EVIL: Must the Bride fall in order to rise again?

I write this post under a deep conviction that the Bride of Christ, as she is manifested in the West, is horribly ill and perhaps terminally so!

****

It is strange to realize you're a soul-brother with a man you don't know; especially on a controversial subject like evil. But that seems to be the case. Theodore Dalrymple admits to a fascination with books dealing with "evil." I too am fascinated with this subject ... even before becoming a believer.

Recently, Dalrymple read a book by Phillip Cole [a philosopher], The Myth of Evil, and was impressed with some, but not all, of Cole's arguments. The author's principle point is that the word evil is useless in a civilized society.

[Cole] uses as an example the notorious and brutal murder of the two year-old James Bulger by two ten year-old children, John Venables and Robert Thomson. Both of the culprits came from highly disturbed and indeed sordid backgrounds, in which there was a lot of violence, emotional instability, excessive drinking, etc. The statistical connection between such a background and violent criminal behaviour is clear; but what the two boys did was nevertheless exceptional (murder by children, even from the worst circumstances is very rare).

In Dalrymple's words ...

[Cole] argues for the uselessness, indeed the harmfulness ... , of the concept of evil. And I confess that, though I have sometimes had a strong sense of being in the presence of evil, I have had some slight difficulty with the meaning of the concept myself. What exactly does it mean? Can we, ought we, or must we, do without it, philosophically, ethically, psychologically and sociologically?

Notice the absence of the spiritual realm.

Cole argues that the concept is redundant both as a description and as an explanation of human conduct. In fact, he says, its main use or function, when stripped of its unsustainable pretensions to describe or explain anything, is to frighten populations into acquiescence to the extension of power over them by ruling elites whose legitimacy might otherwise be called into question. For it is not common values or characteristics that unite political entities such as states in the modern world, he says, but common enemies, who are either wholly imaginary or whose power and malevolence are much exaggerated.

It is true that fear, as a concept and a reality in Scripture is used to elicit our acquiescence to the person and power of God. Yet, only the fool would suggest He uses it to avoid questions concerning His legitimacy.

Indeed, [Cole] continues, the concept of evil is responsible for much harm ... in the world. The reason for this is clear. When we say of someone that he is evil, we are saying that he is a being of a quite distinct category from ourselves, such that normal ethical limits and restraints do not apply in the way that we must deal with him. For evil is the ultimate – well, evil, and must be destroyed by any means possible. Without the concept of evil, then, we would be much less likely to treat people evilly.

I detect a hint of Reagan and Bush bashing in Cole's argument above; remember the "evil empire" and "the axis of evil," respectively?

Of course authentic believers know the question of evil was answered by God Himself long ago:

Out of the ground the LORD God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing to the sight and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. [Genesis 2:9]

After analyzing Cole's forensic weaknesses, Dalrymple offered the following penetrating thought ...

... on the larger point on [the Bulger] case, Dr Cole is surely right: to have dismissed them as irredeemably evil, or possessed by evil, would have been mistaken and cruel, as is proved by the fact that the children subsequently turned out well, much better in fact than they would have done had they never committed the murder, for they received intense and humane attention thereafter.

Herein is nurture and justification for the Age of Accountability doctrine.

As the writer of a book on the case, Blake Morrison, put it (I quote from memory), ‘It was a pity they had to murder James Bulger to get an education.’ I don’t think I have read a more succinct and damning indictment of a society and its educational system than that, and no doubt it does not apply only to Liverpool, England. [New English Review]

This is such an excellent metaphor for the Good News. I might paraphrase Morrison's words in this way: "It is a pity we had to murder Jesus of Nazareth to get understanding." But it is true ... isn't it? What would man have learned about evil had not the ultimate innocent died?

Like Dalrymple, I don’t think we can find "a more succinct and damning indictment" of man and his systems than that.

Likewise,

Dr Cole extends the lessons of [the Bulger] case to all human evil ... . Venables and Thompson were redeemable precisely because those who looked after them thought they were redeemable and did not consider them as evil by essence; by extension, everyone else who commits evil is redeemable, though perhaps with more difficulty.

Sinners all (Romans 3:23), we "were all redeemable precisely because [God made us] redeemable " and considered evil as "evil by essence." I believe Dalrymple inadvertently tells us an eternal truth: "by extension, everyone ... who commits evil is redeemable, though perhaps with more difficulty."

Is that not what God put in man at his creation ... His own image? Thus the concept of "evil by essence" must be mitigated with the Imago Dei.

Christianity, Church,
Evil, Redemption, Religion

IMMIGRATION: Deporting 16 million illegal aliens!

While looking for my bunny slippers this morning I realized something was troubling me about this morning's "Ark" post ... that we can conceive of such futuristic scenarios as is described in this NGS article (sending the human archive to a lunar station; ditto to Mars later ... ostensibly to preserve the human data bank) ... but cannot conceive of deporting 16 million "illegal" aliens from our sovereign nation to preserve her boggles the mind.

The founders of the group Alliance to Rescue Civilization (ARC) agreed that extending the Internet from the Earth to the moon could help avert a technological dark age following "nuclear war, acts of terrorism, plague, or asteroid collisions." (Read: "Killer Asteroids: A Real But Remote Risk?" [June 19, 2003].)

But the group also advocates creating a moon-based repository of Earth's life, complete with human-staffed facilities to "preserve backups of scientific and cultural achievements and of the species important to our civilization," said ARC's Robert Shapiro, a biochemist at New York University.

"In the event of a global catastrophe, the ARC facilities will be prepared to reintroduce lost technology, art, history, crops, livestock, and, if necessary, even human beings to the Earth," Shapiro said.

We are, I am told, 250,000 miles distant from the moon; the mean average distance to the border of any foreign nation on earth is roughly 5,500 miles. A combination of buses or planes or trucks would be used to transport the deportees to their respective borders; from the beginning to the end the logistics for accomplishing this might be about five years, the cost of the project couldn't exceed 500 million dollars.

I presently do not have the mathematical or logistical means to do a comparative cost analysis per essential element at my disposal; however, based on some quick scribbles on the back of last year's tax return, I estimate NASA's project would cost somewhere between 40 to 80 times as much with zero immediate or direct benefit to American tax-payers.

"What say you?"

BLOGGERS BLOGGING:

Gumpe
Mr. Barlowe

Ark, Christianity, Illegal Aliens, Lunar Living,
Meteors, Moon, NASA, Science

NASA'S ARK: Space giant has big plans to save man and his accomplicments!

I'm thinking it's mighty nice of these folks to be so concerned about us; truly, I am! But the other "I Am" has beat them to the punch. The National Geographic Society reports ...

The moon should be developed as a sanctuary for civilization in case of a cataclysmic cosmic impact, according to an international team of experts.

NASA already has blueprints to create a permanent lunar outpost by the 2020s.

Reminds me of Moses' trip up Mount Sinai to fetch the tables, when God showed the leader of the Hebrews His blueprints for an outpost of a slightly different kind.

But that plan should be expanded to include a way to preserve humanity's learning, culture, and technology if Earth is hit by a doomsday asteroid or comet, said Jim Burke, a scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California.

This too is mighty nice of you folks but perhaps you should read theses before you decide to save what you think are man's accomplishments.

For all of us have become like one who is unclean, And all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment; And all of us wither like a leaf, And our iniquities, like the wind, take us away.

Isaiah 64:6

[for] as it is written, "THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE; THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS, THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD; ALL HAVE TURNED ASIDE, TOGETHER THEY HAVE BECOME USELESS; THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD, THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE." "THEIR THROAT IS AN OPEN GRAVE, WITH THEIR TONGUES THEY KEEP DECEIVING," "THE POISON OF ASPS IS UNDER THEIR LIPS"; "WHOSE MOUTH IS FULL OF CURSING AND BITTERNESS"; "THEIR FEET ARE SWIFT TO SHED BLOOD, DESTRUCTION AND MISERY ARE IN THEIR PATHS, AND THE PATH OF PEACE THEY HAVE NOT KNOWN."

Romans 3:10-17

In this politically correct world we live in today, it's doubtful you'd even find a bible on the lunar surface once you landed; and yet it would be the only thing worth saving out of this garbage heap we call humanity.

An impact of the size that wiped out the dinosaurs hasn't happened since long before the rise of humans, he pointed out.

Yet scientists' expanding knowledge of asteroids and craters left throughout the solar system has created a consensus that Earth remains vulnerable to a civilization-crushing collision.

This calls for the creation of a space age Noah's ark, Burke said.

Those blueprints God showed Moses also included an ark in them; one design to picture the One True Ark: the Lord Jesus Christ.

For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words.

1 Thessalonians 4:16-18

In those last days the Lord will catch up those worthy of His salvation and be carried in His bosom safely to the other side. Baruch hashem adonai!

Ark, Christianity, Deliverance, Jesus Christ,
I Am, Sermon Illustration, Meteors,
Redemption, Salvation