Reflection on the Word for the Fourth Sunday of Advent in 2022 (December 18, 2022)
CHOOSE WISELY (Isaiah 7:14-16)
“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin will conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. He shall eat butter and honey when he knows to refuse the evil and choose the good. For before the child knows to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land whose two kings you abhor shall be forsaken. “
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Why do bad things happen in general? First of all, in trying to get some answers to the question, we should state, that if bad things happen often in human life or in the kaleidoscope of the universe, especially more often than wished for, then the very nature of the happenings of bad things are natural.
That is inherent in their very nature that they occur naturally because this is their very nature, like happening on a regular basis, thus they have a tangible pattern. This pattern is not only tangible, but even scientific, as statistics is a scientific discipline, involving a lot of hardly understandable math. Regarding the scientific nature of the bad-things-happening-too-often phenomenon, we have to take a look at the four law of thermodynamics.
The Zeroth Law of Thermodynamics and the First and the Second Laws deal with the energy conservation within a system, the energy level and energy equilibrium of a system, the energy transfer between systems, etc.
The Third Law of Thermodynamics actually hits closer to the problem that why bad things do happen almost all the time, because it talks about entropy, which is basically the very phenomenon of the disorder in any systems or even in the universe in general, when structures are falling apart, when stars die, but it is also present in biological systems and it affects their relation to life, like when our own cells begin dysfunctioning, but entropy is also present in economics and affects social structures as well, as disintegration and chaos.
This later approach, called the Third Law of Thermodynamics, is almost scientifically there to tell us, as an almost satisfying answer, that science says that things can go naturally and very much wrong even in nature.
Accordingly, there is a the Fourth Law of Thermodynamics, which is just an honorary Law of Thermodynamics, the so called Murphy's law, which is actually phrased by engineers and was born during aerospace engineering.
Although the Murphy's law as an experience principle was adopted by social sciences too with some reservations, its deep human level experience made it well known even as a cliche in the public society, as it simple truth is so axiomatic that almost everybody agrees with it, that “if anything can go wrong, it will.” The extended phrasal sentence that " Everything that can possibly go wrong will go wrong" was termed in a book, entitled Men, Rockets and Space Rats written by Lloyd Mallan.
Some physicists and philosophers contest that the Law of Murphy with its pessimist tone just can not be real. However, the general public and the general human experience agree that something is profoundly wrong in the created Universe, actually so wrong that even the Universe as a whole is inclined to experience entropy, not only as a rare, occasional event in some unfortunate neighborhood in the Galaxy, but ultimately the Universe will end in disintegration and in falling apart or even it will be destroyed, as it is stated in the N.T., in the Second letter of Peter, chapter 3, that "But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fervent heat, and the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up. “ "
So what shall we do?
The around 2500 years old Book of Isaiah gives us real guidance. Refuse evil and choose the good. Some people think that it is so easy, as most people are quite good, thus choosing the good can not be that hard for otherwise good people. It looks simple, however it is not that simple. Within our calculations of how to live our pretty short lives well, we must not omit Murphy’s Law from the considerations, when it says that “if something can go wring, it will.”
Although it looks like that some malevolent physics is mostly involved in nature to make things bad, disintegrated, chaotic etc., still we know it from the Bible that at the very beginning it was not the case as it is written in the very first page of the very first book, called the Genesis, that " God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. There was evening and there was morning, the sixth day."
We also exactly know that from the human point of view the worst things, like sickness, aging, death, violence and wars, they all came into universal existence through and after the sinning by disobedience to God, which is a special case of idolatry, when we worship ourselves mostly listening to the evil whisper in our own hearts.
Thus, we must have the clue, that the originally good creation, which did not have a single trace of entropy and destruction, became cursed and somehow rotten by the same sinning.
The second letter of Peter not just giving the description of the demolition of the old Earth and the old skies to be replaced by the new ones, but also declares the restoration of the original order, that " according to God's promise, we look for new skies and a new earth, in which dwells righteousness."
It might also be clear from this that only righteousness gives the Universe longevity and immortality to humans. That is why we have to choose the good over evil, because it affects the fate of the whole universe as we are all related.
However, to be enabled to choose the good wisely, our choice must be an educated choice, we have to learn to make distinction between good and evil.
As human nature together with some angels and even with the very mother nature fell from Heaven after the beginning and it is still prone to sin and entropy, so our evil inclination brought a lot of misery to this world, thus the guidance and the Golden Standard of what is good and holy, must come from God.
When humans tried to legislate the moral standards, usually excluding God from the laws, it always ended in mass disasters. That is why we have the Bible as a revelation and a guidance to learn what is the huge difference between good and evil in order to be able to have an educated and conscious choice to choose the good.
The Bible is the written, counselling word of God, and God also gave us the living word, Jesus, as a living example what to do, how to behave, what to follow, and ultimately how to resist evil, as it is written that “Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the young woman will conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. He shall eat butter and honey when he knows to refuse the evil and choose the good.
For before the child knows to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land whose two kings you abhor shall be forsaken.”
May the Almighty One help us follow closely the living Word by the Holy Spirit, AMEN
