Don't Ask?

Foundations are so critical in the longevity of any establishment or structure. You might get some argument on this principle from a fringe element or two but it pretty much amounts to an axiom and most people will agree. Jesus made this point very clear in Matthew 7:24-27 when he spoke about building our house on the rock. His purposeful metaphor has stood the test of time and we ignore it to our spiritual and practical peril. Today’s decision by the United States Senate to continue to chip away at the foundation of our Judeo-Christian heritage will certainly yield calamitous consequences. In the 1860s our nation suffered the cost of treating our brother and neighbor with contempt to the point of bringing shame on the name of Christ and finding ourselves in a civil conflict that resulted in over 600,000 deaths, exceeding the nation’s loss in all other wars from the Revolution through Viet Nam. Sure, other nations throughout history were guilty of the same offence without reaping such a bitter crop, but they had not the advantage of being birthed with these words: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.” This acknowledgement of the Creator’s special grace brought with it a higher responsibility to continue that acknowledgement in order to continue the grace. We turned our back on that obligation early in our nation’s existence and paid a dear price then got another chance.

Many argue today that eliminating civil laws that restrict sexual preference is in keeping with the spirit and intent of the equality language in our founding documents. Homosexuality is touted as a civil right. But, we are warned in Isaiah 5:20 “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.” We can always find justification and rationalization for our behavior and our convictions. In fact, that’s precisely what we’ve done by superseding God’s moral law with our nation’s civil laws in the past 200+ years. We have nearly completed our segue from “freedom of religion” to “freedom from religion” to the point that our civil code, along with our personal preferences, allows us to worship what we please, misuse the name of God, disrespect our parents, abort our babies, relish in adultery and fornication, cheat on our taxes, lie when it’s convenient, and lust after everything on television. “Well,” says the cynic, would you have us imitate the Taliban?” That’s indeed the tone of comment I would expect from someone who doesn’t know the difference. Yet, we should know the difference. We ought to be able to notice those chips and chunks missing from the foundation. But since we don’t, we probably don’t notice us leaning like the Tower of Pisa either