While the issues today are certainly more complex than those faced 500 years ago (or even in Bible times), the fundamental issue is the same. Man is sinful. And sinful creatures sin. “Now, isn’t that an overly simplistic way of interpreting today’s events?” you may ask. Maybe it is. But it is an answer that, I believe, comes from the very pages of Scripture. Man’s nature is corrupt and can only go in a certain direction. He can’t do otherwise. He can’t act against his nature.
We’re a number of days into 2021, and it seems as though nothing has changed. Truth be told, nothing changed. Nothing ever changed with a transition to any new year. But the usual enthusiasm that accompanies the coming of a new year seems to be lacking in this new year. I will blame this on the pandemic that continues to ravage the world. This lack of excitement is probably one of the reasons why I have been thinking a lot in the first few days of 2021.
In these past few days, I’ve been forced to ask myself if things will ever get better this side of eternity. In my country, things are certainly not getting better—or, if they are, the changes are imperceptible to the ordinary man on the streets. One only has to turn on the radio to hear how bad things are, or live here for a few weeks to gain firsthand experience of how bad things really are. There is hunger on the streets. There is no security of life and property. There are false prophets on our pulpits. There are false gospels ravaging the land. Things look bleak, and the air reeks of hopelessness.
And as I churned these matters in my mind, four words seem to provide the answer to my contemplations: Man has not changed.
I see this truth in the pages of old books (which I find extremely helpful these days, probably more than most new ones I read). Dead writers, commenting on the social and moral ills of their time, seem to be speaking about life today. And I cannot be the only one who has felt this way. You must have read an old book that spoke to you as though its author were writing in this century. And if you read the Bible with some level of consistency, you might come to the same conclusion as I have: Man has not changed.
While the issues today are certainly more complex than those faced 500 years ago (or even in Bible times), the fundamental issue is the same. Man is sinful. And sinful creatures sin. “Now, isn’t that an overly simplistic way of interpreting today’s events?” you may ask. Maybe it is. But it is an answer that, I believe, comes from the very pages of Scripture. Man’s nature is corrupt and can only go in a certain direction. He can’t do otherwise. He can’t act against his nature.
