Sin is Not Good #4
Sin, Resulting in the Fall, Explains Humanities Wretchedness and yet Greatness
I think it’s accurate to say that “any viable worldview must successfully explain the seemingly paradoxical nature of the human condition.”[i] The philosopher Blaise Pascal lamented, “What sort of freak is man! How novel, how monstrous, how chaotic, how paradoxical, how prodigious! Judge of all things, feeble earthworm, repository of truth, sink of doubt and error, the glory and refuse of the universe!”[ii]
Look at
“the inexplicable phenomenon of mankind: unquestionably corrupt, subject to inconstancy, boredom, anxiety and selfishness, doing anything in the waking hours to divert the mind from human wretchedness, yet showing the vestiges of inherent greatness in the mind’s realization of this condition. Mankind is also finite, suspended between twin infinities revealed by telescope and microscope, and aware of an inner emptiness which the finite world fails to satisfy. No philosophy makes sense of this. No moral system makes us better or happier. One hypothesis alone, creation in the divine image followed by the fall, explains our predicament and, through a redeemer and mediator with God, offers to restore our rightful state.”[iii]
Human greatness split the atom, human wretchedness uses the same to kill millions of people. A great, though wretched, leader, Adolf Hitler, will lead a nation to slaughter millions. A great leader, Winston Churchhill, will lead a nation in their defense. As much as we are great, we bare God’s image. As much as we are wretched, we bare Satan’s. Ben Carson, with his intelligence, will fight for cures; others will inject poison. Humanity is simultaneously great and wretched. What explains this paradox? We all innately sense it but why is it here?
Humanity is fallen. So “the line between good and evil is never simply between ‘us’ and ‘them.’ The line between good and evil runs through each one of us.”[iv] We are made in God’s image and thus can do fantastic things and fantastic good but we have been marred by the Fall and often reflect Satan so we can also do acts of unbelievable wickedness.
Thus, sin is not good because it wreaks havoc on our greatness, on the fact that we were created in the image of God, and distorts it to evil ends.[v] How sad that we who are capable of exploring the limitless expanse of the sea, the mind, space, and biology so often content ourselves with razing and rioting. How sad that though we as humanity are capable of such good, there is such grave injustice. I’ve read for example that a woman born in parts of South Africa is more likely to be raped then to learn to read.[vi] This surely should not be!
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[i] Robert Velarde, “Greatness and Wretchedness” “How can one species produce both unspeakable wickedness and nearly inexplicable goodness? How can we be responsible both for the most disgusting squalor and for the most breathtaking beauty? How can grand aspirations and self-destructive impulses, kindness and cruelty, be interwoven in one life? The human enigma cries out for explanation” (Thomas Morris, “Making Sense of It All: Pascal and the Meaning of Life” as quoted in Robert Velarde, “Greatness and Wretchedness: The Usefulness of Pascal’s Anthropological Argument in Apologetics”).
[ii] Pascal, Pensees, 131/434.
[iii] D.G. Preston, New Dictionary of Theology, ed. Sinclair B. Ferguson, David F. Wells, and J.I. Packer (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1988), s.v. “Blaise Pascal” as quoted in Robert Velarde, “Greatness and Wretchedness: The Usefulness of Pascal’s Anthropological Argument in Apologetics.”
[iv] N.T. Wright, Evil and the Justice of God, 38.
[v] Sadly, “human nature itself, with its vast and mysterious amalgam of capacities to think, feel, supervise, love, create, respond, and act virtuously—that is, with its vast capacities for imaging God—has become the main carrier and exhibit of corruption” (Plantinga, Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be, 30-31).
[vi] Yet how strange and how sad that we hate the thought of this and yet many still struggle with the wickedness of pornography. Most of humanity hates the thought of human trafficking but yet enjoys the very things that feed that market.
Sin is Not Good #3
Sin is Humanities Death Wish
I was always told growing up that it’s not good to do bad things. And for a time I was content with that. It didn’t need to be explained to me. However, as time has gone on and temptations have increased, or at least my perception of them, I find it helpful to understand and remind myself of why “it’s not good to do bad things.”
Obviously, “it’s not good to do bad things” because it doesn’t please God but why doesn’t it please God? Why are bad things bad? We see from reflection on Scripture that bad things are bad because they are not in accord with God’s character and thus apart from being bad they do not finally work with the way things are. In short, they are against the universe. Against existence. Against the way things are. Against the way things work. This is because God is good, supremely good. And creation is thus to operate in a certain way. Sin, evil, and bad are not innate within God’s good creation. They don’t “work” and will one day soon be expelled from the whole system. Then, and only then, will all things be put right and made new.
Thus, “The consequence of human sin is not to be seen as an arbitrarily imposed penalty, like a judge imposing a fine for drunk driving, but rather as an inevitable outworking of the implications of sin.”[i] “Death is not an arbitrary punishment for sin; it is its necessary consequence,” because “the turning away from the living God which constitutes idolatry is the spiritual equivalent of a diver cutting off his own breathing tube.”[ii]
To turn from God, to sin, is not only wrong but also foolish. Why? Because “God is our final good, or maker and savior, the one in whom alone our restless hearts come to rest. To rebel against God is to saw of the branch that supports us.”[iii]
Sin is humanities death wish in everyway.[iv] To be separated from God is to die, physically and spiritually. Human flourishing, true shalom, is bond up with God.[v] Apart from union with God we can seek but we won’t find.
The world is a dichotomy. It’s two paths. The wise and the fool. New creation and de-creation. Damnation and liberation. Life and death. Hell and heaven. Where, in a very real sense, are you going?
Sin is thus not good because it is innately against true human flourishing.[vi] Sin is not good because it is humanities death wish in every sense.
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[i] Anthony N. S. Lane, “Lust: the human person as affected by disordered desires” 35 in EQ 78.1 [2006], 21-35.
[ii] N. T. Wright, Evil and the Justice of God, 109.
[iii] Plantinga, Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be, 123. “Sin dissipates us in futile—and self-destructive—projects. Sin hurts other people and grieves God, but it also corrodes us. Sin is a form of self-abuse” (Ibid., 124). “Sin against God is therefore outrageous folly: it’s like pulling the plug on your own resuscitator” (Ibid., 125-26). Thus “because it is futile, because it is vain, because it is unrealistic, because it spoils good things, sin is a prime form of folly” (Ibid., 126). Proverbs 8:35-36 says, “For whoever finds me [i.e. “wisdom” which is the fear of the LORD] finds life and obtains favor from the Lord, but he who fails to find me injures himself; all who hate me love death.”
[iv] “The association of sin with physical and spiritual death runs like a spine through Scripture and Christian tradition” (Cornelius Plantinga, Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be, 47).
[v] “The biblical vision of human flourishing implicit in worship means that we are only properly free when our desires are rightly ordered, when they are bounded and directed to the end that constitutes our good” (Desiring the Kingdom, 176). Likewise John Frame, God’s “law is not arbitrary, but is based on his own nature… His moral standard is simply himself, his person, his nature” (Frame, The Doctrine of God, 448 see also Frame, The Doctrine of the Christian Life, 133-35). G. K. Chesterton said, “God is not a symbol of goodness. Goodness is a symbol of God” (Chesterton, William Blake [London: House of Stratus, 2000], 40).
[vi] “Human flourishing” rather is “the same thing as glorifying God and enjoying him forever” (Plantinga, Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be, 37-38).
Sin is Not Good #1
Sin is the Unmaking of Man and a Manifold of Beauties
This world cries out like so much ripe fruit, “I’m good! Eat me! Indulge yourself…” However, much of the fruit here, as in the Garden, leads to cataclysmic clashes, with God, yourself, and humanity. It looks good and much of it is. But much of it has an infectious parasite on it. It’s hard, though not impossible, to consume it without getting “sick.”
In Genesis 3:1-24 we see the Fall of humanity. We see various forms of death given birth to. We see “’an ever-growing avalanche of sin, a continually widening chasm between man and God’. It progresses from disobedience, to murder, to indiscriminate killing, to titanic lust, to total corruption, and uncontrolled violence.”[ii] Sin truly brings a litany of death. “Disease, genetic disorders, famine, natural disasters, aging, and death itself are as much the result of sin as are oppression, war, crime, and violence. We have lost God’s shalom—physically, spiritually, socially, psychologically, culturally. Things now fall apart.”[i]
Through sin we have marred more than the mediocre; we have marred the Michelangelos of the world. We have marred superb beauty and made it unbelievably hideous. Yet, if we see something that is less hideous we look at it as a wonder. Why? Because this world is so tainted and steeped in sin and the effects of sin.
To illustrate, if I ruin a “masterpiece” that my son made with paper, glue, and crayons the ramifications will be far less than if I destroy the Mona Lisa. Well, creation was intended to be a Mona Lisa; that is, it was intended to be supremely glorious. God’s creation was intended to be good, beautiful, and esthetically pleasing to our senses, emotions, and intellect beyond what we can imagine. And so the ramifications of the destruction of such beauty is greater. We often think of this world as the way it is not as the way it was intended to be. If we could see a glimpse of what the Great Creator had in mind for His masterpiece then we’d see that we “paved paradise and put up a parking lot.” We essentially killed a thousand Beethovens and blared white noise. We backfilled the Grand Canyon with gravel. We burned a hundred museums of art. We scorched our taste buds off our tongue. We took a wrecking ball to all the wonders of the world and razed a thousand gorgeous cities. In short, through our “war crimes,” we, as humanity, deserve death. We have brought cataclysmic chaos to the world.
Sin is not a light thing. We, as humans, were created in the image of God. We were to be like Christ, God in flesh (cf. Gen. 1:26-27). The world was meant to be supremely glorious, peaceful, and loving but instead it is disgusting and understandably repugnant to God. So, as we try to grasp the wonder of what has been marred we can begin to understand how serious the situation is and how terrible sin is.
Thus, sin is not good because it is the unmaking of man and a manifold of beauties.
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[i] Timothy Keller, The Reason for God, 177. “Disunion with God is reflected in disunion with others and with oneself” (Johnson, Foundations of Soul Care, 466 cf. Bonhoeffer, Ethics).
[ii] Revd Victor James Johnson, “Illustrating Evil – The Effect of the Fall as seen in Genesis 4-11,” 57 in Melanesian Journal of Theology 11-1&2 (1995).
Eschatology and Ethics
Eschatology (i.e. the teaching on end times) is not mainly about charts and predictions. It is about worship, longing, and hoping. It is about crying out, How long, O’ Lord?! (Rev. 6:10) and “Come, Lord Jesus!” (Rev. 22:20). Eschatology is about motivation. Motivation to not live for this world that will soon be dissolved but for one that is unfading (cf. 1 Pet. 1:4; 2 Pet. 3:10-12). When we hope in Christ’s return we have motivation to be pure as He is pure (1 Jn. 3:3). Motivation to labor diligently and constantly because our Master is expected at any time (e.g. Matt. 24:36ff; 25:13; 1 Thess. 5:1-2). We are to constantly remind ourselves of His nearing advent and of the feast we shall share with Him (cf. Matt. 26:29; Mk. 14:25; Lk. 22:16; 1 Cor.11:26; Rev. 19:9).[1]
I do think it is good to be well-informed when it comes to Christ’s return. We should understand the main arguments for the different views on eschatology. However, I don’t think we should be dogmatic about how and when exactly it will happen (cf. e.g. Mk. 13:32). But that it will happen and will be glorious. And that it should motivate us as we seek to live faithful lives here as exiles waiting for our blessed hope.
“It is a pity that the church’s teaching on eschatology, the last days, has been concerned mostly with arguments about the order of events. In Scripture itself, the primary thrust of eschatology is ethical,” says John Frame.[2] I agree with Frame, although that should not be a cop-out for studying the book of Revelations and all the other relevant passages.
Yet, if we are just concerned with revealing that which Jesus said would be unrevealed until He came back then we are in a fruitless pursuit (cf. Matt 24:36; Acts 1:7; 1 Thess. 4:13-5:3). However, I do think it is profitable to have general convictions regarding end times. But, in my opinion, a dogmatic conviction is simply unbiblical and unwise. Most of the Pharisees, for example, were so dogmatic they missed Jesus the Messiah. They were so stuck in their ingrained thoughts (and convictions) that they couldn’t see their long Promised Savior before their eyes. Instead, we should be like the Bereans (Acts 17:11). We should know and search the Scriptures; but we should not have every jot and tittle of eschatology dogmatically lined out to a t.
Seven ways the Main Thrust of Eschatology is Ethical[3]:
- We live in the “already but not yet.” That is, the Kingdom of God has been ushered in but it has not been decisively established yet. “So while we are risen with Christ, we must seek the things that are above (Col. 3:1-4). We have died to sin (v. 3), but we must ‘put to death’ the sins of this life (v. 5). So the Christian life is an attempt, motivated by God’s grace, to live according to the principles of the age to come.”[4]
- Peter reminds us that since the present world will be dissolved we should not then live for this world but the next. And thus have morals shaped by the next Kingdom and not this evil one (2 Peter 3:11; 1 Cor. 7:26, 29).
- We “purify ourselves as He is pure,” why? Because we eagerly await the return of Jesus (Phil. 3:20; 2 Peter 3:12; 1 Jn. 3:3). Thus, we see that eschatology is not about hanging up charts that map out when Jesus will return, we clearly cannot know that, but about being found ready when He does come (Matt. 24).
- We can be sure that since Christ resurrected from the grave and was the “firstfruits” that we also will be raised. Therefore,we are told, to be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the labor of the Lord, because our labor in the Lord is not in vain (1 Cor. 15:58)! When we remember that we too will be raised and receive glorified bodies and enjoy God forever we are motivated to labor for the Lord.
- “We look to the return of Christ as our deliverance from tribulation and thus a source of hope (Luke 21:28).”[5]
- We must always be ready to meet the Lord, always! This is a great prod to faithfulness ( 24:44; 1 Thess. 5:1-10; 1 Peter 1:7; 2 Peter 3:14).
- We also think of the reward that God will give in heaven and this also encourages us to labor for Him (see for example Matt. 5:12, 46; 6:1; Rom. 14:10; 1 Cor. 3:8-15; James 1:12; Rev. 11:18).
Take Away
1) We should study end times. We need to seek to accurately handle the Word of truth (I speak to myself!). Yet we should not dogmatically hold to our position on this subject.
2) We need to remember, that the end of the story, and the main point of the Revelations, is to show that God through Jesus the Christ is victorious! This truth encouraged John who was exiled on Patmos and all the churches that were being persecuted to whom the letter went. If we read the letter, especially in that context, we will respond, not so much with a certain view of how everything will happen, but by saying, “Come Lord Jesus, come”! And that is the more powerful takeaway from the book.
3) Thus, we need to understand that all talk of end times does, or should, have a very practical thrust.
Conclusion
A person can have charts on the wall, even fairly accurate ones, and yet not have Christ in their heart and exuding out of their heart. If our study of the second coming of Christ and the future Kingdom of God does not have a very practical thrust, I don’t care how much we think we understand eschatology, we don’t understand eschatology. May we meditate on eschatology, but may it change not merely our view of the end times, but our ethics!
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[1] “We are called to be a people of memory, who are shaped by a tradition that is millennia older than the last Billboard chart. And we are called also called to be a people of expectation, praying for and looking forward to a coming kingdom that will break in upon our present as a thief in the night” (James K. A. Smith, Desiring the Kingdom, 159).
[2] John Frame, The Doctrine of God, p. 277.
[3] These seven points are taken from John Frame.
[4] Ibid., 277.
[5] Ibid., 278.
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