The Problem of Man and the Shame of the Lost Vision

No one can read the eighth chapter of Psalm and not feel an elevated sense of value and personal worth. The dignity of man constitutes one of the Bible’s primary assumptions and emerges clearly in all New Testament literature. Both Old and New Testaments describe man as a person created in the image of God crowned with glory and honor, the highest concern of God, the ultimate value in the universe.

But the Bible does not allow us to become too comfortable with ourselves for as we read it, we become acutely aware of the fact that these human qualities are NOT the focus of Scripture’s attention. It is the problem of man that is the Bible’s central and ultimate concern; the problem of the lost vision of the value and worth God accorded man.

The Old Testament portrays man as being created morally pure, placed in Eden with a specific prohibition. His initial disobedience brought swift negative consequences both upon the husband and wife and upon their progeny. Man’s original image of God became marred and twisted. Evil became a constant and malignant element in the whole of human experience. It brought social and interpersonal strife, disorganizing human relationships and corrupting all human institutions.

The moral deviation, leading to spiritual and moral degradation, multiplied sins of both flesh and spirit and became the major expressions of fallen human nature. The major bearers of man’s early cultural history are shown by the Old Testament to have been arrogant and systematically evil, until the Lord determined to preserve providentially the family of Noah, and make a new beginning with the race.

The post-diluvian history reveals human nature to express itself continuously in terms of intoxication, pride and greed. The Patriarchal period, the period of the Captivity in Egypt, the epoch of the Exodus, the settlement in Canaan, and the era of the Judges, all reveal essentially the same pattern of deviant human behavior. The Old Testament dramatizes this in the historical Book of Judges, in which it is said that selfish human wants and desires ruled society. Like a refrain, it is said,

After Ehud died, the Israelites once again did evil in the eyes of the LORD.. Judges 4:1.

Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD, and for seven years he gave them into the hands of the Midianites.Judges 6:1.

Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD. They served the Baals and the Ashtoreths, and the gods of Aram...Judges 10:6.

Again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD, so the LORD delivered them into the hands of the Philistines for forty years. Judges 13:1.

Man wants to commune with God but to do so involve obedience in which man’s total being finds its true unity. Without this obedience there is no communion; and without communion there is only disintegration, misery and death (loss of life’s spiritual power). It is the paradox of the freedom given man that by it we are enabled to find both true life in communion with God or our own degeneration and destruction. On the one hand, we want to obey and to live in communion with God, but on the other, we desire being “like God.” But the desire to be “like God” is a denial of the desire to be obedient and commune with God.

Man’s problem is further complicated by the fact that we have lost the vision of community. We do not exist in isolation before God. Before God, it is never just me, but we. We have been placed by God in a community, apart from which we are not our true selves and can never be. In Genesis 1:27-28, this is made clear by the use of the term “man” and “him” for the human species, which is separated into male and female, to whom the command to “be fruitful and multiply” is given.

“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. God blessed them and said to them, ‘Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

In the second chapter of Genesis, the life of individual man is seen to be incomplete apart from woman, and the two in marriage are to be “one flesh,” that is, as one personality. In the order of creation therefore, the individual is seen to exist, not in isolation but in the context of the family. The freedom of man is limited by the necessity God laid upon him in creation to live in the context of the family relationship and in obedience to the will of God governing it. Likewise, there is no individual Christianity for we are all members of the Body of Christ, the family of God. This concept immediately pulls the rug out from under the concept of personal religion or faith.

Neither does the family unit live in isolation. Once again the Bible is clear in its assertion that the family unit does not function in segregation, but is set within still larger groups called society and nation. God’s law in the covenant therefore further delimits the freedom of the individual in the interest of peace and harmony within the group. Man must live in society for apart from it our life has no meaning. Our obedience therefore, is a type which involves the love of God AND our neighbor. Man’s requirement is to love both God and each other as we love ourselves. But we have lost the vision of God and lost touch with God’s vision and desire to envision and realize only our own self interest in which self-love denies and betrays the other two (God and neighbor).

The evil of the flesh is not so much from the instincts and appetites connected with the body in themselves as it is from the fact that we love our own bodies more than the Body of Christ, the community for which God has created us. We love our own bodies so much in fact, that we are ready and willing to use our own and other people’s bodies for our own fleeting pleasure.

Thus, the roots of sin in the Old Testament appear numerous. Looking at our first parents, we see the picture of man striving to “be like God” exhibiting his free will without regard to his Creator. In most of the books of the Pentateuch, many incidents illustrate the elect’s lack of faith in God’s promises. In the prophetic writings we cannot miss sin being identified as a violation of God’s covenant law, both in regards to worship and ordinary life. Actually, in all situations the significance of sin is its violation of God’s command and rebellion against His authority. The third chapter of Genesis presents this rebellion as the cause of man’s trouble on earth. By disobeying God, man has violated communion, has been expelled from Paradise, and has brought on himself and on the earth God’s curse. This is the problem of the lost vision.

Into this heritage every infant is born, and is shaped by it from the moment of birth. The infant, as he/she grows into a self-conscious moral personality in the interplay with his/her human environment, is already infected with evil. And all our sins are the working out of that heritage.

This “fall” of our first parents from God’s gracious communion, a conception which has played such an important role in Christian theology, does not, however, separate us completely from God’s grace. The election of Israel is the proof: “I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” Genesis 12:3. Nevertheless, in this life we can expect nothing but struggle with temptation, with childbirth, and with nature for our food. We can expect no simple peace or security in this life apart from God’s grace and His gracious salvation.

It is this perspective that the whole Bible sees the life of man and earthly society. The focus of attention in NOT on the worth of man, it is rather on the problem of man, God’s judgment, and His gracious promises of salvation and their fulfillment.

New Testament

The estimate of man in the New Testament, and especially in the teachings of our Lord, rests basically upon the Hebrew understanding of human nature and the Old Testament interpretation of human history. The four Gospels do not present a doctrine of man per se; but portrays the activities of Jesus as He met men and women in the context of their daily lives and often emergency situations; and out of these situations emerged definite teachings with respect to the nature of man.

Men were regarded as sinners, and our human condition is that which resulted from our sinfulness. Jesus addressed His disciple with these words:

“If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” Luke 11:13.

This seems to suggest that man is unequivocally involved in its sinful predicament. Jesus recognized sin’s corruption and so we hear Him assert:

“What goes into a man's mouth does not make him 'unclean,' but what comes out of his mouth, that is what makes him 'unclean.' "Matthew 15:11.

Nothing outside a man can make him 'unclean' by going into him. Rather, it is what comes out of a man that makes him 'unclean.' Mark 7:15.

When we consider man’s history, endless wars, perversions, cruelties, stupidities, we experience difficulty comprehending man as being “made a little lower than the angels.” And yet, we know that the forces which are now destroying mankind are enabled to do so only because of man’s consent; man's agreement with the god of this world. We as a human family have lost the vision of the true greatness accorded to us by God to such an extent that to all appearances, we are little more than self-destructive animals.

This is the problem of man and the shame of the lost vision.