A Rising Evil? A Boiling Pot?

Life in the "Innocent" Age: Does it seem bland to you? Image via Wikipedia

Does anyone else feel like the level of evil is rising? I don’t mean just the number of bad things happening, but the number of just plain evil things? We don’t compare to Nazi Germany, Communist countries, or Totalitarian regimes, but is evil becoming the norm?

Some indicators are in the answers you may have to the following questions (keep track of your answers):

• 1. Are some behaviors considered normal today which a previous generation considered shameful, heinous, or evil?
• 2. Do you implicitly trust strangers on first meeting or feel guarded and on alert?
• 3. Do you wonder if someone might burst into your house at night to murder or steal?
• 4. Do you always, and I mean always, lock your cars no matter where you park?
• 5. Have you witnessed torture, blood spewing from bodies, or dead bodies inside of wrecked cars after an accident on TV recently?
• 6. Have you had thoughts that law enforcement officials cannot be trusted?
• 7. Do shows like “My Three Sons”, “Leave It to Beaver,” or the old “Hawaii Five-0” seem bland and non-entertaining?
• 8. Are you horrified by the news of a man who is accused of unspeakable sex acts against 23 young children, but not by 74 soccer fans murdered in cold blood at an Egyptian soccer match?
• 9. Do you know more about the sex life of your favorite celebrity than their religious beliefs?
• 10. Have you or a family member picked up a hitchhiker in the past five years?

The times have changed! How many of these were “Yes”? At what level is the American “EQ” (Evil Quotient)?

Here’s my rash generalization: As the liberal notion that sexual freedom and “choice” promotes greater societal freedom, and the artistic notion that shock value equates to creativity, our EQ rises. Morality gets more chinks in its armor .

C. S. Lewis speaks of morality as “directions for running the human machine (in Mere Christianity).” He tells the story of a little boy who is asked what God is like. The boy says, “The sort of person who is always snooping round to see if anyone is enjoying himself and then trying to stop it.” Americans may feel the same way. God and morality squash personal freedom and happiness.

But is this true?

Lewis compares morality to a fleet of ships. The ships need rules to keep from crashing into each other, and what happens inside each ship, boilers and gears, matters, too. Morality is about fair play, kindness, and “tidying up or harmonising the things inside each individual.” It does no good, Lewis says, to clean up graft [bribery/corruption] or bullying because bullies and twisted people, “will always find a way of carrying on the old game in the new system. You cannot make good men by law: and without good men you cannot have a good society.”

I agree with Lewis who says that Jesus told us to “be as harmless as doves” and “as wise as serpents.” He wants a child’s heart, but a grown-up’s head. Evil is a direct result of the moral lid coming off the human boiling pot. Grown-ups know to keep a lid on things or the kitchen might blow up.

Christians,

1. Stay morally bound to God’s ways!
2. Try hard without feeling condemned if we fail, but try.
3. Know where the lines are, but don’t judge either.

 

 

We help the most by knowing we can freely repent, have freedom from guilt, and acknowledge God is at work to keep us between the lines, and ultimately, to keep the lid on humanity’s boiling EQ brew.