One of the most sinister strategies for justifying wrongful behaviors is a mental game that is prompted by the question, Who’s on top? The game board resembles a ladder. Every position on this ladderlike structure is relative to every other position. You can rise above another player’s position, or you can find yourself on a lower rung.
Of course, this is not really a game at all; it is a way of life—a mind-set that sinful humankind has devised in order to view others in a way that allows us to justify behaviors that are neither peaceful nor loving. But here’s the irony: The object of the game is not so much about striving for and attaining the ladder’s summit. The real object of the game is to justify the horrible things you did to judge and punish your opponents.
The players in my game of Who’s on Top? are there because I have relationships with them. You have your own game going, with a full complement of relationships that can at any time be made active or inactive according to the condition of your own heart. We’re at war with those we have activated. The rest are in a holding pattern. We will remain temporarily at peace with those in the holding tank until a time when being at war with them suits our own purposes. Some of my relationships will spend more active time on the game board than others. When they are active, I will despise them. And I will work very hard to judge them and punish them. That is how the game is played.
One other thing about this game: No matter where each player is positioned on the ladderlike structure, the potential is always there to find an advantage. If I can see myself as being better off than someone with whom I am at war, I will think of that person as insignificant, subhuman, and irrelevant. Because I am in a superior position, I will generally see myself as wise, right, and honest while my inferior appears foolish, wrong, and dishonest. In my superior position, I can also justify my impatience, disdain, and indifference toward my inferior. In short, I can treat that person as an object.
If, on the other hand, my position is inferior to my enemy’s, I can still rationalize my hostile behaviors. After all, such an enemy has probably gained higher rank and status by taking everything he or she has from me. And there’s little doubt that this was done in a dishonorable or dishonest manner. That explains why he or she is wealthier, more fortunate, more blessed than I am. From an inferior position, I will be inclined to view my enemy as privileged or advantaged. This gives rise to my feelings of jealousy, bitterness, helplessness, even depression. But it also provides the kind of justification I need to treat that individual as subhuman.
To play this game, you and I must be prepared to judge others relative to their social status, economic position, moral character, intellectual acuity, political ranking, communal standing, skill level, level of education, and a host of other criteria. Small wonder this game spawns cultural bias, racial bigotry, ethnic prejudice, gender chauvinism, intolerance, and all the other kinds of favoritism that falsely justify cruel and inhuman conduct!
The apostle James wrote with force and clarity about such games: “My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don’t show favoritism. . . . If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself,’ you are doing right. But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it” (2:1,8-10).
James later amplified his remarks, writing, “If you harbor bitter envy or selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. Such ‘wisdom’ does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, of the devil. For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice. But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere” (3:14-17).
Excerpt from Heart At Peace: Biblical Strategies for Christian Conflict, 2014 Northwestern Publishing House. All rights reserved.