Born This Way

James 1:13,14   Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire.

I have, in a display of my finest thinking, blamed God for my disasters of life. I have sat in self-inflicted calamity and boldly pointed my finger directly at him.

You did this… You made me this way… This is your fault… If you know the future and you are in control, then you cannot blame me…

With other defects, I’ve taken it even further. I’ve decided in all my wisdom that if God made me this way, then it is not only his fault, but also that it cannot be wrong. It cannot be a defect if I was born this way, right? I can justify anything if I insist that since God made me this way, it must be the way He wanted me to be.

James must have encountered brilliant thinking such as mine, as he found it necessary to point out the fallacy of these ideas. God is not evil and God does not tempt us. He has, for reasons that I do not always understand, allowed us to be born into a flesh nature that has both assets and liabilities. He has given us the ability to choose, and we are born with the desire to choose self. We may not be completely corrupt, but we were absolutely born with corrupt desires.

Thus, I am not responsible for the hand I was dealt in life, but I am responsible for how I play that hand. I may inherit a predisposition for anxiety, depression, pride, or an appetite for sex, drugs and alcohol. I am not to blame for the defect I got. I am however, responsible for how I respond to my defects.

We may come to blame God for our defects, but when we follow our desires to destruction, we are following self, not God. God is not our enemy. He is the answer to our defects. He may have allowed us to be born into the defectiveness of our flesh, just so that defectiveness would turn us to him. God is not cheering for our failure.  He is hoping that when we fail, we will turn to him.

So, when I struggle with my defects, I can blame God and remain focused on self, or I can turn to him. I may not know why God created me with need but I do know that He created me to need him. It may just be that I was born with defects so that God could use those defects to keep me dependent on him.