Wickedness That Invites Repercussion-4(2016-17) Series

WICKEDNESS That INVITES REPERCUSSION-IV—Genesis 6:1-8

Attention:

Back in the day, before digitization, Tony & his best friend devised a brilliant & creative plan for mischief. They decided to break into the basement of the local dime store, but they did not plan to rob the place(Sunday School boys would never do that sort of the thing). Their plan was to change all the price tags on the items in the store.

They imagined radios selling for a quarter & bobby pins at five dollars each! What great fun! Of course the boys had no thought of the fact that the owner of the store would lose income & his ability to pay his employees, along with his reputation.

Self-service, self-love, & flesh-driven feeling wreak the same kind of havoc on us. In Noah’s day most everyone had effectively swapped price tags by not considering their Creator.

Likewise today, when Christ is considered inconsequential to a person’s or nation’s life, vitally important matters are treated as though they were of little worth. Simultaneously, other things become elevated to the place of indispensability, taking Christ’s place as Head. If we are not very careful to honor Christ, we find ourselves making great sacrifices for that which has no eternal value, for the sake of temporal satisfaction.

From: Jeff Strite, Church of Christ at Logansport, IN. Citation: Anthony Campolo’s book, "Who Switched The Price Tags?"

If people would take it upon themselves to heed God’s warnings, they would not be considered ‘wicked’ & suffer the consequences of missing His presence!

Genesis records the wanton wickedness of humanity & its repercussions.

Repercussion—An unintended consequence occurring some time after an event or action, esp. an unwelcome one.

Wanton wickedness invites repercussion.

How/When does wickedness invite repercussion?

7 channels thru which wickedness invites repercussion.

7 aberrations of wickedness that invite repercussion.

We have seen previously that Wickedness invites Repercussion thru (An) Aberrant...

1. RELATIONSHIPs(:1-2)

2. BURDENs(:3)

3. STANCE(:4)

4—Wickedness invites repercussion thru An Aberrant...

CONTINUITY(:5)

Explanation: (:5) Persistence

:5—“Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, & that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”

As a result of humanity’s course, recorded in :1-4, the enormity of its overall “wickedness” can no longer be overlooked & allowed to progress & flourish. The wickedness had so taken the whole of mankind that it is said to be abundant(“great”) “in” the whole of the “earth.” The wickedness had spread as a disease to every corner of mankind’s habitation.

Indeed, “every” framing of the contrivances, plans & purposes of men’s “hearts” was solely directed toward “evil” every day of their lives.

Everything about man’s machinations was against God’s personal purpose & desire as they were against His overall purpose & desire for man.

“And what God saw when He looked at these evil people was not just their behavior, but behind it was their thought. It wasn't that they were really good people. They were well-intentioned, just kind of fumbling & stumbling & being messed up by their environment, that's the modern definition of sin that man is basically good & he's noble, he's just crippled by the people who are around him & the debilitating circumstances. And if we can get him enough money & enough education & take off the pressure & those people who want to hold him to strict moral laws & free him up a bit, he'll become noble all on his own.”.... “The Bible definition of man is that what's wrong with him is not really his behavior, that's only a symptom. What's wrong with him is [his] nature.”—John MacArthur

“God looked into the heart of man & He saw that everything formed there, everything developed there, everything designed there, everything conceived there, every image,every idea, every ideology, every thought pattern, every philosophy, every self-styled religious view, all of it, everything that was formed in man was only evil continually, everything.”.... “this is not to say that every man is equally as vicious, every man is as equally murderous, every man is equally as proud, every man is equally as angry, every man is as equally violent, every man is as equally as vengeful as to every other man. But it is to say that every human being to some degree, only relative within the framework of his depravity, every human being is at heart a sinner, unable to form, or shape, or conceive, or design anything in himself that is not wicked. Even his philanthropy is conceived as a way to pacify his guilt or to demonstrate that he's better than others for the purposes of pride.”—John MacArthur

“It's not just the behavior of man that is depraved, it goes right down to the very thinking of man, right down to the very forming of all of his viewpoints. And it extends to every human being & it is in the heart of every human being all the time & only that. And then you can add that it's aggravated by unions with demons.” & non-God-fearing men. “The only people who aren't like that are the people who have been transformed”, redeemed, bought by the substitutionarily shed blood of THE Son of God—John MacArthur