GOD COMPLEX
The Trap of Self-Deification
MEANING, OR LACK THEREOF
Now, I don’t trust a word from Bill Gates’ mouth but at the beginning of an article he wrote in 2017 titled, “What if people run out of things to do?” Gates asks an interesting question “What gives our lives meaning? And what if, one day, whatever gives us meaning went away – what would we do then?”
In Gates’ article, he discusses a controversial author, thinker, and influencer called Yuval Noah Harari. Harari wrote a book in 2016 titled “Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow.” It wrestles with the idea that at some point, there isn’t a need for God because humans can become “god-like.” Essentially, he believes that God’s worth can be and has been diminished enough that self-sufficiency has made its own throne.
So, how did we get here and where is it going? In the book’s description, he asks a question, “As self-made gods of planet earth, what destinies will we set ourselves, and which quests will we undertake?” But when did we make ourselves “gods?” Let’s save that thought for later. These questions deserve some time spent on them because it gives us a glimpse of the relationship between the created and the Creator, it reveals a motivation inside the hearts and minds of our modern society, and it helps us more clearly examine the purpose of living life as we know it.
There is a world-orienting and centering manipulation that is present in our society which is designed to trick, like the snake in the garden, ignorant people into making the wrong decision.
SPIRITUS DEI v. SPIRITUS HOMINIS
“…and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.” Genesis 1:2
The Spirit of God, or the Holy Spirit, is part of what is known as “the Trinity,” which is God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. Genesis 1:2 says that the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. The Spirit of God is who spoke to and through the prophets in the Old Testament that were proclaiming the coming of Jesus Christ (1 Peter 1:10-12), and in the New Testament, the disciples were filled with the Holy Spirit, which enabled God to do miraculous works as a testament to the gospel, or the good news, that was given to all mankind. (Acts 2)
But within the tension of heaven and earth, there are worldly spirits that are active.
At this point, I must stop and make something clear about these spiritual tensions: The Spirit of God is called a helper to man that brings people closer to God (John 16:2-15). The spirits of the world exist to “help” pull men away from God (Colossians 2:8-10). These worldly spirits need men to believe that there is a pinnacle to self-satisfaction apart from Him and that God isn’t useful anymore to man’s “needs” or “wants.”
“Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.” 1 John 4:1-3
Man has been on a long quest to reduce or replace his dependency on God and chart his own paths.
The Pastor of my church, Greg Crawford, had made a point that no matter how much we satisfy ourselves or fill our lives with “joy” it’s never enough. We must be “grafted” into God for this fulfillment, found in John 15 and Romans 11.
We can never fully satisfy, ourselves, what can only be satisfied by God.
But the motives of man and the spirits of the world say otherwise. They have promised that fulfilment is attainable or that it is actually possible to be your own god. These “joys” of the world are an illusion found in self-centered satisfaction, false senses of security, and the de-platforming of the sovereignty of God. This appears to be the goal of the people and spirits influencing the world and, obviously, not for the good of the people of the world, but for the benefit of those who wish to control it.
So, what drives men to try and take on God’s role? Ultimately, it is the self-centered nature found in every human that strives to place man before God. From the beginning of time, the created has felt that his intellect was greater than the Creator’s.
THE DIALECTIC
Thesis/Antithesis → Synthesis.
A world orienting mode of thinking that attempts to usher men towards the title of Homo Deus, Latin for '“Man-God,” although not designed for this specific reason, but key to understanding this struggle, was hijacked and improved by the philosopher G.W.F. Hegel and later, Karl Marx. It is known as Hegelian Dialectics. It is the process of coming to a new conclusion by negating an original thesis, or proposition, with its opposite, while at the same time preserving them to form a new synthetic truth. Part of this process, which Hegel called Aufhaben (to destroy and preserve, simultaneously), forms a new, synthesized product.
But why is it important to know about Hegel and his dialectical method?
This operating system places a mathematical equation into the hands of men, societies, and governments who desire a specific outcome. If we applied this equation to Homo Deus, the numerator is the thesis, or the power of God, the denominator is the antithesis, or the power of man, which reduces down into a “whole number” equaling “Men as gods” as the new synthesis – the new moral authority placed into the hands of men. The problem is that this equation’s outcome doesn’t work because its product is an impossibility. Man cannot become gods because God didn’t create us to be gods.
Hegel’s dialectical method, when applied this way, is dangerous. It acts as a reduction process that traps man instead of a process that allows man to thrive, freely; a channeling to a single choice instead of the freedom to decide the right choice.
Think of it like a theoretical stone being skipped over a body of water. Two things, the stone and its reflection, become one new synthesized thing when the stone touches its reflection on the water. After this kinetic moment, the so-called new stone rises with its new reflection in the state of “becoming” the next thing. This process continues until it cannot be skipped anymore.
The alternative mode of thought, using logic and reason, begins with an idea or action and offers choices, like a pathway with forks that lead to different outcomes. Reason is defined by Miriam-Webster as “the power of comprehending, inferring, or thinking especially in orderly rational ways.”
In the secular world, making logical and reasonable decisions, as directed by our morals, guides us to good choices. But, to Christians, we know this method clearly from scripture. God is the only moral authority by being the one who created it in the first place. God commanded Adam and Eve not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They wouldn’t need to know the difference of right and wrong if they followed God’s righteous direction. But God also gave them freedom to obey or to not obey.
THE CREATION
“…for when you eat of it you will surely die.” Genesis 2:16
I’d like to build a vision for us to dwell on for a moment – God’s garden in Eden. We can imagine a beautiful place filled with an overabundance of life. The smells, sounds, animals, trees, and springs flowing throughout the garden would have been an overwhelming experience. And in the end, among all that was created,
“God saw all that he had made, and behold, it was very good… (Gen 1:31)”
But with the genesis of Genesis also starts the struggle between the created and the Creator.
After God finished creating everything, He placed Adam as the steward of His garden. He brought animals to Adam to see what he would call them and explained the “do’s” and “do not’s” of Eden. God allowed Adam and Eve to eat from every tree in the garden except from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
SYNTHETIC POWER
“…you will be like God…”
The Bible says that “the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field.” It came to Eve and used a dialectical manipulation to trick her into breaking the one rule God placed over man in the garden.
At the beginning of Genesis, chapter three, the serpent asks Eve, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden?’” Eve’s answer is as normal as anyone else’s would be to a question like this. She says that they may eat from every tree except from the tree that God said not to eat from. Consequentially, she also added that they shall not touch it.
First, the serpent directs Eve into sub-consciously making a decision in her mind, manipulating the nature of man. It gives us a sense that she can imagine herself holding it. At times, we visualize doing something before we actually do it in order to rationalize the decision we are about to make. When we make purposefully bad decisions, sometimes they are easier to make if we’ve gone through the choice in our minds before-hand.
Secondly, the serpent dialectically guides Eve to take the thesis that God is the one in charge of man and negates God’s power with the power that God granted us to make decisions on our own. This turns into the synthesis of the power of God in the hands of man.
God’s Power/Man’s Power → Equality of power between man and God
Remember back to our visualization after the creation. God gave man rulership over every living thing and the charge to take care of His creation. God brought animals to Adam to see what he would decide to call them and gave them the decision to eat from any tree in the garden. The serpent understood the dominion God had placed into man’s hands and weaponized it against them.
In the end, the serpent created the synthesis of equality between the created and the Creator. The serpent says, “You will not surely die…For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
Be. Like. God.
Let that ring out for a moment. Maybe say it again to put the weight of those three words into perspective.
After the decision and action had been completed, consciousness made itself known and it has been heading downhill ever since. Now that we can see when, how, and why the dialectic changed history, what’s next?
POSTMODERNITY
My Truth ≠ Your Truth.
We have been examining a few philosophical viewpoints and how they’ve had an effect on how we think, how we view the world, and how we live as Christians. We must look at one more concept in order to fully understand the battle of the heart and mind that we are subjected to every day.
The concept of postmodernism has been a catalyst for the dialectic in modern Western and American society. In the shortest terms, postmodernism is as simple as saying my “truth” is different than your “truth” or even that there is no such thing as truth. It is the establishment of subjectivism as objective reality.
Now, in any society, there is clearly room for objectivity and subjectivity. It is the thing that tells us how to approach danger or how to enjoy beautiful things. It’s also the thing that makes us unique as individuals or helps us come together by what we like or dislike. Objectivity recognizes truth for what it is and is verifiable. An example of objectivity is that watermelon is a sweet fruit. Subjectivity gives room for a personal opinion or feeling about something. Someone might say, “Watermelon is best eaten with salt sprinkled on before every bite.” But that may cause someone else to be disgusted at the thought of the mixture of something salty and sweet.
Postmodernity’s desire is to allow subjectivity to thrive as the new objective reality. Never mind that this is causing a lot of confusion in people who have no idea that this argument is even happening, it causes the doubting of truth in a world that relies on it and, in a way, is a Hegelian styled attempt to negate objectivity with its opposite to create a new synthetic reality - a new normal. Today’s most common postmodern arguments surround sexual preference and/or gender identity, racial identity, governmental principles, economics, and religion.
TRUTH
I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. — Jesus
So where does this leave us? I think this leaves us in the position to identify truth for what it is. Truth is as simple as lifting two fingers on one hand and two fingers on the other, counting them, and concluding that you now have four fingers lifted. Truth is that even though we are all humans, we are all different with some commonalities because of the subjectivity God gifted to us. Even identical twins have physical and metaphysical differences (I should know, I am one.) Truth is that objectivity cannot be replaced with subjectivity because God did not create the world that way.
Truth to Christians also acknowledges that there is only one way to live the life God created for us, which is obedience to God and His commands. Christians ought to lean on the power of the Holy Spirit to guide us in our lives by the words of the Bible. John 16:13 says, “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth,” which is an awareness of our common ground as humans who are born with an inclination to sin.
Truth is unchangeable. Truth is what it is. The truth of the status of the world is that we are in a tail spin to disaster. There’s more factional division then ever has been in our lifetime.
Galatians 5:19-21, written by the Apostle Paul, makes very clear what is the natural pull of humanity and the sinful desire in our hearts.
“Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”
How many of these things are evident in society today? How many of these things can we list off as topics we see in news articles or on tv? What we experience at home or work? It is human nature, apart from God, that strives head over heels for that way of life. It burns the question, what is the solution?
The Gospel
Hebrews 10:10 “ And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.”
The gospel of God was given during the same instance as when the serpent synthesized God’s power in the form of the dialectic. In fact, the gospel was the solution to the problem.
When man’s disobedience happened, sin entered the world and created the deviation from God’s intention for mankind. God’s original intention was to abide with His creation, but that would be impossible because God cannot abide with sin.
How, then, was the gospel declared in the garden?
The scriptures, in Genesis 3, read it like this,
“And Yahweh God said to the serpent,
“Because you have done this,
Cursed are you more than any of the cattle,
And more than every beast of the field;
On your belly you will go,
And dust you will eat
All the days of your life;
And I will put enmity
Between you and the woman,
And between your seed and her seed;
He shall bruise you on the head,
And you shall bruise him on the heel.”
The snake, in the Book of Revelation, is described as “the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan, who deceive[d] the whole world.” God made a promise of defeat with the last sentence made, that the seed that came from Adam and Eve would stomp the head of the snake.
How do we know it’s Him who is the seed?
It’s all in the name. Jesus, as described in the book of Luke, was a documented descendant of Adam. His lineage runs back through King David, who God made an everlasting covenant with.
God’s covenant was made with David in 2 Samuel 7, which is known as the Davidic Covenant, when God promised the Messiah.
“When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up one of your seed after you, who will come forth from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for My name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be a father to him and he will be a son to Me…”
Before this promise, God made a conditional covenant with David’s forefather Moses, in which God promised the seed of Israel inheritance into His promised land. This was called the Mosaic or Sinai Covenant, when God gave Moses His holy laws. This law set His people apart from the rest of the world as those who would obey Him from those who would choose themselves. We will come back to this.
Still, before Moses, God made promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob that through their seed “shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice.”
By a continuing covenant, starting with the promise in the garden, flowing through Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and David, which was sealed by the blood of Jesus Christ, an incredible blessing was made to all nations for the redemption of the created by the Creator.
What once seemed to be a closed invitation by God’s promises and laws for God’s chosen people has become an open invitation to all who turn from what’s unrighteous in God’s sight to what’s obedient.
Galatians 3:28-29 reads,
“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, heirs according to promise.”
So what, clearly, is the gospel of God?
The gospel is this: God is sovereign and One — there is no other God. He created all things for Himself and intended to abide with His creation, but sin separated God and His creation like oil and water, which was spawned through man’s disobedience.
By His grace, even in the moments after the fall, God sought to redeem His creation. Knowing that “the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth (Genesis 8:21),” God showed mercy to those whose heart He would change (Deuteronomy 30:11-20), to those willing to choose Him, drawn by His Word, over those who choose their own will, drawn by the world.
This redemption, like the covenants of the past, had to be done in blood. The end of all creation, except those who God saved during the flood, was the blood necessary for a covenant by God, never to flood the earth again. Circumcision was given as a covenant to Abraham as a sign of God’s promise to Abraham’s offspring. The Mosaic Law required sacrifices as an atonement for Israel’s rebellious, continued sin. And in order for sin to be defeated, the Righteous King to be seated on an everlasting throne, and the Davidic covenant to be fullfilled, God sent His son as a living sacrifice, “who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men (Philippians 2:6-7),” to fulfill what man could not.
“None is righteous, no, not one;
no one understands;
no one seeks for God.”
Now, we are going to continue on the paused note from earlier, that mankind’s inclination is to disobey our Creator. We feel that we are able to take care of ourselves on our own. Righteousness in God’s sight was unattainable by mankind in every way, and although He set forth a plan for righteousness through the Law of Moses, man’s heart could not accomplish this. No man could ever perfectly keep the Law, which was evident by the necessary sacrifices needed to be kept.
In God’s mercy to His creation, He sent the Son of Man, God incarnate, as a grace gift to fulfill the Law and the prophecies of salvation to all mankind. The Law could never be satisfied by man because “ it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins (Hebrews 10:4).”
The scapegoat would never be enough.
Hebrews 10:12-14
“But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.”
The scriptures tell us the story of God’s grace to us.
Romans 3:21-26
“But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”
This is the gospel—the good news—that no man who turns from their sins and is reborn into a new life in Christ by placing their faith in God’s salvation should ever perish.
Nihilism or Hope
Romans 15:4
“For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.”
There’s been a lot to unpack on this journey of man and his relationship to God. I think it’s fitting to end it all where we began, addressing life’s meaning, or lack thereof, and the conclusion to the gospel of God which is the hope for the world
No matter man’s attempts to satisfy himself by any means necessary, it’s all temporary. We strive to build empires and legacy’s, wealth or fame, connections or cultures that mean the world to us in one moment and are forgotten the next (1 Timothy 6:17, Romans 1:21-25).
We change, as humans, almost yearly from things we like to things we dislike. The person you were in high school is not the person you are in your mid thirties.
Why address this?
Hope is what motivates us to continue on in the world. Hope gives us a sense of purpose and direction. Without hope, a person may slip into the depths of nihilism, by which the light at the end of the tunnel is so small, you’ve forgotten that you were in a tunnel to begin with. Nihilism is defined as “Relentless negativity or cynicism suggesting an absence of values or beliefs.” When people put their faith in things that continuously fail, it chips away at their foundation of life.
But humanity has been given an opportunity to set our hopes on something greater than we could ever imagine. By placing our faith in Christ, our “faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” Faith in the gift of salvation gives us a peace of the things to come.
Our hope rests in the power of God that raised Jesus from the dead (1 Peter 1:3), that through our hope in him, we will be raised with Him again (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18). We build our lives on the foundation of our faith being rooted in the Word of God and Jesus, our corner stone (Psalm 118:22, Isaiah 28:16, Ephesians 2:19-22), without which we would have no sense of direction.
Having this foundation removes the sense of instability or purpose because every building, every temple, has a plan. Once the foundation is laid, it matters how we build upon it because sometimes our world shakes. Sometimes the foundation is rocked to its core.
Hebrews 12:26-29 speaks on foundational shaking, even more so, the shaking of God’s judgment at his return.
“At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, ‘Yet once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.’ This phrase, ‘Yet once more,’ indicates the removal of things that are shaken—that is, things that have been made—in order that the things that cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.”
We all will be judged, whether we have faith or not. We all will go through trials, whether we have faith or not. We all will have our foundations shaken, whether we have faith or not. The difference will be whether we had faith in the unshakable or not. If our faith is in things that are perishable, then our only expectation is sorrow. Yet, if our faith is in the imperishable, then our hopeful expectation of salvation and the ability to continue worshiping the God of our salvation be magnified.
Conclusion
I want to leave you encouraged because, to the believer, final judgement is a relief, and to the nonbeliever, final judgement either feels unfair, scary, or unbelievable.
Be encouraged! There is hope! There is purpose. After all we’ve reviewed, we know how to identify the trappings of the world and the blessings of God.
Hebrews 6:17-20 says this,
“So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.”
By the power in the word of God alone, His gospel, may you be drawn close to Him through repentance of sins with a growing desire to be obedient and sanctified through faith. May we all learn the discipline and justice of God by His word and not refuse nor neglect the gift of grace that has be given to all men, and may God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit receive all the glory and praise by those who love Him. Amen.
Hebrews 10:23 “Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.”