Cultural Depravity

2019 has begun with a bang.  Perhaps it should come as no surprise, considering the direction this nation and the western world has been headed for 40 or more years, that we are now advocating for infanticide, killing babies up to the moment of birth, and even calling for gerontricide.  In addition, the ELCA darling, Nadia Bolz Weber is now leading thousands of young men and women astray with her complete lack of sexual morals, advocating for an "anything goes" sexuality, including the legitimate and proper viewing of pornography.  It all comes as no surprise.  It is also all completely wrong.  When it comes to the Christian worldview, it is heresy.  At least that is what it once was called.

I'm thankful that according to her own testimony, she only got 170 purity rings from across the country sent to her to create her now completed "golden calf:"  (a sculpture of a vagina - you cannot make this stuff up as to it's complete and utter depravity).  That's still 170 young men and women who have been led astray by her heresy.  It's not a golden calf in the traditional sense, however.  She doesn't see it as worshiping a false idol, but in fact, that is exactly what she and many like her are doing:  they are elevating sex above God.  Sex is the most important thing now.  The worst thing is that she cannot or will not see it.  She is guilty of the very thing she maintains the church has been guilty of:  being obsessed with sex.  Author and columnist Rod Dreher summarizes her in this fashion: "Still, Scripture and 2,000 years of tradition are a more solid basis upon which to construct one’s Christian sexual morality than the juvenile enthusiasm of a potty-mouthed pulpit-pounder who is staring at menopause bearing down on her like a freight train." To quote another pastor:  "She says what the world wants to hear and calls it 'Christian.'"  

These dreadful acts are bringing about the slow, asphyxiating destruction of yet another world culture:  our own.  While she is one of the lead voices in bringing about her so-called "sexual revolution," she's certainly not alone, nor are her ideas the only ones killing society.  (I haven't even touched on the horrendous and appalling liberal ideologies leading to the killing of the unborn - but a sermon on it can be found here).  The final act of an immoral society is tolerating and condoning immoral behavior and canonizing it as the “new normal,” and celebrating this new normal as a great moral victory and advancement.  This society champions its’ tolerance, but only for those who accept this new normal.  In fact, traditional morals and virtue are demonized as a result, showing just how intolerant the so-called champions of "tolerance" really are.  History is replete with examples of such societies collapsing soon thereafter.  You may recall the fall of the Roman Empire, and the old catchphrase "Nero fiddled while Rome burned?"  Today, it is changed to "Nadia diddled while the world burned."

Here's the real rub:  Her claims that the church has been obsessed with sex throughout it's history AND that traditional Christian morality has done great harm simply doesn't bear out under scrutiny of history itself.  Yes, there have always been deviant and immoral behaviors among nations.  Rome is again an example.  But an examination of the orthodox Christian behaviors regarding sexual practice, accompanied by historic understandings of Biblical prohibitions against immorality did NOT lead to "great harm" being done throughout the centuries.  In fact, it, like the 90's "True Love Waits" campaigns among young adults, aided populations immensely in protecting them from the unwanted natural consequences of sex.  And while childbearing is the natural consequence, the simple fact is that deviancy and promiscuity leads to all manner of things that would be outside of the consequences:  such as moral, mental, physical and spiritual injury, as well as disease.  And the world has always been out to reject such morality, as the recent observation of "Valentine's day" should inform us (follow the link for a synopsis of how the REAL Valentine was killed for attempting to uphold traditional virtue and morality).  The Christian faith has always been about rejecting the ways of the world and the cultures around us and following a very different moral code found in the Bible, rather than following the world's.

In our Bible studies this past week, a couple of passages jumped out at me.  From 2 Peter 2:

But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction.  And many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of truth will be blasphemed.  And in their greed they will exploit you with false words. Their condemnation from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. 
...They count it pleasure to revel in the daytime. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions, while they feast with you.  They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin. They entice unsteady souls. They have hearts trained in greed. Accursed children! 
...For, speaking loud boasts of folly, they entice by sensual passions of the flesh those who are barely escaping from those who live in error.  They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption. For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved.  (excerpts)

She is exactly what this and many passages like it are referring to.  She has been enslaved and mastered by her sexual appetite and deviancy, as much of the world has.  As the pastor above was quoted as saying, "she tells the world what they want to hear, and calls it Christianity."  It is not.  And how exactly can we know that hers is a false teaching, making her a false teacher and prophet?  The council at Jerusalem is also one of many places which spells this out, when the new Gentile converts were still held to, among other things, abstention from sexual immorality, as clearly defined throughout the Bible (Acts 15:19-21).

The church has been the beacon of moral restraint and virtue for nearly 2000 years.  Suddenly today, we have men and women who somehow think they are smarter than or know more than those who were the eyewitnesses of all that took place in and around Jerusalem then.  The church must, once again, stand over and against a culturally and morally depraved society and world, and most definitely NOT give her a pass on all of her deviancy (her own denomination has not once censured her for straying from even it's own policies, and in fact has voices applauding her). But until people return to the virtue and morality that has indeed made countries great throughout time, i.e.  they have a real change of heart and believe all this from within (and not just because of societal laws), the problem will only continue to get worse. It will also continue to embolden heretics like Nadia Bolz Weber in continuing to spew their hateful and worldly capitulation.  While her own synod will not speak against her, I am one going on record calling out her teachings for what they are:  heresy.  May we all work hard to stand against those like her, in not only believing what we proclaim, but living it through our actions as well.