On social morality
Sometime back a writer expressed their frustration and suggested that one of the local newspapers should “get off their moral high horse”. After all, why all this chatter about morality, values et cetera when there are roads to be fixed, an economy to drive forward. In other words, let’s deal with “real issues”. But who drives the economy, fixes roads and deals with other problems in society? People do. And unless people are changed drastically from the inside, we are merely wasting time with “real issues”. If you check human history, I am sure you will find that when we work towards the proverbial state of utopia by merely humanistic means, it does not work; period. In almost every case greed, envy, malice and hatred somehow surface and we are back at square one.
Yet even though morality is important, it still misses the mark. For a society content with its own “niceness” and looking no further, will eventually become a morally degenerate society. Mere improvement in behaviour does not result in redemption, but redemption always improves people to a level we cannot possibly imagine. God became man to turn us into His sons. He did not come to produce better men but to produce men of a new kind. Of course the local arm of the intelligentsia will object with the usual, “no place for a theocracy”, “narrow minded bigots” et cetera. We will hold symposium A, discussion B and workshop C. Everyone seems to know what is wrong, yet no one is solving the problem. The truth is, we are reaping exactly what we have sown and will continue to do so unless we get Jesus’ message. In the words of Spurgeon that message is, “Every generation needs regeneration”.
Yet even though morality is important, it still misses the mark. For a society content with its own “niceness” and looking no further, will eventually become a morally degenerate society. Mere improvement in behaviour does not result in redemption, but redemption always improves people to a level we cannot possibly imagine. God became man to turn us into His sons. He did not come to produce better men but to produce men of a new kind. Of course the local arm of the intelligentsia will object with the usual, “no place for a theocracy”, “narrow minded bigots” et cetera. We will hold symposium A, discussion B and workshop C. Everyone seems to know what is wrong, yet no one is solving the problem. The truth is, we are reaping exactly what we have sown and will continue to do so unless we get Jesus’ message. In the words of Spurgeon that message is, “Every generation needs regeneration”.
