The Blame Game — A LifeWords Devotion - Hope 103.2

The Blame Game — A LifeWords Devotion

When things go wrong for us, we often want to blame someone else or something else. It's an ancient game that started with the first humans.

By David ReayFriday 20 Mar 2020LifeWords DevotionalsDevotionsReading Time: 2 minutes

Genesis 3:11-13

“Who told you that you were naked?” the Lord God asked. “Have you eaten from the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat?”

The man replied, “It was the woman you gave me who gave me the fruit, and I ate it.”

Then the Lord God asked the woman, “What have you done?”

“The serpent deceived me,” she replied. “That’s why I ate it.” (NLT)

When things go wrong for us, we often want to blame someone else or something else. Anything or anyone that will get us off the hook. We are not willing or able to take responsibility for our action or inaction.

Such ‘passing the buck’ has a long history, dating back to those first humans. They defied God’s commands and things started to fall apart for them. God calls them to account. Adam blames the woman. She made me do it. She seduced me. Ever since then, men have often blamed women for leading them astray!

When God inquires of Eve, she adopts a common response, The devil made me do it. She is making herself out a helpless victim of the evil one and thus is a primitive example of a victim mentality. I cannot be held responsible for my actions: I am the victim of other forces.

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None of this special pleading does them any good. God holds them accountable for their actions. He does likewise with us. To be sure, God knows, as we know, that our environment plays a part in the shape of our lives. We are sometimes genuine victims of circumstances. We might believe that in some way God does take such things into account as he holds us accountable for how we live our lives.

But we have to take responsibility for what we do with the cards life has dealt us. We cannot pretend to be mere passive victims or helpless pawns in the hands of the evil one. We cannot avoid our free responsibility by playing such an ancient blame game.

Blessings
David