For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. (Romans 7:19, NIV)
Only the other day, we looked together at “redeeming the time, because the days are evil” (Ephesians 5:16). Some would say they are more evil than ever, and they lift their voices to warn us of such. This leaves me with two principal questions, but before we get there…
I am always finding things wrong with my golf game. One day it’s the dreaded two-way miss off the tee, the next day it’s the dreaded speed-robbing slide in my iron swings, the day after that it’s the dreaded chili-dips with my wedges, and one more day yet it’s the dreaded inability to find the speed on the greens.
Mind you, I don’t really play four days in a row like that, but poetic license allows me to create a bigger nightmare that way—the same kind of nightmare that haunts almost every golfer’s mind sooner or later!
Here’s another poetic license I used: repetition. Dreaded, dreaded, dreaded, dreaded. The word not only describes the worst manifestations in our golf game, but it is indicative of those dire proclamations of evil made by the voices, be they hark-harking on television, radio, social media, or a popular podcast. Those voices want to be sure we’re filled up with fear about what will happen if.
So now let’s return to those voices and my questions for them.
If I am thinking of being the one to decry others’ words and their actions, I must first check my own.
First, is the world any more evil than it has ever been? Paul’s words to the Romans suggest not: “[People] have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy” (Romans 1:29-31). That’s a nasty list. And, as the apostle wrote to the Thessalonians, one we are to robustly avoid: “Reject every kind of evil” (1 Thessalonians 5:22).
So, if the voices make it seem as though we’ve never seen a world like the one we’re living in now, our best response is likely this: “Fear not.” It’s a refrain of Scripture, and in this context, it is perhaps best fortified through John’s words: “You, dear children, are from God and have overcome [those who do not acknowledge Jesus], because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world” (1 John 4:4).
Then the second question: Is their evil worse than mine? In our leading verse today, Paul confessed that, even as one in Christ, evil (sin) still emerged from him. This should not surprise us, for Jesus said to all who listened: “If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” (Luke 11:13).
There is no question that unregenerate men and women who have no interest in God often live their evils in the open. They may legalize them with their votes and excuse them with their “everybody’s doing it” justifications. But if I am thinking of being the one to decry their words and their actions, I must first check my own. I must start with me. Let me be certain I have let the megaphone resound in my own ears before I dream of aiming it at others.
—
Jeff Hopper
September 8, 2020
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The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.
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