Entitlement - The Enemy Within (Part 1 of 5)

Recently I was having a conversation with a friend, That quickly turned to a discussion regarding something that he felt ‘entitled to’; when I disagreed with him regarding it and stated a completely opposite opinion he took offense to my position and the evening came to a fairly quick close, as he abruptly rose to call it a night; primarily because he is emotionally invested in his ‘entitlement’ and ‘resented’ the fact that someone would dare to challenge it.  He will get over the difference of opinion,  but it got me to thinking about how  the American culture both outside and inside the church has radically changed in regards to our now closely held belief of being  entitled.   While this may not at first glance seem to be an issue that is addressed in the Bible, upon closer examination of the problem you will find that the undercurrent of entitlements and their destructive consequences are consistently being addressed.  However perhaps I should begin at the beginning. 

A sense of entitlement means that we feel that we have a right or a claim to something, whether it's the best school, a grand home, a better job, preferential treatment, or the good life.  On its own there is nothing wrong with wanting those things (well excluding the preferential treatment); however we begin down a perverse and eventually self-destructive super highway once we take that first step. 

When I was growing up in the 70’s, my mother had a copy of the best selling book “I’m OK—You’re OK” written by Thomas Harris, which was part of the self esteem movement of that time (how has that worked out for America?), McDonald’s slogan at the time was “You deserve a break today”." In the 1980's, another ad campaign said, "Pamper yourself with Calgon." In the 1990's, it was "You owe it to yourself to buy a Mercedes Benz." Society continues to bombard us with the message that we are such fantastic people; we are entitled to an equally fantastic way of living.  I half expect to see a new book titled something in the vain of “I’m Entitled and So Are You, Just Not as Much as Me”.

Entitlement issues are increasingly becoming a top concern of psychologists, therapists, Pastors and educators.  We seem to have come to the place where we feel entitled to the good life.  We're entitled to have everything work for us.  If it doesn't, someone must be to blame, and you can be sure of at least this: Whoever is at fault, it isn't us.

How crazy  of an idea is that? 

Think of last year’s Christmas, recall the pile of presents under the Christmas tree as large as Diamond Head, that's taken for granted.  That's just the way it's supposed to be.  Every child has a right to presents by the ton, and even that will not be enough if the latest, coolest gadget of the minute isn't to be found.

A person standing on Waikiki beach with a frown on his face, muttering, "I really liked our vacation to Tahiti better" -- that's an entitlement issue, too.

Or how about these?  "I'm a college graduate, so I deserve a high-paying job."  "I've been good to my friends, so they owe me their loyalty."  "I am a senior citizen, so I deserve younger people's respect."   "We weren't put on this earth to suffer, so life owes me a break."  "I took care of my kids when they were young, so I am entitled to some special care from them when I grow old."

The upshot is a culture of complaint. We have, it seems, grown fluent in the language of blame, complaint and grievance, while having lost our linguistic capacity when it comes to words such as, "Please," "Thank you," and "I'm sorry."  We also seem increasingly disabled when it comes to expressing personal responsibility for our part in the problems that beset us.  After all, how can we possibly say, "It's my fault," when we've been weaned and schooled on self-esteem?  If I'm OK and you're OK, then it must be "Them."

How has this pervasive sense of entitlement come to pass? I have my theories, but the how is irrelevant. It is the consequences that matter and whatever the cause, this much seems true: Entitlement is the handmaiden of the ego, the sign of a neglected, malnourished soul, and the cornerstone of Resentment. 

Entitlement signals a rejection of the core values of America and of Christianity. Our national genetic code and faith, at least at one time, was patterned on respect for the common man and woman.  A shared belief in the dignity of human life that's not the consequence of having, but of being created in God’s image.

My grandmother, who lived through the Great Depression in the Midwest, was imprinted with this genetic code and made a point of passing it on to my mother, who was just as determined to pass it on to me.   When I was a teenager during one visit to her modest home with my mother, I said something that must have sounded either arrogant or entitled.  My mother locked her glare on me while my Grandmother fixed me with a stern look and said, "Don't you ever think you are any better than anyone else!"  I have remembered it, precisely because I knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that I was special to both of them, the apple of their eyes. However even considering that idea of putting myself above others was never to be tolerated.

Here's a project you can undertake, pull out your bible and try to find the passage where Jesus proclaims that as the Son of God He is entitled to special privileges, or Paul claiming a special exemption from suffering because of all he has done. Easier to find (as the others do not exist) are the passages where David thought he was entitled to preferred treatment and see how God dealt with him.

In the end, it's the entitled who, however rich, are truly poor.  Instead of knowing life as a gift from God, life turns into something that's taken for granted -- or worse, begrudged. That's real poverty, and no sense of entitlement can alleviate it, or stop it from digressing to what comes with it….Resentment. 

Next Post - Entilement A Quiz (Part 2 of 5) 
Part 3 of 5 Entitlement - It's all about I, I, I. 

The Sin of Coveting

You have heard it a thousand times from your pastor that the law is external (meaning behavior), many of the churches within America have perverted and neglected the laws of the old testament to the point of making the laws enemies of humankind.  However here is the rub (so to speak) Since God’s moral nature does not and cannot change (Ex. 3:14; Isa. 41:4; Heb. 1:11, 12), the laws which are based on His nature are absolute.  The moral laws of God are those laws which are based on God’s nature.  God Himself is the absolute standard of righteousness. Since the moral laws reflect His nature and character, they are “immutable and irrepealable even by God Himself.”   This brings us to an interesting, but often overlooked umbrella concerning many of God’s Moral commands. 

It's interesting that many of God’s commandments are about coveting, and that God would have to go to great lengths to teach people all the subtleties of the inner workings of the law against covetousness.  You see this played out in everyday life all about you, a person who deceives himself and others without uttering a "real lie" would fulfill the law...in his own mind.  A person who gossips against his fellow man, destroying another's reputation and life and causing grief and hatred to tag along at a neighbor's foot, would not consider herself a murderer.  However in God's eyes, that person is guilty of great sins of the flesh; malice, resentment, adultery, fornication, etc.

Imagine if you can for a moment that you have been enslaved all your life.  Suddenly you are now free.  What do you suppose you would be like?  Slavery does not make people good or pure.  Pain and bitterness and a hard life does not make people holy. Sickness and suffering doesn't make people kind. Interestingly, a bad life --lived without God's constant uplifting strength-- will make people rather nasty and horrible and covetous. They covet the "good life" of others.  They resent the beauty and the popularity of others. They resent the ease and happiness of others.  Sorrow and hurt will bring sorrow and hurt.  Covetousness is not only wanting something that is not --or never has been – yours; it is much, much more.

Covetousness is judging God, and judging others...for our life. C.S. Lewis once said, "the devil of resentment is that it is justified."  Some of the greatest coveters have been the kindest, most sorrow-filled people.  Covetousness leads us to the concepts of envy and to sin in general.  Looking at just one particular sin of covetousness helps to reveal the true nature and destruction that covetousness brings.  

The law of adultery is a tough one, especially for this generation of American Christians, it is one of those trespasses (I will deal with trespass verses a sin in another post) that so-so many people are guilty of.  I suspect that adultery is probably more prevalent in our media-driven society because we always have the media defining our happiness for us (happiness, not holiness or joyfulness).  Just as it shows us the beautiful things we do not have and makes us resent our lowly home....or ungrateful for what we have, it also shows us beautiful women and men who make our spouses look like nothing.  

Paul warns us that Adultery is idolatry.  We look at the person we have and somehow they don't seem perfect.  Paul warns us against emulations, adulations, and fleshly mental sins of that type.  But Christian Americans often have an idealism that is rooted in the world's idealism.  Paradoxically, American Christians are so "idealistic" in a worldly way that they are often quite likely to divorce their wives and husbands to find true love because of their "idealism".  They say they have found the perfect spouse.  But what they feel is lust, and what they have found is Sin.  However, even if it were true love, it is no excuse for adultery.   

Jesus made this clear when He said that if someone divorces someone and marries another, that person has committed adultery (He also made it perfectly clear what the adulterer’s fate is).  Many of those sharing the pew next to you, have or are doing this.  They divorce their spouse and marry their adulterous partner, then use the act of matrimony in a truly blasphemous way to attempt to hide/erase the fact that the marriage began in adultery; which by definition is an act of covetousness.  

With a close reading of the Bible you will discover that many of those things that God declares that He hates are those things that come from the sin of Covetousness.  In the book of Ecclesiastes, Solomon says: "the race is not to the swift nor bread to the wise."  People often say this as if they are the swift and the wise and life is treating them harshly.  But as for me, Thank God, the bread doesn't always go to the wise!  Thank God that most of us (especially me) don't get what we deserve!  I have a great job, amazing friends, a varied and interesting life; God has graciously given me some wonderful blessings, while withholding some of the things I desired. Thankfully God has helped the weak and poor and sent away the strong and rich.

Easter - How Will You Respond? (Part 5 of 5)

…“Why do you seek the living among the dead?  He is not here, but is risen! Remember how He spoke to you when He was still in Galilee,  saying, ‘The Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again.’”   Luke 24:5-7

Many people are still looking for Jesus among the dead.  I think of scholars who study the words of Jesus and the gospel manuscripts but do not believe in Christ’s resurrection.  I think of the archaeologists who two thousand years later are still trying to find Jesus’ body and bones in the tomb but keep coming up empty.  I think of people who finger the body of Christ on their crucifixes but do not know the reality of the living Christ.  I think of those who attend church on Christmas and Easter (C.E.O’s).  These people all have one thing in common.  They are all looking for Jesus among the dead. And if you are looking for Jesus among the dead, you will not find him. He is not there.

Frank Morison was a man who went looking for Jesus among the dead.  Morison was a British journalist who lived early in the twentieth century.  He was not a Christian. Although he admired the figure of Jesus, Morison was a skeptic at heart who felt that these stories about Jesus were nothing more than myth or legend, especially the story of the resurrection.

So, Morison had a brilliant idea.  Why not prove that the resurrection never happened? Why not use his research skills as a journalist to dig into history and prove that Jesus never rose from the dead?  He would do his research and then write a book presenting the historical facts about Christ and the events surrounding his death.  So Frank Morison went looking for Jesus among the dead.

Guess what? He never found him. What he did find is exactly what Luke said in verses 2-3: He found the stone rolled away, but he did not find the body of Jesus. Instead he found the risen Christ and put his faith in him as Lord and savior.

Frank Morison set out to write a book disproving the resurrection of Christ. Instead, he ended up writing what has become a Christian classic presenting the evidence for the resurrection of Christ  (Who Moved the Stone?).  Morison went looking for Jesus among the dead.  But he did not find him there. You will not find him there either.  If you want to find Jesus this morning, you must look among the living. And that brings us to the good news of Easter.

Jesus Christ has conquered sin and death and the grave. He rose from the dead on Easter morning. He is alive and well today.  You will not find him among the dead, for he is among the living. And he offers new life to you.  The Bible tells us that those who trust in Christ will share in his resurrection.  The fear of death and judgment is taken away. Christ is risen! He is risen indeed!

That is the good news of Easter.  Only one question remains.  

 How will you respond?

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