It is simply the assumption that we should be better by now. That the world should be fixed up by now.
That we should have evolved out of sin.
After all, a million years ago our ancestors were beating each other's brains out with clubs right? Look how far we've come, from being mere animals to being moral humans. It is a reasonable assumption if you start with the idea that there is no significance to our existence, that there is no legitimate reason for the world being the way it is apart from the assumption we haven't reached that evolutionary stage yet where life is better. And yet have we changed so much even from the "dark ages" where people were being bled of their life's blood under the instruction of "qualified doctors"? If we look at where we are now, is the world any less tragic? I would say not. Our families are disintegrating with the silence of parents. Our children are alone and disconnected and can not relate without a screen. There are hundreds fleeing wars they have no part in, being fought with machines they couldn't even read the name of. Depression is rising, divorce is rising, addictions are rising and we say that we're better? At least we assume we should be.
What if there was a different start? What if we started with the premise that the world fell at the beginning and that sin and pain was increasing from the beginning. What if we were not becoming more evolved, but more like animals with our hate and protection of those nearest us? Then things begin to make more sense, then we begin to see a picture that represents the world we see better. If we start with a world, with a people with a profound knowledge of a God and watch as the world walked, and then ran away from that deity, then does it not make sense that the pain of the world is increasing? When we hurried away from the idea of God, we hurried away from the idea of ultimate morality and accountability. Without God there is no standard, just a physiological happening that we hope accounts for what is our conscience. When we watch as history split from it's conscience is it such a surprise when we see the world as it is today?
So what now? Are we left hopeless? To read the facts and see no hope of human intervention... yes. We are hopeless. But there is one who reached down with divine human intervention. When God saw the world corrupt at the very beginning, he knew the plan to save it. With the ultimate personal cost he had a plan to redeem it. So how can we save our society? We can't, because we are not evolving to be better. Instead, if you know Christ, you are conforming to his standards, to his conscience. With a new understanding of morality, then we can make better decisions.
As Christians we must stand against and guard for that quiet influence of a worldview that eliminates God. We need to know where the philosophies of our world come from so we do not get sucked into the pretty packaging of a false morality the world cannot even live without destroying itself.
