God's Principles

Most Christians agree we’re living in the end times as prophesied in the Bible. One of the key indicators as spoken of by Jesus himself is that it would be a time of deception with people believing everything but the truth.

I haven’t been a Christian all that long, but even in these few short years, I’ve seen things go downhill, so much so that I hardly know where to turn for good, solid Christian information and teaching.

When I first came to Christ, I went to Christian bookstores and picked up books to enhance my Christian walk. Since I’d been brought up Catholic, I knew little about the endless varieties of ‘Protestant’, but I figured they all pretty much taught the Bible, something the Catholic Church had never done, at least not in my presence. I also subscribed to Christianity Today (CT) never thinking it had the potential to lead me astray.

I’ve long since given up on CT. It contains articles about the emergent/emerging church and contemplative prayer and labyrinths. It features authors, like Brian McLaren, who preach a different gospel from what is given in the Bible. All in all, it’s totally unreliable because it basically presents anything and everything in the ‘Christian’ community with no discernment as to its adherence to truth.

As for Christian bookstores -- I’ve learned they’re basically no safer than Barnes and Noble or Borders when it comes to the books they carry, even if they are supposedly Christian. Compare B&N’s Christian section and the contents of a Christian bookstore and you’ll find little to no difference. Christian bookstores even feature novels like THE SHACK whose bottom line is that God is in and around and through everything here on planet earth. They tout authors like Joel Osteen who’s basically no different in what he teaches than mega-selling new age author Rhonda Byrne and THE SECRET. According to both, we need only think about what we want from life in our thoughts and voila, the universe will respond and we can achieve it.

Rick Warren is another case in point. His Purpose Driven Life has much in it that’s not biblical. Even more distressing, this church leader whom some have called the new Billy Graham, went on Larry King recently and made sure everyone knew he was NOT an anti-gay marriage activist and claimed that he’d never openly showed his support for Proposition 8 in California. (I wonder how people can tell lies like this with a straight face when all anyone has to do is check on the internet where you can hear his actual, earlier endorsement of Prop 8). Pastor Warren even assured the audience that he called and apologized to his gay leader friends for this terrible misunderstanding. Can you believe this? What a blow for the church and what a total dereliction of his responsibility as a so-called man of God. He obviously craves the approval of men rather than God.

I next discovered Christian TV and thought, great, here’s a place where God’s truth is being broadcast to the masses. I soon learned all too many of the people on these stations have sold out as well as the station owners who refuse to allow people on their shows to say anything negative about Islam. I had early on heard about the deception of Benny Hinn, but then I learned that Joyce Meyer and John Hagee and many of the others who preach on these stations are also spreading false, non-biblical ideas. So much for ‘Christian’ TV.

Obviously the best and only remedy for all of us is to constantly immerse ourselves in our Bibles, so we won’t be fooled again as the old song goes.

There’s a war going on right now for the hearts and souls of men, and too many people don’t even realize it’s raging around them on all sides, never mind knowing enough to strap on the armor of God. This war is especially fierce in the United States right now because America is the only nation that was founded on Christian principles and it’s the last bastion of freedom and truth left in the world.

Evolution shoulders a lot of blame for the attitude we now see around us. By teaching that all things evolve, it’s obvious religion must evolve as well and thus ‘old-fashioned’ values and teachings like the abhorrent-to-God practice of homosexuality have clearly become outdated -- or so says our secular, liberal society. Homosexual marriage has been passed in several states with more hovering on the brink. Not even in the heavily homosexual-leaning society of the ancient Greeks was there state-sanctioned homosexual marriage.

In fact, those who hold to biblical teachings and who revere the constitution of this great nation are now considered potential terrorists according to a new report from the Department of Homeland Security.

All this and more has come about because Christians have abdicated their role as salt and light in society. I’m not saying that Christians should become political activists, although we can certainly use more of those. But we need to stand up for the word of God and we’re certainly not doing that when the 1% of the population that’s homosexual can hijack and brainwash the entire country into buying the lie that it’s their civil right to be able to marry.

The TEA Parties this past week are a prime example of people acting on their principles. I know some people think the church and Christians should have nothing to do with politics. They argue that Daniel accepted the Babylonian rule he was under and Paul didn’t try to fight the Romans. But there’s a difference. Those governments were dictatorships -- the only way to get them to change their ways was by force, rebellion, revolution. They weren’t governments of the people, by the people, and for the people the way the United States is. This country was set up precisely so that people could have a say. In former times we used this for good and did things like ending slavery and child labor. Modern Christians should be ashamed of themselves that those who have stood up for change in the past fifty years were people like Madelyn Murray O’Hare who got prayer thrown out of the schools and homosexuals who are winning the right to overturn civilization as we know it through homosexual marriage laws and hate crimes legislation. Don’t you think it broke God’s heart to see good and decent Christian Americans do nothing to fight these abominable changes to our laws?

Christians must stand up and make their voices heard no matter how much the tide seems to be turning against us. America is the standard of freedom and hope throughout the world because we are (or at least we used to be) a Christian nation whose government openly operates on Christian principles that guarantee freedom and justice for all. As Christians, we have a clear duty do evangelize. However, as citizens of America, we also have a civic responsibility to stand up for our founding principles.

Isn’t it nice that when we do so, we’re also standing up for God’s principles.