Exceedingly Wicked: That Includes Me -- Jeremiah 17:9-10

Jeremiah 17:9-10


"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; Who can know it? I, the Lord, search the heart, I test the mind, even to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings." (NKJV)

"More than anything else, a person’s mind is evil and cannot be healed" (NCV)

"The human heart is most deceitful and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?" (NLT)

Very recently, Stephen Frye, a British comedian gave an interview to television host, Gay Byrne, on the show, The Meaning of Life. One of the questions Byrne typically asks on his show was what his guest might say to God if he saw God face to face. This was Frye’s response (answering what he would say to God):

"How dare you create a world in which there is such misery that is not our fault? It's not right, it's utterly, utterly evil. Why should I respect a capricious, mean-minded, stupid God that creates a world that is so full of injustice and pain?" (http://www.gaystarnews.com/article/tv-host-asks-atheist-stephen-fry-question-about-god-you-have-watch-what-happens-next300115#sthash.nZohnqzl.dpuf)

"How dare You create a world in which there is such misery that is not our fault?"

Most Christians would simply gloss over this response, knowing it is a typical response of a nonbeliever, but I think that Fry’s response is important for us to consider. Why? Because this is the heart of the world view of many people: that people are fundamentally good, so the evil in the world isn’t "our" fault. This incorrect and poor way of looking at things causes all kinds of problems. In fact, this is one of the greatest problems in the Church today, because we use this errant view to divide the "good people" from the "bad people." You see, if we believe that everyone is born "good," then when they do "bad" things, it becomes their choice. And if their choice is "bad," then they are now necessarily "bad people" (or "evil people"). It’s as if life is about those who wear the white hats and those who wear the black hats. And we do everything we possibly can to continue to this immensely bad doctrine.

Scripture tells us that the heart—our hearts—are "desperately wicked." Don’t you recognize that in your own heart? I know that my heart is desperately wicked, that I’m constantly doing things that hurt others, that ignore God’s will, that I know fail to bring glory to my Lord Jesus.

Paul understood this inescapable nature of being human: "I am carnal, sold under sin. For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do." (Romans 7:14b-15 NKJV).

"What I hate, that I do."

The psalmist wrote:

"God looks down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there are any who understand, who seek God. Every one of them has turned aside; they have together become corrupt; here is none who does good, no, not one." (Psalm 53:2-3 NKJV).

We need God’s mercy and forgiveness precisely because we are so innately wicked! Not them. Us! Me! When we sing "Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me," I totally understand why John Newton chose those specific words. He understood himself; he knew that he was capable of justifying evil deeds; he knew how wicked his own heart truly was.

A recent article on the Internet address this specific song and that word, "wretch":

"That first day at Grace Pointe, an interdenominational church with a membership of about 1,500, the pastors were leading an old-fashioned hymn sing. When they got to ‘Amazing Grace,’ Pastor Melissa Greene said something that ‘hit me right square between the eyes,’ Wigden says. Speaking about the line ‘that saved a wretch like me,’ Greene said the church didn’t agree with the word ‘wretch.’ ‘It doesn’t matter what you’ve done or who you are, you were born beloved by God,’ Wigden says she told the congregation." (http://news.yahoo.com/bible-belt-evangelical-church-embraced-gay-rights-201800629.html)

Of course we are beloved by God, but that doesn’t make us any less sinners and wicked. "God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8 NKJV). The idea behind Pastor Greene’s words is that God loves us because He must have found something loveable in us. The Bible speaks so much to the contrary of that notion. God demonstrated His love, not our worthiness, in that Christ died for us while we were still sinners. The word used here is hamartolos and means "devoted to sin, a sinner; not free from sin; pre-eminently sinful, especially wicked." (Enhanced Strong’s G268).

We don’t want to hear that. We want to look at ourselves and find not find ourselves lacking. We feel better about ourselves if we can find something redeemable within our own hearts and perhaps find something less redeemable in the hearts of those with whom we have disagreements. But the Lord knew that we would think that way:

"Every way of a man is right in his own eyes" (Proverbs 21:2b NKJV).

"All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes" (Proverbs 16:2a NKJV).

We cannot trust our own hearts, our own valuations of people around us. There are no white hats and black hats; there are no good guys and bad guys. There are simply sinners (including me) who are desperately in need of the salvation that our Lord so graciously offers.

© 2015 Robin L. O’Hare. All Rights Reserved. Permission granted for nonprofit and church groups to use this article in its entirety (including this notice). For other uses, please contact servinggodalone@yahoo.com.