Survival of the fittest
Is it nature or nurture that forms an individual’s character and demeanour? This has been a constant question as I have viewed the behaviours of children and their families during my 35 years as a leader within the special educational field. Someone once wrote, “You inherit your environment just as much as your genes.”
Anyone working within a school will have witnessed the playground antics of the bully whose demands outshout the more timid children at play, and we have all witnessed such behaviours not to mention those we have seen emanating from a certain residence on Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington.
St Paul in Romans 7:19 speaks of being between two natures, “For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.”
Yet the bible also contains a remedy, as the Amplified Bible puts it, “Therefore become imitators of God [copy Him and follow His example], as well-beloved children [imitate their father];” Ephesians 5:1
Fred Beuchner in his book, Telling Secrets, writes, “As I see it, in other words, God acts in history and in your and my brief histories not as the puppeteer who sets the scene and works the strings but rather as the great director who no matter what role fate casts us in conveys to us somehow from the wings, if we have our eyes, ears, hearts open and sometimes even if we don’t, how we can play those roles in a way to enrich and ennoble and hallow the whole vast drama of things including our own small but crucial parts in it.”
God of power and mercy, open our hearts in welcome. Remove the things that hinder us from receiving Christ with joy so that we may share his wisdom when he comes in glory. We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, Amen
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