Last week the news was falling all over itself to report on the overturn of proposition 8. I am not sure how this is being reported in the rest of the country so if you need to get up to speed here is an article from the San Jose Mercury News titled, "Federal judge strikes down California's ban on same-sex marriage". 50 years ago we would have said universally that homosexuality is sin and it was viewed by most people as morally reprehensible. Today this is no longer the case. Today people see pedophilia as morally reprehensible and sin. Will this still be the case 50 years from today? It is a legitimate question in the light of how our culture has changed in the last 50 years. What has happened that has brought about the changes that we see today. 50 years ago the 1960's were kicking in and free love with a strong dose of independence was the siren call many could not resist. The moral walls of our society began to crumble. What caused the walls to be so weak in the face of the immoral tide that struck it? I did not live then but I think that the roots of the problem can be traced to the church of the early twentieth century. From what I can tell in church history there was a strong reaction to the neo-orthadoxy coming out of Germany's seminaries and universities. Two things happened. Neo-orthadoxy called into question the literal inspiration of scripture and saw inspiration as being something more personal that happens when the word of God becomes inspired for me (This is a broad simplification because of space. E-mail me if you want to discuss this.). The second thing is the conservative church over-reacted to what they saw as a liberal take on inspiration. Another thing was coupled with this. The church was hit with a widely distributed set of books called, "The Fundamentals". This produced a conservative swing that put up code of conduct fences and condemnation fences. Phrases like, "I don't smoke, I don't chew and I don't run with boys that do" were byproducts of this conservative swing. I think it was during this time that some denominations developed the theology of secondary separation. In a nutshell they separated themselves from anyone that did not adhere to their brand of doctrine. Some denominations still hold this view to this day. What happened is, we added a whole bunch of things to the Christian life and walk that were not scripture, but were held in the same regard. This did not have the intended effect of strengthening the church. Quite the opposite happened. The young people growing up in this environment in these churches saw right through the hypocrisy of it. Essentially the moral strength of the word of God was gutted by man insisting on adding his two bits to the pot. Since the churches moral base seemed to many to be arbitrary the next logical decision was that anything goes. People started crossing lines that were clearly spelled out in scripture. Line after line was crossed. The church retreated from this onslaught. Usually she demanded more and more that her position on all these added things was the right one. When she seemed to be losing the culture she resorted to politics. The church began to be seen as political -- seeking to legislate her version of morality. This brings us to today with a society that is rapidly sliding toward an ancient Roman style of life. Rome was marked by open pedophilia, gladiatorial games and meaningless marriage. The church as it appears to the world is a moral mess. She has very little integrity left. She pats herself on the back when a bunch of conservatives in California rallied the people to make a state constitutional amendment even in the face of great opposition. We won that social battle but we lost the court battle at this point, and it looks like we could lose the war.
And yet there is still hope. I see a fresh desire for God, a renewed embrace of God's word and a greater compassion for the lost. God is moving in people everywhere to ignite a passionate fire for Him in their hearts. The only way that this war will be won is in the hearts and minds of people. They have to meet the awesome God of the Bible Jesus the Christ (Psalm 24:1-5). Their moral foundation needs to be in the bedrock of His word and His word alone (Hebrews 4:12). Is this a daunting challenge? NO! God used 12 men to turn the world upside down. With God anything is possible (Mark 10:27). Be encouraged. Don't be ashamed (2 Timothy 1:12, 2:15). Keep your eyes on Jesus and show the world around you the magnificent God that you serve. Helping others to embrace a God focused life will bring them freedom from slavery to sin and give them the greatest possible future they could ever hope for. So seek the Lord and take Him with you into the world.
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