Week 3 Genesis 38
Er was the first son of Judah and about all we know about him is this: Er was a wicked man in the Lord’s sight, so the Lord took his life. I don’t have any reason to think this was a normal action that the Lord took. In the bible the Lord doesn’t typically take the lives of individual evil people. So this looks like an exception (the writer doesn’t give details so who knows why it happened?)
I think the general rule is that most people – good or evil – get to live out their whole lives. Only a few die prematurely. So Er was one of the exceptions.
I think there’s another pretty basic rule too: if I live my life projecting my personal evil-actions out into the world then that evil will eventually circle around and come back to me. It’s not like my evils just dissipate into the ionosphere. They remain intact & virulent and when they cycle back to me there will be aftereffects. One of the rules of evil action is that repercussions follow. In Er’s case it’s no surprise his wicked behaviour came around. What is surprising is it’s rapidity.
One of the normal benefits of living life is that fallout isn’t usually immediate.
One of the not-so-nice things is that there will be fallout. What goes-around will – sooner or later – come-around.
Note: quote from Genesis 38:7 (NLT)