When I was really little things were right or wrong depending upon the pleasure or pain I experienced from particular behaviors. However, it did not take long before I would begin negotiating with my parents. If I was a good boy, what would I get? Maybe I could get three stories before going to bed. When I was a teen things were right or wrong depending upon the rules of the school. No matter how inane the rules, it was wrong to disobey. They did not have to make sense. It was very much like a line from Tennyson’s “The Charge of the Light Brigade.” “Theirs is not to reason why. Theirs is but to do and die.” That works in the military but not in civilian life.
Unfortunately some Christians obey merely because they want to go to heaven. They want the treat. Or worse they don’t want to be punished. Many Christians operate on the next level of morality. A common bumper sticker reads, “God said it and that’s good enough for me.” That’s the Tennyson level. But what about the brain God gave us? He did say, “Come and let us reason together.” Moses argued with God.
A higher level of morality is for us to understand the reasons for rules and laws. Often we discover the rules no long fit our present culture and our human laws sometimes need to be amended. God’s laws do not change because God’s laws are based on reasons and principles which do not change. Ultimately we understand that we obey because it is the right thing to do. Or we disobey because it is the right thing to do. Enter onto the stage Thoreau, Gandhi, Martin Luther King and Jesus.
Written by Roger Bothwell on March 27, 2013
Spring of Life Ministry, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574
Rogerbothwell.org