The right that doesn't change

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Isaiah 51:1-23

TO CHEW ON: "Do not fear the reproach of men, nor be afraid of their insults. For the moth will eat them up like a garment, and the worm will eat them like wool. But My righteousness will be forever, and My salvation from generation to generation." Isaiah 51:7,8


I often listen to Ravi Zacharias's weekday radio broadcast Just Thinking. In the last while he has been talking about moral relativism. He explains how our society no longer acknowledges that there is a code of absolutes. Instead, what's considered right and wrong shifts with public opinion.

He tells of how prominent atheist Richard Dawkins illustrated this. A chef prepared human placenta using garlic, lime juice, shallots and other ingredients to make it into a gourmet pate. When served to a group of people (who didn't know what it was), all exclaimed how good it tasted.

Dawkins concluded, "Eating a placenta is eating a baby's clone. Science can't tell you whether it's right or wrong to do that but it can tell you that that's what you're doing. Then you decide for yourself whether it's right or wrong."

It brings up the question in us, 'Where does it end?' The answer implied here is, 'No where.'

 Zacharias, in his talk, shows the logical fallacy of such thinking when he says, "Would he (Dawkins) believe that, if I decided to carve up one of his children just because I liked it?"

Isaiah here tells us God's righteousness—and that includes the biblical laws that tell us what is right wrong—"will be forever."

In a culture where standards are always changing, upholding those laws may get us into ever more trouble with our fellow citizens. There may well be "reproach" and "insults," even lawsuits and jail.  But as Isaiah reminds us, the purveyors of such relativism are as vulnerable and short-lived as wool in the presence of hungry moths while God's standards "will not be abolished … will be forever … from generation to generation" - Isaiah 51:6,8.  

PRAYER: Dear God, please help me to take Your standards as my own and live by them despite the changing standards of the society around me. Amen.

MORE: Listen to the whole talk

You can listen to Ravi Zacharias's entire talk referred to above HERE.



 *********
Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.