Laws and the Perpetual Problem of Evil

We’re a nation of laws, maybe more than any other country. When we elect men and women to the House and Senate, we refer to them as ‘lawmakers,’ and that’s exactly what they do – make laws.

 

We have traffic laws, zoning laws, housing laws, parking laws, and education laws. Laws for banking, food and drugs, marriage and families, animals, noise, and advertising. Even laws for enforcing laws. We have criminal laws for dealing with people that insist on breaking the law. 

 

You’d think that with all our laws and regulations, society would be orderly and law-abiding. ‘Here are our expectations. Here are the boundaries. Now do as you’re told.’ That’s hardly the case. 

 

Despite laws against operating motor vehicles under the influence of intoxicating substances, almost every day we hear about people killed by vehicles steered by drunk drivers. Laws have banned texting while driving, but we still notice drivers with their eyes down, focusing on the latest message rather than what’s happening on the road right in front of them.

Child abuse. Domestic abuse. Burglary. Robbery. Murder. Scamming. Lying. We have countless laws concerning these and other forms of bad behavior, but they persist.

 

Whenever I hear someone saying something like, “We need stricter gun laws,” I wonder about the copious laws we already have regulating the use of guns. The problem is the folks who pay no attention to them. The late Charlton Heston, when he was president of NRA, observed: “There is no such thing as a good gun. There is no such thing as a bad gun. A gun in the hands of a bad man is a very dangerous thing. A gun in the hands of a good person is no danger to anyone except the bad guys.”

 

If we want to consider the power of laws to control behavior, all we need to do is look to ancient Israel. Besides the Ten Commandments (listed in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5), God gave His chosen people many other laws. Reading through the Old Testament, it seems the Israelites delighted in how many of the laws they could ignore and how frequently they did.

 

Even “heroes” of the Old Testament, people like Jacob, Moses, Samson, King David, King Solomon and Hezekiah, had an amazing propensity for disobedience. They knew the laws yet defied them in many ways.

 

This isn’t to say we shouldn’t have laws. They’re important and we need them. Without speed limits on our roads, some drivers would exhibit reckless disregard for the safety of others and themselves. There’s a reason we have laws against taking merchandise from stores without paying for them. But no matter how stringent, those determined to break laws will continue doing so.

 

The problem isn’t that laws aren’t clear enough, or we don’t have enough of them. It’s more basic than that. The problem is the perpetual presence of evil, as it’s been from the beginning of history. Adam and Eve were given one simple law, “…you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die” (Genesis 2:17).

 

It wasn’t that there were too many laws to keep up with. They had one law, just one. God said they could eat of any other tree in the Garden of Eden. So, what did they do? They ate fruit from the one that was off limits.

 

Since then, every individual born into this world has been doing what seems to come naturally: Rebelling against God, His laws, precepts and statutes. “But we’re only human!” is the excuse. In one sense that’s true. We read in Romans 3:23, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Perhaps there’s a spiritual component to our genetic makeup and we’re behaving according to a ‘sin gene.’

 

In the words of the old hymn, “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing,” we’re “prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love.” This wandering is a result of the perplexing appeal of evil. As has been stated more than once, “If sin wasn’t fun, we wouldn’t want to do it.”

 

How do we respond? Forget about making laws? Resign ourselves to people just doing what they’re going to do? From what I hear, that’s kind of the conclusion some states have made. But there’s a better answer.

 

In Jesus Christ, who called Himself “the way and the truth and the life” (John 14:6), we find the capacity to turn away from evil, to say no to sin. When we become born again as new creations in Christ (John 3:3, 2 Corinthians 5:17) we step outside the “I’m only human” box. The Lord not only gives us new life spiritually but also the desire to pursue right and reject wrong.

 

The apostle Paul expressed it this way in Romans 8:2-4, “…through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering…that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit.”

 

This isn’t saying we should cease making laws since our “sinful nature” doesn’t like obeying them. But it also doesn’t say the only reason for pointing people to Jesus is to get them “saved” and assured of going to heaven when they die. He wants us to become living, breathing, law-keeping examples of what a life transformed by the power of Christ looks like. 

 

Other stanzas from “Come Thou Fount…” say it well:

“Jesus sought me when a stranger,
  Wand’ring from the face of God;
He, to save my soul from danger,
  Interposed His precious blood….

 

Take my heart, oh, take and seal it
  With Thy Spirit from above.
Rescued thus from sin and danger,
  Purchased by the Savior’s blood,
May I walk on earth a stranger,  

As a son and heir of God.” 

What Are Laws Good For, Anyway?

We’re a nation of laws. There are laws for almost everything. Consider, for instance, laws just for travel: from speed limits on our streets and highways to jaywalking; to the use of smartphones to talk and text while driving; to operating a vehicle while impaired, to where we can park and for how long. We have laws for traveling by air, water, even by bicycle, scooter and skateboard. 

We also have laws concerning the food we eat; things we drink; medicines we take; stuff to smoke if we wish to do so. There are laws about buying, selling and trading. Copyright and trademark laws for what we can copy or replicate. We’ve got laws to regulate hiring, firing, employment and compensation, vacations and leaves of absence. Laws tell us how to enforce contractual agreements.

Then we have the basic laws for common sense things, like not killing or injuring people, stealing things that aren’t ours, telling the truth (or not), borrowing, renting and leasing. When people are accused of breaking one or more laws, we even have laws directing how we’re to prosecute alleged lawbreakers. And laws for what to do with them if convicted. When someone says, “There ought to be a law,” lawmakers eagerly respond, “Okay!”

But what good are laws anyway? Speed limits, clearly visible on most roadways, don’t stop people from speeding. Every state has laws against driving under the influence, but some folks do it anyway. We have laws against shoplifting, but it still happens. Laws against murder, robbery, kidnapping, spousal abuse and every other wrong thing we can imagine have been enacted; yet those heinous crimes continue. 

So again – what good are laws? We find an answer in the book of Romans. Speaking of the Ten Commandments as well as all other laws, the apostle Paul writes, “for before the law was given, sin was in the world. But sin is not taken into account where there is no law” (Romans 5:13). He’s saying even before formal laws were established, people were doing wrong – and they knew they were doing wrong.

Consider this analogy: A heavily traveled road in our part of town has a legal, posted speed limit of 40 miles per hour. Signs are visible at various intervals, and if a law enforcement officer catches you driving above that limit, you risk receiving a citation (or worse, depending on how fast you’re traveling).

One might say that if signs weren’t present and a speed limit hadn’t been set, we could drive the road 100 miles an hour or faster. But that’s not true. With the high density of traffic, along with the concentration of businesses and homes, it doesn’t take genius to realize driving 100 mph there is neither safe nor wise.

In this case the law serves as a reminder that driving well in excess of 40 mph puts ourselves and everyone around us at risk. Yes, had the laws not been created and signs posted, we couldn’t be prosecuted for breaking them. But common sense would still tell us, “Hey, stupid, it’s really not safe driving this fast.”

When God handed the Ten Commandments to Moses on Mt. Sinai – in the process originating the phrase, “Take two tablets and call Me in the morning” – the Lord was putting into writing what deep down mankind already knew: We shouldn’t murder. We shouldn’t steal. We shouldn’t be dishonest. We shouldn’t have sexual relations with someone we’re not married to. We shouldn’t covet or be envious of other people’s stuff. 

Paul stated it this way: “…when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law, since they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness…” (Romans 2:14-15). Somehow it seems, from the moment of birth or even before, the understanding of what’s right and what’s wrong has already been impressed indelibly on our hearts.

The other benefit of God’s laws, from a spiritual perspective, is they point us to Him. The first four Commandments presented in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5, for example, speak directly of our relationship with the Lord: We’re not to worship other gods; not to create and worship idols of false gods; not to use God’s name in a disrespectful or blasphemous way; and we’re to set apart a Sabbath day for worship and refraining from our usual work.

Knowing God’s laws also enables us to arrive at a profound realization. Being born with what we might term the “sin gene,” a natural inclination toward rebellion against the Lord, we discover it’s impossible to “clean up our own act” and make ourselves right with Him. No matter how hard we try, we always fall short – missing the mark of God’s perfect standard.

I can identify with Paul when he wrote, “So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law, but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within [me]. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (Romans 7:21-24).

Almost immediately, however, Paul tells us “who” can rescue him – and us: “Thanks be to God – through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:25). Elsewhere he writes that we have a choice; we don’t have to break the law, just as we don’t have to break the speed limit. “…count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus…. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness. For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace” (Romans 6:11-14).

No matter how many laws are written and enforced, amended and reinforced, they can’t force us to abide by the law if we choose not to do so. But through God’s provision, we not only recognize Him as the ultimate Lawgiver, but He also provides us the capacity for willingly and joyfully keeping His laws.