“Shattered” Discussion Guide

Message by Dan Davis, delivered on 1/23 and 1/24/10

Guide by Loren Collins

CONNECT:

 

1) Which of these unfortunate human conditions have you personally experienced most?

• Pride and/or self-centeredness.
• Pain, suffering, and/or injustice.
• Feeling like a pawn in other people’s agendas.

 

2) Remember the “Avatar Blues” that Dan talked about in his message.  So many people saw the movie and experienced depression following the movie and explained with statements such as this one… 

• "One can say my depression was twofold: I was depressed because I really wanted to live in Pandora, which seemed like such a perfect place, but I was also depressed and disgusted with the sight of our world, what we have done to Earth. I so much wanted to escape reality."

Have you ever had a similar experience from a movie?  What about a book, a dream, a song, or a vision of some sort?

 

3) Have you ever thought of yourself as part of an anti-empire movement?  What is your initial gut reaction to that statement?

 

DISCUSS:

4) Refer to the four areas of Shalom and the result of the fall in each of those areas.  (With God – hid, afraid; With self – naked, ashamed, laborious existence; with others – gender inequality, pain in birth, and eventually empire and power structures; with creation – thorns, thistles, animal skins, difficult cultivation, eventually man-made pollution).   Pick one area and discuss how it connects to your own experiences, i.e. are you particularly wounded, passionate, anxious, or confused about it?

 

5) Discuss Genesis 3 as a group, read it out loud if you like, and consider the 3 human conditions that Dan highlighted this weekend; Pride, Pain, and Pawn.  In chapter 3 we see this on a micro level with Adam, Eve, and the serpent.  How does this grow by chapter 11?  What about now in present day (include empire in the discussion)?

 

6) In many mainline churches the concept of sin and salvation is perceived through the idea of personal sin and separation and then personal salvation from it.  How does looking a Genesis in this different way, looking for the pride, the pain, and the pawn conditions change that perception?  Think about the life and example of Jesus, how can our perception of salvation broaden beyond personal salvation as well?

 

CHALLENGE:

7) Connect:  Which of the three human conditions of sin (pride, pain, and pawn) affects your life the most?  If at all possible share this and brainstorm with your group what you can do to initiate or invite change. 

 

8) Live Different:  Take your answer from number 7, now scribble out a short action plan, what steps are you going to take to be less proud, to address any sort of pain (maybe someone else’s), or to be less of a pawn (or treat others less like pawns).  Who are you going to talk to if you can’t hold yourself to it alone?

 

9) Provoke Change:  Think about and discuss your group’s service projects.  What needs, or human conditions, do these projects address?  Which do you want them to address? Are they breaking down pride through servant hood? Are they alleviating some kind of pain?  Are they helping bring justice to pawns or meeting the needs left in the wake of empire?

 

 

READINGS and NOTES:

Genesis 3:1-24 The serpent was the shrewdest of all the wild animals the Lord God had made. One day he asked the woman, “Did God really say you must not eat the fruit from any of the trees in the garden?”

 2 “Of course we may eat fruit from the trees in the garden,” the woman replied. 3 “It’s only the fruit from the tree in the middle of the garden that we are not allowed to eat. God said, ‘You must not eat it or even touch it; if you do, you will die.’”

 4 “You won’t die!” the serpent replied to the woman. 5 “God knows that your eyes will be opened as soon as you eat it, and you will be like God, knowing both good and evil.”

 6 The woman was convinced. She saw that the tree was beautiful and its fruit looked delicious, and she wanted the wisdom it would give her. So she took some of the fruit and ate it. Then she gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it, too. 7 At that moment their eyes were opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. So they sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves.

 8 When the cool evening breezes were blowing, the man and his wife heard the Lord God walking about in the garden. So they hid from the Lord God among the trees. 9 Then the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?”

 10 He replied, “I heard you walking in the garden, so I hid. I was afraid because I was naked.”

 11 “Who told you that you were naked?” the Lord God asked. “Have you eaten from the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat?”

 12 The man replied, “It was the woman you gave me who gave me the fruit, and I ate it.”

 13 Then the Lord God asked the woman, “What have you done?”

   “The serpent deceived me,” she replied. “That’s why I ate it.”

 14 Then the Lord God said to the serpent,

   “Because you have done this, you are cursed
      more than all animals, domestic and wild.
   You will crawl on your belly,
      groveling in the dust as long as you live.
 15 And I will cause hostility between you and the woman,
      and between your offspring and her offspring.
   He will strike your head,
      and you will strike his heel.”

 16 Then he said to the woman,

   “I will sharpen the pain of your pregnancy,
      and in pain you will give birth.
   And you will desire to control your husband,
      but he will rule over you.”

 17 And to the man he said,

   “Since you listened to your wife and ate from the tree
      whose fruit I commanded you not to eat,
   the ground is cursed because of you.
      All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it.
 18 It will grow thorns and thistles for you,
      though you will eat of its grains.
 19 By the sweat of your brow
      will you have food to eat
   until you return to the ground
      from which you were made.
   For you were made from dust,
      and to dust you will return.”

 20 Then the man—Adam—named his wife Eve, because she would be the mother of all who live. 21 And the Lord God made clothing from animal skins for Adam and his wife.

 22 Then the Lord God said, “Look, the human beings have become like us, knowing both good and evil. What if they reach out, take fruit from the tree of life, and eat it? Then they will live forever!” 23 So the Lord God banished them from the Garden of Eden, and he sent Adam out to cultivate the ground from which he had been made. 24 After sending them out, the Lord God stationed mighty cherubim to the east of the Garden of Eden. And he placed a flaming sword that flashed back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.

Living in PRIDE- ‘You will be like God’ – Exceeding one’s proper limits; giving to one’s self the place that belongs to God alone; making one’s self the center. From world-conquering arrogance to self-preoccupied lifestyles.  Sin- the human problem – is pride understood as ‘self-centeredness.’

 

Knowing PAIN- “Knowing good and evil.” – Good [Towb] (pleasant, rich, prosperous, welfare, potential to thrive) – Evil [Ra’]- bad, evil, sadness, unpleasant, misery, injury, calamity, adversity, distress, wrong, viscious, malignant. They already knew Towb, now they knew pain. Sin – the human problem – is a universally shared experience of pain.

 

Being a PAWN- “The woman you gave me… The serpent…”. “leaving it to the snake.” A person used for the purposes or agendas of another. Letting someone else author one’s existence. Uncritically accepting somebody else’s ideas about how to live one’s life. Not taking responsibility for self, standing up. Sin – the human problem – is living the agenda of others.

 

Genesis 4:8-16 One day Cain suggested to his brother, “Let’s go out into the fields.” And while they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother, Abel, and killed him.

 9 Afterward the Lord asked Cain, “Where is your brother? Where is Abel?”

   “I don’t know,” Cain responded. “Am I my brother’s guardian?”

 10 But the Lord said, “What have you done? Listen! Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground! 11 Now you are cursed and banished from the ground, which has swallowed your brother’s blood. 12 No longer will the ground yield good crops for you, no matter how hard you work! From now on you will be a homeless wanderer on the earth.”

 13 Cain replied to the Lord, “My punishment is too great for me to bear! 14 You have banished me from the land and from your presence; you have made me a homeless wanderer. Anyone who finds me will kill me!”

 15 The Lord replied, “No, for I will give a sevenfold punishment to anyone who kills you.” Then the Lord put a mark on Cain to warn anyone who might try to kill him. 16 So Cain left the Lord’s presence and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden.

 

Gen 4:19;23-24 Lamech married two women. The first was named Adah, and the second was Zillah.

23 One day Lamech said to his wives,

   “Adah and Zillah, hear my voice;
      listen to me, you wives of Lamech.
   I have killed a man who attacked me,
      a young man who wounded me.
 24 If someone who kills Cain is punished seven times,
      then the one who kills me will be punished seventy-seven times!”

 

Gen 6:5-6 The Lord observed the extent of human wickedness on the earth, and he saw that everything they thought or imagined was consistently and totally evil. 6 So the Lord was sorry he had ever made them and put them on the earth. It broke his heart.

 

Gen 6:9;11-13 This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, the only blameless person living on earth at the time, and he walked in close fellowship with God.

 11 Now God saw that the earth had become corrupt and was filled with violence. 12 God observed all this corruption in the world, for everyone on earth was corrupt. 13 So God said to Noah, “I have decided to destroy all living creatures, for they have filled the earth with violence. Yes, I will wipe them all out along with the earth!

 

Gen 10:8-12

NLT: Cush was also the ancestor of Nimrod, who was the first heroic warrior on earth. Since he was the greatest hunter in the world, his name became proverbial. People would say, “This man is like Nimrod, the greatest hunter in the world.” 10 He built his kingdom in the land of Babylonia, with the cities of Babylon, Erech, Akkad, and Calneh. 11 From there he expanded his territory to Assyria, building the cities of Nineveh, Rehoboth-ir, Calah, 12 and Resen (the great city located between Nineveh and Calah).

 

Gen 11:1-9 At one time all the people of the world spoke the same language and used the same words. 2 As the people migrated to the east, they found a plain in the land of Babylonia and settled there.

 3 They began saying to each other, “Let’s make bricks and harden them with fire.” (In this region bricks were used instead of stone, and tar was used for mortar.) 4 Then they said, “Come, let’s build a great city for ourselves with a tower that reaches into the sky. This will make us famous and keep us from being scattered all over the world.”

 5 But the Lord came down to look at the city and the tower the people were building. 6 “Look!” he said. “The people are united, and they all speak the same language. After this, nothing they set out to do will be impossible for them! 7 Come, let’s go down and confuse the people with different languages. Then they won’t be able to understand each other.”

 8 In that way, the Lord scattered them all over the world, and they stopped building the city. 9 That is why the city was called Babel, because that is where the Lord confused the people with different languages. In this way he scattered them all over the world.