In February of last year, a criminal that was wanted in Florida ran from police and hid in the woods of Maine. After spending at least three nights in the outdoors, he got frostbite and lost a few toes. What makes this story interesting is that, following his arrest, he threatened to sue the detective for not having arrested him promptly (Mary Anne Lagasse, "Flight from law leads to frostbite, threat of lawsuit", Bangor Daily News, Feb. 27, 2002 as reported on overlawyered.com)! He had committed a crime, was running from the law, and suffered frostbite while hiding--yet, he felt it was the fault of the officer for not having found him and taken him to jail more quickly! This man would not accept responsibility for the situation he was in, but rather, he blamed whomever else might be available.
A story like this would be laughable, if it weren't that it seemed to happen more and more frequently. Yet, the tendency for a man to blame those around him for his own actions has been around for centuries. In the book of Exodus, chapter 32, Moses came down from the mountain after receiving what we call the Ten Commandments, given by God Himself. What he found when he arrived was that the people had quickly turned aside from following God, and were worshipping a statue that they had asked Aaron, the brother of Moses, to make. In verse 21, "...Moses said to Aaron, 'What did this people do to you, that you have brought such great sin upon them?' Aaron said, 'Do not let the anger of my lord burn; you know the people yourself, that they are prone to evil. For they said to me, "Make a god for us who will go before us; for this Moses, the man who brought us up from the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him." I said to them, "Whoever has any gold, let them tear it off." So they gave it to me, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf.'" Not only did he try to place the blame on the people, but to do so, he told a lie that must have sounded ridiculous to both Moses and him. Sometimes, in order to avoid the consequences of our actions, we tell a lie--when the truth itself would sound better!
We see this same tendency when Jesus was on trial before Pilate. In Matthew 27:24, "When Pilate saw that he was accomplishing nothing, but rather that a riot was starting, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd, saying, 'I am innocent of this Man's blood; see to that yourselves.'" Pilate knew Jesus was not worthy of death; he said it himself, as recorded in Luke 23:22. He tried to shift the responsibility to the people, saying if they wanted to put him to death they would have to do it themselves; yet by doing so it was the same as pronouncing the death sentence himself. In fact, Luke says that he "pronounced sentence that their demand be granted" (23:24), and "he delivered Jesus to their will" (23:25). He could not "wash his hands" of his responsibility as a judge.
Really, this inclination for man to try to avoid personal responsibility has been from almost the very beginning of time, as we read in Genesis 3:12, "The man said, 'The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate.'" Adam blamed Eve... and ultimately God, saying that "You gave her to me." But that's not all; "Then the LORD God said to the woman, 'What is this you have done?' And the woman said, 'The serpent deceived me, and I ate.'" Eve sought to lay the blame on Satan--but, in fact, it was her own desire that caused her to take of the fruit. James wrote in chapter 1 and verse 14 of his epistle, "But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death."
So we see that although we might seek to lay the blame elsewhere, the Bible actually teaches the principle of personal responsibility. In Ezekiel 18:20, we read that, "The person who sins will die. The son will not bear the punishment for the father's iniquity, nor will the father bear the punishment for the son's iniquity; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself."
We bear the responsibility for the things that we do--the actions that we take; and in fact, we'll be judged for them. In Matthew 16, when Jesus is discussing the cost of following after Him, he described how one must put aside his own selfish desires, asking what use it would be to gain all that the world had to offer--but to lose his soul in the process. He then continued in v27, "...the Son of Man is going to come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and WILL THEN REPAY EVERY MAN ACCORDING TO HIS DEEDS." Those things we do will play a part in the final judgment.
Yet, we won't be judged only for our actions. In fact, we find that God takes notice of the things that we say. In Matthew 12, Jesus was accused by the Pharisees of casting out demons by the authority of the Ruler of the demons. Beginning verse 34, He lets them know that even what is spoken is important: "You brood of vipers, how can you, being evil, speak what is good? For the mouth speaks out of that which fills the heart. The good man brings out of his good treasure what is good; and the evil man brings out of his evil treasure what is evil. But I tell you that every careless word that people speak, they shall give an accounting for it in the day of judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned." We are responsible for our words, as well. But why is it that what we say is important? Jesus addressed that issue in verse 34, when He said that, "...the mouth speaks out of that which fills the heart."
Really, we won't be judged simply for what we do and say, but we are told in scripture that we are responsible for our very thoughts. In Jeremiah 17:10 we read, "I, the LORD, search the heart, I test the mind, Even to give to each man according to his ways, According to the results of his deeds." God knows our thoughts as well as our deeds. Jesus commented in Matthew 5:27,28, "You have heard that it was said, 'YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY'; but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart." Everyone knew that the law forbid the act of adultery; but Jesus pointed out that it's not just the act that is sin. God knows our hearts--and if we commit the sin of adultery in our thoughts, we are just as guilty as if we performed the act.
So we see that we are responsible for our actions, our words, and our deeds; we cannot blame others--we have a personal responsibility for all these things. But while we clearly bear the responsibility for ourselves, we also have a responsibility toward others. In the book of Proverbs 24:11,12, we read, "Deliver those who are being taken away to death, And those who are staggering to slaughter, Oh hold them back." The wise man is telling us that if we see someone doing something that will lead to their spiritual destruction, then we have an obligation to let them know--to hold them back. He continues, "If you say, 'See, we did not know this,' Does He not consider it who weighs the hearts? And does He not know it who keeps your soul? And will He not render to man according to his work?" We can't make excuses in the last day, saying, "I didn't know that he was on the way to destruction." Remember--God knows our hearts.
God spoke of this responsibility in the figure of a watchman on the outer wall of a fortified city in Ezekiel 33. Beginning with verse 2, we read, "...If I bring a sword upon a land, and the people of the land take one man from among them and make him their watchman, and he sees the sword coming upon the land and blows on the trumpet and warns the people, then he who hears the sound of the trumpet and does not take warning, and a sword comes and takes him away, his blood will be on his own head. He heard the sound of the trumpet but did not take warning; his blood will be on himself. But had he taken warning, he would have delivered his life." In other words, if the watchman warned the people of their sin but they chose to ignore him, he bears no responsibility for their destruction. "But," the Lord continued, "if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet and the people are not warned, and a sword comes and takes a person from them, he is taken away in his iniquity [i.e., the one taken away will still suffer the consequences of his sin]; but his blood I will require from the watchman's hand." The watchman bears the responsibility because he saw the danger, and chose not to warn the one going to destruction. We have a responsibility not only for our actions, our words, and our deeds, but we also must warn others that we see stumbling on to destruction.
The scriptures clearly indicate that there are consequences for our behavior, and that we ourselves are the ones ultimately responsible. But this doesn't just apply to blame that we might seek to lay to another's account; it also applies to credit we might seek to take from another for ourselves. We read in Romans 2:5-8, "But because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, who WILL RENDER TO EACH PERSON ACCORDING TO HIS DEEDS: to those who by perseverance in doing good seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life; but to those who are selfishly ambitious and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, wrath and indignation." When we stand in judgment, we won't be able to blame someone else for our sins; nor will we ride the coat-tails of another in to Heaven. Just because our parents are children of God does not make us righteous in His sight. Simply because we have met for years with a group of Christians that in general are faithful to God does not justify us, either. We will not be judged as a nation, as a society, as a family, or as a church. We will be judged as individuals.
Have you, like Adam or Eve, sought to blame another, or even God, when your own schemes fell apart? Have you, like Pilate, tried to shift responsibility to someone else for a decision that should be entirely yours? Do you, like Pilate, bend to the will of public opinion? Have you, as Aaron did, tried to blame society for your actions? Have you, like the negligent watchman, failed to warn a brother in danger? Or are you thinking that perhaps you are safe because of the associations with others that you have on Earth?
The Bible teaches that we each have personal responsibility for our actions, words, and thoughts; further, that we also have a responsibility to warn others of the dangers of the Hell that they may be running headlong towards. We will be judged as individuals--we won't be able to blame anyone else, nor can we cling to our neighbor, hoping they will carry us with them.
