(32) S2E9 Consequentialism: My Consequentialist Ethic and Love
Welcome back to the Fourth Way podcast. Today, we are continuing our discussion of consequentialism by looking at how god has uncovered consequentialist ethics and my love for others. Before we really take a look at my consequentialist ethic for love, I think it's really important to talk about what love is. Especially in our our world today, the notion of love has been very confused, and a lot of people think they know what it means and and it's something that you can identify when you see it. But oftentimes, it's it's, not really able to be appropriately described.
Derek:You see this a lot in movies where people have these feelings of love, when really it's it's just pure excitement and emotion without substance. So I wanna take a look at at what I think a biblical view of love is. And I I think you start by just looking at god because the bible tells us that God is love. So what it means to see that God is love, in order to do that then we look at how does a God who is love act. And the first way that we see God act in the Bible is through His creation.
Derek:A loving God created a world where He wanted love to reign. And when he created that world, he created the world good. And in a good world, things functioned as they were intended to function. There was provision. There wasn't any lack.
Derek:Adam and Eve and the animals, that god created were placed in a garden. And a garden, especially in the arid, near east, that was symbolic of provision because in a garden, you were gonna have everything you needed. So God created a world where things functioned as intended and where things were provided for, where the beings were provided for. And on top of this, all relationships were created in harmony. Humanity had harmony with nature.
Derek:Humanity had harmony with humanity, Adam and Eve with each other, and then humanity had harmony with God. All relationships were were good and harmonious, and that's what a world created by a loving God looks like. But, of course, whenever you have one concept, it's possible to have the antithesis of that concept, and sin entered the world. Sin tends to be the antithesis of love. And I think you can see this beautifully in in the very first response to sin by humanity.
Derek:And it's something that always baffled me as I was growing up, and it wasn't until one of my college professors, explained it that I was like, that makes so much sense. And what was the first effect? It wasn't that God cursed them. It wasn't it wasn't even that they hid. There's a reason that they hid, and the reason that they hid was because they realized their nakedness.
Derek:How random is that? That the that the first thing like, what a weird story that, you sin and you realize your nakedness. But here's what my professor said. He said that if you think about the way that a loving god created the world, and, Adam and Eve were placed in the garden, and they were looking out for nature. They were taking care of nature.
Derek:And Adam was looking out for Eve, and Eve was looking out for Adam. And Adam and Eve were searching for God and and wanting to walk with God and wanting to please God. You have all of this harmony that comes about because Adam and Eve were not looking to themselves, but were looking to each other and to the other relationships that god had given to them. So this realization of their nakedness is is extremely important because it shows us what sin and the antithesis of love is. It was this, complete looking to self.
Derek:And when one, when Adam and Eve did this, they they became absorbed with themselves and and self conscious of of themselves. And you don't just see that. I mean, that would be an interesting, an interesting idea just to think about the nakedness. But I think you see this born out also in the curses. And think about what what god declares as curses.
Derek:There's gonna be thorns in the ground. Right? Nature is not gonna be harmonious with humanity. There's gonna be pain pain in childbirth, nature and the body, and and even something as natural as childbirth, something that's intended and good is going to bring about pain. Then, so that's between nature and humanity.
Derek:But then between humanity and humanity, between Adam and Eve, you see that, there is this declaration that from this point on, Adam's not gonna be looking out for Eve like he used to, and Eve's not really gonna be looking out for Adam. Adam's going to lord, this power over Eve. He's going to try to take control, and there's gonna be fighting or, animosity between humans. And then, of course, there's obviously the enmity that that comes between God and his people. Even though God provides a sacrifice for them and and still loves Adam and Eve, they are shooed away from his presence and prevented from going back into the garden and walking with God by an angel.
Derek:So the relationship between man and God is severed. And what we see with the breaking of love is that it is a an inward looking to self, and it is something that does not seek others first. So in summary again, a loving god created a world steeped in love, and that love looked like an outward concern for others, for the other relationships. Jesus tells us that this creation love is, for all people because throughout time, we had the story of of Genesis, but, the Israelites and and everybody else who who used the bible tended to place people in categories. Right?
Derek:Israelites, at least, were supposed to love each other. But you still had these these breakdowns with loving other nations, loving groups like Samaritans, men loving and appreciating women, you know, the rich and the poor. You just you still had these, these breakdowns within a culture who served a loving god. But Jesus makes very clear who this love is for, who this outward affection is to be for. And he makes it clear in 2 ways.
Derek:Of course, he makes clear through his life, and Jesus died for us while we were his enemies, of course. But Jesus also declares in his teachings that creation love is for all people, not just those who can reciprocate. He tells us in the story, particularly in the story of the good Samaritan, where this love is even for enemies and and also in his, in the beatitudes where he in Sermon on the Mount where he talks about, he talks about going the extra mile for, carrying somebody's pack. And that was specifically geared towards the Romans who had asked the Jews to carry the packs for them. And Jesus says, hey.
Derek:Look. Even for the Roman soldiers who are your biggest enemies, we love them. And Jesus does put his money where his mouth is, and he loves his enemies even unto death and tells us that we're supposed to do the same. In fact, Jesus tells us that the sign of his followers are people who love each other. Love is is the mark of somebody who follows God.
Derek:And Paul tells us what love is, and it's it's a lot of things that are hard to follow. Patience doesn't, doesn't do wrongs, doesn't try to do a wrong for a wrong, is not self seeking or puffed up. And Paul gives us this this list of things that love is not. And then Jesus talks more about love, and he talks about how if we love if we love him, then that looks like obedience towards him. John talks about love and and says that if we hate our brother and say that we love God, then we're liars.
Derek:Because if we love God, who loved us while we were enemies, then surely we are going to love others. So love is love is just huge in in the bible, in terms of declaring whether or not we have god in us and whether we are a follower of god. So it may or may not come as a surprise to you that I have found love to be very problematic for me in terms of of the consequentialist ethic. Love has been easy for me in terms of, loving the people that I feel deserve love. But just like the Pharisees and the Israelites in in Jesus' day, I, and I I think our culture in general, does a really good job of of rationalizing, not showing love for certain people or by by saying that what we are doing is love even though you question how can it be love.
Derek:Like, I always think of of Augustine, you know, saying that, you know, when he talks about war and stuff, thinking that we can actually kill somebody else in love. But, yeah, that I don't know how any human could do that. So, anyway, we we justify and rationalize, and and today I wanna show you a little bit how I've seen that, in my surroundings and in my own life. I've talked a little bit before about how I have worked on my church's diaconate in the past and how we would work with individuals who came in who were in need. And a lot of times, they'd try to take advantage of us, and and there's frustration.
Derek:But, you know, honestly, I was able to to withdraw from that world because our diaconate, we would roll roll off, like, and we'd only really have, like, 2 months out of the year where we were responsible from for Mercy requests. So you didn't have to deal with it that much. And working full time, in a school and things, I mean, you really you really didn't have too much contact with other people. So that that didn't bother me too much. I could kind of separate those sorts of things and and not grow to treat individuals terribly too terribly.
Derek:Although, like I mentioned before, I think I think I failed to have a positive justice ethic towards them. I didn't really have animosity. That sort of changed working in Romania where we have the Roma culture. And in our city, you can't really escape it. It's not like, I'm I have to call somebody, who's in need, and then I can choose to go visit them or not, and then get a break from them for a week until I contact them again.
Derek:With The Roma, they see you on the streets, and approach you in this small town. They wait for you outside of your kid's kindergarten. They come to your house and ring the doorbell. You just don't get away from them. If you ever wanna show yourself how little you you truly love somebody and how much animosity you truly have, put yourself in a position where you can't flip the love switch on or off, where you don't get to choose when you're going to display your love or have to suppress your animosity, put yourself in a position where the people who need love are going to be in your face at at their initiation, not your initiation.
Derek:That definitely tests your love, whether you truly love somebody or not. Boy, did did we struggle loving the Roma, and I I conveyed that story. I believe in the the Grace episode talking about, the Roma lady who would come to our house and who we didn't have hospitality for and didn't even know her name until she came back, like, the 7th time, and we finally invited her in because of of god's merciful conviction, in our hearts. We just did a a bad job of loving the Roma people. And it it wasn't just us.
Derek:It was, you know, that that sort of lack of love was something that was ingrained in the Romanian culture in in most people, and it's something that was easy to be encouraged in. So, for example, there was an organization in in our town, and we contacted them fairly soon after we got to Romania and tried to figure out, okay. What's going on in in the town? How are people helping the Roma? What can we do?
Derek:And this organization is like, we just work with kids to try to get them to to go to school and and help them, in other ways, but we refuse to work with adults because and, essentially, the adults are hopeless. The kids are the only ones who have a chance, so that's who we're gonna work with. Alright. We're we're gonna choose to have love for people that we think have hope. And, of course, we receive not not direct pushback to working with the Roma, but you know that there are Romanians who or or even other people in your missions organization or your church or your friends who think you're stupid and naive for trying to love the Roma, because what the Roma need is a a stiff kick in the pants, and they need a stiff arm, and they need they need people to be tough on them because they just need to learn their lesson.
Derek:They don't need these these other things that love entails, like persistence, patience, kindness, gentleness, self control. You know, love love is a stiff arm and tough, and and that's what it what the Roma need. And that's really only gonna work on the kids, and it's not even gonna work on the adults. So there's always pushback to working with the Roma community. And even if there wasn't direct pushback, you could see the way people look when you talk about them.
Derek:Like, oh, these these poor young people who have come over here to Romania to to try to work with the Roma, they're so naive. And, of course, we have to fight our pride in that because we know that the Roma are hopeless. That's true. But we also recognize that all humanity is hopeless without the holy spirit's work and and God. And, for us to count the Roma as any more lost than than other people is not very Christian minded, it seems to me.
Derek:I understand it. And and, yes, certainly, I feel that the Roma are more hopeless than than other groups of people who are more with it, in in my book, but I I have to remind myself that that's not how God works. So in the end, the sentiment by everybody, whether spoken or unspoken, implied, direct, whatever, the sentiment was, the Roma are hopeless. Why bother? You're wasting your resources.
Derek:Love can't change them. And if it can, the only type of love they deserve or need is going to be a love that keeps them at a distance until they're good enough to deserve nicer love. And you might say that's a a caricature and hyperbole, but it's really not. That's that's how it is. And and we feel the same way about certain groups in in America, and I'm sure every country has their groups of people, whether it's the the poor or a certain minority group or whatever.
Derek:Every every culture, has groups of people that they feel that way about. Here in the United States, probably, I've heard I've got, acquaintances who work out in places like New Mexico, and the Native American culture is one that a lot of people are down on, out there. But, anyway, I thought about love a lot in these terms over the past few years, trying to be honest with myself and and thinking, you know, am I really naive? Am I really being a good steward by by loving in this way that most people don't think we should love the Roma? Does god really work in in communities in a particular way that means that I should just count the Roma as hopeless, especially the adults?
Derek:And I I I really thought through this a lot and and went back and forth. And then I I heard this song, from Okay Go back in my college days, and and it really came to mind at this point. And and something clicked for me. I thought, after listening to to, some words in the of the song, I was like, man, that view of of how to treat the Roma and of the hope that the Roma don't have, that's atheistic. That's really what it is.
Derek:So I wanna read these words from Okay Go to you. And now I don't know if this is technically what they they mean by it, when I give my, discussion of of what I think it means. But these are the words, and and then I'll tell you what I think it means. In their song called The House Winds, here are some of their words. Ice age upon catastrophic ice age of selection, and only one result has trickled in.
Derek:The house wins. Oh, the house always wins. If evil were a lesser breed than justice after all these years, the righteous would have freed the world of sin. The house wins. Oh, the house always wins.
Derek:You don't have to be alone to be lonely. You might as well give in. You don't have to be sick to be dying. You might as well give in. You don't have to have lost to be lost.
Derek:Oh, give in. In my opinion, that seems to be a a pretty classic case for, why god doesn't exist because evil does. They're essentially saying, look. If if evil really was was lesser than justice and goodness, then, the righteous would have already freed the world of sin. Right?
Derek:If if justice were stronger, if righteousness were stronger, and and then implicitly, of course, there's a god, then the world would no longer have this evil and sin and despair, but it does, the house wins. And, of course, the house being nature here. Right? Nature just kind of runs it runs its course. Everything dies.
Derek:Everything, dies violently, and, the world will end, either I'm violently here in a in a shutter, and there must not really be a god. So just give in. Of course, no Christian will agree with, with that sentiment. You think of, well, of course, there's a god. God is just, patient.
Derek:You know, you point to to first Peter, not willing that any should perish, but that all come to repentance. God is patient with sin. We see his patience with the Canaanites and and bringing judgment to them. God desires people to turn from their sins and to repent and come to him because he doesn't want any to be lost. He wants all to be saved.
Derek:And that that's true. We believe that, and we know that god is good, and we know that god is powerful. But for whatever reason, when it comes to groups in our own culture, when it comes to groups like the Roma and the Romanian culture, we we take the atheist position, and we say, look. If there was really any hope for them, then the righteous would have freed this group of sin. Now the house wins.
Derek:Right? Nature takes its course. It's inevitable. There's nothing we can do about it because evil must not be a lesser breed of justice in this community. Evil has the power.
Derek:And that is that when I realized that, that became so problematic for me to to have this cynical view of the Roma people, to say that, essentially say that evil is stronger than god. God can't work with these people. And to say that because love can't change these people and even god can't change these people, therefore, I need to not love them how I would love anybody else, how I I think people should be loved. That consequentialist ethic turns me into an atheist when it comes to working with the Roma people, or with other other downtrodden groups that seem hopeless. And that is a huge problem for a Christian.
Derek:I think one of the issues here kind of brings us back to our our old discussion about the election, in the last election 2016, and how it seemed like what Christians were saying is that I have to embrace an evil now to do good now because if I make a decision that's not evil, then there's no hope. If I if I am holy, if I re retain a holy life, make a holy decision, make a just decision, it's not going to do any good right now. I would have to patiently wait and hope on god to do something in my my faithfulness to his holy means. So the this metric of of immediacy is is usually a big part of consequentialism, and we see this here too with the Roma. My metric was immediacy.
Derek:If the adults can't be helped today, if my work with the Roma, with Roma adults won't see fruit for a decade, if it won't see fruit until 2 generations of missionaries later after me, then it's just a waste of resources. I'm gonna go to where it's easy and I can manipulate, you know, kids and their emotions and things and get them to make a a quick decision. You know, I'm gonna do that because that makes me feel better about the results that I seem to get. And I and I get that. I know I'm I'm sounding cynical at this at this point.
Derek:I really do get that. It's frustrating to work with people and not see results. It's frustrating to work with groups and see persistent sin that seems like it has no hope of being changed. But if I'm a Christian and I believe in in a powerful God and I believe that there's hope in and faithfulness to his means, and I believe that love is one of those means, not just one of the, but the central means, then that's gonna shape the way that I live out in the world. And beyond that problem with immediacy, there's a there's another really big problem, and that is that the the metric of immediacy and requiring god to act immediately and thinking that we have to act immediately, and basing morality on this immediacy, that leads to a a very big problem in us, that results from a a pretty big lack of self reflection.
Derek:You know, if if my metric for ministerial pursuit is going to be immediacy, then how would I ever vindicate god's slow slowness in resolving evil in this world? And and even more convicting, how would I ever justify god's slowness in resolving evil within me? In my heart, I know that patience and perseverance are what god has called us all to. We're all to be patiently expectant, at least in part because god is that way with us, but we fail to see that. We fail to see that our only hope of becoming like Christ and being saved is because god is patient with us.
Derek:He didn't expect us to be like Christ the day that we came to him. But through his progressive revelation in in our lives, and and we see this in the old testament, new testament as well, god's progressive revelation, and his his mercy with Israel. Right? Divorce being just one of one of the explicit examples where god says, look. This was because of your hardness of hearts that I gave that to you, but that's not really a good thing.
Derek:That shouldn't be. But I I, I dealt with it and bore that issue even though it it tore me apart. I bore that through time because I recognized that I had to be patient with you in order that I could save you. We're all thankful that god's metric is not immediacy when it comes to his work in our own lives in in our process of sanctification. And I'm sure we've all had people who have taken years or decades to come to Christ, and we're thankful for god's patience with them and and allowing them to come to him and calling them, later in life after many, many years of of praying for those individuals and talking with those individuals.
Derek:We love god's patience, but we're so bad at at being patient ourselves, having that aspect of, of love. So I wanna end that, that section there by, reading just a a quote from from my book because I can't really figure out a a better way to to say it, myself since I already said it myself when it was when it was on my heart and mind, a while ago. With the assurance of God's victory over evil, evil then is not a lesser breed than justice. That's because God is not a Thanos type of God. He doesn't generally bring about resolution through the snap of his fingers, but through his word.
Derek:And words, to be intelligible, must be relational. Praise God for his patience in making his words intelligible to us through his very word. Praise God for his mercy, for it is only due to His patience that we have avoided His immediate judgment and the damnation of our souls. God, rather than instantaneously destroying evil and us along with it, has decided to patiently work within human history in in order to redeem us and share in our burden. His willingness to use imperfect vessels and to incorporate us into the story of redemption is not a sign of weakness or foolishness, but a sign of great mercy and love.
Derek:I thank god that he is not a consequentialist, because if he were, he wouldn't have patience. He'd he'd have the metric of immediacy. And if he didn't have patience, he wouldn't have love because patience is a an important part of love. So to to kinda dig down and get just explicit discussion here, how does consequentialism demean love explicitly? I have told you a story and kind of some of the thoughts that have gone around in my head and and observations.
Derek:But if I was just gonna lay it out, how does consequentialism demean love? And I I've identified 3 ways, and, of course, I think there are probably a lot more. But these are are 3 of the biggest that stand out to me. First, consequentialism tells me that those who are worthy of love are those who will reciprocate or respond. Who should I evangelize and work with?
Derek:Probably not the Roma because the the they have so many ingrained problems that that they're pretty hopeless. But if I am gonna work with them, I need to work with the children. Definitely don't work with the adults. That's hopeless, because they're not gonna they're not gonna respond. They're not gonna reciprocate.
Derek:I need to do, a lot of my mathematical assessments of areas and people groups and age groups and figure out who's worthy of my love? Who who is going to reciprocate? Rather than trusting in in God's Spirit to guide us towards any group, whether that be a group that has a high chance of reciprocity or one where there's very little chance of response, we use math instead of god's spirit. And, that's that's a problem. 2nd problem, and this this relates directly to the the first problem, is that when we look at people as objects for change, which, of course, we do want people to change, but when we base our love and our sacrifice for people on their ability to change, what we are essentially doing is we are objectifying people.
Derek:The fee for entry to our love and to our goodness and to all the the gifts of the spirit that god gives to us, the fee for entry is, whether or not you have hope. And that just turns people into objects. I'm going to use people to make me feel good about, my ministry because, hey, look how many responses I had. And I'm going to resent having to spend my time on people who don't have hope, and I'm going to direct my love and and good things towards those who do. And that's just that's a problem.
Derek:That's the same thing as looking at somebody with lust and viewing them as a a sex object, or, looking at somebody with hatred, and viewing them as an impediment to accomplishing what you wanna accomplish or getting what you wanna get. It's the same sort of thing. It's objectification. And finally, this consequentialist ethic of love tells me that because I've been transformed or I've started this transformation process, then I was worthy of god's love. Why wouldn't god have loved me if he knew that I would change?
Derek:I mean, if that's our ethic for other people, I'm going to love you because I think you have hope, then god didn't love me out of just his his, inexplicable, deep love that is given even for for the vilest of enemies. It's given for people who kinda deserve it, and god knew they'd deserve it. Right? His his love, because I have changed, I have been transformed, of course, god should have loved me because I had hope. And that's that's a messed up view of, of humanity and sinfulness and and our state, especially on a reformed view that's extremely problematic.
Derek:But, even on even on other views, we would we recognize that that's that's, preposterous. Ultimately, consequentialism devalues the cost of love, and it it simplifies, god's expectation for us. And just like I talked about in the first episode where we like to make everything in metaphors and and make the Bible easier, it makes the Bible a whole lot easier if the people that we are to love are the people who have a chance, who are the people who, who we might see results from and where there might be reciprocity. And that devalues love. It does because, we put aside so many of the traits that that love requires us to bear if it's truly love.
Derek:And, of course, it also undermines, the self sacrificial enemy love of, the example of our savior and the example that he gave us to follow. I think that that ends it for our discussion of love. I am thankful that I get to move on next episode away from, from self reflection and and talking about how how messed up I am and how consequentialistic I am and moving into, some of the the specific conundrums that we see in life. That's that's really what excites me. But, hopefully, you have found the discussion of of myself helpful, because I guarantee you that at at least one of these 4 episodes, taking a look in into to my life and and how I think, I really hope that at least one of those episodes has hit home with you and helped you to see how invasive consequentialism is in our lives and how problematic it is.
Derek:But that's all for now. So peace. And because I'm a pacifist, and when I say it, I mean it.
