the moment Eve in her foolish stupidity came into Adam’s awareness.

Adam had already chosen control over Eve as his reason for existence before he now assessed the second set of facts. That second set of facts Adam assessed was regarding the question – which would be the best way for me to assert my control over Eve? And in that moment Adam’s perception took in, not the serpent in the tree of knowledge, but the tree itself – and not the Lamb in the tree of life, but the tree itself. Which tree offers me the best means of controlling all these others in my life in agreement with the arrogance and contempt I have chosen?

The tree of life gave Adam the option of loving Eve, of laying down his life for her, of seeing her as better than himself, of treating her as the Lord Jesus Himself. – Not going to happen. You show me a red-blooded human male that would even consider such an option, and I will show you that you are pointing to Jesus alone.

Pain is never enough to obtain the compliance that is required. You can turn pain to full measure and prolong it over days and years, but pain by itself will never produce the kind of subservience that dominance requires. The devotion of the heart must also be turned towards you as towards “God.” Only then does power accept satisfaction.

In order to win the kind of control over Eve that he required, Adam needed the right words, words that he could plant into Eve’s own story of self that would trick Eve into believing that submitting to Adam’s cruelty was, in fact, submitting to God. – State and Church always work together to control all these despicable others. (I will refrain from going down that rabbit trail.)

Adam needed God’s words in outward form, words under his own control in order to compel Eve to submit to him as to God. A man who has a Bible does not need a whip in order to dominate his wife; he has a far more powerful scourge – the wrath of God.

The fact that Adam, then, was making the same stupid mistake that Eve made was irrelevant to him. He glanced at all the untold sorrow to come and said to himself, “Who cares!” Dominance was the issue; God’s words under his control was the only option that would compel the subservience required.

Adam ate the law, the words of God in outward form now under his control. “God said that ‘your husband will rule over you.’ Curse, curse, curse. Well hey, that’s me. And I will bust any upstart young man (including Jesus) who dares to challenge my rule.” – Only nothing worked out the way “it was supposed to work.” Nothing ever does.

Now, that brings us full circle to this brand-new way of thinking that God tricked me into writing about, a way of humiliation. – That I would submit to the fact of substance that the love of God is poured out in your heart towards me.

Writing that, and then speaking it out loud into audio, is the first thing in my entire experience that has introduced the thought of a separation inside of me from my horns of power, from my perception of superiority and my underlying contempt for others. Thus I submit that “Love one another as I have loved you” IS the one and only thing that brings an end to all of that awfulness.

In fact, you can see that “Jesus up in the sky” is just one more picture of that strutting dominance of corruption. It is Jesus in me placing myself under the wonder of the love of Jesus in you for me in full reciprocity with the Jesus in you placing yourself under the wonder of the love of Jesus in me for you that alone ends this age of human folly and brings forth a universe of life.

You know – we’ve had the other for a while. How has that worked out? I think it is time for something different.

However, I asked two questions at the start of this letter. – What was the rebellion of Adam all about? And how is that rebellion replicated all through Christian thinking? Let me deal briefly with the second question.

Every element found in Nicene theology and practice is for the purpose of controlling the woman, the congregation, the church. You will see that argument all the way through in no uncertain terminology. Controlling out-of-control Christians was the reason why Ignatius, John’s disciple, made himself the solitary “bishop” of Antioch and thus wrote, not about knowing Jesus, but about explaining Jesus. Controlling out-of-control Christians was the entire motivation behind the Nicene Council and the specific basis for Augustine’s explanation of how to read and understand the Bible designed especially to keep Christians away from Ephesians 3:19, a purpose in which he was fully successful.

Of truth, one could easily argue that it is the same rationale underlying R. C. Sproul’s text, Knowing Scripture. Right at the start of his explanation, he positions the importance of mental knowledge in order to quell the outbursts of “life” arising in ‘errant’ Bible readers.

Let me restate again the underlying motivation of my present writing. I want to specify the exact meaning of the serpent’s words in the garden and how Nicene theology is the imposition of those words upon all the verses of the Bible and especially upon the gospel. And I want to specify the exact meaning of Adam’s rebellion and how Nicene practice is the imposition of that rebellion upon all those who call themselves Christians.

The issue is one thing only – contempt for all these despicable, wanton, and fleshy Christians coupled with the arrogance of boasting in “my” control over their approach to God.

That contempt comes out from the judgment made between the appearance of the super-Christ versus the appearance of the despised and rejected Christ. And the unthankfulness, arising inside, that “I” do not look like that super-Christ. Then Nicene theology is the knowledge of right and wrong pretending to be the revelation of God, and church hierarchy is the means by which such power can be implemented.

And let me add this. Many of us are of those who have become so tired of all the strutting of church hierarchy and all the dance of faces taking place inside of Christian churches, and so we have withdrawn. And what is the root reason for our withdrawal? The exact same reason as those who dominate. “If I’m not in control, then — them.”

May I suggest that you and I have one option only. And that option is – Love one another just as I have loved you.