Archive for the ‘Ethics’ Category

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Until about fifty years ago in America, lasciviousness, adultery, and fornication were almost universally deemed reprehensible. Divorce was shameful, pornography was underground, and homosexuality was illegal. These elements are now on open display and enjoy wide approval—and participation.

Is our nation stronger or weaker because of these changes? Are families/homes more or less secure? Is the “misery index” for individuals greater or less? Do more or fewer people turn to chemical “solutions” for failure to find “purpose” in life? Are we experiencing more or fewer individual murders by abortion and mass murders? To ask is to answer.

Many “whys” might be suggested to explain the unarguable decline in national morals and ethics. Arguably, they all go back to a single taproot: Charles Darwin and his evolutionary hoax. Before his theories caught on in the 1870s, Western nations, though divided between Protestant and Catholic, were united in accepting the Biblical view of man as the apex of the creation of the Almighty, Self-existent God. Man had a purpose—to glorify God—and the Bible set forth man’s behavior that would do so.

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In the mildest of his epistles (in terms of rebuke and correction), the apostle Paul nonetheless warned the Philippian saints of “enemies of the cross of Christ” (3:18–19), which he at one time was. He thereby vividly aligned those who lived contrary to the Gospel with the former Saul of Tarsus in his most zealous days of persecuting the Lord. Notably, Paul here made the cross the apex, summary, and symbol of Jesus’ earthly life and work (His purpose in coming, His doctrine, His church, et al.).

In this context the apostle specified three identifying marks of these enemies, who still thrive all about us:

• “Whose God is the belly”—These are those who live only to satisfy fleshly appetites. They live by the philosophy, “If it feels good, do it.” The gross breakdown of sexual morality in our nation over the past half-century is a graphic manifestation of “belly-worship.” “Bibliolatry” also reveals itself in hedonisms ranging from road rage to alcohol consumption, drug addiction, gambling, and various criminal acts (some of which, politicians in the highest circles of power are guilty). As America has increasingly cast aside the Bible (and God with it), its righteous restraints of continence and self-control have increasingly vanished. “Belly-worship” is simply unmitigated selfishness, which is a good working definition of Secularism and Humanism.
• “Whose glory is in their shame”—Glory here refers to that of which men can justifiably be proud, thus things men ought to honor. The enemies of Calvary have turned things upside down, proudly parading behaviors which they should count disgraceful. No more apt description than this could be drafted of the homosexual practitioners and their defenders. In step with them are those who advocate removing all restraints in the entertainment media on nudity, sexual acts, and cesspool language. All who participate in and boast of any evil deed have thereby made themselves “enemies of the cross.”
• “Who mind earthly things”—These live only for time, with little or no thought beyond (which is why their “bellies” are their god). Theirs is the old Epicurean credo: “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die” (1 Cor. 15:32). Humanism, its modern incarnation, denies the immortality of the soul, the Resurrection of the body, and the realm of spirits.

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Introduction

The Pharaoh of Moses' time ordered that every male Hebrew was to be slain at birth (Exo. 1:16, 22). He is remembered in Scripture (and by all right-thinking men) as an unspeakably cruel, immoral, and evil man (Acts 7:19). The ancient Greek pagans “exposed” their unwanted and helpless infants to wild animals and the elements to dispose of them, and most moderns call their behavior “barbaric” and “inhumane.” Herod the Great murdered all of the male infants living in and around Bethlehem at the time of Jesus’ birth (Mat. 2:16). Even the irreligious justly recoil at his jealous blood thirst.

 Mass Murderers in Modern Times

History remembers Adolf Hitler as a homicidal maniac on a grand scale for his destruction of 6,000,000 Jews in the Holocaust of the 1930s and 1940s. Josef Stalin is said to have murdered far more than this number of his own people. Chairman Mao slaughtered even more than Stalin. However, even Hitler, Stalin, and Mao were small time operators beside the perpetrators and advocates of legalized, casual abortion in our “civilized” nation. In the forty-five years since the heinous decision of the Supreme Court was handed down (Roe v. Wade, January 22, 1973), almost 61,000,000 totally innocent, indefensible, babies have been murdered—either in the womb or in the process of being born—by abortion (http://www.numberofabortions.com/).

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            It is always helpful to have a roadmap when traveling, whether on literal roadways or on the journey of life. With this in mind, I present the following as the “map” I aim to follow in my life and work as a Gospel preacher:

1. I aim to be true to God’s Word, regardless of the consequences: “Blessed are ye when men shall reproach you, and persecute you, and say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets that were before you” (Mat. 5:11–12).
2. I aim to seek the approval of God and His Son above that of all others: “Give diligence to present thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, handling aright the word of truth” (2 Tim. 2:15).
3. I aim to gain as much knowledge and understanding of God’s Word as my abilities will allow: “…Give heed to reading, to exhortation, to teaching…  Be diligent in these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy progress may be manifest unto all” (1 Tim. 4:13–15).
4. I aim to impart to as many as I can, by every honorable means, my knowledge and understanding of God’s Word: “And the things which thou hast heard from me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also” (2 Tim. 2:2).
5. I aim to say something worth listening to when I stand up to preach: “Preach the word; be urgent in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching” (2 Tim. 4:2).
6. I aim to remember that I have a family and that I have responsibilities as a husband and a father as well as a Gospel preacher: “Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself up for it;… And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but nurture them in the chastening and admonition of the Lord” (Eph. 5:25; 6:4).
7. I aim to provide a worthy example for all ages, especially the young, to follow: “…Be thou an ensample to them that believe, in word, in manner of life, in love, in faith, in purity” (1 Tim. 4:12).
8. I aim to deal fairly and equally with every person: “I charge thee in the sight of God, and Christ Jesus, and the elect angels, that thou observe these things without prejudice, doing nothing by partiality” (1 Tim. 5:21).
9. I aim to refrain from being vengeful toward those who disagree with me or treat me wrongfully: “Avenge not yourselves, beloved, but give place unto the wrath of God: for it is written, Vengeance belongeth unto me; I will recompense, saith the Lord” (Rom. 12:19).
10. I aim to learn the difference between the more important and the less important and do the most important things first: “But seek ye first his kingdom, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (Mat. 6:33).

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One either believes the Bible to be God’s revelation of Himself to men, or one does not. God does not (and no man can) force anyone to accept the Bible as such. One, however, ought not to profess such belief if one is unwilling to accept what it says without seeking to alter it. Popularity, agreement with my notions, convenience, political correctness, nor any other factors affect or determine the meaning of its words to the genuine believer.

Whether or not one believes the Bible to be God’s Word, he should be honest enough to let the Bible say what it says. One forfeits any claim of integrity when he knowingly twists Biblical statements (2 Pet. 3:16) so as to make them appear to teach other than what they teach (often making the Bible thereby contradict itself). This statement applies equally to professed believers and to infidels. Countless times each day presumptuous men seek to make the Bible say what they want it to say/teach (rather than what it obviously says/teaches) in an effort to justify a position, creed, bias, or agenda.

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