WHY WE ARE SELF-DESTRUCTIVE

 

 We are spiritually blind and unable to weigh our options. Judas Iscariot was one of Jesus’ twelve disciples. However, despite the many miracles Jesus had performed in the three years he had been with Jesus, Judas would not submit to the truth and eventually betrayed Him for thirty pieces of silver.

It was not that Judas needed the money. He had been Jesus’ treasurer and had routinely dipped in. However, after he betrayed his Master, he felt great remorse and tried to return the silver to the priests:

·       Then when Judas, his betrayer, saw that Jesus was condemned, he changed his mind and brought back the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders, saying, "I have sinned by betraying innocent blood." They said, "What is that to us? See to it yourself." And throwing down the pieces of silver into the temple, he departed, and he went and hanged himself. (Matthew 27:3-5 ESV)

Judas felt such great remorse afterwards that he not only returned the silver to the priests but also killed himself. Why did he not pray to the Lord for forgiveness? Even if he might have been skeptical about this, reason should have told him to seek God’s mercy. It was worth a try - certainly a better option than suicide! (I’ve also noticed that this is the very situation that also comforts the terminally ill. Even if Jesus is a long shot, why not give Him a try?)

Why did not reason prevail? Sin derails sound thinking. Jesus taught that we love the cover of darkness rather than the exposure of our sins to the revealing Light of truth (John 3:19-20). There comes a point that we become so hardened within our own worldview that even the prospect of love and freedom appears distasteful to the spiritually blinded.

Judas’ guilt was driving him crazy, and he was driven to get rid of it as quickly as he could, even if his refuge became the darkness of death.

Our minds are vulnerable to the influences of our sinful behavior. This reminded me of a grasshopper parasitized by worm larvae. They go to the brain where they begin to eat it out and direct their host to jump to its death into the water, as they consume the grasshopper from the inside. In the water, the larvae complete their lifecycle after gobbling up the remains of their captive host.

Sin is a larva which eats at our minds and eventually takes control. Jesus explained:

·       “Indeed, in their case the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled that says: ‘You will indeed hear but never understand, and you will indeed see but never perceive.’ For this people's heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.'”

(Matthew 13:14-15)

Sin also dominates us as the does the larva, which takes control of the grasshopper so that it doesn’t know where it’s going or what it’s doing:

·       The way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know over what they stumble. (Proverbs 4:19)

·       But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes. (1 John 2:11)

Their spiritual blindness is a consuming virus:

·       while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. (2 Timothy 3:13)

What we love is what we will get. If we love the darkness instead of the Light, we will inherit blindness and stumble. God will not have to punish us. The thing we love will punish us:

·       “And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed.” (John 3:19-20)

Consequently, we are self-condemned. Judas certainly was! He was marched to his death in step with his love of the darkness. After years of hardening his mind to the Light, suicide seemed to be the only reasonable choice. He got exactly what he wanted, as tragic as it was. The things he loved killed him.

Our society is subject to the same forces. We become successful, proud, and fill ourselves with whatever is appetizing, including the lie of darkness:

·       Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and shrewd in their own sight! Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine, and valiant men in mixing strong drink, who acquit the guilty for a bribe, and deprive the innocent of his right! (Isaiah 5:20-23)

As we commit our lives to the darkness, our hatred of what threatens to expose us, the Light, grows.  We are like a helium balloon. We have risen so high in our own thinking that we expand and eventually explode.

The darkness of our self-deceptions drives away the light, and we continue to blindly stumble. What restores our sight? We must be transformed:

·       And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. ²⁷ And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.  You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God.  And I will deliver you from all your uncleannesses. And I will summon the grain and make it abundant and lay no famine upon you.  I will make the fruit of the tree and the increase of the field abundant, that you may never again suffer the disgrace of famine among the nations. Then you will remember your evil ways, and your deeds that were not good, and you will loathe yourselves for your iniquities and your abominations. (Ezekiel 36:25-31)

Of course, this will sound unbelievable to many who believe that their sins are just picadilloes. Our self-imposed darkness prevents us from seeing how these words can possibly pertain to us. However, if you are brave enough, find someone who is willing and able to tell you the truth about yourself, the very last thing you want to hear, as Jodi Picoult has written:

·       “Sometimes, when you don't ask questions, it's not because you are afraid that someone will lie to your face. It's because you're afraid they'll tell you the truth.”

How does the Christian know that they now see? Recovering sight is often a long and painful process, which can only proceed with the assurances of Christ’s love and care. However, it is like emerging into the light, which illuminates everything, from the darkness of confusion where we stumble, as C.S. Lewis had written:

·       But while in the nightmare I could not have fitted in my waking experience. The waking world is judged more real because it can thus contain the dreaming world: the dreaming world is judged less real because it cannot contain the waking one. For the same reason I am certain that in passing from the scientific point of view to the theological, I have passed from dream to waking. Christian theology can fit in science, art, morality, and the sub-Christian religions. The scientific point of view cannot fit in any of these things, not even science itself. I believe in Christianity as I believe that the Sun has risen not only because I see it but because by it I see everything else. (Theology is Poetry, a paper)