Where The Problem Lies | Matthew

Introduction:
“What is your problem?”
Or to state it in a way more universal - “What is the source of man’s problems?”
MAN’S PROBLEM BEFORE GOD?
MAN’S PROBLEM WITH HIMSELF AND WITH OTHER MEN?
ESV Titus 3:3 For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.
This could be a question someone who loves you has posed to you. They care about you. They care about destructive patterns that they see in you. And maybe in a moment of frustration, or in a moment hoping to get through to you they’ve asked something similar. “What is wrong with you?”
This could be a question you have asked yourself. You struggle to understand your own attitudes, or behaviors. And in frustration, or even despair, you have said within your own mind, “What is wrong with me? Why am I the way that I am?”
It is a question that people often ask about the world of humanity. “What is wrong with this world?” Why do people behave in the ways that they do? Why do they embrace behaviors and philosophies, and lifestyles, and explanations of history - and all sorts of other things - that are demonstrably untrue? I mean just look at the facts, look at the results, look at the confusion and chaos and loss that comes along with such worldviews, and yet people still champion those philosophies. “What is wrong with this world?”
Why hatred?
Why violence?
Why cruelty?
Why murder?
Why chaos in families?
Why confusion in people themselves - even down to the level of a denial of biological reality?
Why other sorts of self-harm and harm to others?
Well, everyone adopts an answer to those questions.
For some, there is no problem. The problem with man is that he has believed there’s a problem. If we would just accept a world without moral absolutes - a world in which the individual is the measure of what is morally acceptable - then the world would be a better place.
But go to the places where the experimental utopias supposedly exist (we are anti-law enforcement, anti-criminalization of behaviors that have long been criminal), and unfortunately for them, objective reality gets in the way of the utopian dream. Those places turn out to be the places that rational people LEAVE - due to the chaos that follows.
The consistent failure of such experiments, not just now but throughout history, loudly declares that man has a REAL problem that can’t be denied.
For some, there is no answer to the problem. “Yes, we will agree that the world is a miserable place, but there is no rhyme or reason for it. There is no true explanation for why you find evil in the world. It is all a matter of chance. It can all be explained by the brain, or the environment, or just how people are wired by chance. If you look for a hard and fast explanation or solution you look for such things in vain.
For some, the problem is EXTERNAL to man.
There are secular versions of this. Our own nation has adopted that view in a massive way. The problem among people is wealth inequality. The problem is educational inequality. The problem is a systemic stacking of the deck against certain segments of society. And this is the reason why there are so many problems is because, either the hateful conduct of human beings is the result of a lack of opportunity, or the product of bitterness over the inequalities. Even the playing field, or FLIP the playing field as an act of justice, and most of the world’s problems would go away. And, of course, what is discovered is that such approaches don’t change the outcomes. It simply makes the world look different while the same outcomes keep coming.
A religious version of this is often something akin to what we see in our text - in the scribes and Pharisees. The belief that man’s problem is external to him. If we can just clean up the outside of the cup through religious activity, if we can harness ourselves through religious rules and regulations, then our true problem would be under control. If we can just get people back to church. If we can just teach people to be better people in the name of God. If we can teach people to love their neighbor in the name of God. Then the problems would go away. The issue is BEHAVIORAL. The issue is something that can ultimately be dealt with through religiously motivated self-discipline and self-denial.
THIS IS NOT A NEW IDEA.