Our Country's Only Hope

 

What is going on in our country?

Since the election of Donald Trump, and especially since the arrival of the China virus on our shores, this country has been under an increasing attack.                     

We’re attacked financially in the form of job loss, businesses shut down, growth stunted. We’re attacked physically in the eruption of lawlessness and chaos, under the cloak of “peaceful protests” which are nothing more than imported riots. Cities are being burned by people who don’t even live in those burning cities. And the mayors of those towns are providing the matches and gasoline and blocking the fire department from doing their jobs.

Insanity has taken over. The answer to the incredible lawlessness and destruction? Defund the police.

The answer to the morality vacuum is to remove the very roots of Faith that this country was built upon.

It’s not only okay to riot…it’s encouraged. But meet in a house of worship and you literally face arrest.

We stand at a critical time in our nation’s history where, once again, we face the very real prospect of a civil war of some form. Come election day, November 3, 2020, we may very well see some form of bloodshed as the tipping point is reached. I feel more and more comfortable that President Trump will win re-election, and in doing so, we will see a level of hatred and insanity the likes of which this country has not seen since 1865.

How did we get here, and how can we leave here?

In my assessment as a believer in Jesus Christ and an adherent to Christianity, we got here because we abandoned the faith this nation was founded upon. On the surface that’s a generic, almost trite, Christianese statement. But let’s look more closely at this.

First…the fault lies to a large measure, with American Christians themselves. We have become complacent and we have compromised the core of the faith that built this country.

In decades past, when a revival hit a town, bars were closed. Broken homes were mended. Businessmen became better bosses. Young men surrendered to the ministry. Houses of prostitution were shuttered. Whole communities were altered for generations to come, because the people took God seriously. The realized they had come face to face with a Holy God, and the thought gave them pause. They dare not defile what He had done in their town. The Holy Spirit broke loose on people and they were radically changed. Sin was exposed…and it was not tolerated.

In more recent times -maybe the last thirty years or so—this has fallen by the wayside. The Church became a big business and like every big business, the focus became growth and profit. Growth was defined by quantity not quality. And so, the message was compromised. In the name of Grace, sin became something almost non-offensive to the new version of God they began worshipping. Where my generation (I am 57) was raised to dread the very thought of sin and run from it…subsequent generations were taught that sin isn’t really the bad thing we were told it was. It’s just part of being a human after all, and how dare the Church stand against it? We’re insensitive. We’re “graceless” or legalistic. Surely Jesus would not care about sin…He’d only care about the sinner.

They twisted the scriptures to meet their twisted views, until the scriptures themselves were so unrecognizable that they then started dismissing them altogether. The Genesis account of Creation became a “myth” that the author used to illustrate a point. This led to “pastors” endorsing gay marriage because after all…the Adam and Eve story was now just a myth. “Love is love” they declared and being popular was all they cared about.

The battle was no longer against sin…it was against anything actually being a sin.

Let’s be clear here…America was not founded as a theocracy. The founders were dead set against that idea. We were not a “Christian Nation” as some would describe us. But we were a Nation of Christians. The first amendment was put in place to guarantee the freedom of expressing and promoting the Christian faith our founders adhered too. They did not believe in forcing adherence to Christianity, or they would have written that into the Constitution. But they did believe that Christianity -if protected by that Constitution and practiced properly—would govern the nation and create a “Theocracy by proxy.” Their vision for the country was that Christianity would be properly lived out in a way that made it irresistible and thereby it would become -almost through Osmosis—the true governing power of our nation.

But the church has surrendered this. The church has grown cold and tolerant…two things that always lead to destruction. The church needs to repent of her luke-warmness. Repent of her carelessness. Repent of her attitude toward sin. The church needs to stop being concerned about being popular, and start being concerned about being Holy!

The Bride of Christ has become a party girl. Instead of a solemn virgin, she has become a popularity seeking gold digger. Seeking the love and approval of a world that only knows to hate her. Jesus Himself said “Do not be alarmed when they hate you…they hated me first.” (John 15:18)

We have spent the last thirty years trying desperately to get the world to love us and all we get is increased hatred. Because they see through the attempt. They expected from us, boundaries and an uncomfortable declaration of sin. Instead they got “woke” ness and weak capitulation. And they only see it as weakness, and they hate us even more.

If this country will survive, it must start with a revival in the church. One that brings a clear, concise, unwavering declaration of sin, and of God’s holiness. We must be the friend of sinners but the absolute sworn enemy of sin. And that line must not be blurred.

Being “woke” “seeking to understand” “extending grace” have all become nothing more than excuses for embracing bad behavior. Yes…embracing. We moved from tolerating, to approving, to embracing it.

We have failed.

This nation needs a repentant, broken, determined-to-be-holy Church to get serious about the time that remains.                                                                                          Without this, we are already lost.