Look beyond reason

Dr. Jack Kavorkian, has been released from prison after serving time for admittedly assisting in the death of more than 150 people. On his release, one of the first questions he was asked was, if he had any faith or religion. This was his ironic answer, "Yes, my religion is reason." All doctors are sworn into the profession under oath to restore and preserve the life and health of every single patient. Kavorkian has become known as "Doctor Death." Just how does reason fit this picture?

The ability of the human mind for logical reason and rational thinking is a priceless gift of the Creator and should be more appreciated. It is this that separates the human race from every other species of life and is strong evidence that man was created in the image of God. The Bible tells us that the prominent characteristic of God is reason, wisdom and knowledge in infinite measure.

The prophet Isaiah writes in the first chapter of his book, "Come now, let us reason together," says the Lord. "Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are as crimson, they shall be like wool." (Vs. 18).

What many fail to understand is that all God-given endowments have been corrupted by sin and even human reason is so fatally flawed that to make it equivalent to God is more dangerous and self-destructive than the worship of a totem pole. Since human reason has not succeeded after centuries of effort, to make progress in explaining good and evil, life and death, we ought to turn to another gift called common sense which directs us to search for our answers somewhere outside of human reason.

Again, the Bible says in 1 Corinthians 1:25, "The foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom."

The passage goes on to say that the Gospel of Christ is foolishness to proud men whose confidence, like Kavorkian's, rests totally on the shifting sands of their own logic. In the Gospel, God answers the hard questions human reason alone has neither the wisdom nor courage to ask. And, the heart of the Gospel is the unjustifiable execution of Jesus on the cross for which defective human reason was in great part responsible for. The cross brought the universal depravity of human sin and the dreadful reality of human suffering and death into sharp focus. Likewise, Christ's resurrection validates that our instinctive hope for life and immortality is well founded and most reasonable. History teaches us that human reason standing by itself is unreliable. Trust it if you choose, or, trust in God whose specialty is restoring corrupted human reason so that we might live in the hope and blessings of the Gospel.

-- Gene Holman is pastor at Living Word Fellowship.