DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE

Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894) wrote the novella “Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” in 1886. The strange things that happen with these two main characters have become legend. So much so that the term “Jekyll and Hyde” has become a part of our language meaning a person who is vastly different in moral character from one situation to the next.

The apostle Paul mentions this struggle with dual personalities when he wrote, “For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.  For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.  Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.”

The scripture mentions this idea in several ways. The Psalmist calls it a “double heart,” and the apostle James, “a double mind,” and the apostle Paul to Timothy calls it, a “double tongue.”

All of this is to say we must be on guard for Jekyll and Hyde moments where we become the other person we do not want to be.

“The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light.” Jesus