God Has Delivered The American Church And This Nation

We live in a nation where sin is rampant and lawlessness is ever growing. What once was a nation that at least held to some moral truth, has in this day and age utterly rejected it. But why? It's not like Christians have completely withdrawn. Missions and ministries are beginning everyday. Yet we find even within our own assemblies a growing unrighteousness. What could be the source of such heinous crimes before a holy God?

A close examination of Romans 1:18-32 will provide us an answer.

For God's wrath is revealed from heaven against all godlessness and unrighteousness of people who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth, since what can be known about God is evident among them, because God has shown it to them.  For His invisible attributes, that is,  His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen since the creation of the world, being understood through what He has made.  As a result, people are without excuse.  For though they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God or show gratitude.  Instead, their thinking became nonsense, and their senseless minds were darkened.  Claiming to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man, birds, and four-footed animals, and reptiles.

Therefore God delivered them over in the cravings of their hearts to sexual impurity, so that their bodies were degraded among themselves.  They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served something created instead of the Creator, who is praised forever. Amen.

This is why God delivered them over to degrading passions.  For even their females exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones.  The males in the same way also left natural relations with females and were inflamed in their lust for one another.  Males committed shameless acts with males and received in their own persons the appropriate penalty of their error.

And because they did not think it worthwhile to acknowledge God, God delivered them over to a worthless mind to do what is morally wrong.  They are filled with all unrighteousness, evil, greed, and wickedness.  They are full of envy, murder, quarrels, deceit, and malice.  They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, arrogant, proud, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, and unmerciful.  Although they know full well God's just sentence--that those who practice such things deserve to die--they not only do them, but even applaud others who practice them.

 That's quite a wall of Scripture to sort through, but hopefully I can bring out the main thrust of the argument.

I feel like it's often stated among conservative Christians that our nation needs to repent or God is going to bring His judgment upon it.  If memory serves correct, I believe a few conservatives have gone so far as to say that natural disasters like hurricane Katrina were God's judgment being poured out upon us.  In any case, the idea is that judgment is coming, and if we preach that loud enough, just maybe we can turn this ship around.  

Where there is a sense in which I would agree that there is a judgment coming, I would also present an alternative view derived from this passage of Paul's.  In this lengthy passage, Paul actually says that the rise of sin within the culture is a result of God's judgment.  God delivers the people over to their sin.  The first paragraph states the problem, and the proceeding three paragraphs elucidate the result of that problem.

So what is the problem?  "God's wrath is revealed...against all...people who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth."  The problem is people suppressing the truth.  But what truth exactly?  The knowledge of God.  The problem is epistemic/noetic.  The knowledge of God is innate, and His existence is evident throughout all creation, but people would rather turn their thoughts away from the true God, and create false gods of their own.  This is a key point to notice in this paragraph, the people still found something to glorify, whether it was men, animals, or birds.  People gave up understanding who God truly is, to trust in a god whom they liked or suited them better.

This is why the problem exists within the church as well as from without.  Too many churches today are not churches of God, but synagogues of Satan, and the problem stems from a lack of the knowledge of the true God.  "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge" (Hos 4:6a). Maybe we can understand why the world is lacking some knowledge of God since they lack the oracles of God by which the full revelation is made known, but why is the church lacking in knowledge?  "Her prophets are reckless--treacherous men.  Her priests profane the sanctuary; they do violence to instruction" (Zeph 3:4).  "For the lips of a priest should guard knowledge, and people should seek instruction from his mouth, because he is the messenger of the LORD of Hosts.  You, on the other hand, have turned from the way.  You have caused many to stumble by your instruction" (Mal 2:7-8a). "Because you have rejected knowledge, I will reject you from serving as My priest.  Since you have forgotten the law of God, I will also forget your sons" (Hos 4:6).  Our own teachers and pastors, those whom we have appointed over ourselves to lead us have in fact lead us astray.  The American church especially looks more like Israel in the days of Samuel and Saul, rejecting God and appointing a man whom they think is great in His place.  If you don't believe me, then ask yourself why the church looks to worldly business models and men for direction and leadership within the church instead of looking to the strict qualifications Paul gives.  The church is no longer regulated by the Scriptures, they have forgotten the law of God in which we discover the full revelation of God's holiness, being, and will.

Notice what this lack of knowledge leads to, what the consequence is of the problem.  Paul says that "God delivers them over."  Over to what? Sexual immorality and degraded passions.  How does Paul describe these sexually degraded passions?  As homosexuality and lesbianism.  But Paul doesn't stop at just these, he further describes a totally degraded mind in a long list of rather self-explanatory things.  My personal favorite, having formerly been a youth pastor, is "disobedient to parents."  That one was always fun to point out.  But one that is rather self-evident in our culture is God-haters.  Specifically in our culture, you'll hear no harsher statements made than against those of "the God of the Bible" especially "the God of the Old Testament."  

Why specifically "the God of the Old Testament"?  Because it is in the OT that one finds the law, which is holy, just, and good (cf Rom 7:12), and God judging peoples and nations according to it.  People don't naturally like holy. And though they want to see justice, they don't like it when it is enacted because it isn't by their standard it is performed, but by the holy standard which they attempt to suppress.  As Paul says elsewhere, 

But we know the law is good, provided one uses it legitimately.  We know that the law is not meant for a righteous person, but for the lawless and rebellious, for the ungodly and sinful, for the unholy and irreverent, for those who kill their fathers and mothers, for murderers, for the sexually immoral and homosexuals, for kidnappers, liars, perjurers, and for whatever else is contrary to the sound teaching based on the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which was entrusted to me. (1 Tim 1:8-11)

God held the nations under judgment in the Old Testament, judging them according to the moral standards written upon their heart, which are the "works of the law" (cf Rom 2:14-15).  A good summary of these works are the 10 commandments, which a close study of this passage from 1 Timothy will show that the sins mentioned there are, in subsequent order, the most heinous ways to break the second table of the Decalogue.  One can likewise go through the sin-list of Paul's in Romans and find their Old Testament parallels (again mostly from the Decalogue).  That's because "sin is the breaking of the law" (1 Jn 3:4).

The problem is that the church today has just as much disregard for the law of God as the world.  Why is that?  Because the appointed leaders and teachers of the church have done violence to God's instruction and rejected the knowledge of God, withholding it then from the people and leading them astray.  Instead, our culturally and philosophically inundated pastors and teachers are ignoring sin in their congregation, or worse yet, applauding it!  Notice how Hosea goes on to say a very similar sentiment to Paul's accusation.

The more they multiplied, the more they sinned against Me.  I will change their honor into disgrace.  They feed on the sin of My people; they have an appetite for their transgressions (Hos 4:7-8).

What a graphic!  They feed on the sins of others, having an appetite for others' wrongs.  Also, Hosea says that God will disgrace these people.  Paul likewise said they would be disgraced through the delivering over to various sins and degraded passions.  What better explanation for the vast majority of "churches" that are singing the victory song of the homosexual agenda.  They "feed" on the sin, and "applaud" those who practice it.

Recall my comments earlier about seeking leadership models from businesses and their leaders instead of trusting in the inspired Word?  This might be eisigesis, but I can't help but notice in Hos 4:7 that "The more they multiplied, the more they sinned against Me" and how that could correlate with business leadership and the Church Growth Movement mindset and infiltration into the church.  The church has been all about being "seeker-sensitive" for years, trying to attract people with good-feeling messages and grow in mass numbers, because it is all about the bottom line. But that's not Paul.  Notice Paul's discussion of the law in 1 Timothy: it was considered sound doctrine in accordance with the Gospel.  Without knowledge of the Law of God, there is no plausible way to understand the Gospel of Grace.  Without knowing the full weight of being a sinner in the hands of an angry God, there can be no fullness of joy in knowing there is mercy and forgiveness of sins in the death of Christ.  Paul will call you a sinner to your face and tell you repentance and faith in Christ are the only way to be saved.  If you believed, great!  If you didn't, Paul wouldn't waste his time harvesting weeds.  If you put on Christ, you were to walk in a new way of life (sanctification), which is God's revealed will--that you turn from sin (lawlessness/law-breaking) and begin walking in love of God and man which is a summary of the Decalogue (Rom 13:9).  When you suppress the truth of the Gospel, you only have the foolishness of the world to guide you.  And just like weeds in a garden, that foolishness will multiply and overtake it all to the demise of the church.  God is removing his lamp stand from this nation, leaving only the embers of the faithful elect to glow for His glory.  And if the church doesn't walk in the light of God's Word, then there can be no expectation that secular nation would walk so faithfully.  

The "American Church" and this nation have been delivered.  Delivered over to degraded passions, foolishness, and a worthless mind.  Judgment isn't coming, judgment has already been given, and it is evident by the direction this nation is heading in that God is no longer mercifully restraining sin, but giving it over to sin and lawlessness.