Society under Siege: Drug Abuse

Romans 12:1-2; 1 Corinthians 6:12-13; Galatians 6:6-7.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on October 16, 2016.

Although drugs have been around in one form or another throughout the history of our nation and even all of mankind, it has really been since the 1950’s that our society has become inundated with them.  Of course through the years we have made a distinction between medicinal drugs and illicit drugs.  Our purpose is not to go into that today other than to recognize that there can be a legitimate use of drugs.  Churches today are challenged by the difficulty of helping people who are stuck in drug addiction and whose lives are spiraling out of control.

Those who desire help to get out of the grip of drugs have many problems.  Some of them are the physical addictions that can occur.  Others are the mental, coping mechanisms that are unhealthy and continually turn back to the false peace of a drug.  The shame and guilt that such a person feels can push them further and further away from the very people they need around them. I believe that this onslaught of drugs in our nation is orchestrated and promoted by the evil, spiritual powers that seek to destroy the Gospel of Christ.  War is not easy.  But, if we are to help people, we cannot surrender to the temptation to either push people away because they keep turning back to drugs, or redefine what is good.  Some segments within the Church are being swayed by reasoning that overlooks the dangers of drug abuse and how people end up stuck in it.

How We Live Matters

In Romans Paul has written to the Corinthians about many ways that they are living and the morality or theology behind them.  Their theology and lives were being affected by the culture around them.  This is true of the Church in the United States of America.  Increasingly modern Christians have been surrendering certain areas by saying that they are no longer moral issues.  We determine that abortion is no longer immoral and thus encourage women in a destructive path.  We are beginning to do the same with drugs.  Many ideas are coming together to promote a theology of drugs that basically says it is not a moral issue.  This is a tactical mistake.

In chapter 12 of the letter to the Romans Paul reminds believers that their lives should be lived as a sacrifice to God.  Paul calls it a “living sacrifice” because the imagery is going from the very literal sacrifices they were used to seeing to the spiritual sacrifice of putting to death our fleshly desires for the glory of the purposes of God.  In fact, both Christians and those who do not believe live a life of dying.  The important question is, “To what am I dying?”  The Lost live a life surrendering to the desires of their flesh and their spirit/soul dies in its ability to connect with God.  Whereas the Christian surrenders to the desires of the Holy Spirit and their fleshly desires are put to death.  Of course, this is a daily thing.  So Christians are called to live life in a way that is following the Spirit of God and not the desires of our flesh.  Paul calls it our holy and acceptable sacrifice.

The term “holy” means that we are not for the common use.  Our lives have been set apart for a divine purpose and not a common purpose (i.e. what everyone else is doing).  Also, the term acceptable is often used in a negative way.  In other words, “OK, I guess that is barely good enough.”  That is not what this word means in this translation.  Our lives are not to be lived so as to be barely good enough.  Rather, the word has the meaning of that which is pleasing.  So our sacrifice is to live for God’s purposes, not our own (holy), and to offer that which is pleasing to God.  It is my contention that the Holy Spirit is not leading people to take drugs, especially recreationally, and that they promote a lifestyle that is anything but pleasing to God.

Paul also brings up the issue of conforming to this world’s way of living.  Conformity focuses on the outward shape without a true change of the nature of a person.  Thus a person who has murderous intentions in their heart can conform to the pressure of society to not act on that impulse.  However, their nature has not changed.  Conformity is temporary by nature.  Thus many people live a life of continually taking on new shapes that conform to the templates that the world gives us (like Play Dough).  So whether you take on the template of a driven business person, who doesn’t do drugs, or you take on the template of the person without a job doing drugs in mom’s attic, both are templates that this world offers in opposition to what Jesus has called us to.  So you may think you have your life in order, but many times you have conformed to the world in a different way.  Also, many people who take drugs seem to think that they are somehow breaking out of the system and going their own way.  This too is self-delusion.  Yes, we do need a better template, and Jesus can be that.  However, He is more than a template.

Paul places the word “transformation” against this conformity.  In fact, many churches have lost sight of this difference.  Transformation is a change of nature, not just outward shape.  We must be careful that our discipleship does not become focused on merely changing the shape of people’s lives.  Without an inner transformation they will only be taking on a religious template that is conformity to the world in the end.   Paul says that our transformation comes by the renewal of our mind.  This is precisely the problem.  We are told by someone that our lives should look a certain way.  But in the end we are not learning to listen to the Holy Spirit and say no to our flesh.  The Pharisees had just such a religion: all conformity and no transformation.

The renewal of our mind definitely starts with a moment of believing in Jesus and God placing a new spirit within us.  However, it continues day by day as we work each day to have our thinking renewed back to the way God intended it.  How do we do this? 

First, we have to counter the continual barrage of antichrist ideas and lifestyles that wear down our mind by meditating on the Word of God.  In John 8:32, Jesus tells us that “…the truth shall set you free.”  The problem with lies is that no matter how good they make your life in the short term, they cannot lead to long term good.  Why?  They can’t because they refuse to deal with reality, to deal with Truth.  Daily prayer is the place where we converse with God about what His Word reveals and what His Spirit is leading us to do.  It is the daily maintenance of the transformation that God is doing in our life.  We also need the fellowship of other believers around us.  When we are surrounded by those with a worldly mentality, we will be like the frog in the kettle, slowly being boiled to death.  Fellow believers give us a sounding board that can help us when we are knocked down or coming under deception.

When our mind is renewed to think like Jesus rather than the world, our life will be transformed.  Paul says that then we will prove what is the good, perfect, and acceptable will of God.  God’s will always leads to good in the long term.  The word “perfect” has more the idea of complete or lacking nothing.  When we follow God’s will we are lacking nothing that we need.  This is important when you think about how the Devil tempted Eve into eating the fruit.  He got her to believe that God’s will wasn’t perfect (enough).  Of course the word acceptable like we already mentioned means that which is pleasing to God.  Our life and the results of our decisions become living proof to ourselves and to the people around us that God’s will is good and lacks nothing. 

So take time to scrutinize God’s Word and determine what is good and then live it out.  This will confirm that God knows what He is talking about.  Take time to pray about how to do that and for the strength to do it.  You will be a living example to others that the “sacrificial life” is truly life indeed.

So What is Wrong with Drugs?

So we come back to this question whether you ask it in regards to our society or in regards to being a Christian.  Why not just legalize all drugs?  In some ways legalization is a red-herring.  It sounds like an answer, but not really.  When drugs are “legalized” there will most likely be more laws on the books regarding their sale, distribution, and use (think in terms of “legal” alcohol).  It is legal to drive a car across town.  But don’t think for a second that legality solves all the problems of an issue.  Thus there will always be laws and legalizing drugs will not solve the problems that come with drugs.  The real question is, “What is good for a person,” and, especially for Christians, “What reflects the image of God that we see in Christ?”  Contrary to popular conception, Jesus would not be hanging out in some mother’s attic with his disciples smoking weed.  Why?

The first reason is that drugs affect the mind away from Christ.  The Spirit of God has always used His Word and the experiences in our life to transform our minds.  The life-giving method of God is to speak truth to people in the midst of their difficulties.  Drugs, however, debilitate a person’s ability to reason, and not just when you are high.  The mind-altering effects are both physical and logical.  Our life becomes fixated on the desires of our flesh rather than on the Spirit of God.  Now we need to also recognize that drugs can open our mind to spiritual experiences.  Throughout history many cultures have used drugs in order to make it easier to contact the spirit realm.  Here is the problem.  God does not use this method.  No holy prophet in the Bible ever used drugs in order to get a message from God.  This was a method used by the pagan religions with their fallen angel “gods.”  So even if you use drugs for a “spiritual” purpose, you will only connect with deceiving, lying spirits that seek to use you against Christ and His people.

Another aspect of this mind-altering effect is a false sense of euphoria.  Though a person may be able to “feel good” for a short time, it becomes a feeling that is harder and harder to achieve.  So you head down a path that destroys your ability to have a real life and allows you to have a temporary “feel good” moment in the midst of crushing pain and sorrow.  This is even worse than the picture in the movie “The Matrix.”  At least there they weren’t aware of their condition.  But, the person on drugs is continually trying to escape the increasing hell of their life.  On the flip side, God offers a person the ability to have peace and joy even in the face of the worst situations imaginable.  When Jesus went to the cross, he did not “feel good.”  But he did have clarity about what His actions would achieve.  He would be paving the way for relationships that He would have with millions in the future.  He faces the “bad feelings” of living for God in this wicked world, in order to receive the eternity of joy with new brothers and sisters.

Lastly drugs impair our ability to function.  We become less and less able to deal with life around us.  Even when a person joins up with a gang or group of like-minded friends, we may be able to get along for awhile.  But, in the end the drugs are sucking out your life like a vampire, and putting the poison of death into everything that you have.  If drugs only did this it would be reason enough to reject them.

In 1 Corinthians 6:12-13 we have a passage where Paul is responding to some statements that the Corinthians themselves had written in their letter to him.  The first statement from the Corinthians is “All things are lawful for me.”  I can only assume they are referring to the fact that they are no longer under the Law of Moses.  Thus in their mind they could do whatever they wanted as long as they called themselves Christians.  Instead of arguing about the lawfulness of what they were doing, Paul goes along with them.  Basically he says, “Yes, all things are lawful for you, but not all things are helpful (beneficial). “  He then states it again but differently.  “Yes, all things are lawful for you, but I will not be brought under the power of anything.”  So notice the two points Paul makes.  Basically he is pointing out that legality is itself a red herring.  Legality is moot for the Christian.  What is important is whether or not something is good for me (i.e. helps me be more like Jesus) and that it doesn’t enslave me.   You can argue about whether or not you are “addicted,” but being enslaved to something is not about just a physical need for something.  Drugs and the desire for their effects becomes a controlling thing in people’s lives.  You will find yourself rationalizing things that you would have never done before you started taking them.  Even if you start out trying to keep focused on God’s things, this will die off as you keep pushing away the Spirit of God.  When our police officers go into the homes of people who are trapped in a life of drugs, they witness that people are complete slaves to the drugs.  It becomes their god and they sacrifice everything (family, kids, jobs, etc…) in order to please it.

Galatians 6:6-7 says, “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that will he also reap.  For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life.”  If we do not follow Christ we are actively destroying our life.  I end with these verses because this is really what it is all about: not being deceived.  Can we use drugs medicinally?  Of course, we can.  However, medicine should never become a controlling and addicting thing in our life.  Medicine is not given to people because they enjoy how it makes them feel.  Rather, it is taken to help restore something that is wrong in the body.  Thus we have a system of prescriptions from doctors and controls on drugs that can be beneficial if used correctly.  I do not have time to deal with the fact that not all medicines are as good as they purport due to the desire of drug companies to make money.

Quit asking yourself what is biblically legal and start asking what will make you more like Jesus.  If we are not becoming more like Jesus then we are decaying into the destruction of our life, and perhaps even our soul.  In this way drugs are just another rabbit trail that the Devil uses to side-track us from Jesus and towards destruction.

The world has gotten good at the physical side of helping people through withdrawals and detoxification.  However, it is has little to offer for the spiritual side of a person.  Even 12 step programs can be so watered down that the spiritual truth gets pushed out.  Your child or spouse cannot be your higher power.  You need Jesus in your life.  You need to be touched by God and made alive to His Holy Spirit.  The only way to truly be free in this life is to ask Jesus to forgive you of your sins and then trust the way that He has told us to live.  This includes the apostles that He authorized to go out and teach the nations how to follow him.  Blessings.

Under seige: Drugs

Society under Siege: Neo-Pagan Green Movement

Genesis 1:27-28; 2:15; Mark 2:23-28.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on October 9, 2016. 

Our modern era is often presented as a very scientific, technologically advanced, and non-religious.  However, what is often missed is that there are many streams of spirituality that are thriving within this society besides Christianity.  A few of which are: Wiccans, Neo-Pagans, the New Age Movement, mediums and channelers, many Hindu/Buddhism influenced groups, Extraterrestrial groups.  Many of them have a view of history that sees a spiritual evolutionary leap coming ahead for mankind.  What is interesting about these groups is that they are tied in to a common view of the spiritual realm, which is the same view as the ancient pagan religions, and that is an All-Is-One spirituality.  Today, I am using the term Neo-Pagan in a very broad description to cover this resurgence of the old spiritual world view.

Our society is not getting less spiritual and becoming atheistic.  On the contrary society is only pushing certain spiritual ideas aside and grabbing onto others.  In this environment, the Christian world view has been put in the bull’s-eye of many of these groups.  Sometimes this is seen in an open clash of ideas.  But, other times it is hidden in the background slowly chipping away at the foundations of our society that are built upon a Christian world view.  We see this in the rise of environmentalist groups that have a neo-pagan world view.  They are actually a mixture of some very good ideas with a very bad world view.  These groups see the earth as a quasi-sentient consciousness that we need to be in harmony with along with the rest of the cosmos.  This should concern Christians because God reveals to us in the Bible that mankind is not headed towards a scientific atheism.  Rather, we are actually headed to a society that will worship a particular man as a god and surrender the control of the nations to him.

Man Should Care for the Earth

In Genesis 1:27-28 and 2:15 we find that God put mankind on the earth with a purpose, and part of that purpose was for mankind to care for the earth.  Let’s look at the descriptions that God uses in telling Adam what this purpose was.  At first He tells us to be fruitful.  At first look that could just be a metaphor for “multiplying.”  However, in light of what the rest of Scripture says about fruitfulness (especially Jesus), we should recognize that this fruitfulness goes beyond the population of humanity.  God made mankind to be fruitful in other ways as well: mentally, occupationally, and spiritually.  Man should express and live out the life-giving image of God.

God also tells mankind to fill the earth.  Thus the Garden of Eden was not just a fabulous prison.  God’s plan was for mankind to fill the whole earth.  That doesn’t mean we have to keep going until there is 1 person for every square foot of land.  But, neither does it support the idea that mankind shouldn’t touch most of the earth and the population should remain under 500 million, which is what many of the elites of the earth believe.

Another term that is used is that mankind should “subdue” the earth and “rule/take dominion” over the all of its creatures.  The term subdue is the idea of bringing something under your control.  Of course this has a negative connotation if you are talking about subduing a person.  But in this case we are talking about a planet that is in a wild condition.  The whole earth was not a paradise, only a portion.  God creates the earth in a wild state that has all the raw materials for mankind’s purpose, but would need to be brought under control.  In its wild state it would not be fully useful.  The Garden would then be a kind of template for mankind to expand as they multiplied.

We are not told to subdue the animals, but rather to rule over them.  Again, ruling itself can seem negative.  But the truth is that the real problem lies in how one rules and not that they do at all.  Our rule of the creatures should reflect the image of God and respect that they ultimately belong to Him.  Thus we should be good stewards of the earth and its creatures, just as God is good.

Lastly Adam is told to work and tend the Garden.  This fixed up area would be expanded and the fruitfulness was to be good for both man and creatures.  The work would then involve watching over the threats against the garden’s fruitfulness and the eventual expansion of it.  Notice that the Bible does not present the Earth as some kind of sacred space that mankind should not touch.  Yet, neither does it present the Earth as man’s to do with as he wishes without any accountability to the Creator.  We are to care for the earth and make it fruitful.

Although the Christian has a strong foundation for being staunchly concerned with the environment and keeping it fruitful, we arrive at it from a very different world view than these Neo-pagan, green groups.  To them mankind must make a spiritual connection to the Earth and the spiritual forces of the cosmos.  Although they would look at many things as evil, that is only a remnant of Christian thinking.  In truth, the Neo-pagan world view doesn’t believe in evil, only imbalance of actions.  Thus mankind is out of balance and needs to be brought back into balance.  If that takes actions that Christians would describe as evil, then so be it.  They would deny any existence of fallen spiritual beings that are deceiving mankind and even promote a seductive desire to connect with the enlightened spirits who have gone before us.  It is here that we see the insidious twisting of biblical truth.  Movies like Avatar use a false dichotomy to promote this new spiritualism.  So your two choices are a capitalistic, greedy company that destroys everything in order to get a rare, non-earth metal called Unobtainum on the one hand and an indigenous culture that lives in harmony with the planet and its creatures by plugging into them with a kind of mental, spiritual connection on the other hand.  Believing in right and wrong, that will be ultimately judged by the personal Creator who is both within and beyond that creation, is anathema to these groups.  Now let’s finish this study by looking at a passage in the Gospel of Mark concerning the Sabbath day.

Everything Needs Rest

In Mark 2:23-28 the word Sabbath literally means rest.  The most well known application of this was the one day of the week that Israel was supposed to refrain from working.  On that day they would enjoy rest and worship God.  Now, I am not preparing to teach that we should be following the Law of Moses.  However, we can gain wisdom from God’s commands in the past.  In this passage Jesus deals with a legalistic view of the Sabbath that existed in Israel at the time.  They had developed many nit picking laws of what you could or couldn’t do.  So the Pharisees accused the disciples of Jesus of  “harvesting” when they were simply walking through some fields and picked some heads off of the grain to eat.

Notice that Jesus does not quibble with their expanded definition of harvesting.  Rather he points out the true intention of the Sabbath Law or the spirit of the law.  The Pharisees had turned the day into a dictatorial overlord that the people had to satisfy at any cost.  It was man who must always yield and not the law regardless of the consequences.  Jesus points to the reality that God gave the law of Rest for the benefit of the people.  It was created in order to help us not put restrictions on us.  Thus we can learn the wisdom that it is not good for man to drive himself 24/7/365.  Physically he would breakdown, and spiritually he would see himself as his own source and go down a bad path.

Now this was also true for the land that they used to grow crops.  It needed a break as well.  Thus they were told to not work the land one year out of every seven.  They were to let the land rest.  If they would do this then God would bless them and their land would continue to be fruitful.  Thus God qualifies man’s subduing of the earth in order to make it fruitful, by also teaching us that it needs rest as we do.  When you couple this with man’s other purpose to image God in how he fulfills his purpose, you have two powerful restraints that God gives to the greed and wickedness that can infect that purpose.  In fact, isn’t this the sense of the modern business world?  There is practically no concept of rest and “this is enough.”  This driven, ungodly desire to keep squeezing more out of everything is not how we were designed to thrive.  This is partly why many turn back to the ancient pagan ideas of spirituality.  They know that there has to be something better than this perversion that we see today.  We were created to be in relationship with our Creator, and when we aren’t a vacuum is created in our hearts that haunts us until we try to fill it with something.

So what should we do?  In some ways technology and our increase in knowledge can either destroy us or help us.  We can do powerful things, more quickly than ever before.  However, it should be done in a way that honors God as the Creator and the Earth as His creation.  The leaders of the world today do not and will not honor the Creator.  Thus they will only use these tools to honor themselves, and the spiritual power that many of them are connecting to through the occult, and other spiritualistic means.  The baseline of this tragic choice is that the ancient pagan world view devalued mankind.  Christianity teaches that God has given mankind a great value and we must seek His help to fully realize it.  However, Neo-paganism devalues mankind to a place as just one of many animals that is causing the world to be out of balance.  This is why a baby seal garners more compassion than a baby in the womb.  The idea that the Earth would be better off if humans were eradicated, or at least subdued by the enlightened ones, comes from this world view.  We are in the middle of falling into the greatest slavery that mankind has ever known. How about you?  Have you found the rest that God has designed for you to have?  Are you growing to be like Him?  Are you fruitful in every way?  Turn back to the Creator and learn to rest in Him so that we can truly enjoy all that God has given to us to enjoy.

neo-pagan Audio

Society under Siege: Social Activism

Mt. 28:18-20; John 13:1-8.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on October 2, 2016.

What is social activism?  It is the tactic of creating social upheaval, and thereby pressuring the government into changing laws and policies.  Ultimately it is about changing society.  The idea of manipulating the people of a nation for political purposes has been around for ages.  However, in the last 2 centuries the fine tuning of changing society has led to books like the anti-Semitic, propaganda text in pre-revolution Russia called “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.”  Another book would be “Rules for Radicals” by Saul Alinsky.  We have reached a point where multiple, competing agencies are trying to manipulate society to their own ends.  In the midst of this environment large parts of the Church have been seduced to employ this same tactic in order to achieve a “godly” purpose.  Is this what Jesus wants?  Is it our job to force society to adopt and live by the truth of God?

No godly person ever used this tactic

Technically this first point is made by the absence of Scripture.  I must give credit to the late Dave Hunt who made this point back in the 1980’s.  The absence of godly people organizing a community to cause social upheaval and the approval of God should be glaringly obvious.

We do see many cases of civil disobedience.   So let’s look at some of them.  In Exodus 1:15 and following we have the Pharaoh of Egypt telling two midwives to kill any Hebrew boys who are born.  These midwives were Hebrew themselves and in good conscience could not kill these baby boys.  Thus they lied to Pharaoh.  They basically claimed that the Hebrew women had their babies too quickly for the midwives to intervene.  Notice that in this case there is no organizing of a large group to create social upheaval.  These women aren’t even operating to change the laws of Egypt.  They simply refuse to kill the baby boys out of deference to the commands and nature of the One True God.

Several other cases are seen in the book of Daniel.  The three Hebrew boys refuse to bow down to an image when commanded to do so by the king.  Under threat of death they make the statement that they believed God would save them.  But if not, they still wouldn’t bow down to the idol.  Daniel himself faced a law that commanded the citizens to pray to no one but the king for a period of time.  Daniel refused to obey this law and prayed to the God of Heaven anyway.  Notice that none of them create riots and marches.  They make no attempts to change the laws of the land.  Rather, they obey the dictates of their conscience, regardless of what might happen to them.

Lastly, we see the same thing with the Apostles Peter and John.  They had been preaching about Jesus, when the Sanhedrin commands them to stop. Of course they make the statement that if they have to choose between obeying man or God, they would choose to obey God.

All of these examples are all about individual conscience before God.  The godly of every generation have not necessarily obeyed all the laws of mankind (basically the evil ones).  However, they are not leading protests and social upheaval in order to change society.  They are simply trying to please God over man.  So what should godly people be doing in our culture today?

Our mission is people not societies

This leads us to our first text.  In Matthew 28 we see Jesus explaining that he had been given power and authority over all nations and all heavenly principalities.  With this authority he could have commanded anything.  Yet, he does not give us the mission of taking over the nations of the world.  This may be what Islam teaches.  It may be what communism teaches, but it is not what Christ taught.

Instead he sends his disciples to all the nations in order to preach the Gospel of Jesus and disciple the individuals that respond to it.  We must never forget that our main aim is to disciple those who become Christians.  Our goal is not to take over the governments of this world and neither is it to build crystal cathedrals.  Rather we are called to build people.

So if we get caught up in trying to change or “save” societies we can be in danger of losing the individuals that we were sent to reach in the first place.  What do I mean by that?  When the church focuses on society and trying to change or perfect it, then our focus looks for those tools and things that “work” to change society.  When we focus upon the system instead of the people, then people will end up getting crushed.  The mistake is not just in trying to perfect society.  Even our churches can be guilty of trying to build little perfect societies within our church walls.  Evangelism typically ceases to be about discipling a new believer to become more like Jesus, and becomes about forcing an individual to fit into our system.  “Be a good cog.”  This path is dehumanizing, uncaring, and anti-Christ.  There are multiple generations of people who have been crushed by Churches and Christians who are more concerned about a perfect system (i.e. don’t rock the boat) then they are about following and obeying Jesus.  So what would Jesus do if he were here today?

Jesus shows us the way

In John 13:1-8 we see Jesus the night before he is crucified.  It is clear from his actions here that Jesus would not be rioting in the streets and leading a revolution against the government.  It is also clear that he would not be using millions of dollars to subvert the political process.

In these verses we see that Jesus knew that society had it out for him.  He knew that things were only going to get worse politically.  Instead of throwing a temper tantrum and using his power to force change in society, Jesus accepted the reality on the ground and focused on what really mattered.  Is it possible that we could learn to accept the reality that this world will give us difficulty if we want to follow God?  And, can we accept the reality that it will not give us justice?  If a nation dissolves and reforms, or is taken over by another nations, it is not the end of the world.  How many nations today have taken the place of others before them?  Most of the nations fit this parameter.  Now weigh this against the reality that if an individual goes into eternity lost, it is the end of their world.

Thus, we are told that Jesus loved them to the very end.  Can we choose to love people to the very end of our earthly life?  I know that this passage is about Jesus with his closest disciples.  Yet, one of them has surrendered to the devil and is about to betray him.  Jesus even loved Judas to the very end.  On top of this, it is impossible to see Jesus hanging on the cross and not recognize that he loved the world and paid the price for whosoever would believe.  If we sacrifice caring for individuals in order to build the perfect society (whether in the church or in the nation) then we are being foolish.  The Church was not established to create a perfect society.  It was established to provide a family for those who would respond to the call to believe on Jesus.  We are to be a family of imperfect people who have been redeemed and are being saved by Jesus.
Jesus said that the Truth will set you free.  Radicals like to talk about speaking truth to power.  But the truth is they are always heavy on power and light on truth.  Their methods look nothing like Jesus.  Jesus spoke truth into people’s lives.  He combated the lies of the enemy that held them spiritually captive with the love of God’s truth.  “Yes, if you remain in your sins you will die in them.  But, if you turn from your sins and believe me, then you will live eternally.”  Now this does not save everyone, but it is the only door to hope.  The only way to do what Jesus did is by getting down in the nitty gritty of a person’s life.  It takes time and investment to determine the lies a person has believed and counteract them with the truth of God’s word.  It isn’t a quick, easy, perfect process.

The problem with a pragmatic approach is that it rarely asks, “Should we do this.”  Yes, we could go to war against progressives and try to take our nation back for Jesus.  But should we?  At least should that be our focus?  If there is going to be another Spiritual Awakening in America, it will first start because Christians repent of being side-tracked and actually start following Jesus.  Even then, it will be because of the move of God.  It is He who raises up nations and He who puts nations down.  Let us start demonstrating such humility before God that even Jesus himself exercised.   He humbled himself and used his authority and power to accomplish what God asked.  If we will do this then we will hear from the Father the same words He says to His Son.  “Come, sit at my feet until I make your enemies your footstool.”  When Jesus comes back he will take up the governments of the world and hand them over to his saints.  Until then we must humble ourselves and focus on sharing the Gospel, and discipling those who respond in repentance.  Some tools may be powerful.  But at what cost do we use them?  Our country will be torn apart by these competing, social powers unless God has mercy on us.

Social Activism audio

Society under Siege: The Overflow of Perversion

1 Corinthians 7:1-7.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on September 25, 2016.

There is a growing boldness in our society to call sexual perversion a good thing.  In fact this has spread to many who claim to be Christians and justify much that the Bible labels as immoral.  Now when we read the Bible we find that the open overflow of sexual perversity is always followed by the judgment of the nation or society in which it occurs.  We see it with the pre-flood world.  We see it at Sodom and Gomorrah.  We see it within the tribe of Benjamin during the time of the Judges.  Now it is our own country that is going down the well-worn path of destruction.  I pray that God will wake us up as a nation before it is too late.  Regardless of what happens with America, I challenge each of us as individuals, “Save yourself from this wicked and perverse generation!”  Acts 2:40.

Singleness is good

In 1 Corinthians chapter 7, the Apostle Paul is dealing with some very specific issues within the Corinthian Church.  In some ways these issues are related to our issues today and in some ways they are different.  It is important to note that Paul is responding to some statements that the Corinthians were saying, which he either received by word or letter.  In verse 1 Paul is able to agree with one of their statements, “It is good for a man not to touch a woman.”  To touch a woman is a euphemism here for sexual intimacy.  Paul basically agrees that it is a good thing for an adult to remain single and not engage in sexuality.  However, he is going to have some issues with the lengths to which they take this idea.  But let’s deal with singleness first.

In our society most people who remain single do so in order to have more sex, or rather, sex with more people.  Biblically this is called fornication and is a type of sexual immorality that God has warned will receive His wrath in the end.  However, the Corinthians Christians had a different mindset.  Some of them were seeing sex as unspiritual and therefore celibacy as spiritual.  So when they said it was good for a person to remain single, it had to do with trying to be more spiritual.  This is not true.  Both a single person and a married couple can be just as spiritual or unspiritual.  Imagine a celibate who is inflamed with sexual desire.  They would be a moral time-bomb that is anything but spiritual.  Also, a married couple who is regularly involved sexually can be very spiritual.

Notice that in verse 7 Paul states that his personal desire is that everyone could be like him, which is unmarried and not having sex with anyone.  However he recognizes that not all people have been given this ability from God.  In fact, we know that the larger percentage of people do not have this gift.  Now the word translated gift is “charisma.”  It is the same as the gifts of the spirit elsewhere in this book.  There are some who are gifted by God to thrive as singles.  They may wonder from time to time what it would be like to be married, but they do not have the same drive towards sexuality as others.  They have the ability to live a single life without being inflamed with lust, fantasies, and fornication.  We should confess that Christians have not always been so healthy minded towards singles on this issue.  We can often assume that singleness means there is something wrong with someone or that they are a homosexual.  A parent who wants grand children can overly pressure their adult child to find a mate.  This is not healthy.  In principle there is nothing wrong with being single and abstinent for one’s life.

In fact Paul argues later in verses 26-28 that the “present difficulties” of persecution are a good reason to not get married.  Instead of having to worry about a spouse and their desires, you can focus completely on pleasing the Lord.  Paul also mentions “trouble in the flesh.”  To choose to marry is to choose to deal with certain things that have to do with the body.  It is not necessarily bad; it is just another area of difficulty in your life.  Paul ends that section by pointing out that this world is passing away.  Verse 31 says , “The form of this world is passing away.”  Thus Christians should hold all things that they have in this life loosely.  If my spouse is jailed or even killed because of persecution, I have to learn to trust God and let them go.  Such troubles in the flesh are not insurmountable, but they are extremely difficult.  Our culture has taken singleness and turned it into a hedonistic life-style that plunges into sexual immorality so much that they have become bored with it and seek ever more perverse sexual desires.

Within Marriage Sexuality is Good.

Now that we have talked about singleness let’s talk about marriage.  In verses 2-3 Paul uses two phrases that both point to sex between a husband and wife: “let each man have his own wife,” and “let the husband render to the wife the affection due her.”  Paul underlines that sexuality in the context of marriage is good and that to abstain from sex is bad.  Why?  It is bad because of sexual immorality.  Married people who quit having sexual relations set themselves up for being susceptible to sexual temptation.  Thus marital relations have a certain defensive quality to them.  They can help to strengthen the marriage bond.  Of course, just having sex is no guarantee of fidelity.  Now this is not the only reason for marriage.  Paul is dealing with a question of sexuality and is answering on that level.  In Ephesians 5 we are given a far nobler purpose for marriage and even sexuality.

Within the marital bond are certain commitments that each make to the other.  Paul points out a mutual duty, or obligation, that a married person has towards their spouse.   The phrase “affection that he owes her,” is definitely a euphemism for conjugal duties.  However, it is put in a much softer phrase that implies a greater atmosphere of affection or kindness within the relationship.  When we stand before God and family and vow to love each other until death do us part, we are obligating our self to care for that person in every way.  If you marry only to get something that you want and fail to see your obligation to the other person, then you are headed for a divorce or a very rocky marriage.  Yes, marriage is more than sexuality.  However, sexuality is a part of it that we need to understand.  Paul reminds them in verse 4 that the husband’s body belongs to the wife and the wife’s body to the husband.  In other words, we should not go into the marriage looking at what we want our body to get out of it.  Rather we should go into it in order to give something that the other needs.  The needs of a married couple go beyond sex, but it does include it.

Paul brings up something that the Corinthians were doing.  Some of them had developed the idea of making their marriages “spiritual.”  They would abstain from sex so that they could be more spiritual.  Paul recognizes that abstinence for a time in order to fast in pray is entirely appropriate if it is mutually agreed upon, but doing so for a long period of time is foolish, and a tactical mistake.  Paul says, “Do not deprive one another.”  This is not just applicable to the stated scenario.  Sometimes we can get angry with our spouse and use sex, or lack thereof as a selfish punishment.  A married couple needs to be wise about each other’s needs, both spiritual and sexual.

Satan uses the temptation of sexual desires

We need to understand that what is going on in our society is not just about what people want.  There is a spiritual side to this issue in which we have an enemy who is trying to destroy and plunder us.  Satan did not create sex or sexual desire, God did.  However, he is skillful at wielding it like a weapon against us.  Verse 2 and verse 5 both mention the temptation towards sexual immorality.  Here in this country we live in a sea of sexual immorality.  In this we are the same as the Corinthian Church.  Our media is saturated with sexual images, sexual innuendo, and even explicit in your face sexuality.  Because we have lacked restraint in the areas of pre-marital sex and adultery, the lust for sex has inflamed to all manner of perversions: incest, homosexuality, bestiality, and a sea of sexual fetishes that warp the God-given reason for sexuality into a tool of destruction.  All of this is being promoted and instigated by spiritual forces that are breaking down the strong defenses that God has given us because we surrender them.

This spiritual enemy is looking for an opening for temptation in your life.  Within a society that is “super-saturated” with sexual input, a person is primed to fall in this area.  He is looking for that chink in your armor and that foothold that gives him the leverage to topple you spiritually.  Thus sexual sin becomes a bondage that first starts within our hearts.  It is in the heart that sexual sin is thought to be desirable.  Just like Eve looking at the fruit, we look at what we see around us, or on pages of magazines, and begin to desire to taste it.  Over time a person who desires forbidden fruit will convince themselves that they must have it or can have it.  Our powers of self-justification are also aided by demonic lies that have infiltrated our society.  Lastly we act upon that desire, and when sin is fully grown it brings forth spiritual death in people’s lives.

In verse 5 Paul underlines the key issue in sexual matters, and that is self-control.  Each individual is born with a God-given autonomy over their own mind and actions.  However, through lack of self-control, we can surrender that autonomy to sin and the plan of the devil.  We can end up as slaves to sin.  Thus the one who has become a slave to sexual sin needs to cry out to God for help in true repentance and sorrow for what you have done.  They will have to go back to the arena of their mind and stop surrendering to fantasies of lust.  They will have to reject the demonic lies by meditating on the truths of God’s word.  We are told to bring “every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.” (2 Corinthians 10:5).  Thus, the body is not for sexual immorality (1 Corinthians 6:13).  Don’t use your mind to think about it and what it would be like.  Satan uses the sexual immorality of others to try and plant into your mind the potential for you to taste the fruit of it.  This sets up the next issue.

What begins in the mind is inflamed with GIGO (Garbage-In-Garbage-Out).  When you live in a society that is overflowing with perversion, there is a certain amount of garbage that you cannot shield yourself from.  Thus, I am not pointing to some kind of perfect control of our life where nothing impure is ever seen or heard by us.  But when we willfully cooperate with the garbage around us, and when we willfully go out of our way to bring it into our heart and mind, then it becomes like gasoline to the fires of the impure desires in our heart.  Thus, we have to stay away from certain places and activities because we know they will lead to spiritual destruction.  We must refuse to feed upon pornographic images and videos.  Within the last 2 decades the internet has put pornography at the fingertips of people who would have never been near it before.

Lastly the lack of self-control destroys marriages, families and souls.  When we give into justifying our desires, it will destroy us within and then destroy us without.  Satan baits us to fail in these areas because he hates the God-designed power of a godly husband and a godly wife loving each other and raising up another generation of godly people.  Failures in this area are sin and sin always fills us with guilt.  Sin says to us, “Keep me hidden at all costs.”  But eventually when the seed has matured it will demand to come out in the open.  Many are using Scripture today to justify their failure in this area.  They have given in to sexual immorality and now want to be justified in doing it.  But God is not pleased.  Sexual immorality destroys relationships, marriages and even your own soul.  One day you will stand before God and give account for your life.  Do not go into eternity justifying sexual immorality.  Romans 1:18 says, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.”  He goes on to point out that gross sexual perversion is a sign that God has given us over to the judgment of His wrath. 

Don’t let the enemy destroy your life!  In fact even in the midst of a society that God has given over to judgment, we can still turn from our sin and be saved today.

Overflow of Perversion audio