Third Thursday of Advent
From Wilshire Advent Devotions 2019
“Someday, when I get to heaven, I’m going to find Jack Kilby and tell him, ‘Thanks for ruining college athletics.’”
A friend said that in the midst of the sensory overload of music, lights and video that has overrun the traditional pageantry of college football. Kilby, the target of his ire, was the engineer at Texas Instruments who created the first integrated circuit. My friend’s complaint was somewhat in jest, but there is much truth to the fact that what Kilby started innocently has gotten way out of hand.
So it is also with Eve, one of the most blamed characters in the Bible and all of human history for that matter. It was she, after all, who spied the apple, elbowed her mate Adam, and coaxed him into joining her in taking the bite that opened their eyes and likewise opened a Pandora’s Box of knowledge of good and evil that forever changed what had been a peaceable garden.
Whether or not you read the story literally or figuratively, the character of Eve is mostly just guilty of being first. She was the first to be tempted by Satan, the first to disobey God, and the first to act on a God-given impulse to look beyond what she could see. The risk for first people is they have nothing to go on; they have nobody to consult or compare notes with. They are prophets who say, “Maybe something good awaits if I do this.” And then when it goes wrong, they face the judgement of others who, with the gift of hindsight, wag their fingers and say, “You should have known better. You should have listened to others.” And in Eve’s case, “You should have listened to God.”
Jack Kilby dared to be first, and his invention sparked a revolution in technology and science that has advanced exponentially with no end in sight. The results have been mixed: from musical greeting cards and video games to moon shots and life-saving robotic surgery. Likewise, Eve opened humanity to the burden of its sinful nature, but also to all the goodness of humankind that began in the garden. And let’s not forget: whether sinner or saint, we all trace our lineage to Eve.
Advent is the story of God’s re-creation — God’s plan through Christ Jesus to redeem and restore the best of what he breathed into Eve and Adam at the beginning of creation. That is something to think about as we gaze upon the beauty of an LED-lit Christmas tree, or curl up on the sofa to watch a favorite holiday movie on a flat-screen TV.
Lord, help us to look beyond the imperfections we see and focus on the goodness in your creation. Help us to see our sisters and brothers through your eyes of love and redemption.