Sometimes my roommate and I keep track of how often people are referred to as “innocent” in a TV show, movie or even the news.  As if anyone really were innocent, and not a rebellious sinner.  And as if this one label innocent changes everything about that person or circumstance that came upon them.  It is just a fun game we play to remind ourselves of the pervasive anti-Christian worldview that permeates entertainment and broadcast news.

But due to a brief bit of a Bible study I attended recently, I really started to think: do I want innocence or redemption, innocence or salvation, innocence or faith?

I think sometimes I want innocence.  As if that would make everything better, or somehow that if I had it I could make everything come out alright from there.  But if you think about it, innocence is what Adam and Eve had in the garden…and look how they turned out.

But sometime I want innocence and I think that may be naive at best, but probably is actually idolatry in my heart most of the time…and hatred of God and Christ at its worst.

Innocence isn’t what’s needed.

Redemption, God’s work of redemption, a Christ sacrificed on the cross–The Gospel!–that is what is needed so desperately.  Needed by me, needed by my friends, needed by the hurt and suffering, and the oppressed and the sinful and the tradegy-be-fallen.

Redemption, not innocence.  In some cases, innocence is simply idolatry in rejecting redemption