The Disruption of Shalom

I'd like to share a quote with you from a book I'm currently engaged in reading. Before I get to it though I need to define a word used in the quote that unless understood will render the quote meaningless to you.

The word often translated as "peace" in the Bible is the Hebrew word shalom. Now, while peace for us generally means an absence of conflict or discord, shalom carries with it far more deep and important meanings than simply an absence of conflict. Shalom is best defined this way: it is life lived in wholeness, completeness; life as God created it; life where all things are ordered according to the rhythm and reality of God. Or, as Radiohead puts it, shalom is "everything in its proper place."

The quote I'm going to share will be sans commentary for now. I want you to read it and absorb it for a minute and think about some of the implications of it. I will comment further later on.

With that in mind let me share the following quote from Engaging God's World by Cornelius Plantinga, Jr.

Evil is what's wrong with the world, and it includes trouble in nature as well as in human nature. It includes disease as well as theft, birth defects as well as character defects. We might define evil as any spoiling of shalom, and deviation from the way God wants things to be.

Let me close with this question: Does this change the definition of what sin is and is not? We think we have a handle on what is right and what is wrong, but with this definition in mind, does it change what we call sin and what don't call sin?

shalom, matt