The Bible is filled with verses that address the dangers of choosing to play God. Many times, we think we know better than God and make decisions that we believe are in our best interest. Unfortunately, those decisions often result in disaster. The world has seen many examples of people who play God through their politics, scientific endeavors and even social programs. This blog will examine what the Bible says about “playing God” and share ways to avoid making bad choices.
The Bible is a source of guidance and inspiration, and it has also been used to assist in the creation of many games. In fact, Bible verses about playing God have appeared in some populargames,s such as Call of Duty, Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, Skyrim and Dishonored. This article will look at those games and the verses they use to encourage players to be cautious about their actions.
Bible Verses About Playing God
Playing God is a concept that many individuals struggle with. As humans, we often try to take control of situations and make decisions that are not ours to make. The Bible warns against playing God and reminds us that true power and authority belong to God alone. Below are some relevant Bible verses that speak to the dangers of playing God.
1. James 4:13-17 (NIV)
13 Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” 14 Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. 15 Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.” 16 As it is, you boast in your arrogant schemes. All such boasting is evil. 17 If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.
2. Proverbs 16:9 (NIV)
9 In their hearts humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps.
3. Isaiah 55:8-9 (NIV)
8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. 9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
4. Proverbs 3:5-6 (NIV)
5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; 6 in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.
5. Romans 12:2 (NIV)
2 Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.
2 Timothy 4:3-4 ESV / 57 helpful votes
For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.
Ephesians 2:8-10 ESV / 43 helpful votes
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
Proverbs 1:7 ESV / 27 helpful votes
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.
Daniel 2:21-22 ESV / 24 helpful votes
He changes times and seasons; he removes kings and sets up kings; he gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have understanding; he reveals deep and hidden things; he knows what is in the darkness, and the light dwells with him.
Psalm 139:13-14 ESV / 17 helpful votes
For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.
James 1:5 ESV / 15 helpful votes
If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.
Hebrews 9:27 ESV / 15 helpful votes
And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment,
Ezekiel 18:20 ESV / 12 helpful votes
The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not suffer for the iniquity of the father, nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself.
Revelation 14:3 ESV / 9 helpful votes
And they were singing a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and before the elders. No one could learn that song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth.
Revelation 5:1-14 ESV / 9 helpful votes
Then I saw in the right hand of him who was seated on the throne a scroll written within and on the back, sealed with seven seals. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, “Who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals?” And no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or to look into it, and I began to weep loudly because no one was found worthy to open the scroll or to look into it. And one of the elders said to me, “Weep no more; behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered, so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals.” …
Galatians 1:8 ESV / 9 helpful votes
But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed.
1 Corinthians 2:6-10 ESV / 9 helpful votes
Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away. But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But, as it is written, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him”— these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.
Psalm 139:1-24 ESV / 9 helpful votes
To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David. O Lord, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether. You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me. …
2 Samuel 6:5 ESV / 9 helpful votes
And David and all the house of Israel were making merry before the Lord, with songs and lyres and harps and tambourines and castanets and cymbals.
Exodus 7:1 ESV / 9 helpful votes
And the Lord said to Moses, “See, I have made you like God to Pharaoh, and your brother Aaron shall be your prophet.
Genesis 1:26-28 ESV / 9 helpful votes
Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”
Colossians 3:17 ESV / 8 helpful votes
And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
Colossians 3:16 ESV / 8 helpful votes
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.
Amos 6:5 ESV / 8 helpful votes
Who sing idle songs to the sound of the harp and like David invent for themselves instruments of music,
Job 39:26-27 ESV / 8 helpful votes
“Is it by your understanding that the hawk soars and spreads his wings toward the south? Is it at your command that the eagle mounts up and makes his nest on high?
Job 38:12 ESV / 8 helpful votes
“Have you commanded the morning since your days began, and caused the dawn to know its place,
1 Timothy 3:15 ESV / 7 helpful votes
If I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of the truth.
Colossians 1:15-18 ESV / 7 helpful votes
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent.
Consequences of Playing God
“If men who are fighting hit a pregnant woman so that she delivers her child prematurely, but there is no harm to either the mother or child, the man should pay the fine her husband put on him with the help of the judges. If any harm follows, give a life for a life, and eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a hand for a hand, a foot for a foot…” [Exodus 21:22-25 – AAT]
These words spoken by God to the children of Israel clearly state that the child in the womb is a human being entitled to the full protection of the Law, including the Fifth Commandment which states: YOU SHALL NOT MURDER! Confronted with God’s Law, men have only three options:
1) Reject God and his Word;
2) Deny that the passage speaks to the abortion issue; or
3) Obey God.
There are many today who reject both the Word and its author. The philosophy of the world is to deny both moral absolutes and ultimate responsibility to anyone but one’s own self. Today, most people PLAY GOD rather than listen to and follow God. The ultimate consequence of that game is death.
A common phrase used to be said, “Do your own thing!” In reality, it means the individual establishes his own standard of what is right or wrong, simply according to his own pleasure or whim, without a proper regard for others. In effect, the individual becomes his own God; he is PLAYING GOD.
The selfishness of the “Do your own thing” thinking expresses itself in the idea that “everything should revolve around me”; “everything and everybody is to bow to my convenience.” That becomes a key factor in society accepting abortion. Analyzing the motivation of “abortion on demand,” we see it for what it really is — murdering an innocent for the selfish whim of another, dealing out death for the convenience of another.
Some of the most often heard arguments for abortion are: “no unwanted children;” “a woman has a right to do whatever she wants in private;” “the woman’s mental health must be protected;” and “no defective babies.” Although sounding divergent, they are all saying: “It is more convenient to murder. It is more convenient to abort than to contend with the normally minor inconveniences of pregnancy. It is more convenient to murder than to give time, effort of love to a growing child. It is more convenient to pay a few dollars to an abortionist than to spend thousands on raising a child. It is more convenient to murder in private than to face public embarrassment. It is most convenient to get rid of anything or anyone who would keep me form doing my own thing.”
God has given man a conscience, a natural knowledge of his law and of ultimate moral responsibility. He has instilled in man a natural fear of the coming judgment. Today, people suppress it by denying that there is ultimate moral responsibility or that there will be a judgment day. They are PLAYING GOD as they set themselves up to decide if God’s rules for living have any value for life in our day. While perhaps most people would not be so radical as to proclaim “GOD IS DEAD” they lead their lives as if he were; in their thinking they treat him as if he did not exist. Today, references to the Word of God are met with comments like “You have no right to impose your morality on me,” in effect calling the Christian “god” and denying the existence of the true God, the creator of all things. Men may set themselves up as gods, they may deny ultimate moral standards or ultimate moral responsibility, but the day of judgment will come. PLAYING GOD will have deadly consequences.
Not everyone who is pro-abortion/pro-murder openly rejects the Word of God. Some in fact claim to be his followers and are active in “churches.” Some even use the name “Lutheran” as they do thousands of abortions in their “Lutheran” hospitals. But how do they get around the clear words of God spoken in Exodus to salve their conscience? The most liberal of them say that standards in the Word of God which do not agree with their standards (as they PLAY GOD) are just the ideas of men as they reflected upon God. They say they do not reject God and his Word, but that they don’t equate the exact words of the Bible with the Word of God. But the position cannot stand in light of Scripture. The Bible is the Word of God and Exodus 21 is a direct quote of God speaking to the children of Israel. We reject the thinking of men who are PLAYING GOD by trying to determine what God has said and what in the Bible is merely the thinking of men.
Others agree that the Bible is the Word of God but claim that Exodus 21 has no direct bearing on the abortion issue, or for that matter that no other passage does either. But that is blindness. The Bible speaks to the abortion issue. It speaks about men causing the death of children before they are born as being responsible. It talks about “killing” and “murder” instead of using veiled words such as abortion. It speaks of the child in the womb as a “child” or ” infant” and not as “potential life.”
Exodus 21 is a part of God’s Law, of the ultimate moral code, of the absolute moral standard. The above quote is part of God’s explanation and practical application of the Fifth Commandment which says, “YOU SHALL NOT MURDER!” The specific example given is a fight between two men during which a pregnant woman is harmed.
Let us note first that in this passage God speaks of the unborn as a “child” and not just a “blob of cells” or a “mass of tissue.” Nor does it matter whether the mother is in the first, sixth or ninth month of pregnancy, she still is a “pregnant” woman with a “child.” God makes no distinction whether the fight occurred in the first, second, or third “trimester.” She is simply a woman with child.
Let us also note that the Bible states the most obvious cases to cover all others, to state the extreme to cover the lesser. Thus Jesus explained that the term “murder” covered hate and the commandment against adultery forbids lust. Thus if there is punishment for a careless act, the punishment should be even swifter for a deliberate act. If an accidental murder of a child was punishable by death, then most certainly a deliberate act of murder is equally punishable by death.
In the case cited when an injury or premature birth resulted, a penalty was invoked. If the only result was a premature birth of a healthy baby then the husband assessed the penalty with the aid of the judges. However, if there was “harm”, that is, permanent injury, then the law of retribution applied: “…give a life for a life, an eye for an eye…”
No distinction is made between the life and body of the mother and that of the child. The standard is the same: If the unborn child were not the major concern of this passage, there would be no need of this passage, there would be no need for special mention of the situation. The mother would already be protected by the general rules for everyone given elsewhere. This example showed the Children of Israel that the unborn are to be treated as other human beings under God’s Law. The unborn are protected by the Fifth Commandment. To murder them violates God’s Law. To claim that they are not human is to PLAY GOD. To claim that God does not speak to the issue is to PLAY GOD.
The only alternate response to this Word of God is obedience. For the true believer there is no other choice. To follow God means to follow his Word. To follow his Word means to recognize the baby in the womb as a human being protected by God’s Law.
As Christians we have a responsibility to make known this Word of God. As God told Ezekiel (3:1621) those who know the Word are to warn those who go against the Word. In obeying God’ s Law which protects the unborn we have a responsibility to speak on their behalf and to warn of the consequences of going against the Law of God.
The Fifth Commandment is clear. God’s application of the Fifth Commandment to the unborn is clear. Let no one think he can hide from God’s all-seeing eyes. Let no doctor think that he can hide behind his surgical mask or corrupt medical ethics, to defend “murder by scalpel.” Let no judge think that he can stand before the Judge of the World and escape his scrutiny. Let no woman think that she is safe before the Law of God because she was safe before the law of the land. Let no father think he can escape the responsibility for the life he helped create.
God’s Word is clear: “You shall not murder!” To choose a different standard is PLAYING GOD. God will not hold His anger forever against those who are playing God. With God it is not a game. God is serious about being God. His authority, honor and glory shall not go to another.