Twisted Perspective

I came across a disturbing quote today while reading the sports section of the Daily Herald. Columnist Mike Imren, writing about O.J. Simpson's "fall," wrote:

Most troubling about all this is

how one man could go from being so beloved nationally

to being this horrifying human being.
Was Simpson fooling us back in the day

by pretending to be a good guy?

Were we celebrity-gawking gullible?

Or was he good back then before becoming evil?
The wider question is,

do all of us have some dark place deep inside that,

if lucky,

we successfully suppress?

Mr. Imren's words represent a major flaw in American thinking. We see stories of people like O.J. Simpson and are appalled that a human being cold be capable of such evil. But should we be? No way! We don't just have a "dark place inside;" we are thoroughly evil by nature without Christ. And living a life free from evil has nothing to do with luck, but it has everything to do with grace from an Almighty God. No one can "successfully suppress" evil by their own power. It takes acceptance of Christ's sacrifice in order to set us free from our bondage. That is the heart of the gospel. It is sad to me that this sort of thinking is so rampant in our culture. There is much work to be done brothers and sisters.