Genesis 8, verses 13 to 22, part 2, human beings are not basically good

 

God agreed to this in spite of the fact that the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth.

 There is an ideal that comes directly from the philosophers of the so-called Enlightenment which influence in some part resulted in racial slavery, one justification for imperial conquest, and the massive genocides of the 20^th century that says that man is basically good and can be perfected. This concept ran all through the American religious impulse of the nineteenth century (1800s), the age of great revivals and social movements. The belief in a man-created millennium of peace, prosperity, knowledge, and the fulfillment of man’s promise as a noble creature was one driving force of both religious and secular thought. Paternalism resulted in believing that one culture and race or ideology and religion must lead all of the others and the others had no choice but to follow them into this glorious era of man’s perfection.  This idea infected America’s Founding Fathers as it infects political policy today in dealing with international diplomacy, welfare, law and order, education, and medicine among other areas of civic life, even parenting. However, the Bible makes it clear that this belief is simply wrong and much woe would have been avoided had the Bible been believed by our leaders and the people who follow them in blind obedience. The Bible says;

Jeremiah 10:23  O LORD, I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.

Jeremiah 17:9  The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?

And Jesus, speaking to His own disciples, said;

Matthew 7:11  If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?

God’s people are admonished;

Proverbs 3:5  Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. 6  In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.

Along with understanding God’s sovereignty over all creation, even over all reality as underscored in the Book of Job, the understanding of mankind’s inherent shortcoming as a moral

agent will keep one from much confusion and heartache.

As long as the earth exists there will be seasons and day and night, as the rhythm of existence continues unabated. We do, however, await a new heavens and a new earth.

Isaiah 65:17  For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind.

Isaiah 66:22  For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the LORD, so shall your seed and your name remain.

2Peter 3:13  Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.

Revelation 21:1  And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea.