Friday, March 8, 2013

Elaborating On Actions And Their Consequences


My friend, Annette, asked me to elaborate on a phrase—“Consequence-Free Living”—that I used in my blog post from earlier today. With her permission, I’m providing my response:

Our actions and even our thoughts have consequences. In other words there are certain results that follow from doing things, saying things, thinking things.

Doing morally wrong things will, ultimately, result in negative consequences.
Doing morally right things will, ultimately, result in positive consequences.

If we are morally confused—believing things which are right to be wrong, or believing things which are wrong to be right—then our actions and thoughts will often tend to be wrong. After all, we have told ourselves (lied to ourselves) that what is actually wrong is the right thing to do.

If we are doing wrong things—because we have convinced ourselves that wrong is right—then the results (consequences) of those actions will tend to be negative. 

In the long run, morally wrong actions will have negative consequences. Why? Because it is wrong, whether we admit that truth to ourselves, or not.

Here is part of the Bible verse that I referenced in the original post: “What sorrow for those who say that evil is good and good is evil, that dark is light and light is dark…” Isaiah 5:20.

Part of the self-deception that comes with moral confusion is this kind of erroneous thinking: “I can do things and they won’t matter.” (My actions won’t have consequences.) This is why I said in the original post: “There is no such thing as consequence-free living.” In other words, we are deceiving ourselves in a dangerous way if we believe that we can continue to do things that are wrong and escape the consequences.

We might persist in doing wrong things and appear to be “getting away with it” in the short term. But in the long term, it will catch up with us.

“Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.” Galatians 6:7


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