theJesusfreak

Vox Apologia: Glory to Man in the Highest: Humanism's Dangerous Claim.

PS 10:4 In his pride the wicked does not seek him;
in all his thoughts there
is no room for God.

What is at the root of sin? I believe it is pride. When Satan fell it was his pride that motivated him. Satan declared, "I will ascend to heaven;I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly, on the utmost heights of the sacred mountain. I will ascend above the tops of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High." Satan appealed to Adam and Eve's pride when he tempted them to eat the forbidden fruit so that they could "become like God". It was Adam and Eve's pride that was their motivation to give in to Satan's temptation. Adam and Eve's pride is what caused this world we live in to be fallen and cursed.

This was illustrated to me several years ago on a trip to see the Great Passion Play in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. There are several things to do on the grounds before the play that you can see and do. One of those was called the Holy Land Tour. What you do is walk along a road that is about one-half mile long and along the road are exhibits that demonstrate things from the Bible such as how the Israelites made bricks in Egypt, a cistern and a Bedouin tent like Abraham might have lived in among other things. At the end of the tour was a full scale replica of Moses Tabernacle. A man dressed as the High Priest gave you a tour of the Tabernacle and explained the significance of each thing in it. It was especially interesting because the man in the role of the High Priest was a Messianic Jew. He was able to explain things from a Jewish and a Christian perspective.

When he took us through the Holy of Holies the thing that was striking to me was his explanation of the unleavened bread. The Bible uses leaven, or yeast, as a symbol of sin. The "priest" explained this from a Jewish perspective. He drew the analogy that the yeast puffs up the bread the same way that pride causes us to be "puffed up".

Satan is very good at deception. He has several methods of deceiving us which work very well. One is the same one he used with Adam and Eve, an appeal to our pride. He also takes the good and Holy things of God, twists them and creates evil counterfeits to replace them with. In other words, he takes a lie and ads enough that is true and good to make it believable. A little sugar helps the medicine go down sort of thing.

I believe that God has given us a desire to seek Him. To fill that God shaped hole as some have put it. I also believe that he has given us a desire to "Seek first the Kingdom of God". Satan's ruse is that we can create Heaven on earth ourselves without God. We can be the most exalted beings in this humanistic kingdom. In effect we can have our cake and eat it too.

I once entered into a year and a half conversation with an atheist named Reg Reid. Of course, he was constantly extolling the virtues of communism and I, of course, defended the Godliness of capitalism. Reg kept insisting that the philosophy of Jesus was communism and I kept insisting that Jesus was a capitalist. Reg was, of course, wrong but he got me to think about it a little. I was wrong also, Jesus wasn't a capitalist. As a matter of fact, I don't think Jesus cares a whit about economics and political philosophy , what he cares about is people.

Reg, kept telling me that Jesus advocated selling one's possessions and giving to the poor which is true. However, that is a bit different than government taking ones possetions by force and giving them to others. It got me to thinking about why capitalism works and communism doesn't. Capitalism doesn't work because it is virtuous, it works because of two factors. One is that I believe God has designed us to enjoy our work and the fruit of our labor if you believe what Solomon told us in Ecclesiastes as I do. The other is that people are greedy.

The reason that Marxism fails is because they take away the only reason that one would want to share his possessions and put the needs of his neighbor ahead of his own at the beginning. They declare that their is no God and man is the highest authority in the universe. This is a very easy sell as it appeals to our sin nature and pride. We don't want to be under the authority of that ole' cosmic kiljoy God. We want to be our own God. The trouble is that if we won't restrain ourselves by living by God's laws and a changed heart through the Gospel of Christ then we must be restrained by the raw power of an iron fisted government.

After enough friends and love ones disappear because of non-conformity and after it becomes apparent that no matter how hard one works that your lot in life is going to be no better than others who do little or no work, the sham begins to crumble. The sham is that we believe we can have the Kingdom of God on earth without God. We want to have a kingdom of man utopia with no god but ourselves.

The next time you wonder how supposedly intelligent people can believe in idiocy like evolution and that it is OK to kill the unborn or the old and handicapped because they are inconvenient remember that it is because they will raise their throne above God. In other words, pride.

It is said that there have been more people killed in the name of God than anything. What a crock. Humanism has killed 40 million from abortion in this country. It has killed about 60 million in Communist China. Stalin killed about 100 million in the name of humanism. I could go on and on. I hear a lot these days about being "humane". For example, it's the "humane" thing is to kill handicapped people like Terri Schiavo. I hope no one ever tries to treat me "humainly", I can think of nothing more scary. If it is a question of whether the Godly way or the humane way is better it is no contest. Humanism is completly bankrupt.