TIME

How easily the joy of Christmas dissipates into the manufactured revelry surrounding the turning of the calendar to a New Year. For within a short seven days, we have moved from the celebration of the mystery of the miracle of the birth of the Son of God to the bittersweet embrace of the passing of time.

When it comes to time, are we not struggling to balance the hope of the new with the impossibility of retrieving experiences that have faded into the past? For while the novelty of something anticipated excites our hopes, remembrance of things past remind us, if ever so subtly, that life is transient. This is why the celebrations associated with the turning of the pages of the calendar seem forced, artificial and even sad. In response to the iron law of time, some continuously erect mighty artificial bulwarks with money to stay the impending stream of change, but just as time cannot be stopped, so these futile gestures inevitably come to nothing. While the lavish parties of the revelers are impressive for their momentary splendor, in the flash of a moment everything that was once perfect has now become a wrecked vestige of what was before. The band has played its last mournful note, the guests have departed, and the despoiled tables have lost their ordered elegance.

We may seem to have the power for a moment to stand athwart the stream of time, but whatever our strategy might be, it will always prove fruitless against forces that we can neither change nor reverse. If we stake everything on our own power to control time, we will inevitably feel the cold breath of mortality brushing silently by. For behind all the pomp and circumstance, we know in our hearts that “our days are like a fleeting shadow” (Psalm 144:4) that “vanish like smoke.” (Psalm 102:3) Thus wisdom dictates, “Though your riches increase, do not set your hearts on them.”(Psalm 62:10) And as the year opens to new promises both real and imagined, we might try to balance the eternal reality of the presence of God in our lives with the temporal considerations of the here and now. Perhaps the time is ripe to alter our relationship with both time and eternity and absorb the wisdom of Jesus’ compelling words: “Come, follow me.”(Matthew 4:19)

Sin

Few words provoke a greater negative stock response than the word "sin." The secular world generally rejects sin in their progressive view of the world which, from the Enlightenment period up to the present moment, has been an optimistic view of man improving his lot without the fiction of a creator God. They reject the biblical narrative entirely and have replaced it with a therapeutic concept of life where professionals can medicate and consult all of humanity into well being through a secular version of salvation. But such a philosophy seems so incomplete and disregards the unruly reality of our existence. Much of the calamities of the 20th Century seem to contradict the happy view of the progressives.

The Bible tells the reader that "sin is lawlessness" but lawless against whom, and what is lawlessness anyway. If law is a mere construct of man and nothing more, then the law is a subtle (or not so subtle) form of socially based tyranny.

King David gives us the biblical view on the matter: "Against you, you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight...” (Psalm 51). By "you" he is directly addressing God and no one else. The secular modernist defines sin (they never use this word) as an affront against one's neighbor, not against God since to them, God does not exist. But in such a world, only the mighty sinner prevails, for it is strength that defines the law. And the law under this regime can lead to some very dark places. David Berlinski in his excellent book The Devil's Delusion addresses these questions from the perspective of Ivan Karamazov in Dostoyevsky’s classic novel The Brothers Karamazov: In that novel, the question is asked: What happens if God does not exist? The answer: If God does not exist, then everything is permitted. Berlinski goes on to tell a story about an elderly Hasidic Jew who was commanded by an SS guard to dig his own grave. When he had finished digging, the Jewish man stood up straight and addressed his executioner: “’God is watching what you are doing,’ he said.” And then Berlinski wrote: “And then he was shot dead.” If God does not exist, everything is permitted. Berlinski goes on to say this: “What Hitler did not believe and what Stalin did not believe and what Mao did not believe and what the SS did not believe and what the Gestapo did not believe and what the NKVD did not believe and what the commissars, functionaries, swaggering executioners, Nazi doctors, Communist Party theoreticians, intellectuals, Brown Shirts, Black Shirts, gauleiters, and a thousand party hacks did not believe that God was watching what they were doing. And as far as we can tell, very few of these carrying out the horrors of the twentieth century worried overmuch that God was watching what they were doing either.”(The Devil’s Delusion pp 26-27)

So when the world focuses on the second of Christ's two great commandments, it is echoing to some extent the world's view on the reality of the existence of God. In fact, this happens when the Rich Young Ruler (Matthew 19:16-30) runs up to Jesus and asks what he (the young ruler) must do to gain eternal life. In all three versions of this encounter (whether it is Jesus replying or the young ruler); the answer is limited and ironic. For the rich young man answers with a version of “love your neighbor” which is nothing more than the last six of the Ten Commandments. King David has it right; the Rich Young Ruler has it partially, but tragically, wrong. For without the first four commandments, the last six will always lead to one or another form of tyranny, and not freedom. But Paul says, "you are called to be free but do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature."(Galatians 5:13) If societal tyranny is the name of the game rather than biblical freedom, then we now live in a diminished world indeed. Sin is lawlessness and man without God is destined to die in lawlessness and deprivation and in cynicism, skepticism and spiritual poverty. This is true for Cain who was destined to become a "restless wanderer of the earth" because he disregarded the plea of God which eventually led to the murder of his own brother. Disregard the first four commandments, and as B follows A, you will end up engaging in one or all of the last six. For if God does not exist, then everything is permitted. It is only the fear of the sword of the tyrant that will maintain forced order. And “love your neighbor” will be transposed in nothing less than “fear your neighbor” for your squalid life depends on it. In this version of things freedom becomes a slogan of the tyrant who is free to enforce the law in any lawless way he desires. Your neighbor now may be the instrument of your undoing and so you are no better off than any survivor cast up on a desert island; you have been exiled from genuine community.

Paul tells us that one thing is needed for authentic freedom and that is Jesus Christ and him crucified. (1 Corinthians). If sin is only neighbor to neighbor wrongdoing, then the cross is drained of all meaning and Jesus becomes only one of many teachers who we may or may not listen to. But Jesus as teacher only is just a strategy for many to avoid the more difficult implications of the crucifixion. By focusing on the last six commandments, we are ceding much too much to the way the world looks at the matter. For if the devil has succeeded in deluding us into thinking that God does not stand behind everything in creation, then we are reduced to mere human enforced order and that leads exactly where?

About Me

Eric has been section hiking the many miles of the Appalachian Trail for the better part of his adult life. He has made great progress in completing the Trail, but he still has miles to go before he sleeps.

In the meantime, in his off trail life, Eric is president of two publishing related companies; he also is an author, teacher and speaker and he has been frequently featured in the national media including the Today Show and the New York Times. Over the years, he has taught at Harvard, Columbia and other university venues. He is a graduate of Brown University and he holds a graduate degree from Stony Brook.