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A Trio of Lies J. R. Bronger We have closed out the twentieth century. I know that really the century closes at the end of December, but for all intents and purposes we are in the twenty-first century. As any discerning man or woman could easily tell you, the last part of the twentieth century was characterized by lies — lies that were perpetrated and told so often that countless millions believed them. Since Christians are products, at least to some extent, of the world in which we live, then Christians have believed these lies as well. When we believe these lies, they produce a behavior change altering the way we govern our lives. As Christians, we must guard against acceptance of the ways of this world. Paul writes in Rom. 12:1–2: I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. This is especially true with regard to the ideas that shape our society, our culture, and our nation. Every age has had its lies and its infamous liars. I suppose you could say that some politicians of the late twentieth century epitomize all liars. Whether it’s Richard Nixon’s statement, “I’m not a crook,” or Bill Clinton’s finger-wagging confession, “I did not have sex with that woman, Miss Lewinsky,” or Al Gore’s outlandish claim, “I invented the Internet,” these are lies the gullible populace have believed. Of course, the biggest liar of all time is the being Jesus said is the ancestor of all liars — the devil. Jesus said this about Satan in Jn. 8:44: “When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.” My friends, we must be careful that we do not believe the devil’s lies. American poet Oliver Wendell Holmes said, “Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle which fits them all.” The last few decades have produced subtle changes in the bedrock of our American culture, and consequently in the belief system of many who claim to be Christians. These changes have not all been good. In our government, our courts, the media, public schools, and our homes, dangerous lies have been planted that have proved destructive to our country. My friends, unless we recognize and uproot these lies, our society will continue its moral decline, and the church will suffer along the way. One lie we have come to believe is that freedom of religion means freedom from religion. Citizens of this country are constantly conflicted about the Constitution’s First Amendment. The establishment clause of the First Amendment says, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” This amendment means that the federal government cannot establish any particular faith or religion as the nation’s official religion. But the humanists and atheists of the American Civil Liberties Union have loosely interpreted it as a total restriction on religion, or a strict separation of church and state. For decades after the Constitution was written, Americans understood that this amendment was not written to make America a nonreligious country. It wasn’t written to protect us from religion — it was written to protect us from the government. Yet in 1947, the United States Supreme Court declared in the decision of Everson verses the Board of Education, “The wall of separation between church and state must be kept high and impregnable.” This opened the floodgate. In later years, the Supreme Court issued rulings that believers feared would follow in the wake of such philosophy, rulings such as no prayer in public schools in 1962 and no bible reading in public schools in 1963. Then the Supreme Court pronounced religious speech among students unconstitutional in 1965. Recently, the Supreme Court ruled in a six-to-three decision that invocations led by students at football games were also unconstitutional, based upon the lie that freedom of religion means freedom from religion. Based upon this lie, all traces of religion, all aspects of faith, and all appearances of prayer must be eliminated form public in this country. Last Monday in the Indianapolis Star, a sports columnist wrote a commentary in which he praised the decision of the Supreme Court. He said: Let me make this clear: I agreed completely, vehemently and enthusiastically with the U.S. Supreme Court's recent decision to maintain the sanctity of the separation of church and state. I agreed completely that school officials at publicly-funded institutions should not be leading the crowd in any kind of religious prayer, even a non-denominational prayer. What do you think of this? Are you in favor of a religion-free America? The answer you give might depend upon whether you have believed the lie that freedom of religion means freedom from religion. Let me illustrate for you where this lie has led this great country of ours. I can easily do that by just listing some words without comment: Abortion, homosexuality, gambling, drug abuse, suicide, prostitution, pornography, adultery, public nudity, premarital sex, and the recreational use of alcohol. These are all moral issues readily accepted by our society. Our constitution permits a representative of the pro-abortion Planned Parenthood to come in the schools and address a gathering of students, but a 16-year-old Christian cannot use a classroom for a before-school Bible study or lead a group of consenting students in prayer. A male teacher is allowed to tell his male students that he is gay but a male teacher cannot proclaim to the same group that he is a Christian. This lie has led school boards to allow a teacher to bash and ridicule the Bible as a fraud and a lie, but a teacher who believes and respects it is not allowed to praise it to the same group of students. Abortion, homosexuality, gambling, drug abuse, suicide, prostitution, pornography, adultery, public nudity, premarital sex, and the recreational use of alcohol are immoral and wrong only because God says, in His word, that they are immoral and wrong. But when we remove all hints of God from our society, then these things become the norm. These are accepted because God is not accepted. I read where the television show Survivor garnered an audience of more than 50 million viewers for its final episode. I believe this is an apt commentary on the conscience of America. The winner of the million-dollar prize was, as I understand it, an avowed homosexual who celebrated his birthday by going nude before the other contestants and television crew, and maybe even the television audience. This whole sordid mess should offend our sense of morality, but it doesn’t because we collectively have no sense of morality. It is only through the scriptures that we can understand right and wrong, moral and immoral, good and bad. It is through the scriptures that God regulates human conduct. When we eliminate God and his word, the Bible, then we have eliminated the only means by which we can regulate the conduct of men and women. Abortion, homosexuality, gambling, drug abuse, and pornography are so prevalent because mankind resists God's regulation of his behavior. Whenever we conclude that we are free from religion, then we naturally conclude that we are free from any divinely imposed restrictions. Anyone who is even remotely familiar with the Bible probably knows the difference between God's position and man's practices of these moral issues. Trying to exist without God as our compass is impossible. No society can last long when it excommunicates God because what we practice regarding moral issues determines what kind of society we are and will become. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that when we replace God with humanism, prayer with abortion, and the Bible with pornography, that we are on a downward spiral and we cannot long survive as a nation. When the Boy Scout organization is attacked because it does not want to expose young boys to male homosexuals, but then Ellen DeGeneres’s breakup with her lesbian lover is lamented, something is terribly wrong with our culture. What’s wrong is that this country has implemented a policy of non-religion and this has led to a shift in moral values. This liberal shift in moral values is the result of a disregard for God and his word, which is the moral code for all humanity. This society, therefore, has changed. But, the moral nature of God does not change. Heb. 13:8 says, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” The Lord and his standard of morality do not change to reflect the wishes of society. Therefore, God has not changed his instructions to mankind in the 2,000 years since the beginning of the gospel of Christ. Also, as we begin this presidential election season, abortion, homosexuality, gambling, and the other moral issues we have been discussing are becoming hotly contested political issues. As far as I am able to tell, many of these political candidates are hypocrites. They claim to be religious and believe in God, yet they reject the absolute standard of his word. They go into denominational churches and give testimonies about their supposed faith and yet they promote homosexuality, abortion, and gambling. They are for everything God condemns in His word. The reason for this is easy to determine: They believe the lie that freedom of religion means freedom from religion. We must reject this lie. We must understand that morality is critical for our nation’s survival and for our society’s well being. More importantly, the salvation of souls is at risk. The Bible says in Prov. 14:34, “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.” Another lie being believed is that the traditional family is irrelevant. As a result of believing this lie, the end of the twentieth century saw the family under attack and suffering many battle scars. Did you know that today the average marriage lasts for only seven years, and nearly half of marriages dissolve within the first three years? According to some, this country ranks highest among nations in the world in divorces granted. We are told that it matters not whether mom or somebody else, usually a government day care center or privately hired babysitter, nurtures the children. We are also told that dad is not even needed at home. Those concerned about the traditional family are left asking, “Whatever happened to mom, dad and the kids?” The cover of the August 28, 2000 issue of Time pictured four women with the caption, “Who Needs a Husband?” The magazine presented the power and influence of the lie that the traditional family is irrelevant. The article, “Flying Solo,” serves a truckload of this propaganda. The story featured a 32-year-old single woman from Houston, Texas. This young woman said: I've finally matured enough to acknowledge that there's more to life than being married . . . I'd like to get married and have kids, but something in the past few years has changed. I'm happier being single. Later we read that this woman: …might seem to have little in common with the four lead characters on TV's Sex and the City, single women who live the supafly life and discard men quicker than last season's bag and shoes — and look . . . good doing it . . . Unattached females — wisecracking, gutsy gals, not pathetic saps — are the heroine du jour in fiction, from Melissa Bank's collection of stories, The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing, to Helen Fielding's Bridget Jones's Diary, the publishing juggernaut that has spawned one sequel and will soon be a movie. The single woman is TV's It Girl as well, not just on Sex and the City, the smash HBO series in the midst of its third buzz-producing season, but also on a growing number of network shows focused on strong, career-minded single women, such as Judging Amy and Providence. Time points out that: Forty-three million women are currently single, which means that more than 40% of all adult females are single. Also, an estimated four million of these unmarried women are living with their lovers, and a growing number are being more open about gay relationships. This ought to alarm even the most cynical among us. A greater departure from the Bible could not be more evident. God intended for there to be one man for one woman for life. God says in Gen. 2:18, “It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him.” Since that time, God has expected men and women to marry in order to have companionship and raise a family. Adam said in Verses 23 and 24: “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, because she was taken out of man. Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” This is the verse Jesus quoted when questioned about divorce in Matt. 19:5. In verse 9, he said, “Whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery; and whoever marries her who is divorced commits adultery.” We must understand that families are the bedrock of any society and civilization. Heb. 13:4 says, “Marriage is honorable among all, and the bed undefiled; but fornicators and adulterers God will judge.” Families are important and they are relevant. However, forces are working to destroy the family and those forces have a powerful tool — the media. Whether we discuss the Time article or popular television shows, we are being spoon-fed the lie that families are unimportant, irrelevant, and outdated. Let me tell those of you who may not know about the highly popular Sex and the City television series referenced in the Time story. Broadcast on HBO on Sunday nights, it is about four single women who are sleeping with men they consider to be, and treat like, dogs. Columnist James Poniewozik writes about the show in an article titled “Waiting for Prince Charming.” I am going to have to sanitize some of his remarks, but he describes the show this way: Sex columnist Carrie meets her lover Aidan — a shaggy, happy-go-lucky golden retriever of a guy. Lawyer Miranda, cohabiting with scruffy bartender Steve, agrees to buy a pooch with him, and it becomes a metaphor for their unworkable relationship. Husband-hunting Charlotte learns to control her new fiancé with a hand on the wrist: Roll over, boy! Then there's Carrie's on-and-off-and-on squeeze Mr. Big, a sexy, powerful (and married) alpha wolf. Dogs are adorable — in theory. Take one in, though, and it can shed, stray, and worse. In its first two seasons Sex became a pop-culture icon for its astute bedroom politics, for the saucy Seinfeld banter (laced with corny double entendres) of its glam foursome, but above all for recognizing that a woman can live well without being at either end of a man's leash. I wonder how many professed Christians leave Sunday night church services and then tune into this trash? My friends, we must understand that God formed the family unity to preserve us. The Biblical family is composed of a man and woman married for life. The Bible further reveals that it is to be in this family unit that children are to be born and raised. God does not intend for there to be sperm banks across the street from gas stations dispensing children like gallons of unleaded gasoline. In a story entitled “Mom on Her Own,” Tammerlin Drummond writes this: Once upon a time, there was a very happy lady named Marianne who had one thing missing from her life. She wanted a baby. But since Marianne didn't have a husband, she went to a doctor, who gave her seeds from a kind and generous man called a donor. Nine months later, out popped a beautiful baby boy named Sam. That's the story Marianne Boswell, a single mother in a suburb of Boston, tells her five-year-old to help him understand why he doesn't have a daddy. Like many single moms who become parents without a husband or partner, Marianne doesn't have an easy life raising a son on her own. But perhaps the biggest challenge is trying to answer Sam's inevitable questions. “He knows that we're a family with a mommy and a nana,” says Marianne, 47, an executive recruiter. “But I still cringe on Father's Day.” If there are going to be children born, they are to be raised in a two-parent home. A family, as described by the Bible, is mom, dad and the kids. For years, this country recognized this. In 1885, the United States Supreme Court defined the family as “consisting in and springing from the union for life of one man and one woman in the holy estate of matrimony” But now, in 2000, the courts, the legislature, and the average man or woman on the street can’t tell you what a family is. Today, a family consists of two homosexuals or lesbians living together, or a man and woman living together, or a single man or woman adopting a child. Some religious denominations sanction so-called marriages between members of the same sex. And even one state, Vermont, sanctions such perversions of marriage. But, my friends, what we must understand what we must respect is that God approves only of the husband and wife team, provided it is a scriptural union. Also, God approves of children that may bless that union. This is a family, and the prevailing lie that the traditional family is irrelevant will not erase that truth. A third lie that is being spread and believed, a lie I might add that is closely related to what we have just discussed, is the lie that the sexual revolution has set us free. After the decade of the sixties, in which love-ins and live-ins became the norm, this nation became fixated with sex. Then in 1970 our government entered the sex education business, and since then has put billions of tax dollars into promoting so-called “safe sex” in public schools. Kids today may not be able to do the multiplication tables or discuss intelligently the history of this nation, but they can tell you about sex. They know more about sex than they do about most everything else. Parents, it is not biology these kids are being taught. They are being taught how to engage in sex. It is true that some school curricula include a small discussion of abstinence, but most sex education educators and, for that matter, many parents do not believe that abstinence is achievable. Therefore, our nation and the government-run and -controlled schools are inundating our children with ideas about sex and then telling them how to engage in sex, albeit safe sex. Here are some of the myths widely propagated by the safe-sex advocates: First, they say, “Young people are going to be sexually active anyway, so we might as well teach them to be responsible.” Second, they say, “Sex education in our schools is value-neutral.” Also, a third myth is one I already mentioned briefly, which is, “Abstinence is not realistic.” No thinking or intellectually honest man or woman can say that sex education is value-neutral, because someone’s values will govern the study. And it will not be the values of God, because he has been banned from the discussion. It won’t be the values gleaned from the teaching of Christ, because the Bible has been blacklisted. And, Christian parent, it won’t be your values, because you won’t be instructing the course. It will be the amoral values of the teacher, a teacher who has been selected and approved by a government-controlled board who has publicly stated they are free of any Bible influence. No one has been freed by sexual revolution. Instead, we have reshaped our schools into a laboratory to turn out sexually active kids. Then we need to build more abortion mills because kids are not learning to engage in sex responsibly, they are simply learning to engage in sex. God intends for there to be complete sexual abstinence until marriage. 1 Cor. 6:18 tells us, “Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body.” Also, God intends for marriage to be a man with a woman. 1 Cor. 7:2 says plainly, “Let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband.” This says nothing about a man having a husband or a woman having a wife. After marriage, God intends for there to be fidelity to one’s spouse. In Heb. 13:4 God says the marriage bed is to remain “undefiled.” Soldiers in the sexual revolution aren’t hearing these Biblical truths. Therefore, instead of bringing liberty, they have brought bondage to sin. |
