The Problem of Pain

Do you think if Adam and Eve had never sinned, that the human race would know what pain was? Of course, we know that sin would have entered the world eventually because we were given a free will and somewhere down the road that will would have chosen poorly. But supposing it hadn't, supposing sin had never entered the world, would there be pain? In other words, is pain a result or a byproduct of sin? At first thought, I would say of course it is. Look at the curses God meted out to the original sinners. To Adam, hard work, an unforgiving earth full of throns and tough soil, as Genesis 3:17-19 says, "Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life...By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food..." To Eve, the physical pain of childbearing coupled with the emotional pain of longing for a husband and having him rule over her. But then if you look more closely at the curse given to Eve in Genesis 3:16, God says, "I will greatly increase your pain in childbearing." The Hebrew word for increase, rabah, means multiply or make great. So, that makes me wonder, was pain already there or at least the potential of it without sin, before sin?

What do you think?

Never Settle...

This has been my byline for a long time. I plan to stick to it, though it has been difficult at times to wait on God's best. Recently, an anonymous female from church wrote a semi-cynical, semi-lighthearted poem about the fact that the single men in our church don't ask girls out very much. The poem was posted on another girl's blog site...this sparked a bit of conversation, both on and off the web, and it got me to thinking...not that it takes much to get me to thinking, but thinking coherently is quite a different thing from just plain thinking. I'm hoping this is the coherent kind.

My thoughts:
Single people are single for a reason. The reasons vary from fear of committment to social ineptitude to the plain and simple fact that it just isn't God's timing for them to be married. I think this last reason is the most overspoken and underbelieved reason of all. It's right up there with "do not be anxious about anything..." See, we singles can spout faith-filled sentiments saying, "God is in control" or "I know He has somebody for me somewhere" but then, we go off and try to make things happen on our own or we pine, whine and worry about our lack of a dating life. Do we really believe God is in control and that He has someone "out there" for us if we are constantly talking about our singleness? Maybe we are using tunnel vision and seeing only marriage as the end-all, be-all of existence, when truthfully, there are limitless callings in life that are just as viable and believe it or not, fulfilling, as marriage. A lot of us who whine (and I'm including myself, because I've done my share) probably will get married eventually, but what are we doing with our singleness and do we have the mentality that even if we never do marry, we can live an adventurous, victorious and God-glorifying life as a single person? Are we willing for God to call us to singleness?

Never settle...I've always thought of that injuction only in terms of who I'd be willing to end up with. But, it's bigger than that. Never settle for less than God's best whether that be marriage or singleness, a desk job in the city or a remote mission field assignment, teaching or ministry, in my case.
I've learned that "Never Settle" is not an excuse to close my mind to what I think I don't want. It's a command to be open to what God wants.