Doin' What Comes Natur'ly

Someone once told me, "If you want to know the right thing to do in any given situation, just think about what you would naturally do ... and do the opposite." The idea, humorously put, is relatively simple. Humans are sinful. The "natural" thing for humans to do, then, is to sin. Want to avoid sin? Do something different.

I can see the wisdom in the basic concept. It is, in fact, that wisdom that gives me pause. You see, it seems to me that there is some of our own theology that is much more comfortable as "natural" than, well, supernatural. While it isn't necessarily a genuine test of doctrine that it violates my natural inclinations, it does make me a little nervous when the Natural Man is quite comfortable with it.

Take, for instance, the very popular notion of the supremacy of Man's Free Will. The most prevalent view these days is that God would never interfere with Man's Free Will. And most of us don't bat an eye at the suggestion. Why? Well ... it feels right. Oh, you know how it goes. "God doesn't want robots." Or maybe you prefer "Love isn't real if it isn't freely exercised. God wants us to really love Him." So for the most part the notion of Man's Free Will as inviolable is just taken for granted ... because it is so natural. Of course, some recognize that it may be challenged, so they develop a structure to support it. "Oh, yes, it's true, because if God violated our Free Will He couldn't hold us morally culpable." Ah, there, see? All settled. And if I raise the question of God's Sovereignty, you'll likely hear, "Well, God in His sovereignty has chosen to surrender some of His sovereignty to Man's Free Will." That ought to clear things up ... right?

Here's the problem. You don't find this in Scripture. Nowhere in the Bible do you find "free will". You find the implication that humans are (obviously) capable of making choices and you find the certainty that God doesn't tempt anyone with evil, but that's about it. This entire notion of the supreme, inviolable Free Will of Man cannot be found anywhere. On the other hand, there are a lot of references (some, in fact, can be disturbing) to God making choices for people. There are multiple passages that reference both God's predestination of events and Man's culpability for his choices in those events. In other words, the biblical vision of God's Sovereignty seems to be at odds with the popular version of the sovereignty of Man's Free Will.

But this is just one example. If you look around long enough, you'll start to find that 1) there are lots of notions that are popular in the church today that have little or no biblical backing, and 2) they are very comfortable because they appear so natural. Unfortunately, when you compare these with Scripture (and evident reason), you start running into real problems. I've found "Christian" groups that defend homosexual behavior, adultery, fornication, and just about any sort of sexual sin. On what basis? Well, you start with "it feels natural" and then you go to work rearranging Scripture to match and -- voilà! -- you have a natural doctrine. Why is it that the Church in America is looking more and more like the world? Because it comes naturally. So we modify our standards to what feels more natural rather than what the Word says. Why is it that the doctrine of Original Sin and the suggestion that there is no such thing as a "good person" is so abhorrent to so many Christians? Because it doesn't come naturally and we are more and more inclined to go with our natural intentions rather than the biblical version.

As I said, "natural" is not a genuine test of good doctrine. Still, if Natural Man is unable to understand the things of God (1 Cor 2:14) and humans are inclined naturally to evil from birth (Gen 8:21), perhaps it would be wise to keep an eye on it. Doing what comes naturally may sound right ... but it doesn't work out that way if the Bible is correct. Something to think about in my view.