Betrayed and Angry

 God as My Enemy

As we argued recently, the Western world is characterised by a near universal belief in personal injury.  Somebody owes me and that "somebody" eventually morphs into the State being obligated.  The system, the government, or society are responsible to put things right in my life.

A corollary is that whatever is lacking or unacceptable in my existence is due to an external cause.  The problem ultimaty lies with others, not me.  If we only had different parents and families, gone to different schools, or been slightly more attractive life would have been so much better.  And on it goes.  It is not surprising, then, that we are seeing more signs of seething, angry discontent in Western society.  It does not take much for hissing, booing, stone-throwing, and imprecatory curses to pour forth into, and take over, the public square.  For, as C. S. Lewis had Screwtape observe, "the more claims on life, therefore, that your patient can be induced to make, the more often he will feel injured and, as a result, ill-tempered."

The seething discontent arising from the belief that others have defalcated in their duty and responsibility toward us  ultimately sheets home to God Himself.  One of the reasons that a modern Western man does not fear God, nor seek Him, is the bitterness which the Unbeliever is nurturing in his heart towards God.  Every sin or failure is seen ultimately to be God's fault.  God has not provided; God has not done what He ought to have done with respect to moi.

Some may observe at this point that such a view assumes that most people believe in the Living God, which the majority it the West clearly do not.
  Yes it does, but not in the way the objection assumes.  The Spirit of God, through the Apostle Paul, tells us that all mankind has clearly perceived not a god, but the only true God.  But they have universally suppressed this truth, and given their "loyalty" to idols or something else within the created world.  Thus, all men, outside of the disciples and believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, know God, but work to suppress that knowledge.  The West, then, consists largely of men, women and children working to justify Unbelief in a passive-aggressive fashion. 

Therefore, the West knows, but refuses truthfully to acknowledge, God.  In the West this has taken the form of the creation of a substitute god--an idol.  This god is on the lips daily of everyone (outside of  Christ) in the West.  It is "oh my god" here, and "god!" there.  This false man-made deity has become the idol to which endless repetitive incantations are made every waking moment by the vast majority of people. 

What is this god like?  What are its attributes.  If god exists, his entire raison d'etre is to serve Me--along with my circumstances, my parents, school, society, government and the entire cosmos.  There is a deep seated belief that if a god exists at all, he owes me and is obligated to bestow good things upon me and meet all my needs.  It is part of the passive-aggressive rejection of God.  A human construction of God--an idol--is set up where the deity exists to serve and provide for man.  This is consistent with the prevailing cultural idea that the entire cosmos exists to meet my wants and desires and that when one is thwarted, it represents betrayal.  God has failed me.

We suggest that this is the real reason the modern Western mind loathes God so much.   In former ages people acknowledged their transgressions far more readily.  They feared death, and they feared God.  Many died shaking the fist at God not so much because they had an argument to pick with God, but because they rejected His authority.  They were rebels.  But today's unrepentant Unbeliever has a different mindset.  He shakes his fist at God not because he fears him and hates his power and authority, but because he believes God is a traitor and has failed him.  Therefore he despises God, rather than fears Him.  He loathes God because, in his vastly egocentric, narcissistic  world, God is a betrayer.  Why would you worship and revere the One who has failed you, let you down, betrayed you?

Hatred and anger towards Christians therefore lies just beneath the surface of society.  It is a small step to take.  Christians have sided with the Betrayer.  They have taken sides with the Enemy.  Therefore they richly deserve our ridicule, our slander, and our mockery--and if they persist--our hatred.  It's personal.  Loathing of God means that the West can easily move to loathing His people.  The friend of my Enemy is also my enemy.  It is a very, very small step to take.