Worship Night

Worship Night
Catalyst Christian Church, Nicholasville, KY

Friday, June 7, 2013

Government Scandals re-awaken America's sense of right and wrong

Nothing awakens the awareness of right more than the overwhelming presence of wrong.

Put another way, the presence of evil awakens a person to the value of good.

Our government is swimming in scandals.  We can't even count the number of things that are being daily brought to light- Benghazi scandal, IRS targeting of conservatives and Christian groups, EPA scandals, IRS lavish spending scandals, DHS causing ammunition shortages by buying up enough hollow-point bullets (illegal to use in warfare by Geneva Convention) to shoot every man, woman, and child in America 5 times, and most recently the mining of data by the NSA on cell phone carriers, websites, Facebook, Google, etc.

For many years now, America has been in a moral slumber.  There's no doubt about it.  Issues that would have grieved our grandparents barely even get noticed now.  There has been no real concern over the prevalence of porn in our homes, the breakdown of the family, the lack of honesty in classrooms and businesses, the lack of character demonstrated in our public officials, the ignoring of faith, the war on religion, the Kermit Gosnell abortion scandal, the gross misuse of money and the crushing debt incurred by Americans living above their means, etc. 

We have been asleep at the wheel.  We have been lulled to sleep by cultural forces that tell us that there is no objective right and wrong- that right and wrong are outdated concepts used by bigots and racists and knuckle-dragging Neanderthals to oppress the disadvantaged and disenfranchised.  We have been dozing on the lullaby sung by popular culture that God is irrelevant, judgment is bad, and that nothing is really "wrong." 

Not so any more.  We have been hit in the face with the 2x4 of true wrong.  The lullaby has ended, and in its place is a screeching alarm clock that has awakened us like a hydrogen bomb. 

The overwhelming magnitude of evil coming out of Washington (yes, I said the word "evil," because that's exactly what it is) has stopped the momentum of the secular humanistic forces wanting to fundamentally change our society.  We are seeing the fruit of a society without moral foundations.  The veil has been ripped away from our eyes- the veil that said, "People are basically good- we don't need faith in God, we don't need the Bible, we don't need strong churches, we don't need character, we don't need to be taught right and wrong.  Those things are detrimental to our society, and the "new" society will be a secular humanistic utopia without these outdated, archaic meanderings."

Well, we now know, as a nation, what happens when a nation loses its moral foundation.  We now see the value of faith, the value of objective right and wrong, the value of (gasp- dare I say it?) judgment.  We now see the value of a society that is able to judge right and wrong.  We now see the results of power without character, power without morals, power without a living fear of God.  We see how people without a fear of God will abuse power, how they believe they are above accountability, how selfishness and personal agenda rise to the top when unchecked by a strong faith in God.

This is a good thing.

It is a good thing to be confronted by evil.  It is a good thing for evil to smack a nation in the face, because without it, we would never know what "good" truly is. 

We, as a nation, have been like a naive teenager coming of age in a home where there is a strong, loving dad.  Dad has laid down rules that are to be followed, and the teenager resists.  He criticizes the old man, calls him "outdated, stupid, irrelevant" and runs away from home, determined to experience "real life" away from the repressive laws of his dad.  He wanders the streets, enjoying his new freedom.  He falls in with unsavory characters, who take advantage of his naivety and get him hooked on drugs.  He wastes away- doing their bidding, waking up in dirty rooms next to people he doesn't know.  He is beaten, robbed, and abused.  Finally, wearing threadbare clothes, penniless, broken, and depressed, he realizes that things were so much better when he was living with his dad. 

That's where America is right now.  We are literally the prodigal son.  We have left our Father and wandered to a foreign land and placed our fate in the hands of people who have no character.  We have been taxed to death, robbed, and oppressed.  We have watched our families fall apart, our sons and daughters raised without values, our churches become politically correct, the Bible absent from homes, and our schools become cesspools of misbehavior.  We have indulged in pornography and sensual delight, and it has left us broken and empty.  Now, in the face of the evil in our country, we are realizing how good we actually had it when we, as a nation, followed God. 

We are realizing that a society cannot exist without personal character and faith.  We are realizing that our homes are happier when they are based on the word of God.  We have been awakened to true evil- we have been awakened to the path that we as a nation have been on for years.  We are beginning to get what we paid for, and it doesn't look all that great.

Right now, it is time for Christians to call this nation to repentance.  We have to make changes, and we have to make them now.  We now see clearly what happens when a nation thinks it doesn't need God.  We now see clearly what happens when a country removes God from the picture- government scandals, Chicago-politics-gone-national, breakdown of the family, lack of honesty and character, and the list goes on.  Only by bringing 2 Chronicles 7:14 to ourselves, our homes, our communities, and our nation will anything change. 

"If My people who are called by My name, will humble themselves and pray to Me and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and forgive their sin and heal their land."  2 Chronicles 7:14

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