Wednesday, February 11, 2009

Five Lies Contemporaries Love

Okay, maybe I am obsessed with the topic of ethics this week and searching all the literature I can find on the subject but I think I found a real gem here. It is called the “Five Lies Contemporaries Love” by John MacArthur (Heartcry!, issue 45, 2009).

One, Life is random. We are all products of evolutionary chance – no purpose, no creator, no accountability. No one made us, we have no reason, and that is why we are free in this random world to do what we want.

Two, Truth is relative. No absolutes, no standards. Ethics can be changed if you have enough clout, power and persistence but there is no absolute truth. We are all free to possess our own truth and demand and to demand the freedom to live our lives according to our own truth which is our own invention.

Three, People are basically good. If they go bad, someone else is to blame. Somebody else abused them. They lack self-esteem. They have psychological problems based upon environmental failures. But people are basically good. “I’m a good person.”

Four, Everyone can change their own life. Get control, take charge, become the person you want to be. You have the power to be whatever you want to be. That’s the biggest lie ever: “You can be everything you want to be.’ There are certain things you can’t ever change. You cannot do anything you want to do, that’s ridiculous. But that fits the mantra of this maniacal kind of freedom in a sin saturated culture.

Five, The Goal of life is self-satisfaction. You hear people say, “This is who I am, take it or leave it, and I am happy who I am.” And you want to say, “Well, we wish you weren’t; just go somewhere else.”

This behavior sounds a lot like the life ethic of Immanuel Kant which can be summed up in one imperative: “Always do the act that is motivated by the sincere belief that what you are doing is the right thing to do…” (The Moral Quest, Grenz, pg. 31). What would be the ethical statement of contemporary Jesus I wonder? What say you?

Thanks for stopping by!
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Adrian

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