The Orphan Crisis: Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be (Part 1)
by Dan ~ July 7th, 2009. Filed under: Theology.
From before the beginning of time God intended that children grow up in God-centered families where reciprocal love was unbroken. Children were meant to live in families. That is the way it’s supposed to be. We all know this.
To see an orphan, then, is to be confronted with the reality that the world is not the way it’s supposed to be. We live in a world that has 132,000,000 orphaned and vulnerable children. The presence of orphans in this world is evidence that God’s world—the world that he described as “very good” when he made it—has been violated and corrupted by sin. This is the world we live in.
God’s original design for his world was that it would enjoy his shalom. Sin, though, has tragically violated God’s shalom. Shalom, as Cornelius Plantinga describes it, is “the webbing together of God, humans, and all creation in justice, fulfillment, and delight.” He continues:
“We call it peace, but it means far more than mere peace of mind or a cease-fire between enemies. In the Bible, shalom means universal flourishing, wholeness, and delight — a rich state of affairs in which natural needs are satisfied and natural gifts fruitfully employed, a state of affairs that inspires joyful wonder as its Creator and Savior opens doors and welcomes the creatures in whom he delights. Shalom, in other words, is the way things ought to be” (Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be: A Breviary of Sin, 10).
When sin entered the world through man, shalom began to unravel. Soon “the webbing together of God, humans, and all creation in justice, fulfillment, and delight” became a distant memory. One of the tragic consequences of sin’s entrance into the world is the presence of orphans. The orphan crisis is irrefutable evidence that this world is not the way it’s supposed to be.
July 7th, 2009 at 5:44 pm
I couldn’t agree more, and appreciate you posting this. It is something we remind our girls (both adopted internationally) of in the context of many ‘why’ discussions.
July 7th, 2009 at 11:52 pm
[...] entire post HERE at http://www.togetherforadoption.org. [...]
July 14th, 2009 at 6:18 am
[...] Biblical wisdom always has its eyes on the way things ought to be. Proverbs 3:19 says, “The Lord by wisdom founded the earth,” that is, the Lord put everything together with incomparable skill and care. When he created the heavens and the earth, everything was the way it was supposed to be. There were no pollutants or rogue cells, no marginalized people (i.e., orphans or widows) or oppressive governments. In the beginning everything—God, humans, and all creation—was webbed together in universal “justice, fulfillment, and delight.” Everything, as the Hebrew prophets was say, was characterized by shalom (see part 1). [...]
July 21st, 2009 at 7:23 am
[...] quotations come from “The Orphan Crisis: Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be” (Part 1 and Part [...]
July 21st, 2009 at 10:22 am
[...] The video’s quotations come from “The Orphan Crisis: Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be” (Part 1 and Part [...]
November 2nd, 2009 at 1:33 pm
[...] This video connects the glory of the Gospel (i.e., the treasure that Jesus is) with the current global orphan crisis. The video’s quotations come from Dan Cruver’s article “The Orphan Crisis: Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be” [...]
November 3rd, 2009 at 8:38 pm
[...] more here Filed under: Miscellanies | You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. [...]