The Blame Game — Morning Devotions

By Chris WittsThursday 10 Feb 2022Morning Devotions with Chris WittsDevotionsReading Time: 5 minutes

Back in October 1991 Reader’s Digest published an article entitled “It’s Not My Fault”, where Pete Hamill coins the word ‘victimism’. Victimism is what happens when we blame other people for our problems.

Here’s the deal. If we persist in blaming, then we won’t take responsibility and then ultimately we won’t be healed. Don’t play the blame game; own it by name and avoid the shame. It’s what happens when you blame other people for your problems. It’s a way of explaining why life hasn’t worked out the way you would like.

We can always find excuses

You’ve been treated unfairly; you’ve ended up on the short end of the stick; you’ve been dealt a lousy hand of cards. You’re a victim. And that’s how you get through life—by blaming other people for the bad things that happen to you.

The popular author J.K. Rowling once wrote: “There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction; the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you.” Isn’t it the case that too often we make excuses for ourselves by blaming others?

It was George Bernard Shaw who once said: “People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don’t believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can’t find them, make them.”

Sometimes we even blame God. Proverbs 19:3 says: “People’s own foolishness ruins their lives, but in their minds they blame the Lord”. I’ve heard it said, God, why are you allowing this happen to me? Well, it’s not God’s fault—maybe just some poor choices you have made. Former President of the US Ronald Reagan once said: “We must reject the idea that every time a law’s broken, society is guilty rather than the lawbreaker. It is time to restore the American precept that each individual is accountable for his actions.”

And blaming is a very old game

The ‘blame game’ has been going on since the beginning of creation, as we see in the book of Genesis, the first book in the Bible. In the third chapter, we find that Adam and Eve broke God’s command by eating the fruit of the ‘Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil’. When God confronted him with his sin, Adam said “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate” (Genesis 3:12).

Since Creation’s beginnings humans shifted responsibility

From the very beginning, Adam tried to pawn off the responsibility for his sin: ‘the woman you gave me’. He shifted responsibility for his sin first to Eve—that she gave it to him—and then ultimately to God himself, when he said, “The woman you gave me”! Adam did not accept personal responsibility for what he had done. He blamed someone else: his wife, and even God, instead. He started the ‘blame game’. And of course mankind is still caught up in this game today.

Blaming—we’ve all done it. Something happens and it’s someone else’s fault, not ours. We end up having an argument and, of course, they started it, not us. We are right, they are wrong. Why don’t they see it the way we do? We try to buy that nice flat screen TV set and we blame the credit card company for reaching the limit of our credit card. We blame our boss, our spouse, our parents, the government, but never ourselves. Our misery is always someone else’s fault.

Blaming prevents us from changing

Wayne Dyer writes:

“All blame is a waste of time. No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you…You may succeed in making another feel guilty of something by blaming him; you won’t succeed in changing whatever it is about you that is making you unhappy.”

Indeed we are very clever putting the blame in someone else’s shoes. It’s an easy thing to do; it’s an easy way out. It’s easy to play the victim role. This way, we do not have to take responsibility; after all, it’s their fault. They are doing it to us. For some of us this is the way we live our lives, day in, day out—a very stressful, anxious way of living.

When blaming others you hand over the responsibility for your happiness to others. In other words: your happiness depends on them. You are not the director of your life, they are. If someone pleases you, you will be happy. If someone fails, you blame them and your happiness fades away. And where is the sense in that?

The speck in someone else’s eye

It is far better to ask God to help you take responsibility for yourself and your own actions. When something doesn’t go right, accept that situation and try and do something about it. Jesus said, “I am with you always til the end of the age”. He’s with you today and wants to be your friend, and your Guide. Allow him into your life.

In Matthew 7:3-5 we find these words of Jesus for us:

“Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”

Jesus says there are two realities you can buy into: either judgement and condemnation or giving and forgiving. Jesus tells us the currency that God deals in: “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful” (Luke 6:36). Don’t blame others.