Insightful Musings on the Scriptures
by
Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67
Passage: Matthew 12:22-50
Focus: “That is how it will be with this generation.” Matthew 12:45.
I judge that Jesus is giving us in this section some insight into the cause-and-effect process of moral degeneration that takes place in a society.
During the course of our missionary experience over the years, I’ve never had any difficulty with negative culture shock when stepping into a foreign culture. How can anyone be so afflicted when they’re on an adventure? But when we would return to the USA after a 4-year term, that’s when I would regularly struggle with a form of culture shock. It was just plain shocking to see the moral deterioration that took place in just 4 years. Society most definitely changes over time.
May I refer to “9/11” as an example. That horrendous experience precipitated a major cleansing and turning to God in our culture. I remember seeing “Pray” and “In God We Trust” messages all over the place. But although the spiritual faith graph spiked at that point in our nation, it would appear that it has since fallen way below pre-9/11 conditions. The speed of our downward spiral as a nation is both alarming and predicted.
Let’s not overlook the fact that Jesus links this kind of cultural effect with spiritual causes. To help underscore the matter, I’ll quote this section from THE MESSAGE (Matthew 12:43-45). “When a defiling evil spirit is expelled from someone, it drifts along through the desert looking for an oasis, some unsuspecting soul it can bedevil. When it doesn’t find anyone, it says, ‘I’ll go back to my old haunt.’ On return it finds the person spotlessly clean, but vacant. It then runs out and rounds up seven other spirits more evil than itself and they all move in, whooping it up. That person ends up far worse off than if he’d never gotten cleaned up in the first place. That’s what this generation is like: You may think you have cleaned out the junk from your lives and gotten ready for God, but you weren’t hospitable to my kingdom message, and now all the devils are moving back in.”
Remember: THERE ARE ONLY TWO KINGDOMS.