Daily Devotional for Saturday July 14, 2012
Is There Such a Thing as Karma or Luck
(Genesis 1:11; Galatians 6:7-9)
***ASK BILL: Pastor Bill, I been getting very queasy stomach when people say "karma" is going to get you. I did a research on it and I see why I was having queasy feelings. What is your opinion and have you written any devotionals on "karma." Thanks and God Bless!
ANSWER: I get this question daily, especially as there has been a blending of God's Truth from the Bible and various new age philosophies. Today's Devotional is on this very issue, and while some may see it as "semantics" or "splitting hairs," IT IS NOT! This is the very type of compromise that leads to the watering down of God's Truth!
Karma originated from the false Hindu religion and has been adopted by other false religions like Buddhism and the various New Age philosophies. It literally means deed or act, and more broadly names the universal principle of cause and effect that governs all life. The basic teaching of karma is that for every event that occurs, there will follow another event whose existence was caused by the first, and this second event will be pleasant or unpleasant depending on whether the first event was pleasant or unpleasant. Karma is a philosophy that has NO basis in truth, and to be perfectly blunt, is a load of cow manure.
I have told you over and over how satan is the great perverter. Satan takes the perfect things of God and perverts them. He takes the truth of God and turns it into a lie. The TRUTH from God's Word where the perverted lie of karma comes from is the law of sowing and reaping. We first read about it in Genesis 1:11. The foundation of the law of sowing and reaping was in agriculture. You plant seed into the ground, and in time that seed will produce a crop. This law of sowing and reaping also translates into our spiritual lives as well. The key passage is from Paul's letter to the church at Galatia where he tells them, "The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life." - (Galatians 6:8 NIV)
I share with you often how our rebellion to God brings consequences and our obedience brings blessings. When we choose to live our lives in disobedience to God's Word; when we choose to sin, we are then left to deal with the consequences of our sinful choices. God is not going to bless your sin. However, when we choose to live our lives in obedience to God's Word, when we choose to obey Him, we reap the blessings of God in our life. It is God's good pleasure to bless His children, He loves to bless us and it is our obedience that unlocks the blessings of God in our lives. That my friend is NOT karma, it is God allowing the consequences of our sinful choices and the blessings of our obedient choices to occur.
The myth of karma is an attempt to explain what happens to us during our life APART from God. In this perverted lie from satan, God is not part of the process. That fact alone exposes this false philosophy since NOTHING happens in your life, in my life, in this world apart from God. God did not just create the world and then decide to go take a walk and come back and check on things later to see how they were progressing. GOD HAS A PLAN AND PURPOSE FOR EVERYTHING AND NOTHING HAPPENS OUTSIDE OF THAT PLAN AND PURPOSE.
This, of course, raises the question of why do we have all of the evil and horrible things that happen in this world and in people's lives every day. As we have discussed in the past, the evil in this world stems from the hearts of men living their lives in rebellion to God. God has permitted the evil and sin in this world for these few years in His desire to see all men come to repentance and that none be lost. We know from reading the end of the Book, there is coming a day very soon when God will step in and wipe away this world as we know it and all sin and evil will cease to exist.
One of the key passages in the Bible to understanding the mind God is found in Isaiah 55:8-9, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts." What God is saying is to quit trying to get into His head because you can't. We simply do not have the ability to know or even begin to comprehend the mind of God. The fact is, there is no place in the Bible that says we are supposed to.
As humans, we have this insatiable desire to know "why," and the fact is there are times in our life when we will not get the answer to that question. These are the times when our faith in God must become real and while we don't know "why," God has a plan and purpose for everything and we have to trust Him. The interesting thing I see in my life and the lives of others is that we never ask God "why" when good things happen to us, only the bad things. Take a moment and think on that one with me. When was the last time something wonderful happened in your life and you asked God "why?" Probably never. It is almost exclusively when the tragic things happen to us that we are asking God "why?"
I love you and care about you so much. There is no such thing as karma. It is a philosophy born out of the false religions to try and explain the things that happen in our life and is nothing more than a perversion of God's law of sowing and reaping. Let me tell you something else that doesn't exist, and that is LUCK. I know I am bursting many bubbles today but luck is a perverted concept of chance that doesn't exist so take that word out of your vocabulary. The reason karma and luck don't exist is that they operate apart from God and NOTHING happens apart from God! There is nothing that happens in your life apart from God and that is why we are totally dependent upon Him.
I will be praying for you today. Praying for the Lord to keep you focused on the fact that in this life, God is on His throne at all times. He doesn't need to take bathroom breaks, He doesn't need to leave to fix a sandwich, He doesn't need to take a nap, OUR GOD NEVER SLEEPS NOR SLUMBERS AND HE IS ON HIS THRONE AT ALL TIMES!!! Nothing in this world or in your life happens apart from God allowing it to happen. God allows the consequences you have to deal with from your choices made in rebellion to Him, just like He blesses you for your obedience. That is NOT karma, it is God's law of sowing and reaping found in His Word.
In His love and service, Your friend and brother in Christ,
Bill Keller