ON JUDGMENT AND ACCUSATION
One of the earliest stories recorded in the biblical narrative involves two people, mostly naked, hiding from God in a garden. They had done the very thing God told them not to do. Now, God came around and they were terrified.
God asked the man, “Have you eaten from the tree I commanded you not to eat from?” This question demanded a direct response, but the man’s response was to blame the woman. God asked the woman what happened, and she blamed the serpent that deceived her.
Neither the man nor the woman could admit what they had done. They covered up, ran, hid and blamed the other. Thousands of years later humanity is much the same, except we wear more clothing.
We still blame and accuse to do away with pain and discomfort brought on us through the choices we have made. It seems many of the problems in our lives and our world are the fault of someone else. One does not need to look far to see examples of this everywhere.
Politicians are always telling us why the other party is to blame for our flailing economy. They accuse one administration or another. If a politician were to admit fault, it may well be the end of their political career.
It’s no better in the Church. Research continues to show that young people are leaving the church in droves, and that the influence of the Church in America is in decline. The response of many Christian leaders is to blame the media, universities or culture. Few have the courage to ask what the Church herself might be doing to cause the decline.
We fail to see God still asks us what we have done, and the best most of us can muster is to point at someone else and say, “It’s their fault.” This is no small thing, and we must not accept it as normal.
Our propensity to blame and accuse may in fact be one of the darkest evils in our world. You may think that’s a bit of an overstatement, but consider the word Paul used to name the evil one. In his second letter to the church in Corinth he named the evil one “Satan – which literally means “accuser.”
The name Satan describes one who stands in judgment, with his finger pointed at someone else all the time. Anyone can imitate this because it is easy to find fault in someone else. When we do this, it feeds something inside of us, and it makes us feel better about ourselves.
Anytime we blame another, we exonerate ourselves from wrongdoing. The more we do this, the better we feel about ourselves. When we make a practice of blaming others it is not about hating them, it’s more about feeding our bloated egos. With every accusation we whisper to ourselves, “At least you are not like them.”
The more we practice blame the more self-deceived we become. Over time we lose any real ability to look at ourselves, which brings us to a dark and dangerous place. And there is no one more dangerous than one who is unwilling or unable to look within
This is the Devil’s game. He never looks within because he is so busy pointing the finger and accusing. This is the evil that characterizes the devil himself. It’s no wonder that when the first man and the first woman fell into his trap, they imitated him.
Confronted with their true selves they accused the other. Considering the rampant nature of blaming and judging in our world today, we should ask ourselves exactly who we imitate.