There are compelling reasons for the existence of nations and laws, with the call for nations to make fair laws, and enforce them. The record of nations is spotty, but historically in the natural world that is all we have for communal living – unless we include God, who espouses values, in the equation. Mankind can’t find agreement, from nation to nation, even from community to community, what the law should be. Slavery was legal (good) in one part of America, and illegal (bad) in another part. The death penalty is legal in some states and illegal in others. There are vehicles legal in some states and not in others determined on emissions of spent fuel. Gambling is legal in some states, but illegal in others. Which communities are right: which are wrong? Are both satisfactory to the specific culture? For the thoroughgoing humanist, neither is right and neither is wrong, but whatever laws there are become useful for social peace if accepted. As sensible as this appears for freedom’s limits, it breaks down because it has no moral force. Moral force comes from God revealed in the divine laws that govern creation. Mankind finds those laws in experience, in sacred writings, and in conscience related partly to experience – and these sources have God beginnings. They lead to morality so to be regarded no matter what legal forms pertain.
Scripture states: Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people. Proverbs 14:34 Righteousness ought to be a background for law in any context, free or restrictive. Righteousness is not found in the majority views of the electorate, but in holy God. The electorate may adopt righteousness, but righteousness did not enter by democratic principles, but by the nature and acts of God. Human righteousness is too flimsy, contradictory and changing. It has too many variances to form well. It does not know how to maintain itself. For example: America adopted prohibition just after World War I. Alcohol had become a monstrous national threat, so it was declared illegal (prohibition) by constitutional law. For more than ten years the underground moonshiner brewed his product and nearly every larger community had its speakeasies. In less than fifteen years the law was repealed with the argument that the nefarious trade had created a crime wave. In matter of fact the crime wave, the deaths from murder, and much of the negative part of prohibition was among the criminal element. Since repeal of prohibition, the number of deaths on the highways from drunken drivers alone, and the cost of the free flow of alcoholic beverages on life are greater by considerable multiplication than losses found in prohibition, even warfare. The much larger human costs currently are found in citizens higher on the ladder of good citizenship and morality. The nation reduced the deaths of criminals and substituted the deaths of masses of citizens, especially youths. Is alcoholism only a disease that might be curable, reducing human sorrows? It is more than disease. It may never be clear to even the Christian public that some issues are both matters of disease and sin. Alcoholism has not been represented publicly as both – a double whammy. It is both.
Without morality, mankind’s tendency is downward. The story can be told of the incremental ways in which this decline is accomplished in society. We need a non-mankind source to know the right thing to do. How do we make laws to fit, create an environment that advances that morality, and treat all persons with equity within the legitimate boundaries of concern for the rights and benefits of others? Morality is in the individual in truth, fidelity, respect, honor, service, and related characteristics. To these matters, Scripture addresses men and women. If we follow the human pattern we may become a drugged society, or a non-marriage society, or a selfish society, or a sexually drenched and distorted society – and so the story may go. To counter this decay to Roman decline we ought to: seek the pattern of God for soul and daily experience; model the Christian life; speak out against social sins or distortions; relate to Scripture and prayer; and, educate in ways of righteousness. This last is best accomplished in the family, including an effective church environment keeping alive a Christian (biblical) culture. The proofs of effectiveness for biblical morality are found for me in following the model lives of several hundred persons (some biblical and historical, some in our own generation) born into variant cultures but interpreted to my wife and me during our adult years in family and the meaning of the Church – in all. *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020