Losing control

 This week's verse is Lamentations 4:21:

Rejoice and be glad for now, O people of Edom,
who reside in the land of Uz.
But the cup of judgment will pass to you also;
you will get drunk and take off your clothes.

Lamentations is a poem written by the prophet Jeremiah during the captivity of Israel by the Babylonian empire. Each verse is linked with a letter in the Hebrew alphabet. This one is linked to "Sin/Shin"(ש), ironically enough. The thing that interested me in this verse is the similarity to the imagery in the book of Revelation, where God gives the unrighteous the wine of his wrath to drink.

Wine is a transformative beverage. Alcohol causes people to lose control of their inhibitions, intensifies their emotions, and causes them to act in ways they ordinarily wouldn't. It also dulls their conscience, preventing them from self-censoring or reining in their behavior in ways that they might have otherwise, if they were sober.

It's frightening that God would describe his judgment as being like the experience of drinking a cup of wine to the point of drunkenness. What he's saying is that the people taking it would no longer act like their normal selves. They would be given over to their worst impulses and would do things that were out of character, things they would regret later. If God gives us over to our sin, that is exactly what happens to us.

Most people naturally consider themselves to be in control of their impulses. They look at sinful behavior and think "Well *I* would never do that." They're told the consequences of the path they're on, and they say "Well, I would stop before it got to that point. What kind of person do you think I am? Do you think I'm stupid?" But that is the perspective of someone who has not yet lost control of themselves, who has not yet been impaired and under the influence.

We've had anti-drug propaganda in the US for a few generations now. We're urged a thousand different ways not to take illegal drugs, shown pictures of what happens when people get hooked, gruesome pictures of health conditions that come from it, and so on. And yet we still have people getting hooked every single day. How do you make a rational decision to smoke crack or shoot heroin? The answer is, "you don't." We don't take into consideration the fact that we're not always rational.

And that's what makes these verses scary. In the same way that someone who tries a dangerous drug will often fall into its power, we can be overtaken by our sin. We know (mostly) not to try cocaine, or meth, or cigarettes, but we don't have that same respectful aversion to anger, uncontrolled sexual desire, hypocrisy, self-righteousness, and so on.

We don't realize that the point at which we decide that we love sin more than obedience, that anger can become murder, that desire can become adultery, that hypocrisy can blind us to our sin, and that self-righteousness can ultimately lead to genocide, war and hell on earth. 

We look at our behavior in the rational present, confident that we can continue as we are, and keep our cute sins like pets, forgetting that if we fall asleep, they can grow up and devour us overnight as God's judgment causes us to forget and leave the cage door unlocked.

So, God, speaking through Jeremiah, tells the people of Edom to rejoice with their little sin, aware only of their sober selves, and not imagining where things could lead and what they are capable of doing. And we ourselves often seem happier when we are not aware of the sin that is in our heart. 

Nobody wants to admit that they're a little judgmental, a little short-tempered, a bit too fond of their own voice or of the bottle, maybe not quite as honest or as helpful as they should be. We brush it away and continue in our sin, sipping on the cup of God's judgment unawares, until we wake up one day in horror at what we've become, the toothless addict, the creepy homeless guy, the murderer, rapist, carjacker, etc.

So it should frighten us that, metaphorically speaking, good ordinary people can "get drunk and take off their clothes." The end result of sin is bad decisions, the inability to hide it anymore, and the judgment that comes when it is found out. We don't want to think about it, so we drift through life contented and unaware, like the people of Edom.

Don't do that.

We need to develop humility and a respect for sin. If God tells us to say "no" to something, take it seriously. The things he's describing could very well be the spiritual equivalent of something like heroin. Or maybe it could slowly eat you away like tobacco. In the same way that we would say "no" to dangerous drugs, we should say "no" to the dangerous lifestyle choices and toxic attitudes God warns us about, even if they seem harmless to us.

There's a methadone clinic across the street from my church, and if ever there was an argument not to do hard drugs, that place would be it. But maybe Hell looks like that from Heaven's perspective, full of people who can't explain why they started or why they haven't quit and are in constant agony because of it.

Don't get to the point where you start to drink that cup of judgment without realizing it. You haven't fallen asleep yet. You haven't lost control yet. You can still come clean and choose a better path.