The Bible Project once made an analogy in one of their videos that studying and meditating on the Bible could be a bit like looking at a gemstone. When you look at it from even a slightly different angle, a whole new picture emerges. Importantly, the new picture doesn’t somehow invalidate the other; they’re both true and cohesive representations of the gem, just emphasizing different details. In fact, it’s likely that together they form a more complete picture. I’ve already written on one example of this, in which a picture of God’s goodness is incomplete unless you consider both His justice and His mercy.
With that in mind, I’d like to share something I’ve encountered in my spiritual journey that I think is true for all of us: that the motivation of sin is (almost) always control. To justify such a sweeping statement (even with the qualifier), I’ll point out some biblical examples, map it onto our modern culture, and then look at a theological implication.
The First Temptation
Something else I’ll thank The Bible Project for – this time their podcasts – is pointing out how often the Bible uses a phrase along the lines of “They saw it was good in their own eyes, and they took it.” It’s a phrase that gets at the heart of sin: substituting one’s own judgment for God’s, and acting on it. It’s a motif that starts at the fall:
So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.
Genesis 3:6 (emphasis added)
(Off the top of my head, this motif is also used in the story of David and Bathsheba, and similar language is used by Achan in Joshua 7:21.)
This phrase, I think, gets at the core of my point: we want to be the ones in control. We want to judge what is good for us, and we want to act on our own judgment. This is directly contrary to the truth written in Genesis 1 and 2: we are created. Without God, we can do nothing, and we are utterly and wholly reliant on Him. That’s what makes this desire for control inherently and fundamentally flawed, and even sinful as we try to step into the role of the creator.
Similar motivation is a key theme of Abraham’s story. He was promised a son to continue his lineage, but he wanted to control the terms by which that happened – so he abused his slave. Later, after God did fulfill His promise, what was Abraham’s test? It was to give up control: to put his only son on the altar and trust that, by following God, He would be faithful to His promise.
King Saul also sought control. In his tests, he sought to add or take away from what God had commanded, instead using his own judgment. His sacrifice in 1 Samuel 13 is a prime example: he feared his army was leaving him, so he tried to control circumstances by offering the sacrifice himself. Chapter 14 sees him drop the initiative in God’s command to defeat the Philistines, then make a pretty stupid vow (which was apparently an attempt at spiritual leadership). And finally, in chapter 15, he again sought to control how things went when he left some people and livestock alive for his own purposes. At every turn, God’s instructions were clear, but Saul wanted to write his own story.
And this motivation isn’t unique to the flaws of the “good guys” either. Cain built a city to protect himself from the consequences of his own actions, and his lineage proceeded to make Babylon so that they could seize the power of heavens and prove themselves just as worthy of control. Every conquering army sought the same: to control more land or people or resources. Haman, the antagonist of Esther’s story, similarly sought to control the world to conform it to his whims.
The Rat Race
Does any of that sound familiar? Control of power or resources or people? Trying to shape the world to our own desires, or at least put up a self-imposed Truman Show fantasy? Trying to work out our own good ends on our timelines?
I think our culture is absolutely rife with idolatry of control. At the personal level, we sell our time for currency that we use to create our own little bubble of influence. We spend that money on nice things, often things that give us a more thorough illusion of control: a house where we can’t hear the neighbors, or a car that can take us where we want on demand, or investments that surely must make us even more financially independent. Politics cuts away the middleman, getting straight to the point of “making a difference” or “enacting change” or what have you. Though very rarely have I seen a politician deny the benefits of money and influence, which can be exchanged for more control.
Though he doesn’t use the word “control”, John Mark Comer describes this mad, desperate scramble in his book The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry. He adds that there are further symptoms of being hurried which he categorizes as “socially acceptable addictions”: the modern mental narcotics that numb us to the bone-tiredness we feel after days and weeks and months of clutching at every scrap of control we can to expand our little demesne where we chart our own course. Addictions of household names like binge watching, pornography, social media, as well as addictions to substances. I’d argue that most of these are desperate attempts at making a decision for ourselves, even if it’s a terrible one.
In a similar vein, there’s a Chinese phrase that gets at this same concept: “revenge bedtime procrastination.” Defined in a now-deleted X (formerly Twitter) post by Daphne K. Lee as “a phenomenon in which people who don’t have much control over their daytime life refuse to sleep early in order to regain some sense of freedom during late night hours.” (Emphasis mine.)
Turning to other international examples, this is the motivation of every authoritarian regime, and the tradition of conquerors from the Old Testament holds true of their motivation today. Communist influence in Southeast Asia and capitalist coups in Latin America led to bloody wars and generational violence, often justified by the concept of “spheres of influence” – the argument that great powers had a right and even duty to control their neighbors to maintain stability (and of course their own eminence). Paired with the proxy wars in Africa and the Middle East, we’re left entire regions where no living person remembers a time before insurgency, ethnic cleansing, and strongman politics. All of this to serve the desires of a few people or nations who wanted to control the course of history, or at least their part of the world.
Through-and-through, our worldly culture idolizes control. Many will point first to money, or sometimes stardom, but what good are those except for the power they can be exchanged for? Nobody wants money just to set it on fire, and nobody wants to be famous only as someone whose name is a curse; these things are only good because they can be exchanged for control.
So for such a timeless vice, it raises the question: what are the implications in the Christian faith?
The Good News
Gethsemane.
With that question and answer, I think many of you already know where I’m going with this. In the parallel stories of Mark 14 and Matthew 26, Jesus prays the same words at least twice (though I think it’s likely he spent a lot of time saying the same phrase over and over). With his betrayal, torture, and execution before him, he prays what almost anybody would: that God would save him from this fate. This is exactly the temptation of control.
It’s the next part that makes Jesus the Messiah, our perfect high priest, and the fulfillment of the Law and Prophets: in prayer, he actively submits himself to the Father’s will. He cedes control (perhaps the only time anyone has ever ceded true control, and not its illusion), becoming obedient so that he could pay our debt and redeem us from slavery to sin.
Think through this again, this time from the perspective that sin is motivated primarily by a desire to control. Where this hit me recently is when reading through Hebrews:
> For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.
> — Hebrews 4:15
Without at least some unifying feature behind sin, it was difficult for me personally to move this verse from my head to my heart. I knew that from some perspective Jesus was tempted by perhaps every category of sin, like greed or lust or what have you, but where’s his example of struggling with the attention economy and social media algorithms? What passage of the gospels can I turn to for his example when faced with being laid off?
It was while asking questions like this when I remembered this concept that it was all about control under the surface, and I tied it back to Gethsemane. Suddenly, I wasn’t trying to bring my time management or political passions to the cross – Jesus already had. Any time I wanted to let my heart wander, it wasn’t about bad habits or fear for provision, it was about the night Jesus looked at Calvary and said “your will be done.”
What better an example could I ask for?
The Upside-Down News
Of course, this perfect example serves as a challenge. Though we can never meet the perfect record set by the Christ (I have some thoughts on this I’m stewing into a post), we are called to look to him as we live our lives and allow the Spirit to slowly conform us to be like him.
I just spent several paragraphs describing how the world is full of people jockeying for first place in their bubble or to expand the bubble where they are first place. So for a kingdom that defies the wisdom of the world and follows its own, inverted morality, the prescription for Christians is clear: give up control.
I mentioned already that we are created beings, wholly dependent on God to even exist, breathe, and live day by day. Acknowledging that is a good first step.
But then take that into the rest of your life. You don’t control anything around you – not the traffic, the weather, and least of all other people. All you can control is how you handle these things, and whether you will soften your heart to the guidance of the Spirit in showing love to customers, coworkers, or whoever else is on your nerves today.
We find our citizenship in a kingdom where leadership is defined by servitude. We are ambassadors to a king that said the gentle and quiet person is the one who is truly blessed, because their inheritance is the very kingdom we represent. We are the town criers of the euangelion, commissioned to share the Good News that there is a new king. We are the torchbearers of the Eden promise, driven by God’s love to be the meeting point of heaven and earth, the new temple and tabernacle, walking invitations to meet God at His throne and bow before Him.
We give up control as Christians, because control runs contrary to love. We love the Lord our God, and so we submit to His plan and His will. We love His images around us, and so we serve them happily from humble positions, because we hope they will one day love the same God, and we know that one day we will all bow the knee to Him.
Control: The Great Illusion
This is quickly becoming a central point of my personal model and understanding of the Christian faith. As such, I would love feedback – does this resonate with you? Did I get something wrong (aside from completely glossing over the free will vs predestination debate)? Do you have a recommendation of a book that talks about this?
Aside from that, I can only suggest that you consider control in your own life. Where do you feel the need to control things? Do you doubt that giving up control to a loving Father will bring you peace? Are you prepared for Him to do something you don’t like in the moment?
To pay one more homage to John Mark Comer, take a minute to slow down and chew on this thought: that we really can do absolutely nothing under our own power, and we are reliant for every breath and moment on our creator.
Life in Tension 