Paul Derengowski, ThM
The other day I encountered one of the least sharpest knives in the drawer who told me, “God created marijuana. Therefore, it should be legalized for our recreational enjoyment.”
To prove his case, he ran to the Bible and quoted Genesis 1:12—”And the earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed after their kind, and trees bearing fruits, with seed in them, after their kind; and God saw that it was good.”
Then he added his mastery of Old Testament Hebrew to the discussion by telling me that “plants” actually meant herbs, and since marijuana is an herb, then to be outlawing an herb that God created was not justified.
But, my Einstein of the Bible conveniently left out several details in his exposition, simply by not going to the end of the chapter, where it is explained what all the plants and trees were to be used for.
In Genesis 1:29 we read, “Then God said, ‘Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree which has fruit yielding seed; it shall be food for you.”
That plant life was created for food is re-emphasized in verse 30: “‘I have given every green plant for food;’ and it was so.”
A second observation my pot-headed mastermind forgot, though perhaps unintentionally, was that all of this creating took place before sin was introduced into the world, found later in Genesis 3.
With the introduction of sin and the fall of mankind, everything in creation was tainted and perverted.
No longer does the Bible record God seeing the world as “very good,” as he did shortly after creating all the land animals, insects, and mankind on Day 6.
In fact, much later we see God destroying the whole of creation and bringing forth a new heavens and new earth to be ruled over by the New Jerusalem (Isa. 65:17, 22; 2 Pet. 3:13; Rev. 3:12; 21:2).
The ebb and flow of the rest of the biblical record shows just how far sin had led God’s once pristine creation afar, away from God, whereby “the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen. 6:5) and “we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now” (Rom. 8:22).
Marijuana, in other words, was originally created for the purpose of feeding human beings, not for their smoking pleasure, whereby they could succumb to its affects and float away into a thoughtless fog.
Yet, since sin perverted everything, including marijuana’s original intent and man’s thoughts about it, it is no longer a plant or herb that may be used for nutritional purposes.
It is a weed, just like all weeds that were not originally weeds, that is a perversion of the original created order.
To treat marijuana as anything but a weed and then abuse the Bible to justify the perverse treatment of it only demonstrates the great wickedness and evil that God said was inherent in all mankind—continually.
So, next time you meet a pothead advocate who wants to sing the glories of being a pothead, and abuse the Bible in the process, simply ask him what the original purpose was for marijuana.
If he tells you anything other than for nutritional purposes, you can either ask him (or her) for the biblical reference to support his claim or you can open your Bible and show him from Genesis 1 what it reveals.
Hopefully, your acquaintance will not be too stoned out of his mind to understand what you are saying.
