We often hate the things that are closest to us:
Christianity, Western Civilization, capitalism, and even the principles that
had once made the West great.
Why? These provide the metrics by which we judge ourselves.
If we feel judged - and to some degree all of us feel judged - we hate the
source of these judgments.
For instance, capitalism represents the requirement that we
succeed and the threat of failure, while Christianity represents the accusing
finger which informs us that we have failed to maintain its moral standards. There
is even resentment towards our parents when we feel that we have failed to live
up to their standards and interfere with our desires.
I too had been a hater. Perhaps this helps to explain our
attraction to counter-cultural elements, which, from a safe distance, seem to
be benign alternatives.
Before Charles Manson had moved to LA, where collected his
band who murdered on his behalf, he stayed with my roommate and I in Berkeley,
California. Bob, my college roommate, had met Charlie on the Berkeley campus
one night during an impromptu jam session. Bob played his guitar and Charlie
found a can for his drum. At the end, Charlie asked Bob, “Do you have a place
where I can crash?” We had a couch in our living room, and so Bob invited him
back.
Charlie was a talker,
and we were glad to listen. He seemed to be quite “evolved,” so we thought he
was cool. He talked about dropping acid and dancing with the energy of the
surrounding trees, and killing cops, but that was what the “Woke” folks were
also talking about, and so we enthusiastically listened. He never showed any
interest in us or in what we were thinking, but why should he!
We never thought of him as a psychopath. One night, Bob
slipped into my room to excitedly ask me, “Who does Charlie remind you of?” I
told him I didn’t know. Bob continued, “Doesn’t he remind you of Jesus Christ?”
Annoyed, I answered, “Bob, I’m Jewish, and Jesus doesn’t trigger any image for
me.”
How were we not able to see Charlie as the psychopath he
evidently was? And how was his latter group of women, who accepted him as a
Christ figure, unable to see the disconnect? We were possessed with the
zeitgeist of the sixties, and the past and its lessons were no longer relevant
for us. We were also driven by the pressures to conform to what we experienced
as oppressive. Therefore, we were receptive to the approaching new age where
love and peace would reign. We were ready to reject the ancient repressive
restrictions of Christianity in favor of the Age of Aquarius and free love. The
choice was easy.
Similarly, we can also ask how the cult leader, Jim Jones,
succeeded in luring almost 1000 idealists to commit suicide. And how Adolph
Hitler was able to take control of the minds of a highly educated nation,
perhaps the most educated nation in the world? He subsequently proved that even
“education” is no a defense against the insanity of our age.
The Manson girls had
been blinded as they were knifing to death their innocent victims. Is it
possible that we too can be similarly blinded by our social context?
Even now, educated Westerners are celebrating Shariah Law,
although it undermines the human rights that Westerners value, and seeks to destroy
the West, along with perhaps the most debunked and genocidal philosophy of
Marxism.
How do we understand this? Historically, Christianity has
stood against social experimentation. It understood that the evils could not be
eliminated but just held in check. There are no perfect societies because there
are no perfect people. We are the source of our own evil, which arises in every
society and utopian experiment. However, it has always been more convenient to
blame society than to blame ourselves.
One reason for our rejection of God is that we are more
sensitive to the criticism of those who are close to us. Consequently, we feel
more judged by our own society than by others, and therefore seek to destroy
it. No matter how benign our society might be, we are inclined to undermine and
deconstruct its authority. Why? Because we feel judged and undermined by it,
even though it has nurtured and protected us.
It seems that the same principle pertains to the God of the
Bible, even though the Christian Faith has built the West and has been the
source of so many of our blessings. Consequently, we hate the peace-loving
Christian Church and malign its God and His Gospel.
Not everyone feels this way. I no longer do. Why not? I no
longer seek its approval and feel condemned by the God of the Bible. Nor do I
have to rebel against the influence of my parents. Why not? I have found a
better source of validation in my Savior, Jesus, who loves me so much that He
died for me, even while I hated Him:
·
God shows his love for us in that while we were
still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified
by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if
while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much
more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. (Romans
5:8–10)
It is His love and forgiveness that enables me to love even
my enemies. They are no longer a threat to me, since I am convinced that I am
completely in the keeping of my Lord. Jesus has bought and has won my heart.
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