If It Feels Good...
Too Little, Too Late? • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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· 1 viewAre right and wrong knowable and does it matter?
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If the beginning of the decline of American civilization coincided with a bumper sticker, it would be this one popular in days past: If It Feels Good, Do It.
I remember hearing the late Bill Glass, DE for the Cleveland Browns, tell a story about this bumper sticker.
Story of Glass ramming into the back of a car with that bumper sticker and then telling the guy he invited him to.
The pendulum has swung from too far in one direction to too far in the other, in my lifetime. We had moral absolutes about everything, and some moral absolutes that were flat out wrong. In reaction to a lot of what I call moral wrong-headedness, others call them the Good Ole Days, people now claim right and wrong, good and evil, are obsolete terms and morality, or lack of it, is entirely subjective.
The condition is not new.
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 clever in their own sight.
Willard uses the story of the fighter pilot who turned the controls for what she thought was a steep climb and flew straight into the ground. She was flying upside down when she thought she was flying right side up. He suggests we as a society are flying upside down and have convinced ourselves it is impossible to determine what right side up looks like and it wouldn’t matter if we could.
So, are right and wrong knowable and does it matter?
What do the words mean?
What do the words mean?
Moral: Knows the right thing to do and does it.
Moral: Knows the right thing to do and does it.
Immoral: Knows the right thing to do and does something else, something wrong.
Immoral: Knows the right thing to do and does something else, something wrong.
Amoral
Amoral
A thing is right if I or someone I approve of does it.
A thing is right if I or someone I approve of does it.
A thing is wrong if I or someone I approve of thinks it shouldn’t be done.
A thing is wrong if I or someone I approve of thinks it shouldn’t be done.
Ethics, the values by which a person lives, becomes purely subjective even if they proof-text sacred or secular texts to back up their behavior.
Ethics, the values by which a person lives, becomes purely subjective even if they proof-text sacred or secular texts to back up their behavior.
I have been preaching/teaching for at least 3 decades that our national problem is not immorality but amorality.
I have been preaching/teaching for at least 3 decades that our national problem is not immorality but amorality.
Isaiah laid out for us the root of the problem, which is really two
Isaiah laid out for us the root of the problem, which is really two
How does one define good and evil and aren’t all definitions equally valid?
How does one define good and evil and aren’t all definitions equally valid?
There are no moral absolutes; what’s wrong for you isn’t wrong for me.
There are no moral absolutes; what’s wrong for you isn’t wrong for me.
This has just enough truth in it to be deceiving.
This has just enough truth in it to be deceiving.
Most people can use computers without a problem; others can’t without getting arrested.
Most people can use computers without a problem; others can’t without getting arrested.
“It would be distasteful, but I couldn’t call it wrong.”
“It would be distasteful, but I couldn’t call it wrong.”
“Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight.”
“Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight.”
So, to buy into the “all definitions are equally valid” premise, makes everyone, except perhaps the criminally insane, an adequate source for defining right and wrong.
So, to buy into the “all definitions are equally valid” premise, makes everyone, except perhaps the criminally insane, an adequate source for defining right and wrong.
One immediate issue is what happens when your “right” is my “wrong,”
One immediate issue is what happens when your “right” is my “wrong,”
Illustration: When going back to your Good Ole Days is going back to my Bad Ole Days.
Illustration: When going back to your Good Ole Days is going back to my Bad Ole Days.
But is the “self” the best determiner of what is right and wrong or do we need a source outside the self that is not just another self like me?
But is the “self” the best determiner of what is right and wrong or do we need a source outside the self that is not just another self like me?
Why was Adolf Hitler able to commit the atrocities he did with little opposition, inside or outside Germany?
Why was Adolf Hitler able to commit the atrocities he did with little opposition, inside or outside Germany?
Remember, it was not the camps, the experimentation on the impaired, or anything we talk about today that got the West involved; it was his attack on Poland.
Remember, it was not the camps, the experimentation on the impaired, or anything we talk about today that got the West involved; it was his attack on Poland.
It was not that other nations did not know what was happening; we just rejected it as fake news.
It was not that other nations did not know what was happening; we just rejected it as fake news.
There was widespread belief that humankind had evolved past the point where such atrocities were impossible, at least in what we call the West.
There was widespread belief that humankind had evolved past the point where such atrocities were impossible, at least in what we call the West.
In religious circles, including conservative South Baptists, there was a belief we were progressing ourselves into the Millennial Reign.
In religious circles, including conservative South Baptists, there was a belief we were progressing ourselves into the Millennial Reign.
I maintain we need more than the self and the ideas that drive the self as a source for building good character and right living.
I maintain we need more than the self and the ideas that drive the self as a source for building good character and right living.
Call me cynical, but I’ve had too much experience with human nature to trust it to rightly define good and evil.
Call me cynical, but I’ve had too much experience with human nature to trust it to rightly define good and evil.
We are being carried along by ideas, of many political but mostly economic stripes, without even knowing it.
We are being carried along by ideas, of many political but mostly economic stripes, without even knowing it.
Tolstoy, whose elite circle of friends were enchanted by atheism, was told by those friends it was all about human ingenuity, particles and progress.
Tolstoy, whose elite circle of friends were enchanted by atheism, was told by those friends it was all about human ingenuity, particles and progress.
Yet this self that feels self-sufficient, no pun intended, to define morality and theoretically resists all attempts to interfere with that freedom routinely gives it away for the basest of reasons.
Yet this self that feels self-sufficient, no pun intended, to define morality and theoretically resists all attempts to interfere with that freedom routinely gives it away for the basest of reasons.
We call the silly profound.
We call the silly profound.
“Stand up for YOUR rights.”
“Stand up for YOUR rights.”
“All I ever needed to know I learned in kindergarten.”
“All I ever needed to know I learned in kindergarten.”
“Practice random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty.”
“Practice random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty.”
But there is another possibility.
But there is another possibility.
Where is the wise person? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom did not know God, God was pleased through the foolishness of preaching to save those who believe. For indeed, Jews ask for sign miracles and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a cause for stumbling, but to the Gentiles foolishness, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.
The call is not for a return to the rigid, often silly, often dehumanizing, morality of the past.
The call is not for a return to the rigid, often silly, often dehumanizing, morality of the past.
Get that one line: Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God.”
Get that one line: Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God.”
“…in some special, mysterious way, (Jesus) was the kingdom.” Malcom Muggeridge)
“What’s the point of knowing good if you don’t keep trying to become a good person?” (Willard, 10)
“What’s the point of knowing good if you don’t keep trying to become a good person?” (Willard, 10)