Today is Ascension Day, the Thursday in the year that the Church has historically remembered the Ascension of Christ. Of all the doctrines around Christ, I would say this is the one that is most neglected, to our detriment. For in my experience, it is the one that fills believers most with an electric charge of spiritual energy.

There are several questions that are answered by Ascension Day. The first is, “Can people fly?” Yes, yes we can. Not yet, but one day we will, just as Christ ascended in the clouds:

Acts 1:9 And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.

1 Thess. 4:16–17 For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord.

So yes, people can fly, and one day we will. (I can only assume this means we can walk on water, too, but I digress.)

It also answers the question: in this present chaos, is there anyone in charge? Yes, yes there is. The Ascension is the fulfillment of Psalm 110, where David observes in the Spirit Yahweh (“the LORD”) saying to his (David’s) “Lord”:

Psalm 110:1 The LORD says to my Lord: “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool.”

We now live in the age of the reign of Christ. He is King. Over all. And all means all.

This leaves us with many questions. If he reigns, why this or that evil? He does not give us many answers, just as he only said to Job, “I am God, and you are not.” But he does wrap us in a covenant of grace, one that promises he will never leave us nor forsake us (Deut. 31:5; Joshua 1:5; 1 Chron. 28:20; Psalm 94:14; John 14:18; Heb. 13:5).

He calls us to trust that covenant and seek first his kingdom and his righteousness. All of which leads us to the Great Commission. Note that it does not begin with something that we do, but something which is true about Christ:

Matt. 28:18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

The Great Commission begins with a call not to action but to faith, specifically in what was ratified in the Ascension - that there is now no square inch over this existence over which Christ does not say “mine.” This is the faith that propelled the Moravians to leave family, lands and culture behind, for they knew that Christ was King over the islands of the Pacific.

And this is the faith that must propel us today, across the street or across the aisle, to share the gospel - that Jesus is King over that house, that living room, that family of Muslims or Sikhs or Hindus or atheists. He reigns. When we get there, Jesus will already be there, reigning and working.

We do not obey the Great Commission in part because we do not believe the Ascension. Yet he is enthroned; He does reign; and not for nothing. He reigns for the hallowing of the name of the Father, to advance His kingdom, so that His will would be done. And so as we believe that and move, he supplies us by His Spirit whatever we need, forgiving us our errors, and leading us every step of the way.

We don’t need better tactics. We need faith the size of a mustard seed, faith in the Ascension of Christ. Hallelujah! Our God reigns!

“Therefore, go . . .”

This is a common question, and it must be answered with the data of Scripture, but then that data must be digested devotionally, that is, in a way that helps us endure in faith.

I say this because this is how Peter answers this question, in 1 Peter 3:18 - biblically, and devotionally.

The biblical data goes like this. Jesus was (17) "put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit." In the spirit, then, verse 18, Peter says that Jesus a) went somewhere and b) proclaimed something. The original word for "proclaim" is different from the word for "preach" in 4:6. There the sense is that the gospel was "preached" to those who were once alive but have now died, that though they died, they will one day live, in the resurrection, because of their faith in that message.

Here, in 3:18, something else is going on. Jesus "proclaimed" something. This word is more an announcement. There is no call to faith and repentance - only the news that, in this case, the war is over; I won.

Who does he say this to? "The spirits in prison, [who] (verse 20) did not obey, in the days of Noah, when the ark was being prepared . . ."

Now here is a place where God calls us to do spiritual push-ups, and remain faithful to His Word, even if the answer seems strange to modern, unsupernatural ears. The only biblical explanation for what Peter is referring to is Genesis 6, and what precipitated the Flood.

Not only was the wickedness of mankind malignantly metastasizing on the earth - this was also happening in the heavenly places. The "sons of God" - another word for heavenly beings - angels - saw the beauty that God bestowed on the women of earth. And they looked at God, and looked and those women . . . and chose the women, creating a great rebellion in the heavenly places. This was large-scale, gross rebellion, for angels see the face of God.

This gives us greater understanding of what precipitated the flood and why God thought it good and right. God is not a cosmic grump, flying off the handle at a few folks running off into the bushes (though that is sin, too.) But this was rebellion spanning the breadth of the created order. These fallen angels were trying to hijack God's good creation for themselves, by creating a new race, one forbidden by God, and one meant to live without need for God. Their offspring were called the "Nephilim" - mighty men of old.

It's possible that Goliath was a descendent of the Nephilim, at least that's what the spies said when they returned in Numbers 13:33. This would mean that one of Noah's sons took a Nephilim wife or child, which is unlikely. It may very well mean that the sons of Anak and Goliath were like those of Noah's day. Regardless, all this casts a different light on what was happening then between David and Goliath. Here is the "offspring" of the Great Rebellion, wanting to stamp out God's anointed king and his "offspring," God's chosen race, whom He leads, provides for and protects via His anointed David. It is also no coincidence that Goliath's armor is like that of the scales of a dragon. Here is the cosmic battle, which began in the Garden, and broke out in Genesis 6. So it is no coincidence that David kills Goliath by crushing his head (Gen. 3:15). He is a living parable, of God's gospel.

Thus Jesus is called the Greater David, God's Anointed One, the Messiah and King, who came to slay the great giant of our age:

Luke 11:21 When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own palace, his goods are safe; 22 but when one stronger than he attacks him and overcomes him, he takes away his armor in which he trusted and divides his spoil.

Just as David beheaded the "dragon" Goliath and took his armor, so did Jesus, when he went to the cross. There he beat death by death - by absorbing on himself in death all the condemnation and wrath due to God's people, for our sins. It turns out that when his cross went into the ground at Golgotha, he was doing what David could only picture. The word "Goliath" is deeply related to the word "Golgotha". That place, which looked like a skull, was pierced by Jesus' cross. And by his death, he crushed the head of the giant that caused all our fear and loathing.

But Jesus' life is indestructible (Hebrews 7:16). Though he died in the body, Peter says (1 Peter 3:17), he was made alive in his spirit. He had finally vanquished the great rebellion. This is what he proclaims, to those spirits - the fallen angels who rebelled against God and left their place in Genesis 6. He was proclaiming His victory over their cosmic, whole-creation rebellion. He's not rubbing it in their face - He's announcing to them, too, ”It is finished."

Now, a few more bits of data. Where are they, exactly? It seems best to me to say that they are in "Hades", which was the Greek word for what the Jews would call "Gehenna." In the Old Testament, everyone goes to Sheol when they die (Gen. 37:35), the good and the bad. The "good" place was called "Abraham's bosom" (Luke 16:22), while the bad place is called "Hades," or, in Hebrew, "Gehenna," named after the trash dump outside Jerusalem that never stopped burning.

And we should note that there is some possibility of communication between the two, between "Abraham's side" (or, in Greek, Elysium) and Hades. You'll remember Jesus' parable of Lazarus and the rich man (Luke 16:22-23), where Lazarus is in the good side, and the rich man suffers in Hades.

So then, to die in Christ means to be "with the Lord" (2 Cor. 5:8), and to die apart from Christ means to exist in Hades. But in the end, even these will pass away. One day the New Jerusalem will descend from heaven, and heaven and earth will be one, a renewed Garden of Eden (Revelation 21:2-10). And at the same time, Hades itself will be thrown into the Lake of Fire (Rev. 20:14), the second death.

All of this to say this devotional point. Peter says, baptism corresponds to this (1 Peter 3:18), this being Noah's escape through the deluge of judgment through the water, by faith. Baptism is a plea to God for a clean conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus. For Jesus did not stay in Hades. On that first Sunday, God raised him from the dead, making him alive in spirit and in a glorified body, in which he ascended back to the Father's right hand.

Thus that clean conscience assures us of this: that we, by faith, will follow Jesus' path. All of it.

Thus we can lean into the pain we may experience for doing good in this age, knowing that it will only come back to serve us and lead us to resurrection glory. This is the larger pastoral point that Peter is making 1 Peter - that we would not shrink from pain, and that we would not even just tolerate it, but that we would lean into it, the way Jesus did, knowing that it will lead us down Jesus’ path.

We will escape the judgment and will ascend to glory and honor and immortality (Rom. 2:7). Thus we can face our giants today and slay them in jolly, triumphant joy. Not that we see that triumph yet - we apprehend it by faith - faith that yes, first there is the cross. But on the other side of the cross there will be triumphant glory.

By this faith we will slay our giants, too. And one day, all that is subjected under the feet of Jesus will be under our feet too. So then, Peter makes this application:

1 Peter 4:1-2 Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, 2 so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human passions but for the will of God.

Soli deo gloria!

Introduction

Christians have celebrated a variety of feast days throughout the centuries. Some movements have celebrated no feast days, other than the weekly Lord’s Day - for example, the Puritans, and the Church of Scotland. Others have celebrated a large number of feast days throughout the year, following a liturgical calendar. Let each be convinced in his own mind, with charity towards others (Romans 14:5).

I am convinced that our church should follow a simple calendar that celebrates the great days of the faith, and those celebrations should be characterized by feasting. In this article I want to demonstrate why this seems right to me. Secondly, I will lay out which feast days we ought to celebrate. Lastly, I will describe what this feasting should look like.

In Step With the Old

Feasts have always been at the center of God’s working. After all, the first command of Scripture was to feast:

Genesis 2:16 “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden . . .”

History will end with a great, restored Eden, and a feast at the center:

Revelation 19:9 And the angel said to me, “Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.”

Those who are invited to that great feast are those who feast on Christ along the way:

John 6:53 So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. 55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. 57 As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. 58 This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.”

Thus we celebrate on the first Sunday of every month the Lord’s Table:

Matthew 26:26 Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.” 27 And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you, 28 for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. 29 I tell you I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.”

And this great feast of the Lord was prefigured by the feast of the Exodus and the Passover. After all, on the Transfiguration, Moses and Elijah wanted to discuss Jesus’ “exodus” (Luke 9:31), and on his cross, not one of his bones were broken (John 19:33):

Exodus 12:46 It shall be eaten in one house; you shall not take any of the flesh outside the house, and you shall not break any of its bones. 47 All the congregation of Israel shall keep it. [speaking of the Passover]

Of course, before Christ, Israel was commanded to enjoy great feasts. The three Great Feasts (summarized in Exodus 23:14-17) were:

* The Passover (otherwise known as the Feast of Unleavened Bread and Firstfruits) - Exodus 12:1-2. As was already mentioned, in this feast Israel was to remember the Exodus, how God passed over their sins, all by His grace, and delivered them from slavery, into His dominion.

* The Feast of Weeks (otherwise known as Pentecost or the Harvest Feast) - Leviticus 23:15-21; Deuteronomy 16:9-12. Celebrated 50 days after the Passover, this feast celebrated the wheat harvest in the spring.

* The Feast of Tabernacles (or the Feast of Booths and the Feast of Ingathering) - Leviticus 23:33-43; Deuteronomy 16:13-15. This feast remembered Israel’s 40-year trek through the wilderness, and more centrally, how God dwelt among them, with them, in His tabernacle, providing for and preserving them.

It is no coincidence that that these major feasts map over to the three major moments in the life of Christ:

* The Feast of Tabernacles > Christmas, when our Immanuel dwelt among us.

* The Passover > Good Friday and Easter, when Christ our Passover Lamb was sacrificed, that we may be delivered from sin and death, unto life.

* Pentecost > Pentecost, when God’s people were born again from above (just as Jesus had told Nicodemus - John 3:3), when the people of God became Christ’s firstfruits.

Christ is the fulfillment of God’s promises (2 Cor. 1:20). He succeeded where ethnic Israel failed. Thus God’s people in this age are those who are in him, by faith. Moreover, in every age, God seems to think that it is good for His people to feast in celebration of the great things He has done.

Which Great Things?

In my view, the church should feast on those days I’ve already mentioned:

* Christmas

* Good Friday/Easter

* Pentecost

I add another day to these three because it so important, and because the Church has underemphasized it in recent generations: the Ascension. After all, God’s “favorite Bible verse”, Psalm 110:1, anticipates it:

Psalm 110:1  The LORD says to my Lord:

“Sit at my right hand,

until I make your enemies your footstool.”

At Pentecost, Peter declared to Jerusalem that this Psalm was fulfilled by Christ in his Ascension. And it was upon this truth that he made his truth-claim: that Jesus is more than the Christ, the Messiah, who saves - he is also Lord, period (Acts 2:36). This should remind us of the truth that Jesus says we are to believe, that is the basis for our fulfilling the Great Commission:

Matthew 28:18 “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me . . .”

So then, the Ascension is a pillar truth upon which all our service to Jesus now rests. We serve him in confidence that wherever we go, he is Lord.

Now I would add one more “feast,” and this addition is one part imitation, one part pragmatism, and one part “just cuz”: a “love feast,” celebrated in the doldrums of the first quarter of the year. It is imitation, because clearly the early church enjoyed “love feasts” (Acts 2:46; Jude 12; perhaps 1 Cor. 11:33-34). And it is pragmatic, because there are no other feasts during this time of the year. And it is “just cuz,” because, well, just because.

Should there be others? For instance, Thanksgiving? Is it good for Christians to stop and give gratitude to the Lord? Of course - why not? What about Palm Sunday? I could very easily be talked into that day being a feast day, too. But the four pillar days, in my view, are Christmas, Easter, the Ascension, and Pentecost.

Let’s Get This Party Started

So how should they be celebrated?

Well, if you haven’t caught on by now: with a feast. Sometimes that’s a special meal during the week (Christmas, Ascension), or it’s expected that every household with have their own feast and invite others (Easter, Pentecost). But regardless, we mean “feast”: friends and family sitting around the same table, enjoying good food and each other’s company, and all of it in joyful remembrance of and gratitude to the Lord.

Those two words point to a way of celebrating that we have largely lost. There used to exist a word, closely related to “solemn”, that comprehended how we think of “solemn”, and yet at the same time denoted a “celebration.” A weighty happiness, you might say. The best modern equivalent that I can think of is a graduation: it is both a solemn ritual and a happy, celebratory occasion. That’s the tone that we should aim for in these feasts: on the one hand, feeling the glorious weight of what God has done; and at the same time feeling a light joy that it is done.

You can capture something of this dual feeling in Nehemiah 8:9-12. Ezra has read the forgotten Law to the people, and it happens to be on the day of the Feast of Trumpets (Neh. 8:2). Then all the people wept and grieved, for how they had not kept the Law (9). But then Nehemiah reassures them - this day is “holy to our Lord” (10-11), which feels weighty. But because it is holy to God, the people must not weep, but must celebrate, by feasting (12).

This passage brings us to the heart of why God must want His people to celebrate:

Neh. 8:10 . . . for the joy of the LORD is your strength.

More than that, God is most glorified by His people’s joy:

Psalm 22:3  Yet you are holy,

enthroned on the praises of Israel.

Joy inherently points a bright finger on the object of the joy. So our joy in our God is both the thing that strengthens us and enables us to endure to the end, and it is the means by which God gets the most glory from our lives. What matters most is not the relative greatness of our sacrifices, but the greatness of the God for whom we sacrifice, portrayed in our joy.

Our God is a happy God, in Himself. Thus He rejoices as His people join Him in His own joy about Himself.

So then, lastly, there should be singing at these feasts: hearty, full-throated singing, that both remembers the cosmic truths at hand, and that incites us to deep-hearted joy.

“To God be the glory . . . Great things He has done! . . .”

I’ve noticed a widespread difficulty with Christians knowing how to pray for Israel, in the aftermath of being attacked by Hamas. Perhaps it’s because we are awash in propaganda, and we know it, and that causes reticence. After all, as the old phrase goes, the first casualty of war is the truth.

So how to pray, for Israel, and about a war and evils occurring halfway across the world? I would like to offer a few suggestions.

Well, Pray

First, if you want to know how to pray, get to praying. Like most things in life, we learn to do it by doing it. We learn to pray by praying.

This reminds me of the story that Corey Tenboom told of when she and her sister were jammed into a room with 700 other concentration camp prisoners - a room designed for 200 people. Some of them fought with each other, and soon the room became jittered with nervous tension. Corey said that they needed to do something, and her sister said we must pray. And so she prayed, and she prayed, and she prayed, and she prayed, and then the room finally went silent and was at peace. How to pray? Sometimes we just need to get praying. It happens after prayer.

Pray with Dirt and Blood

Secondly, we must pray with dirt and blood. What I mean is that in times like this, and in all other times, we must pray in specifics. We must forsake all pie-in-the sky generalities, and instead get dirt and blood on our prayers. When you’re watching the news and you see some atrocity, remember that those are real people with real families. Get rid of all generalities and pray, pray, for the victims and their friends and families, and for those who did it, that God would stop them and bring justice.

Doing this may also have a practical benefit: it will slow down the velocity of your doom-scrolling. You won’t have the ability to move onto the next awful atrocity on your screen, because you’ll be too busy praying for real people.

Pray Like the Bible

Thirdly, we need to pray out of the Bible, because the Bible teaches us how to pray both for the specific case of Israel, and for the general problem of atrocity-level evil.

Let’s begin with evil. When atrocities happen, we learn how to pray by turning to the psalms, specifically, those that have come to be known as the imprecatory psalms. The word imprecatory has a lot of overlap with the word curse. That’s what it is: asking God to bring something bad on someone else who’s doing something bad.

We may, for instance, put the words of Psalm 140 into our own words, on behalf of the innocent in Israel:

Psalm 140:8–11 (ESV): Grant not, O Lord, the desires of the wicked;

do not further their evil plot, or they will be exalted! Selah

9  As for the head of those who surround the nation of Israel,

let the mischief of their lips overwhelm them!

10  Let burning coals fall upon them!

Let them be cast into fire,

into miry pits, no more to rise!

11  Let not the slanderer be established in the land;

let evil hunt down the violent man speedily!

Go ahead, pray this. Or, if you are so moved, pray along these lines:

Would you strike them on the cheek? Would you break their teeth? (Psalm 3:7)

Or, if you are so provoked, you may echo the words of Psalm 58:

Psalm 58:6–11 (ESV): O God, break the teeth in their mouths;

tear out the fangs of the young lions, O Lord!

7  Let them vanish like water that runs away;

when he aims his arrows, let them be blunted.

8  Let them be like the snail that dissolves into slime,

like the stillborn child who never sees the sun.

9  Sooner than your pots can feel the heat of thorns,

whether green or ablaze, may he sweep them away!

10  The righteous will rejoice when he sees the vengeance;

he will bathe his feet in the blood of the wicked.

11  Mankind will say, “Surely there is a reward for the righteous;

surely there is a God who judges on earth.”

Note that the psalmists are not taking vengeance into their own hands. They are leaving vengeance with God, as we are commanded to do, and praying to Him is how they do it. Note also that these psalms are this bloody because some evils are this bloody. And lastly, note that the psalmist knows how God works. God is not the inventor of evil, but He sovereignly uses even evil itself to deal with other evils. If you see the atrocities and are so provoked in your soul, pray along with these psalms.

But then end your imprecation by echoing the words of your Lord: “Yet not my will, but yours be done, O my King and Lord.”

The Specific Case of Israel

Now, having prayed along with the imprecatory psalms, we must also allow the Bible to instruct us as to how we should pray for the unique case of Israel. The most relevant chapter of the Bible is Romans 11, especially beginning in verse 11 through to the end of the chapter. Paul describes the people of God as one olive tree, and only one. For the most part, the Jews are like branches that have been broken off of that tree, by their own unbelief. And the Gentile believing Christians are like apple or pear tree branches that have been unnaturally grafted into that tree. One day the Jews’ general state of unbelief will be reversed, and many will be saved. But not yet.

So then, by verse 28 Paul comes to a startling conclusion, and yet another example of how the Bible teaches us to think of two things at the same time. As regards to the gospel the Jews are enemies, for our sake - they were broken off from the olive tree so that we could be grafted in. But at the same time as regards election, as regards God sovereignly choosing them, they are beloved, for the sake of their forefathers.

A Metaphor

Here is a metaphor that I hope helps you comprehend both feelings - considering them both enemies and beloved. Suppose you have a great grandfather, from whom your whole family has come, and he leaves your great grandmother and betrays her and wants nothing to do with the family. And every time a family member entreats him to be reconciled back to the family, he spits on them and rejects them. Then one day you find out that he has been mugged, beat up and sent to the emergency room. On the one hand, you would feel concerned for him, with a familial love. But how would you pray for him? You would pray that God would use this terrible circumstance to bring him to his senses and cause him to return and be reconciled with the family.

Or in Paul’s metaphor, to “be grafted back in.”

In my view, that is exactly how we should pray for the Jews today. That God would thwart every evil - that He would smash Hamas’ teeth - and at the same time that He would use every evil to cause the Jews to wake up and return. Pray that God would use this suffering to cause them to see that Jesus is their King, and become jealous of what we have in Him, and want it for themselves. For Paul says that though they have been broken off, they can be grafted back in again (23). Pray that God would be merciful to them, and that they would not waste His mercy, for it is meant to lead the Jews to repentance (Romans 2:4).

And then cast your eye across the rest of the world, to Christians suffering in other places, like Ukraine, or Nigeria, or China, or Gaza, and use the same categories that Paul just used. As regards to the gospel, they are brothers and sisters, not enemies. And as regards election, they were not chosen, yet God by grace grafted them in, just like you. Pray for their suffering, too - for they are your brothers and sisters, and you’ll spend eternity with them.

Don’t Let Them Tell You How to Think and Feel

Lastly, one bit of advice, that’s not about prayer directly, but can only be applied by prayer. Don’t let the propaganda or CNN (but I repeat myself) cause you to think or feel in a certain way. Let the vile acts drive you to your Bible, to prayer, to God. You often see this, again, in the Psalms. David cries out to God because of evildoers, and then He “remembers” Who he is talking to, and then you see his emotional temperature change, right there in the psalm. We are to walk in his steps. In the heat of great atrocities, we are to make psalms ourselves.

Not only does this change the world, it will also change us. God can walk and chew gum at the same time, and juggle, too. He can thwart evil, save the Jews, save Palestinian terrorists, and keep you from becoming derailed by unbridled emotion. Jesus is King, over Israel, over Hamas, and over America. May every tongue, tribe and nation come to bow in faith-filled fealty to Him.

We are now entering #PrideMonth,1 when companies like Target form a great crowd, especially on social media, to pander to those who follow LGBTQ ideology. In June they roll out their chest binders and glow-up their social media logos - but only in their western hemisphere units, not in the Middle East. Crowds are funny that way - headstrong they always are, but not necessarily consistent. Loud and boisterous they are, but not necessarily courageous. Powerful they can be, but not necessarily for good.

The Axiom

This is an axiom you and I must remember, especially in June: just because a crowd exists doesn’t mean it’s for a good reason. We can easily think of examples of crowds assembled for bad reasons. Crowds thronged to hear Hitler speak. Sodom met Lot’s guests with a huge crowd - that wanted to rape them. I’m aware of a town in Nevada with a large number of young people coming down with cancer. No one wants to be in that crowd. In the 1980’s, a “swarm” of people in the US became fixated on self-amputation and becoming handicapped. Just because a crowd has gathered around something doesn’t tell you anything about whether that thing is good or not.

This is especially important to remember if you are a student surrounded by friends and peers who tell you they are gay, bi, poly, cake-gender, or any of the other 267 “genders” popping up. You’ve found yourself in a crowd, and a lot of the people in that crowd you appreciate; you perhaps love some of them; you at least care for them, and you want the best for them. It’s hard for you to conceive in your brain that this crowd, with this many people, this crowd that I’m in, could be wrong. How can that be? How can God be angry or judge them?

Understandable Questions

This is an understandable question. Yet consider this fact: that in each of the “wrong” crowds that I mentioned above, those people would have concluded the same thing. Those Nazis listening to Hitler, those rapists in Sodom, those self-amputators would have all asked the same question: but how could my friends that I’m here with, whom I like and care for, how could they be wrong?

Consider also how you got to that crowd. The impulse to be “in,” inside the “inner ring”2, however you define “inner ring,” is really strong with each of us. We each of us want to be inside a group, a crowd, that we admire and esteem and enjoy and care for. Life can be cold and cruel, and such “crowds” promise comfort, care and respite. But note that the reason you therefore entered that crowd has more to do with your own desires, and certain features of that crowd that you find admirable. But in seeking your own desires, you may have looked past certain features of that crowd that are less than admirable. It’s easy to do, and oh so common - easy for the Nazi (before that name was bad) to look past that comment about the Jews, cuz he!, zee economy’s booming, gut!

Lessons from History

When you look at the history of the Third Reich, or Stalin in Russia, it is a dark wonder, how one man could lead so many - such a crowd! - into such malignant evil. So many people in that crowd would have said in the moment - surely not these, my friends! Surely these people, my friends - surely they’re not evil! How could God be angry and judgmental to them?! So, so many would have said that. And later regretted and disavowed any and all participation in that very crowd.

So again, being part of a crowd, and being close to a crowd means nothing. Mankind’s best and brightest have often been so deceived. The existence of a crowd tells you nothing about whether it’s there for a good reason or a bad one. Nor do your feelings. Our feelings are not a good standard by which to judge whether we participate in a good crowd or a bad one.

Note again: we all want to be part of a good crowd, not a bad one. Even people who rebel against “the man” find it good to be part of the “bad” crowd. Everyone is looking for the good. The question is, by what standard shall we discern the good?

Start with the Bible

Might you consider the fact that every good in Western civilization previously came to us from a worldview founded on the Bible? Might you consider that the blessings that you enjoy today stem from the gracious hand of God, Who authored the Bible? Who is both the One we should fear, but Who is also the One we should run to - and CAN run to - for mercy and forgiveness?

If we are willing to believe that, and rest our thinking on His Word, we will discover two things that are fresh and desirable. The first is solidity. We will know that we can find the good, and stand on it, and know that it is good, and that it won’t change to something else, when the crowd changes its mind about what’s good next month. We can have solidity.

But secondly, we can have true love, toward those in our crowd who are rebelling against this God. For instance, let’s say you are a student in the choir. And in the choir there’s a number of self-declared homosexuals. As you consider them, you can know that you are standing on solid ground, that their homosexuality is part of the wrath of God itself (Romans 1:22-27), and that they will not inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor. 6:9). So you know that you don’t want to be “in” with them, in that trajectory, that destiny.

But you can also relate to them with love, wanting them to join you in your destiny, with Christ. Thus you don’t despise them either. You befriend them, without joining them. You look for an opportunity to tell them of your life in Christ, while not giving away an inch of your stability in the Word, never apologizing for it. And you endure their scorn, knowing that Jesus endured the same scorn before you.

In this you give and they see real love, a love foreign to the rest of the world. A love that is as solid as the cross, as and happy as the angels sitting on Jesus’ tombstone. This is not easy. It is not hard to be stable, solid, without love, or to be loving without stability in Jesus. The goal is both, and it ain’t easy. But good things never are easy. It’s hard all around these days.

One More Thing

One more thing. If you find yourself tempted to be drawn “in” to the inner ring of any ideology, that pull, that tendency is telling you how much you need the church. Not just the youth group or your small group, but the whole church. The church is the only entity that exists now that will go into eternity. As humble and strange as she is sometimes, it’s true. God hides His glory in plain sight in humble packaging.

As you live in the church, you learn that life really can be lived without being in that “inner ring”, that crowd. The church teaches and empowers you, that it is plausible to live a fuller and happier life without that crowd. You see it in the elderly widow, who is so sparklingly happy, though she lives by herself. You see it in that middle-aged man, who suffers from an early cancer, but whose hope is in the life to come. And you see it your other friends and peers who are wrestling to follow Jesus, though the cost is high.

Crowds are just crowds. They are either good or bad, and the standard is always Christ.

* Or as we like to call it around these parts, “Romans 1 Month.” ↩︎

* As C.S. Lewis put it, in his essay by the same name. ↩︎

Introduction

We listened to the news, stunned . . . Stunned at the murdering of children in Uvalde. Stunned at the seeming senselessness of it - as if some sense could be made of it. We humans are “sense makers”, after all. But we were also stunned that the “good guys” . . . stopped. And waited. And waited. And waited, while the killer killed, again and again.

Of course our elites have responded with political grandstanding; they ask, “How can I use this against my political opponents?” Meanwhile the folks in Uvalde wonder how one of their own could kill like this - or wait at the door, while it happened. That is the question. Asking how we might harden school security or harden gun laws won’t answer that question.

But that is the question.

Axe the Axioms

Christians understand that man is fallen - each one of us. God has made each of us in His image. Thus man is capable of magnificent good. But sin has defaced that image, and parasitically twists it. Thus man is also capable of the most grotesque evils. And yet we don’t all do such things. This basic understanding of the fallenness of man is essential to understand, but it does not explain Uvalde, not entirely, not in a satisfactory way.

We Christians also like to say, “There go I, but for the grace of God.” That’s true. As Solzhenitzyn once wrote, the line between good and evil runs through every human heart. All the world’s barbarities lie in seed form in every lust and sinful desire. But again, as soon as we say, “There go I, but for the grace of God,” we instantly feel something inside us that says, “No, I never would go there.” Not to that place. Not to killing children.

But perhaps, if we are honest with ourselves, we might wonder, if I were in that hallway, gear on, gun loaded . . . Would I run into the line of fire? Would I have the courage to sacrifice myself? Would I have inside of me whatever is necessary, in that moment, to risk, to sacrifice, for others?

This is the question of every man who enlists and waits for the first day of boot camp. Do I have what it takes? To both endure the trial and do my task with honor?

The Failure of Failures

Uvalde was a failure of true masculinity - the glad assumption of sacrificial responsibility. Standing on this definition, we can see its two ditches, both operating at Uvalde: the first being a brutal, violent masculinity, where the man becomes the devouring dragon; and the second ditch being an impotent, cowardly masculinity, where the man refuses to unsheathe his sword and fight the dragon. But true masculinity, whatever else it is, gladly the assumes responsibility for the well-being of others, to lead them to green pastures, and protect them from wolves. Manhood failed at Uvalde.

To which many have pointed out the importance of fathers, and fatherhood. This gets closer to the heart of the problem. But it assumes the question, What should be at the heart of fatherhood that would have changed this? That would result in true masculinity, in the classroom, and in the hallway?

The Heart of the Problem

As is often the case, C.S. Lewis could see down into the heart of the problem, a long time ago. There may be no other book that explains our present age better than his “The Abolition of Man.” You can sense the point by the title: that we have abolished manhood. How?

He could see it happening even in the 1940’s: it began when we jettisoned any connection to objective, unchanging truth. This rejection of objective standards then leads to the rejection of making any kind of value judgments. When there is no standard, then there is no basis for saying that this thing of greater value, because of its superior beauty and goodness, than that thing.

Thus art is art, and one cannot say whether a Van Gogh is of any more artistic value than a solitary dot painted on a white canvas. Because what is beauty? And thus life is life - who can say whether this life is of more value than that life? Who can say whether the life in the womb is of equal value than any other? Or the life of those with Downs Syndrome? Who can say?

Of course we might ask, by what standard do you say that there is no standard? Where does that enlightenment come from? But man is not meant to question the pride of man. Let us keep swimming in our sea of delusions. The only standard left to us is our emotions. Lewis writes:

Those who stand outside all judgements of value cannot have any ground for preferring one of their own impulses to another except the emotional strength of that impulse.

We have trained generations of people now what to think. We have to do that, because we have trained them to believe that there is no standard, no superior beauty, to which we may appeal to, and base our lives upon. We have trained generations that there is no standard, by which to make value judgements.

And thus there is nothing worth living for, nor dying for. No transcendent glory. It is all in the eye of the beholder. Thus concepts like courage and sacrifice and living for others, and gladly surrendering your own lusts and conceits in order to nourish and sustain others - these have no basis. They are not grounded in anything - they are only tactics by which a marriage or a society might survive.

Men Without Chests

Thus we produce “men without chests.” Lewis envisions three parts to us: the mind, with its thoughts; the gut, with its base desires; and the chest, where we love, treasure and value things. But we actually train our men and women to turn that off, to suppress that “chest”, to empty it out, leaving behind only the mind, trained in what it should think, and the gut. The “gut” then becomes the governor of the person. Whatever I feel most strongly, that I do.

If I feel the life inside me is a parasite, I kill it. If I feel it’s my child, I keep it. After all, there is no other standard for making any other value judgment, about what “it” is.

In this way we have raised up generations of “men without chests,” men without any eyes of the heart that can see that which is worth living and dying for.

And where have we done this? Yes, we have bought into this foolish nonsense at home. But we have propagated it without reservation in our schools, especially in our public schools. We abolish men. We grind out manhood.

The Tragic Irony

This is the tragic irony of Uvalde. The very place that has served as the temple of this religion called relativism served as the place for its most grotesque blood sacrifice. The very place that has created men without chests for almost a century saw them come home to roost, in the most horrific way.

We should not be shocked. As Lewis famously wrote:

And all the time — such is the tragi-comedy of our situation — we continue to clamour for those very qualities we are rendering impossible. You can hardly open a periodical without coming across the statement that what our civilization needs is more ‘drive’, or dynamism, or self-sacrifice, or ‘creativity’. In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and demand the function. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful.

He could easily be talking about the headlines since this shooting. We laugh at honor, and are shocked - shocked! - to hear that the cops stayed outside. We have removed the heart of men, and then wonder in ghastly surprise when they act like men without chests. We take out the heart, but still demand that the men pump blood like men. The very place where we have rendered self-giving and sacrifice impossible - and where we’ve sent our children for eight hours a day, for twelve years of their life - is the place where the “ghastly” results of that work were revealed.

I do not deny that immediate, practical steps should be taken to harden school security. We treat our schools as if nothing valuable is inside. Yet that too is just another feature of the problem. According to what is taught inside the school, upon what basis, by what standard, might anyone say that there is something valuable inside, except the strong emotions of the parents?

Forward, Finally

No, the only way forward is a wholesale rejection of the godless philosophy that permeates how we raise our kids. Note that I am not calling for any particular course of action, though some will easily follow from this rejection. For many, leaving public schools is an obvious next step. But in order to reject the empty, death-inducing relativism of our day, one must know what to replace it with.

But then we must know the standard, the truth that is there, the transcendent beauty that we have forgotten. But in order to see the rays of the sun, there must be a sun, and one’s eyes must be opened, or reopened.

There is no way to see this truth, this beauty, without the work of God, to open the eyes and shine that light. For He is the way, the truth and the life that is there, from which all other light comes from. He is the standard; He is the supreme, unchanging beauty. And He proved this by raising Himself from the dead.

What we need most is both faith in Him, but also repentance toward Him, away from the empty philosophies of our age. The relativism of our day has caused so much death. But He conquered death. The relativism of our day has rejected so much beauty, but He is the Creator of all beauty. We need nothing less than wholesale revival - beginning in the church, for the church has swallowed and propagated so much of this relativism, to its shame. We Christians must repent, and then call our age to do the same.

Societies cannot survive with malicious or cowardly men. Thus it cannot survive with family, church and educational systems that produce men without chests by the millions. The only answer is repentance, back to the God of lights, the King of glory. There is no more time left for Uvalde. But there is for us.

It’s been said that the thing that really made America exceptional in the history of nations is that we were the first great superpower to say that we are not great. What made America great is that we said you should never trust an American. Not any farther than you can throw him. 

But that does not mean that America has not been populated by exceptional people. It has, abundantly so. The foolish royalty of Europe gave away their greatest treasures when they chased off our forefathers across the Atlantic. Though our founding fathers said you should never trust an American - and thus our political system of checks and balances - this nation has been lavishly blessed with forefathers and foremothers that children and towns could trust and build around, for their flourishing.

What They Knew

These men and women knew of goodnesses and beauties that are objectively true, unchanging, and full of life and glory. These were people who could look at a sea of amber grain, waving at them in the wind, and see the beautiful goodness inherent in the scene. These people knew the difference between good poetry and bad; between good entertainment and trash; between a good tree and a useless bush; between truth and a lie; between a good man and a dangerous fool; between a priceless woman and a cheap harlot. They knew the difference. These were people that knew that right is not just right; it’s the pathway to life. 

And when you know that these glorious realities exist, and you know that they are your way to life, you are willing to sacrifice for them - to expend blood, sweat and tears, to see these glories be born, mature, and then to protect them from threats. Our forefathers knew how to live, because they knew of things so good and glorious that were worth dying for. 

Die they so often did - on ships getting here; during countless plagues that swept the New World; in our first wars, and in many since; and in the social battles for societal justice - our forefathers died, for unchanging goodnesses and glories. 

Today we live a different storyline. We are so secure and rich, and yet depression and suicidality and drug use are rampant. We don’t want to live, ironically, because we have nothing worth dying for. We’ve discovered the hard way that a vapid, superficial life of ease and security is no life at all. Thus the question: what changed? What did our forefathers have that we lack?

The Answer

The answer is God. We lack God. When any people, no matter their prior greatness, tries to become their own kings, living by their own logic, apart from submission to the wisdom of God, out from under His rules and Word, that people will mess everything up - relationships, economies, sexuality - you name it, we will muck it up. As Chesterton put it, when a people stops believing in God, it’s not that they then believe in nothing - it’s then that they will believe in anything. Anything but the truth. And when a people stops believing in the most high God, it’s not that they stop looking for great power - they just look for it on earth. And often it will land on the strong-men of earth. Thus it’s no coincidence that we have ceded so much power to our state. 

But the way and the truth that leads to life is only found beyond us, in Another. Jesus proved that he himself is the unchanging wisdom of God, by his resurrection from the dead. He proved therefore that there is an unchanging good, an unshakeable beauty that exists. It exists and it can be found. In Him. Our forefathers knew that beauty, at least in part, because they knew him - or at least a worldview that grew from him. 

They possessed this wisdom because they were taught the Bible in school, at the dinner table, before bed, in church, in Sunday School, and along way, to and fro. They were taught a “biblical worldview,” to such a degree that that phrase would have been incomprehensible to them. Isn’t that, like, the water we swim in? They were taught, and they were shaped to love that beauty, more than lesser beauties. 

This was not narrow-mindedness on their part, to say that this is objectively better than this. That’s called sanity. That’s called living with eyes in your head, and using those eyes, rather than plucking them out, in the name of “progressivism,” “wokeism,” or any other -ism one may proffer. They knew the truth, and it set them free, even to die for it, for they found it not in an -ism, but in a Person. Beware all -isms, someone once said. They knew this; they knew that -isms were counterfeits, because they had been taught so well the authentic Real Thing, risen from the dead. 

Do not misunderstand me: these were not perfect people. But neither are we. So let us compare and contrast with honesty. We have declined. We have become blind. And thus we lack a spine. We have instructed multiple generations in what to think, according to the whims of the day, and then we have eroded our moral foundations, and bastardized academia to justify living however we want. And all the while, we have stopped shaping young people in their hearts, to know and love that glorious, unchanging beauty beyond us. Again, we don’t know how to live, because we never were taught that there’s anything worth dying for. And then we’re surprised and shocked when we produce generations of cowards. As C.S. Lewis famously put it, in “The Abolition of Man”: 

And all the time — such is the tragi-comedy of our situation — we continue to clamour for those very qualities we are rendering impossible. You can hardly open a periodical without coming across the statement that what our civilization needs is more ‘drive’, or dynamism, or self-sacrifice, or ‘creativity’. In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and demand the function. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful.

Remember and Learn

But that need not be the end of the story. This Memorial Day, it is good and right and fitting for Christians to remember those who gave “the last full measure of devotion,” like those at Bunker Hill, Gettysburg, New Orleans, Belleau Wood, Midway, Osan, Hamburger Hill, or Abu Ghraib. It is right that we honor their names and memory. And it is good and right for us to enjoy the freedom and pleasures that they bought for us, over a leisurely cookout. 

But we must also remember what can free a person to even contemplate and then accept the possibility of such a sacrifice. Their last measure of devotion reminds us that unchanging, glorious beauties still exist, and that they come from Somewhere. They exist, and they are still worth devoting one’s whole life to their birth, growth and defense. And they are worth passing on. 

Remembering those who have died for our country should move us to pick up our own shovels and weapons. Our shovels are the gifts and time that God has given us, and our weapons are bread and wine and water. Time to rebuild from the ruins, conserving what they got right, and “progressing” beyond what they got wrong. Time to roll up our sleeves in order to build anew a generation that knows how to truly live, in the knowledge that there is light and life beyond the grave. 

The core of this rebuilding project will always be Christ, if it will amount to anything. We know what we should conserve or progress beyond by the yardstick of the Word. All that God is for us in Christ is more than enough to rebuild a new society from the old. God is not done with America, I’m convinced. She may slowly divide and decline; or she may become an evilsuperpower; or she may be revived from the ashes, as a conduit of God’s grace. Let us pray and labor for the latter. 

Introduction

It was pure political theater, of course. During Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court confirmation hearing, when asked if she could define what a woman is, said, “Not in this context. I’m not a biologist.” That was, on its face, silly. She had referred to women over and over again already in her testimony, and in most cases, she was referring to what you or I would call a “woman.”

But equally notable was what was spoken next. Senator Marsha Blackburn, from Tennessee, replied: “The fact that you can’t give me a straight answer about something as fundamental as what a woman is underscores the dangers of the kind of progressive education that we are hearing about.” Indeed, Senator Blackburn. Judge Jackson’s words were perhaps the most public example in our time of the central failure of public education. Yet the great dangers here were pictured by the words of both women.

Judge Jackson’s testimony demonstrated a great ability to borrow a definition from the periphery, and to work with it, as if it were true, as if it were a tool, with some utility. But when asked what the thing is - its ontology, its actual nature, its definition, its character - she could not answer. Of course she was evading the simple question, so as to avoid some controversy within her sphere of political, academic and polite society. But it was more than that. She could not answer because, I’m convinced, she could not answer.

In other words, we should take her at her word at that moment, as much as we should any other moment of her testimony. And Senator Blackburn is right, to connect the Judge’s comment with “progressive education.” Though the Senator from Tennessee - and all who are “hearing about” this sort of thing are late, too late. C.S. Lewis looks over his shoulder at us from his tower, window broken, feet bleeding, machine gun in tow, yelling down to us, in his best Bruce Willis impersonation, though with a proper British accent, “Welcome to the party, pal.”

Lewis Saw Our Day

Lewis wrote about this “progressive education” in the 1940’s, in his book, “The Abolition of Man.” The book was prophetic. In it he observed how the “progressive” teaching philosophy even in his day sought not to teach such things as objective beauty or truth, but only to “condition” children as to what they should think, believe, or even see and feel.

But what they should think or feel or see was not based on some fundamental, unchanging reality, but on the opposite: on seeing through what’s there, to whatever’s behind it. And then seeing past that, and that, and that. No wonder today we are awash in a nihilistic wasteland where nothing is anything and everything is nothing. Because, as Lewis observed, when you see through everything, you’re left with nothing on the other side. Once you see through everything, you see nothing. You are blind.

And then you are a slave, enchanted by your own desires. As Lewis put it:

When all that says ‘it is good’ has been debunked, what says ‘I want’ remains. It cannot be exploded or ‘seen through’ because it never had any pretentions. The Conditioners, therefore, must come to be motivated simply by their own pleasure.

And thus this educational model “conditions” children, in the end, to see nothing and then become slaves of their own desires. And once enslaved to their own lusts, they become more easily fooled and enslaved by the state. This is the endgame of state-run education - again Lewis:

But the manmoulders of the new age will be armed with the powers of an omnicompetent state and an irresistible scientific technique: we shall get at last a race of conditioners who really can cut out all posterity in what shape they please.

Theodore Dalrymple famously put it this way in more recent times:

The purpose of communist propaganda was not to persuade or convince, not to inform, but to humiliate; and therefore, the less it corresponded to reality the better. When people are forced to remain silent when they are being told the most obvious lies, or even worse when they are forced to repeat the lies themselves, they lose once and for all their sense of probity. To assent to obvious lies is in some small way to become evil oneself. One’s standing to resist anything is thus eroded and even destroyed. A society of emasculated liars is easy to control.

The “conditioners” condition children to see only that this clump of cells is a uterus, and the biological function of a placenta, and the hormonal changes that happen with pregnancy, and a thousand other details. But they emasculate the children of the ability to say, “Marvelous!”; emasculate them of the delight in seeing the magnificence of the design; emasculate them of eyes to see the whole being who can create a child and nurture it to maturity, and say, “Beautiful!”; emasculate them of a “chest”, a heart that can look at this “thing” and say, “Woman. The glory of Man. Beautiful. Woman.”

Incoherence

Of course the conditioning itself is logical incoherent, because when you ask these “conditioners,” “By what standard do you say that we should see through everything, but not see through your claim that we should through everything?” well, then we are met with silence.

Thus there is no coherence to anything in our existence, unless it is connected to a fixed, unchanging reality. And that reality is God. But that reality - that Word - did not stay up in the sky, detached and ethereal. It came down and walked among us, died for us, and was raised from the dead. In the resurrection the reality of this Word was proven for all. Thus when you detach yourself from this fixed reality, sooner or later you will become so proud as to take His place, and you will dissolve into chaotic incoherence. Only He upholds the universe by the word of his power (Heb. 1:3).

To which Lewis points out, if you are not grounded in this fixed reality, this Word, and if you condition children to live apart from this Word, you will produce “men without chests”: people who know what to think, in their heads, but who then follow their base lusts from their gut, because they have no chest, no heart in the middle, no right-ordered loves. They are blind; consciences seared; having been conditioned by liars to lie to the deep reality of God Himself (1 Tim. 4:2).

Products Versus Fools

Thus Judge Jackson may have had the highest of privileges in our land, the most prestigious eduction, but it appears that she too has only a head and a gut, but no chest. She is simply a product of the system. And this system, this con, has been run for a long time. Lewis noticed it, and so did Paul:

2 Timothy 3:1–7 (ESV): But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. 2 For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, 4 treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Avoid such people. 6 For among them are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, 7 always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth.

So who is the greater fool here? Judge Jackson is but a product of her conditioners. She is obviously intelligent, but as Lewis remarked about those so conditioned, her intelligence only seems significant in contrast with the small vacuum of her “chest” - her heart. But Senator Blackburn hails from the Bible Belt and presumably has freer access to the truth. Christianity did not just begin “hearing about” this “progressive education” scam in the last few years. We’ve been warned, for a long time. We’ve been told for two thousand years that arrogant “conditioners” would creep into households and capture women - as they have done to an entire generation of our young women today.

Who is the greater fool here - the conditioners, who know exactly what they are producing with their conditioning? Or Christians, who send their kids off to the conditioners for eight hours a day and twelve years of their life, and then are surprised when their kids come home unable to love anything enough to live courageously and sacrificially for it? As Lewis famously put it:

. . . such is the tragi-comedy of our situation — we continue to clamour for those very qualities we are rendering impossible. You can hardly open a periodical without coming across the statement that what our civilization needs is more ‘drive’, or dynamism, or self-sacrifice, or ‘creativity’. In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and demand the function. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful.

Rich to Repentance

In other words, it is rather rich for Senator Blackburn to demand of Judge Jackson that she define what a woman is - after all, Senator Blackburn has been propagating the compulsory educational system that produced Judge Jackson, and all like her. The only way forward is through repentance. But not a repentance back to the 1950’s, or any other “glorious” day in the past. No, the only repentance that will lead us through our self-created, nihilistic chaos is by training boys and girls not only to know what they should know, but also to love what they should love, to desire that which is desirous, and to see that which is truly beautiful. And then to enjoy it, with gratitude to its Maker.

There is no middle ground here. We either educate our children with Christ at the center of it all and permeating it all, or it will end up in chaos. Our repentance must go all the way back, to all the Word, for all of life, in all that God is for us, in all of Christ. We either go back to that, or we are lost. Our country is already lost. A generation is already lost. But Christians have in hand the power to rebuild a new civilization from the ruins of the old. But the way forward is not found by trying to join our elites - either Jackson or Blackburn - in their educational models. The way forward is found by going back, all the way back, to a reigning King on a cross, and then working out from there, once again.

“The apostles turned the world upside down. They did so without any help from it.” —John MacArthur

Introduction

California has entered a new age of barbarism - actually a very old one. Just down the road from me in our state’s capitol, Assembly Bill #2223 passed the assembly almost unanimously, which permits women to commit infanticide. You read that right - our legislature wants to allow women to leave their newborn, “perinatal” babies to exposure and death - without repercussions. In fact, the law allows the mother to sue any authority that even attempts prosecution.

We should begin by noting that fathers are not even in the equation - their role in the decision was aborted a long time ago, in the Roe v. Wade decision. The entire question is conceived in terms of what the woman will do. Oh, dear reader - pardon me for using that “scientific” term! After all, I’m a pastor, not a biologist. “Birthing persons” - this legislation only relates to “birthing persons.” I’ll do better next time. Anyways . . . Where were we? One has trouble keeping track of all the ways we enlightened moderns are “progressing” . . . Oh yeah, infanticide.

The Origination of the Barbarism

Where did this idea of legal infanticide originate from? The ghouls of Planned Parenthood? Of course. The Democratic Party? Yes - this state’s party supermajority equates with the word “legislature.” Feminism? Check. A culture of self-centered lust for “having it all’? Indeed. And now we’re getting a little closer. But the real answer goes deeper. No one woke up last week and decided last week to leave babies to die. And until we see that deeper source of the barbarism, our response to this bloodlust will always be, in some way, superficial and sub-Christian.

We may get at the reasons by first asking ourselves why Christians in the first century made it their habit to go out in the morning and seek out unwanted babies, who had been left to be exposed and die. This was the norm in the ancient Roman Empire, rather than killing the baby in the womb. But why did the Christians do it? After all, they had no “pro-life” organizations, no blogging pastors, no email alerts. They had no political representation. They were citizens of a tyrannical autocracy, if they were citizens at all - some of them were slaves. So what prompted them to seek out these babies, and though they often had little for themselves, to take on another mouth to feed?

The Reasoning

One wonders if they were just reading their Bibles. When you see the world afresh, with new eyes, the eyes of the grace of the gospel, you can’t unsee it. You can’t look at an exposed newborn and see anything but how I too was once dead in my trespasses and sins; helpless to do anything about it; alone in the world; alienated from my Parent; with nothing to earn my way into His graces; only bringing deficits to the equation, like more food to consume, diapers to change, and sleep to interrupt. In those exposed newborns, lying in the field, alone and helpless, those first Christians must have seen themselves, before knowing Christ.

But God, in His mercy, made us alive together with Christ. And so those Christians could not help but see in each and every newborn the whole storyline of the Bible: that though God would bring judgment on the world, he saved Noah and his family through the judgment; that though He would bring judgment on Israel through Pharoah, he would save a baby on the Nile and name him Moses; that though God would bring judgment on Egypt, that same Moses would lead His people through the waters to new life on the other side; that though God would bring judgment on the nations of Palestine, God would bring His people to that Promised Land, by means of His servant Joshua, whose name means “God saves”. And though Herod would kill the babies of Bethlehem, another baby named Joshua - in Aramaic, Jesus - would escape to Egypt. And out of Egypt, God would again call His Son.

God saves. That entire storyline reaches its pinnacle, in every one of those Roman citizens who were saved by the mercies of God. At every one of their baptisms, they were proclaiming this new life, this new way through God’s judgment. And so when they came upon these babies, they could not help but see the entire storyline of God’s redemptive plan, and they had to act.

After all, Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me.” You must trust me as if you are as helpless as a child, Jesus is saying. THEN you qualify for the kingdom - when you know you don’t qualify. And these babies were a picture of the glorious truth of that gospel.

For Joy in Grace

From this perspective then, the Christians were not doing it “for the children”. I mean, they were, but what really moved them was God. They did it out of gratitude to Him, to glorify His grace. To put it another way: they were exercising “sympathy”, not “empathy”. Sympathy sees in another their true situation, according to reality, which means according to God, and then gives them what they need. Empathy, on the other hand, perceives the other person’s feelings accurately, and acts according to what we perceive would be psychologically beneficial to them, in their situation.

Today only a Christian can see that exposed baby, and relate to it with true sympathy. Because only a Christian can see what that exposed baby represents, in the scope of the whole cosmos. But what cognizant feelings does a baby have? Thus our whole world can only relate to the mother, and that not with sympathy, but only with empathy - only according to the fleeting and changing emotions of the mother, who was put in such circumstantial distress that she had to leave her baby behind, alone. What distress that must have been for her!, says empathy.

But you see the limits of empathy in its fruits: it still leaves the baby to die, while the sympathy of Christians brings life, and rescue. What kind of culture can revert back to the ancient Roman barbarism of exposing unwanted babies to die? To allow infanticide? Only one that worships nothing over and above the autonomous self - in this case, the pregnant mother. And empathy for the mother is the sweet veneer that frees our warped and seared consciences to give approval to the murder of her child. When the self becomes god, and belief in the one, true God disappears, it’s not that we then believe in nothing. It’s then that we will believe in anything, said Chesterton. It’s only then that we can believe that assuaging the mental anguish of a mother is worth more than the life of that baby.

Politics is produced by culture, and culture is produced by whatever that culture worships. Thus the culture that produces barbaric legislation worships a barbaric, bloodthirsty god. It’s not a matter of WHETHER you worship a G/god that demands blood sacrifices - all the gods do. It’s just a matter of which G/god that is, and whose blood it demands. Our culture’s god promises pleasures and freedoms and says that it demands nothing in return, and yet in the end it always requires a payment of blood - the blood of innocents.

Governor Newsom has proclaimed that California, by fiat and legislation and tax dollars, will become a sanctuary for those who want to have an abortion. By this he and all who serve in this industrial-scale abortion apparatus are only serving their god. Regardless of whether this legislation passes as-is, our state has become a den of death for the most vulnerable, because we worship the god of the autonomous self. Which is simply the base lie of the Garden, the only ploy of that old Dragon, who is destined for the pit. And so is this abominable practice.

In the end, what matters is what G/god the people worship.

The Christian God, the God of the Bible, the God Who is there, He too requires the blood of us all - not because we are innocent, but because we are all guilty of rebellion against him, in any number of ways. Yet in our place He has given us His own innocent Son - all by His unmerited favor, an undeserved gift. Our God in love rescued us, when were as good as dead before Him. What God required of us, God gave us, as a gift, when were dead to rights, helpless before Him.

Thus we now stand in the place of our first mothers and fathers in the faith. The church in California now must make itself publicly available as an alternative sanctuary for these babies. Instead of killing their babies, mothers or fathers can bring them here, and we will find a home for them. We will do our best to see to it that they are raised in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

Being on God’s Side

In the end, those first Christians’ acts of rescuing love exposed the Romans’ awful practice back to their faces, in a way that changing legislation never could. It shamed not just the practice of infanticide, but also the entire system of perversity that led to that practice. And I believe we are called by God to stand in that same gap once again, for our most vulnerable neighbors, fresh from the womb. And by God’s grace, this will display the shame of our state’s abortion program, and shine a bright light on the grace of the gospel. There is great power - more than we realize - in simply being on God’s side, and simply obeying the Great Commandment, to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself. To that exposed baby, that love will feel, eventually, like, well, love. To the barbarians in our legislature however, our love will feel like burning coals heaped on the head.

Those first Christians were not “fighting a culture war”, though the culture was shamed and fell before their feet. They were not “getting political”, though they upended an empire’s political system. They knew nothing of “social justice”, though they brought justice to those most in need of it. They were simply Christians, following their Lord, their hearts enlarged by His grace, proclaiming that there is a King of Kings, and He owns the land that empires simply rent for a time. And He will require an accounting from us all. Best to face that now, and repent, before the day of that Great Audit:

Psalm 2 Why do the nations rage

and the peoples plot in vain?

2  The kings of the earth set themselves,

and the rulers take counsel together,

against the LORD and against his Anointed, saying,

3  “Let us burst their bonds apart

and cast away their cords from us.”

4  He who sits in the heavens laughs;

the Lord holds them in derision.

5  Then he will speak to them in his wrath,

and terrify them in his fury, saying,

6  “As for me, I have set my King

on Zion, my holy hill.”

It still rings in my mind, the way my friend Roger (not his real name) questioned me condescendingly, about why I was still “fighting the culture wars.” Christians had lost the war, he said - why keep fighting? Roger said the whole notion of a culture war is not just a losing battle, but a lost one.

I note, in reflection on that conversation, that Roger was and is today very much already in a culture - he grew up in the church, went to a well-known Christian college, and yet today holds the Scriptures lightly, while holding more strongly to science, and left-leaning politics, and sometimes an anger at certain strains of conservatism. In short, my friend does have a culture - largely that of the general stream of our larger culture. And in this way he is like all of us - we all have a culture; it’s not a matter of whether you have one, but which one.

Depraved Disney

This comes to mind as I reflect on Disney’s vocal, open protest against Florida’s new law that prevents elementary school teachers from talking about “sexual identity” with “their” students. Leave that up to parents, the law basically says - the necessity of which speaks volumes about our culture’s lurch into depravity. For most of humanity’s 6,000 years, such a law was unnecessary. The parent’s right of sovereignty was assumed. Up until about 30 seconds ago, we would have called people who wanted to talk with children about sex behind parents’ back “predators” or “groomers.” Our church even has a policy to ward against such people.

As I reflect on this, I also remember a visit to Disney’s Epcot center in Florida. There was an animatronic show that, if memory serves me right, was meant to celebrate “progress” in technology. There is a grandpa figure in the show, who undoubtedly is meant to picture Walt himself. And at one point in the show, his grandson finds a magazine that grandpa jokingly tells little Johnny never to mind - it was undoubtedly what grandpa’s generation would have called a “girlie mag” - pornography, smut. I remember my sister and I looking at each other like, “Huh? Where did that come from?”

Same DNA

It came from that culture. And that culture gave birth to our own. They are of the same strain, the same lineage. The child is like the parent. Oh sure, the child-culture today is more out there, more brazen, wearing purple hair with tat’s, and all that, but the same DNA is operating.

For instance, it was the baby boomer generation that celebrated its autonomy, to be and do whatever it wanted. This love of autonomy started long before them, with 17-century Rene Descartes and his “I think, therefore I am.” With that simple phrase, Descartes upended the foundations of knowledge, by saying that man is the starting point of knowledge, not God and the fear of Him. This is the fundamental sin - autonomy - which, in a world governed by God, is always from God. It was this autonomy that the serpent offered Eve in the Garden, and Eve accepted. And thus the individualism and autonomy of our present generation is nothing new - just the full flowering of what was handed down to them.

Now, the mistake that many Christians make is thinking that they could fight the culture wars while remaining good standing members of that fallen culture. But that has not worked. After all, as Christians are discovering to their great discomfort today, our culture will no longer tolerate Christian thought (ironically in the name of “tolerance”). You cannot wear the same uniform and yet fight against the uniform. You either get in line, or change uniforms. As soon as you start to fight the culture you’re in, you get spit out, and these Christians were not willing to do that.

But there is another ditch, which I fear my friend Roger has driven into. He has concluded that the only other alternative is to give up, raise the white flag, and join in the prevailing culture. He is not willing to change uniforms, because he sees that it has not worked. And, along the way, he has become too invested, academically, professionally, politically and relationally in the prevailing culture.

A Culture to Impose

What both kinds of Christians fail to see is that God never intended for us to fight any “culture war” without another culture at hand, to fight with. From the very beginning, God intended for His people to fight the prevailing culture means of an alternative culture. God has always been on a mission to impose a new culture, in place of the old. News flash: that’s what war is - one culture displacing another. Thus we cannot fight the culture without one of our own to take its place. The problem with our “culture wars” is that we have not been fighting with seriousness, as if we really wanted to win, as if we really wanted displace the old. We didn’t want to be seen as that “extreme”, or to go that far.

Everyone wants to impose a culture - not a matter of whether, but which one. God has called us to impose His culture here and now, in Elk Grove. But by “impose”, God does not mean a holy war, nor does He mean for us to employ power politics, nor does He mean “be nice”. But He will displace the rival culture with His own. And that culture is already here, in microcosm form, in the church. The church is the “snow globe” of this new culture, that we may point to, and take refuge in, and be strengthened by, and be commissioned by and sent out from again. This was always God’s purpose for His people: to demonstrate and bring the good life that is only found in ordering one’s life and world according to God and His wisdom and grace.

It Started in the Garden

And God means to proclaim this and bring this good life, because of how everything got turned upside down in the Garden. Creation was supposed to be a hierarchy of man, helped by woman, exercising dominion over creation, under God. But this hierarchy flipped when the crafty dragon spoke to the woman, and the woman listened, and the man listened to the woman, and turned their backs on God. So Christ in his resurrection is the firstborn of a new humanity, and his Body, the Church, is meant to be a living parable of that resurrection life. We are his new “culture”, breaking into the world, proclaiming to the world that life is found here, amidst the chaos, darkness and pain.

Our culture is only producing the fruit of seeds planted a long time ago, seeds that were growing in the 1950’s. Disney is only now doing the Full Waltie, because its perverse agenda was always there, evidenced in that animatronic presentation. And this perversity was only there because Uncle Walt and his generation had already discarded God at the center of their being. As Paul writes in Romans 1:

21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

But we did not repent, but instead we enshrined our perversity in animatronics and Roe v. Wade and Google making pornography mainstream, and all the rest. Thus we have our current situation:

26 For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.

There is still a culture war, and it was won not by some Supreme Court decision but by Christ in cross and empty tomb. And thus God does not give his people permission to simply join the other side. Instead His call to us remains the same: to go, and make disciples of all the nations, including our own. What our culture needs now is what Uncle Walt needed back in the 50’s: repentance, from our autonomy, evidenced by our perversity, back to God.

To the Church

To the church then, we must sharpen and practice fighting with the weapons God has given us. And our primary instrument is worship: bread and wine, consumed with an infectious, jolly joy in our King. Ground zero of our fight is Sunday worship, and from there we labor to build a new culture out of the ashes of the old. And we make no apologies that the King of that culture is our resurrected Lord. Not at all. Only in the fear of Him is there knowledge; only in His resurrection do we find life; only in His ordering of sexuality do we find transcendent pleasure; only in His gospel will we ever be truly free. So then, being freed ourselves, we call the nations to repent, submit, and thereby be free, and live as free men. And by this proclamation, the “lost” battle of the culture war is won.

To the Culture

And to the culture we say “Repent. Be baptized, into the name of the Lord Jesus.” Make Him your Lord, for we as a culture are living on borrowed time. Every moment is a gift of His massive mercy, in the face of our bloodlust, bloodletting and depravity, all in the name of our own autonomy. Do you see all the chaos around you? Do you notice the anger and seething rage in your own heart? Do you see where that’s coming from - that it’s not from without, but from within! You need a new heart, one that is untwisted, unbent by the weight of trying to be your own god. You need to believe and bend your knee to Christ, before it is too late.

We need nothing less than revival. How will it come, if not by God? And how will God bring it, if not by His people?