Day 2653 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge.

1 John 1:5 NIV

Yesterday we talked about that all too common question that people outside of our faith love to ask: Where is God? People seem to have a plethora of questions that they think will undermine our beliefs and cause us to admit that we're wrong in having the faith that we have. I guess that since they've closed their minds and hardened their hearts to the possibility of something bigger than themselves, they need to attack those who live by faith in order to bring us down to their level where we give up and accept defeat. But I have a question of my own for those who don't choose to believe in God:

How do we determine what's right and what's wrong if we don't have some kind of supreme moral foundation by which to gauge good and evil?

Which, having typed that out, I guess we should address whether or not people even believe in good and evil. I reckon that's an assumption on my part. Do people believe in the difference between righteousness and evil? Do people agree that there is such a thing as wrong? Will folks admit that there is a vast difference between good and bad? To me, that whole idea is just foundational in all of humanity. But I guess that may be an assumption that isn't true.

But for the sake of assumption and argument, let's just say that pretty much everyone does in fact agree that there's a difference between good and evil. Where does that come from? How do we evaluate where things fall on the spectrum between good and evil? How do we decide what things are good and what things are evil? Do we have some kind of universal scale by which to judge things so that we know what is right and what is wrong? Is this making sense to anyone?

If we can all agree that evil does in fact exist, how do we define that? How can we say that something is evil if we don't also have a concept of what's righteous by which to compare it? Is it just up to what every individual person thinks? Is our idea of right and wrong handed down from what someone a long time ago decided? Do we determine what's good or what's evil based on what other humans think? And if that's the case, then do we not see the inherent room for error that provides?

You see, my point is that while we humans like to think that we're better, smarter, stronger, and more powerful than we really are, we all still have to have something external by which we can determine right and wrong. That fact comes from another fact which is that none of us are perfect. Each of us make mistakes. Each of us get things wrong. Each of us jump to conclusions and act irrationally and do things out of impatience and selfishness. So are we the ones who should be deciding what's right and what's wrong?

If humans get to determine the difference between right and wrong, then how do we explain the evil things that humans do? Say for instance someone thinks it's perfectly okay to kill someone, does that make it okay for everyone just because that person doesn't see anything wrong with it? What about stealing? Is it okay for all of us to go around taking things that aren't ours because there are other people who do so? Or perhaps someone doesn't see anything wrong with being attracted to children. Is that okay now? How far do we go down this line before we come to the unavoidable conclusion that humans cannot be the ones who decide what’s right and what’s wrong?

Do you see what I getting at yet? There has to be an infallible foundation of truth for us to rely upon in our determining the difference between right and wrong. There has to be some universal good that we can compare everything else to in order to determine what is right and what is not. If it were just up to us, then everyone could decide for themselves what's okay. If it were up to us then we'd all have the right to do anything we want without ever being questioned about it because if we think it's okay then it's simply okay and no other opinion matters.

I think that most of us will agree that evil does in fact exist. But in saying that, are we not also saying that therefore righteousness must exist as well? And if righteousness does in fact exist, does there not need to be a perfect form of righteousness that we can use to compare our thoughts and actions and choices to in order to determine what's right and what's wrong? And if we need a perfect form of righteousness, well, as much as we'd all like to think we could volunteer for the position, there is no human that is anywhere near perfect.

So all of these questions that I've asked, all of this thinking and considering we've done here leads us to this final conclusion: If we're not God then someone else must be because we have to have a perfect version of righteousness so that we can determine what's right and what's wrong. Without God's perfect light, His perfect goodness, His perfect truth, we have nothing left but to apparently come up with our own, and that's just not how this works.

I understand that there will always be those who deny God's existence and berate and persecute and judge those who have faith in Him and believe in Him. But if God doesn't exist, then evil must not exist. And if that’s the case then everything that everyone wants to do must be okay because if we all get to decide what’s right for us then we can’t tell someone else that something they do is wrong. There are no consequences if everyone gets to decide for themselves what's acceptable. Nothing can work like that folks. We don't find order through chaos. We can't create something civilized through anarchy. There must be a supreme law that all of humanity is judged by because without it, moral decay is unavoidable.

As much as our pride and arrogance may hate to admit it, God's ways are truly higher than ours. And for that we should all be truly thankful. Because without His definition of right, we wouldn't know what's wrong. Without His truth, we'd all be living a lie. And without His light, each of us would be perpetually lost in the darkness without ever knowing that there was something better than what we personally think is okay.

Simply put, we need God because without Him all we have is a bunch of highly imperfect and highly errant humans deciding for themselves what they think is right based upon what they want to do. And friends, we just need someone far better than we are to help us find our way to something better than we’d ever find on our own.

#LeaveNoSoulUntold