Understanding Our Core Struggle(s)
I am currently reading a remarkable book by Antonio Gonzalez entitled “God’s Reign and the End of Empires.” In the opening chapters Antonio works to describe the structural problems of sin – seeing the same structure supporting both an understanding of individual and corporate sin. I find his desciption here compelling. As he reads the opening chapters of Genesis, he describes sin as our attempt to justify ourselves.
Understanding self-justification has acted as a key to unlock the door to understand not only my humanity, but humanity in general. As human beings we look to be valued, and self-justification is our attempt to find value for ourselves. It is self-justification, or the attempt to show myself right, that puts me at odds with God, with others, and with my own self.
Self-justification makes God my enemy. In the attempt to justify myself, anyone who stands opposed to my sense of right-ness is my enemy, therefore God becomes my enemy. Not only does he become my enemy, but he now becomes one I fear. Instead of seeing God as author and giver of life, we now see him as the one who stands opposed to how I author my own life and give my life meaning. Rather than seeing God as a source of life, we now see him as our opposition.
Self-justification leads us to treat others as a means to our own security. We are, in our broken state, deeply insecure beings. We look and long for the affirmation of others or our own successes to provide us with a sense of security. In our attempts to justify ourselves, others become enemies or ones to fear (much like God) when they are seen to disagree with us. Therefore we can end up looking for ‘friends’ who hold the same opinion as we do, and therefore isolate ourselves from a truer experience of community grounded in diversity.
Self-justification also leads to the exploitation of others. In order to justify ourselves we need to prove ourselves – and we go about proving ourselves by doing and accomplishing more and more. As we accomplish more and more we are put on a different level than those who accomplish less, and may also have used those people to accomplish more – therefore rather than maintaining a sense of mutuality we’ve created distance with our fellow human beings. Our culture defines itself on what we have and what we achieve. This is how we justify our worth, and this is destructive to our own selves (emptiness and even workaholism) and to our relationships with others (using them as means to an end).
All this attempt at self-justification erodes the soul. We cannot prove our own worth. That which is made does not determine its own value, nor can it earn its own value. The created always derives its worth from the creator – and the reformation of humanity happens as we return to our Creators words about us and his ways for us.