If you think this is yet another COVID- related reminder to wear a mask- it isn’t. I have shamelessly lured you into a different dialogue entirely. Although I am 100% a proponent of wearing a mask to prevent the spread of contagion, fully support proper hygiene techniques, and applaud those tirelessly reminding us to act responsibly, I think we’re all in need of some diverse topics of conversation to help encourage sanity in these ever-changing times. Rather, I’d like to get your attention with an equally shocking topic- nudity! For the faint of heart, there are no revealing photos to follow, nor a treatise on the merits of nude beaches. (Sorry if I’ve disappointed anyone at this point, but read on and hopefully at the very least I will have distracted you from quarantine- crazies for a good 5-10 minutes).
In Genesis, Noah has the 1st recorded experience with the over indulgence of alcohol. According to Genesis 9:22, Noah apparently passes out in his tent. Somewhere along the way, he got himself comfy for bed and stripped all his clothing off before passing out. I’m sure he was just being considerate and trying to save his wife some extra laundry should he not make it to the outhouse in time. We weren’t there, so we can’t know for sure; I’m just trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. If I were cooped up on a boat with animal excrement for months on end I’d want to change clothes too.
In any case, Genesis goes on to record that Noah’s sons, Ham, “saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brothers outside.” The two brothers, Shem and Japheth reacted by walking backwards with a garment or cloak to cover Noah, without disrespecting him by looking upon him in his compromised position.
When Noah awoke, he was royally ticked off at his son, Ham. This is the last we hear about Noah’s life- his angry reaction to Ham, so it must be worth noting. This raises a lot of questions in my mind. Why is Noah so mad at Ham? The Bible doesn’t say anything about Ham slipping whiskey into Noah’s juice, I think it is safe to presume that Noah got himself into this predicament. Was Noah just hungover and grumpy? Was he angry he forgot where he put his clothes? Why wasn’t he angry with Shem and Japheth for coming into his tent?
I believe the clue to these unanswered questions lies back in Genesis 3:7. Genesis Chapter 3 contains the first mention of the word “naked” in the Bible, and it happened to coincide with Adam and Eve’s eating of the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The very 1st thing they noticed was their nakedness- the first time they felt shame and felt the need to cover themselves.
Why would nakedness have bothered them? After all, God made them that way. Adam and Eve were the only two people on earth at the time. No worries about growing love handles or extra chins. Heck, they didn’t even have clothes, so they wouldn’t have noticed the waistband on their pants getting a little snug. Psalm 139:14 refers to us as “fearfully and wonderfully made.” A Chapter or two earlier, in Genesis 1:27, the Bible states that “God created man in His own image.” So why does the word naked elicit giggles from anyone under the age of 13 or the ol’ eyebrow side eye from anyone old enough to legally drive? Why all the fuss about nudity?
It doesn’t seem that nudity in and of itself was the issue. The issue was Adam and Eve became self-aware. They “realized they were naked.” They immediately became aware of their sin, aware of their disobedience to God. The result of their 1st act of rebellion against God was to become aware of their guilt, their shame, their unworthiness to commune with a Holy God.
Since humans are hardwired to fight or flee adversity, Adam and Eve’s instinct when they sensed their awareness of sin was to flee, and then hide from God. They covered themselves with vegetation and hid like a child who had inhaled the entire contents of the cookie jar in one sitting.
So, getting back to Noah, if nudity wasn’t the issue, what was? Genesis Chapter 3 shows us that nakedness is representative of awareness of sin. It is self-awareness of our separateness from God; awareness of the fact that our sin will always be there to taunt us and remind us of our shortcomings, our weaknesses, our poor choices, our yielding to temptation.
Noah, born on a sinful planet, awoke to self awareness of his own sin- his gluttony of alcohol which was, until Ham walked in, just between him and God. Rather than turning away or covering his father’s sin, Ham immediately told his two brothers- he exposed his father’s sin to others, thereby disrespecting Noah. In modern day terms, he gossiped. As a result, Noah cursed Ham by declaring him a servant to his brothers. Anyone with siblings that has ever lost the “I’ll do your chores for a week,” bet knows that this is a pretty steep penalty indeed.
When we gossip, it serves to lift us up in our own mind as being better than the person whose sin we revealed to others. We ironically convince ourselves that we are somehow better or stronger than the individual that succumbed to the sin, all the while succumbing to our own sin of partaking in the guilty pleasure of gossip. While futilely trying to lift ourselves up in our own minds by pointing out the sins of others, we become slaves to our own sin, just as Ham was condemned to serve his brothers.
While we can all relate to an incident where we revealed something that wasn’t ours to share with others, or a time perhaps when we were the target of unnecessary over-sharing, my objective isn’t to make you feel less than, or to feel like a failure for giving in to the ever-present human temptation of gossip. It is wrong, to be sure, and hopefully this will remind us to be ever aware of this counter-productive human propensity to crave news about others that makes us feel better about ourselves. Yet, I hope the main takeaway is that by gossiping or speaking ill of others, as Noah pointed out to Ham, we lower ourselves deeper in the sinful mire of life and become slaves to, rather than victors over, temptation. One rumor shared leads to another, and pretty soon we manage to camouflage ourselves with the vegetation of social acceptance.
It’s never easy to push back our human natures, but it will be worth it. God rewarded Shem and Japheth and blessed them for the respect they showed Noah in spite of his sin. They knew that by sharing in this sin of disrespecting Noah, they would be disrespecting God. They turned and they did the right thing, that which was in Noah’s best interest, and in doing so, they pleased God and were blessed.
It’s not just gossip we need to be on guard for. We all have unique temptation profiles that will dog us. They may change over time, but I don’t think any of us are able to completely shed our self-centered human natures until we leave planet earth. Just as God covered Adam and Eve’s guilt with skins, Shem and Japheth knew Noah’s sin needed to be covered. Those of us born post Old-Testament have been blessed with the opportunity to not just have our sins covered, but removed completely and removed “as far as the east is from the west, so far does He remove our transgressions from us.” (Psalm 103:12) All we have to do is ask God for forgiveness and accept Christ’s sacrificial gift. Gratitude for this undeserved gift will hopefully give us the will-power to show grace rather than condemnation or slander to those whose sin simply looks different, yet is no worse than our own. Maybe those masks we should be covering our faces with will be useful for us in more ways than one. We all need a reminder now and then.
Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. Ephesians 4:31-32
A Peace of Humble Pie 