Your Faith Is a Personal Choice

“Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard its spots? Neither can you do good who are accustomed to doing evil” (Jeremiah 13:23).

For a long time, the battle of nature versus nurture, or heredity versus environment, has raged. A generation ago, scientists began saying that your heredity isn’t nearly as important as your environment.

Behavioral psychologists such as John Watson and B. F. Skinner contended that you can control the environment, and if so, you can control the person. They demonstrated that the use of rewards or punishment could modify or shape behavior. Well, farmers had been using a less refined approach of this for centuries. They called it the “carrot and whip” approach.

In recent days, however, much of what was considered to be accurate, say 50 years ago, is less than gospel today. The change in our thinking is the result of better understanding our genes and how they affect behavior. Researchers say new evidence proves that genes do affect your behavior; however, the research doesn’t tell you why you do certain things. It only demonstrates there is an association between genes, or heredity, and what you do.

Much of the research has centered on twins who have been separated from birth, or at least from early childhood. Studying the lives of these individuals whose environments have been totally different demonstrates remarkable likenesses in dress, habits, attitudes, and personalities which have to be the result of heredity.

Take, for example, twins Ann Blandin and Barbara Parker; they were separated at birth. Their pregnant mother had arranged for an adoption, but when two babies were born, the obstetrician who delivered the babies took one home. It was in this family that Ann Blandin grew up. Her sister’s adoptive parents separated a year later, and nine years after that, her adoptive mother died. Until some 35 years later, they were separated. Meanwhile, one of the twins had become a beautician; the other had aspired to become one. Both had likes and dislikes that were uncanny. Both were gregarious, perfectionists; they had the same temperament.

In a study of over 100 identical twins, there was one area, however, where beliefs didn’t necessary overlay—it was religious convictions. To me, this is one of the most significant findings of studies. Frankly, recognizing that your heredity plays an important part in your ability to do well at school, your personality and temperament, is somewhat like certifying the obvious. Anyone who has worked with parents who struggle with adopted children has to recognize the powerful element of heredity.

But to recognize that your religious convictions and your faith are not derived from heredity is significant. No one questions that being raised in a home where there are godly parents, impacts the lives of children in a positive way. The Bible talks much about the responsibility of parents when it comes to moral and spiritual instruction. Take, for example, Moses’ instruction that parents were to keep the laws of God “so that you, your children and their children after them may fear the LORD your God as long as you live … ” (Deuteronomy 6:2).

The Bible contends that anyone, regardless of heredity or environment or culture, can come to Him. Paul wrote, “This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:3-4).

Saying that God has no grandchildren, now has scientific backing. You don’t get to heaven on the basis of heredity. In that sense, you have to do it for yourself. You get there on the basis of your personal choice—faith is individual and personal. It’s up to you to decide which way you go.

Resource reading: Joshua 1:19-26.