And So It Was That Mankind Decided to Accept His High and Lonely Destiny

Introduction

The first temptation of our first parents happened when the serpent set out the lure and possibility of being “as God” (Gen. 3:5). That was the bait in the first trap, and after six millennia, we are still suckers for it. Having pursued our dreams, and having thus succeeded in becoming fifth-rate men, we think we have now paid our dues for long enough and that it is high time for us to be promoted to the status of first-rate god. We still think that.

The current tool we have selected to serve as our royal scepter is the tool of Science. But here, right at the beginning, I must follow our betters at Wikipedia and disambiguate. There is a profound difference between science and scientism. We have to distinguish in this way because scientism in this Pinky-and-the-Brain sense doesn’t do anything in the name of scientism, but rather in the name of Science. And science doesn’t do anything in the name of science either, but rather in the name of truth. But, as everyone should know by now, that truth thing is kind of passé. How could it not be passé when our sages and solons and talking heads and magisters and philosophers assure us that there is no such thing as objective truth?

But there remains such a thing as a planner. And a controller. And a thought leader. We have shouldered actual science aside (the kind of thing that Karl Popper could falsify), and are now falling at the feet of experts who have emerged from the temple vested in those white lab coats.

Libido Dominandi

There is something in this peculiar temptation of ours that really is a mix of meth, dopamine, ecstasy, catnip, testosterone, and Old Rotgut Kentucky Straight Bourbon. I don’t recommend it.

It would seem that if any finite creature gave it more than 5 minutes of concerted thought, he would understand that his finitude absolutely prohibits any thought at all of ascending the everlasting slope of the infinite mountain. Jesus taught us that our “taking thought” could not a single cubit to our height (Matt. 6:27), and we want to make ourselves into gods? Lucifer is greater than we are, but even he is a microscopic dot on the face of the cosmos. Ascend the sides of the north, eh?

But the people have been sufficiently prepped for it. There is no God. Above us, only sky. And if there is no God above us, then there is no law over us. And if there is no law over us, then we can do as we please. And when we say that we can do as we please, we mean that some of us can do as we please, and the rest of you can also do as we please.

If you are inclined to dispute this, we appeal to the scientific method, which consists of this white lab coat here. And the white lab coat method, as they are now applying it, requires us to clean up the lab and control for all the variables. And you, my friend, along with your small business and life savings, are a variable to be cleaned up. We would like you to shelter in place while we perform this important task.

That phrase libido dominandi comes from Book 1 of Augustine’s great City of God. It refers to the will to power or the lust to govern. And that lust to govern, if it is a lustful scientist or careful planner, the kind who doesn’t want to soil his lab coat, needs to get the laboratory as clean as possible. You have to account for all the variables. The best way to account for those variables is to make everybody shelter at home. Stop running around, everybody. Yes, we know you like your freedom, but we are trying to do some science here.

The historic Christian position on these matters wants as many people as possible to be set free from vice through Christ, and as a consequence to be able to live productive and useful lives as a free people. The Christian faith wants the people to be free. The secularists want the planners to be free.

To be sure, they still want to use the language of freedom, in the same way that Soviet agricultural art wanted bountiful harvests and tractors that ran. But that language is a sham, a lie, a misrepresentation. But we are Americans, you say, and have never been slaves to anyone (John 8:33). I see. Can you throw a banana peel in the wrong bin? Can you buy a toilet that flushes well, that wasn’t designed by someone who thought the planet was low on water? Can you keep the money you earn? Are you working in your shop today, or are you doing jigsaw puzzles at home? Gee, I hope this lock down ends before the Fourth of July so we can celebrate our freedom!

So Knock It Off and Come to Jesus

During this time, a number of Christians have pointed out that we need to come to Christ, which is quite true. A number of others have said that we need to repent of our sins — abortion, porn, immorality, etc. — as we come to Him. This is also true. But before lamenting the fruit of our revolt, and even before coming to Christ, we must repent of the aboriginal sin. And this aboriginal sin was the idea that we could make our own way, be our own dog, and make up our own laws. In short, all of this is cascading down around our heads because we thought we could be our very own Christ.

And repentance means laying the axe at the root. Repentance means going back to the place where we went wrong. And the place where we went wrong was in accepting the ideals of secularism as though they were not essentially incoherent and contradictory. So in our repentance, let us lay the axe at the root. We are laying this axe at the root of a tree that is not producing good fruit.

Americans were told that we were engaged in a bold experiment, and even Christian Americans went along with that nonsense. With that well-known can-do attitude of ours, we were going to be the very first people in the history of the world to plant one kind of crop and to have another very different crop at the time of harvest. The promises on those seed packages were very clear about it. The seeds were the seeds of pure thoughts and enlightenment and a new world order. The harvest was going to be a thing of glory.

But then the crop came up, and here we are, looking at quite a mess. I mean these dire melons look like diseased squash, and not just any old diseased squash — I am talking about the kind of squash that might appear in an opium dream that Dr. Seuss had. The rind is knobby and pale yellow, with little rotten squishy bits hanging off each one. If you manage to get one open, it tastes like a mix of battery acid, lemon juice, and rat poison.

How did this happen? It all started so bravely. We were going to have respect one another, and there would be no religious strife because neutrality is so fair-minded, and the rights of mankind would be universally respected. But the devil was the one who manufactured those seed packets and, it turns out, the devil is a liar.

Why is all of this happening? Because God is not mocked.

You cannot plant one thing and harvest another. And this is not an instance of us sinning in one area, and God delivering a judgment from outside, like brimstone on Sodom. He has every right to do that, and He sometimes does, but the way judgments usually come is through the harvesters walking out to the field to bring in what they all planted.

This disaster that we are going through right now was a function of our fear. And our fear was a function of our guilt. Our guilt was a function of our sins. And our sins were a function of our aboriginal sin, which is sketched for us below.