One of the great spectacles of the 21st century is the caravan of migrants which originated in Honduras. It is bound for the United States of America. Well over 7,000 men and women left their country on foot, some with babies. Some of the migrants cited poverty, corruption and gang violence for the flight. They were determined to cross four national boundaries en route America. That’s 2,606 kilometres. Travelling in sweltering heat rising up to 100 degrees Fahrenheit, hungry and exhausted they persevered. Attempts to stop the caravan in Mexico failed. Initially there was a standoff between the caravan and the security forces on the bridge between Guatemala and Mexico. They populated the Suchiate Bridge like a school of sardines. And then the amazing happened. The people began to swim the river under the bridge. That was considerable risk though the local populace did assist by providing canoes. A few days before the horde had destroyed metal barriers in Guatemala to cross over into Mexico. Nothing could stop them.
The interpretation of the event is of course dependent on which side of the political divide you belong to, left or right. It tallies with a liberal agenda of borderless nations. The conservatives of course saw it as invasion. But questions arise. Was the horde organised? If so by who? Is there a motivating force? Is the horde being propelled by an unseen energy to upturn the political equation in America? What gave them the confidence they could ignore national boundaries and immigration laws? Or was this just an act of desperation by people determined to look for a better life in a fabled land? Questions, questions, questions. One thing everyone is agreed on is that this is not normal. Europe had similarly battled with mass immigration from war-torn Syria. Germany had to absorb a million immigrants. It affected the fortune of politicians at the poll. One individual fingered in the Syrian migration was a billionaire named George Soros. Quite an interesting study. He’s a Jew who doesn’t believe in God, and he has a radical one world agenda. Soros moves and shakes financial markets with his resources, has capacity to weaken nations. A global NGO network financed by him facilitates his radical agenda.
The spectre of a horde of humanity acting in a peculiar manner elicits a wider ambit of cogitation. Why for example does the WHOLE of humanity tend towards evil? There are only two bulwarks against the naturalistic instincts of man: strong institutions of law and order, as well as upbringing. In nations where the citizenry are well behaved the restraining force has been law and order, as well as societal convention largely coded as morality. In other words, without programming and restraint man will resort to barbaric exhibition and animalistic instinct. The big question is, how come this is the lot of ALL humanity? Why for example is the default of humanity not good behaviour? Why is it bestial tendency? Even with moral coding the thoughts of man are continually evil. Against our better judgment we tend to gravitate towards sin, why? Why is sinfulness normal? Why does goodness require discipline? Why does man tend towards immoral extremities? It’s what gave rise to profiling. There are some human behaviour that are so gross they require forensic and talented reflection. How do we explain psychopaths and sociopaths?
The fact of a generic nature for ALL of humanity raises issues only religion can answer. Psychology can’t answer to it. There should be local variation if we go down that route, there should be no genericness. Evolutionary theory can’t answer the question either. Evolution assumes improvement on the ladder of ascent but there seems to be no improvement in human nature over millennia. Why is man still prone to bestial tendencies over millennia despite improvement in other indices? Why is the generic default of man over at least 6,000 years evil? Why no local variations? How come the whole of humanity subscribes to evil thought?
All these raise the question of an Adam, be it a biological Adam or a religious Adam. Science recognises a biological Adam. An Adam is the source code of humanity. The existence of an Adam explains why human nature is perpetual and evenly distributed across climes, cultures and geographies. Sin is universal. The degree of sinfulness may vary from individual to individual – and that is based on a number of factors, but the thoughts of man are perpetually evil. The technical phrase used by the Bible for the evil tendency of mankind is “flesh.” It simply refers to the default psychological state of mankind. It’s base. The Bible explanation of how mankind became a native of evil is quite interesting. We never quite figured it out until we got into the New Testament. It took man 4,000 years to put it all together.
It all started in Genesis. The story goes that God planted a garden popularly known as the Garden of Eden. In the midst of this garden were two special trees – the tree of life, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Man could eat from every other tree in the Garden except the tree of knowledge of good and evil. He could eat from the tree of life as well as other trees. The injunction was only on the tree of moral ambivalence. As it will turn out that tree contained a virus. There are of course arguments as to why God would plant such a tree in the Garden. Wasn’t that incitement to temptation, some ask. Until we can interview God on the issue we can only speculate. But the answer would seem to lie somewhere between the question of God’s sovereignty and man’s freewill. And for all we know there might be deeper and bigger issues at play.
We tend to view the story of the fall of man strictly through a moral prism. We dimension it as an act of disobedience, but in actual fact it’s more of a political saga. The give-away lies in statements made by the serpent. We all know the story. Adam had married an adventurous woman. She liked to try new stuff, check out people, converse with strangers. We’ll call her forward today. She wasn’t given to very deep reflection on issues, didn’t weigh consequences of her actions. As it turned out Adam was a very indulgent fellow who was smitten by her love and beauty. Adam could see her in himself, as any man who has ever experienced the absolute love of a woman can attest. He called her bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh. It’s why he named her “Woman.” It simply means she was his clone. They were so together, so trusted each other nakedness wasn’t an issue. She felt safe with him.
From the account the babe later named Eve was easily dazzled by brilliance. And so when she met a clever little wretch called serpent she was taken in. Only that the serpent was a counterintelligence agent who subscribed to a rebel cause. Eve didn’t know much history obviously, or she would have figured out some things about the serpent. Eve succumbed to revolutionary propaganda. The serpent was actually channelling another serpent with capital “S.” He’s called the Devil. He had a long history with God. That history went back into another dimension. It was the serpent who introduced the concept of class warfare. There were two classes, the serpent said. There was the creature class and the God class. The God class oppressed the creature class with ignorance.
According to the serpent you can ascend to God-class through carnal means. You can become “Godlike” he told the Woman, by eating the forbidden fruit. But that propaganda required a proprietary definition of “Godlikeness.” According to the serpent Godlike beings are the ones who knew the difference between good and evil. It’s moral sophistry but the propaganda worked on Eve. We see the propaganda subsisting on earth today. It’s now packaged as “ascendance” in “New Age.” Only there’s nothing new about New Age. It’s as old as the Serpent. Eve ate the forbidden fruit and gave to Adam to eat. Adam was with her all through the conversation with the serpent. Genesis 3:6. What was interesting is that God had warned Adam the day he ate the forbidden fruit he’d die. Well, Adam didn’t plunk down physically after eating the fruit. Neither did Eve. That would come later. Evidence suggests Adam’s DNA broke down and weakened. His psychological state became altered as well. That’s the Bible explanation for the genericness of evil tendency of mankind.
As the source code of humanity Adam passed on modified genetic code. Shortly after the Eden crisis his son would become a murderer. Cain killed his brother in a fit of envy. Which means murder, envy and rage had started manifesting in the human race shortly after the Eden Crisis. An altered psychological state was passed on genetically. The degenerated genetic code is what the Bible referred to as “death.” Things pretty much went downhill from there. Wars soon ensued on earth. Man became bestial and barbaric. The point being made is that the generic tendency of mankind towards evil lends credence to the Biblical narrative of a single source code for humanity. Christianity hypothesises that the change in the DNA code of Adam as a result of rebellion is what accounts for man’s negative tendencies. Man became negatively oriented.
The question of the sinful STATE of mankind was what Jesus came to solve. We sin because of that sinful psychological state. Our sins progress from our nature. It’s why we struggle with sin. It’s why we’re all sinners. Our nature is the problem. The Jesus solution was to take on the political and biological role of an Adam. It’s why the Bible calls him Last Adam. As Adam he could reissue life. Unlike the first Adam all those who believe in him will not perish. John 3:16. The Bible says Christians have two natures. There’s the nature of the first Adam and the nature of the Last Adam, Christ. The story of our lives is the titanic struggle of these two natures. “The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants. And the Spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires. These two forces are constantly fighting each other, so you are not free to carry out your good intentions.” Galatians 5:17 NLT. We’re like those phones with double sims. There’s the evil nature inherited from Adam. There’s the new nature inherited from Christ. Both cohabit us. Until the problem is fully resolved at resurrection Paul says there’s only one solution: “Let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won’t be doing what your sinful nature craves.” Galatians 5:16 NLT.
If you’ll like to receive Jesus into your life please pray this prayer: “Father I acknowledge that I am a sinner, that Jesus died for me, that you raised him from the dead. Father please forgive me. I accept Jesus today as my Lord and my Saviour. Amen.”
© Leke Alder | talk2me@lekealder.com.
The fact of a generic nature for ALL of humanity raises issues only religion can answer. Psychology can’t answer to it. Click To Tweet
The question of the sinful STATE of mankind was what Jesus came to solve. We sin because of that sinful psychological state. Our sins progress from our nature. Click To Tweet