Our culture has fallen into the age-old trap of confusing good and evil. It is part of our outlook of moral relativism. We have trouble maintaining God’s standards that distinguish between right and wrong. Watching the final game of the Little League World Series this afternoon between the two young teams from Hawaii and South Korea (although the boys certainly look bigger than normal 12-year-olds), I was struck by some of the adjectives used by the commentators. A “wicked” fastball or a “filthy” curve ball has become the highest form of compliment. In a similar fashion, “dope” which used to be reserved for morons or marijuana now has come to mean very good, excellent, or cool. Other examples would be calling something “sick” or “rad” or the “bomb.” When did these designations take on positive connotations?
I like the article by the famous evangelist Billy Graham published back in 2012 where he discussed at length this topic from his text of Isaiah 5:20.
Humanity has always been dexterous at confusing evil with good. That was Adam and Eve’s problem, and it is our problem today. If evil were not made to appear good, there would be no such thing as temptation. It is in their close similarity that the danger lies.
Modern social righteousness often differs from the righteousness of the Bible. Someone has said: “A wrong deed is right if the majority of people declare it not to be wrong.” By this principle we can see our standards shifting from year to year according to the popular vote! Divorce was once frowned upon by society, and laws against fornication and adultery were strictly enforced. But now divorce is accepted by society, and fornication is glorified in our literature and films. . .
Man without God is a contradiction, a paradox, a monstrosity. He sees evil as good and good as evil. That is why some people love evil and hate that which is good—they are still in their sins. For them, life’s values are confused. Paul found the cure for his violent, destructive disposition, not at the feet of Gamaliel or in the culture of Greece, but on the Damascus Road when he met Jesus Christ. Later he wrote: “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death” (Romans 8:2).
Before his conversion, he saw Christ as the greatest evil and breathed out “threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord” (Acts 9:1). But after he encountered Christ on the Damascus Road, he loved what he had so fervently hated. At last he could see evil as evil and good as good, and, according to Acts 9:18, “there fell from his eyes something like scales.” His values were straightened out because his nature had been changed by the redeeming grace of God.