Berit, this could be
two or three articles. The section on Worldviews could stand alone. So could the
discussion of how far we have fallen into paganism. Use any titles that you want
to use. Adapt this in any way that works for you.
The Importance of Integrity
by Maria Kneas
“Who can understand
his errors? cleanse thou me from secret faults. Keep back thy servant also from
presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me: then shall I be upright,
and I shall be innocent from the great transgression. Let the words of my mouth,
and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength,
and my redeemer.” (Psalm 19:12-14)
In the Navy, the
term “integrity” means “water tight.” In other words, a ship with no leaks in
it.
Some leaks are
obvious and catastrophic. An example is when the Titanic hit the iceberg. It
sank in less than three hours.
Other leaks are
smaller, and they may not be noticed, at least at first. However, unless they
are repaired, they can also be deadly, because as the water comes in through the
hole it keeps making the hole larger. That reminds me of incremental changes in
society, and in individuals. Because it happens gradually, people are often not
aware of the danger. But over time, there can be a lot of damage.
The Book of Judges
shows what happens when God’s people lose their integrity. It shows a gradual
process by which the Israelites (God’s chosen people) turned away from God in
stages, to follow “other gods” (i.e., the gods of the Caananites and other
pagans).
These stages are not
limited to the Israelites. They also apply to Christians, because we are also
God’s people. Therefore, we should learn from what happened to the Israelites so
that we won’t have to go through the suffering that they endured. Here are the
stages:
Stage 1. Peace and Prosperity
God blessed His
people with peace and prosperity, because He loves them. All seemed to be going
well for them. They were grateful, and they loved and served God.
Stage 2. Apathy and Compromise
After a while, the
people took God’s gifts for granted, and they forgot Him. They served Him
apathetically, or else they neglected Him altogether. They found reasons for no
longer following God:
“But this thing
commanded I them, saying, Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be
my people: and walk ye in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be
well unto you. But they hearkened not, nor inclined their ear, but walked in the
counsels and in the imagination of their evil heart, and went backward, and not
forward.” (Jeremiah 7:23-24)
Dr. Erwin Lutzer’s
book When A Nation Forgets God shows
how this is happening in America, and how it happened in Germany before Hitler
came to power. There are a number of parallels that are quite troubling.
Stage 3. Rebellion and Paganism
The people turned to
other gods for strength and help. The Bible calls that spiritual prostitution.
(We see this analogy very clearly in the book of Hosea, where God compares
Israel to a faithless wife who leaves her husband and runs after other men.) The
Bible says:
“And yet they would
not hearken unto their judges, but they went a whoring after other gods, and
bowed themselves unto them” (Judges 2:17)
God warned them that
because they turned away from Him, He would no longer protect them:
“The Zidonians also,
and the Amalekites, and the Maonites, did oppress you; and ye cried to me, and I
delivered you out of their hand. Yet ye have forsaken me, and served other gods:
wherefore I will deliver you no more.
Go and cry unto the gods which ye have chosen; let them deliver you in
the time of your tribulation.” (Judges 10:12-14)
Stage 4. Famine, War, Plagues and Slavery
God allowed bad
things to happen to His people. They went through great suffering:
“Hear, O earth:
behold, I will bring evil upon this people, even the fruit of their thoughts,
because they have not hearkened unto my words, nor to my law, but rejected it.”
(Jeremiah 6:19)
The Israelites were
conquered by outsiders. However, people can also be conquered from within.
Hitler was elected as President of Germany. Then he cleverly undermined the
freedom of the people and became a full-fledged dictator. He did it
incrementally, in stages, and managed to make each stage seem to be reasonable.
By the time the people realized what was happening, it was too late.
Stage 5. Confession and Repentance
God showed the
people the inadequacy of their own resources, and the fact that pagan gods would
not take care of them. They discovered that they needed God, and they needed to
be right with Him. They finally repented and confessed their sins:
O Lord, to us
belongeth confusion of face, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers,
because we have sinned against thee. To the Lord our God belong mercies and
forgivenesses, though we have rebelled against him; Neither have we obeyed the
voice of the Lord our God, to walk in his laws, which he set before us by his
servants the prophets… O my God, incline thine ear, and hear; open thine eyes,
and behold our desolations, and the city which is called by thy name: for we do
not present our supplications before thee for our righteousnesses, but for thy
great mercies. O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive; O Lord, hearken and do; defer not,
for thine own sake, O my God: for thy city and thy people are called by thy
name.” (Daniel 9:8-10, 18-19)
Stage 6. God Hears, Saves and Restores
God blesses His
people with peace. He protects them and prospers them—as long as they follow
Him.
v v v
Where does the
United States fit in this cycle? There are still some Christians who believe the
Bible and take God seriously and try to live Biblically. Unfortunately, they are
a minority.
Many people go to
church for social or cultural reasons, rather than devotion to God. And many
pastors preach a watered-down Gospel, because they want their listeners to feel
good, so that more people will come, and their church will grow big and be
successful in worldly terms.
Some pastors deny
foundational Christian doctrines, and some bring New Age teachings and practices
into their churches. This is described in
A Time of Departing by Ray Yungen, and
Pagans in the Pews by Peter Jones.
Randy England’s book The Unicorn in the
Sanctuary tells how the New Age has impacted the Catholic Church.
That is the second
stage: apathy and compromise.
In America, humanism
can serve as a bridge between Biblical faith and paganism. First, people turn to
men as their source of authority, rather than the Bible. Having done that, it is
then easier for them to turn to pagan gods. Or, to put it another way, first
they make a god out of man, and then they turn to more traditional pagan gods:
“Thus saith the
Lord; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and
whose heart departeth from the Lord.” (Jeremiah 17:5)
The New Age movement
is another bridge between Biblical faith and paganism. First, people get into
New Age things. Then from there, they can get into overt paganism. (The New Age
movement is pagan, but it is dressed up in modern vocabulary and imagery, so it
isn’t obvious.)
Pagan goddess
worship has gotten into many mainline churches. In addition, it is being taught
in public schools, universities, and nursing schools. It is also being promoted
by Hollywood, the music industry, and the media. In addition, practical
witchcraft is being taught in some public schools.
According to the
Bible, pagan gods and goddesses are demons:
“But I say, that the
things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God:
and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils.” (1 Corinthians
10:20)
Wiccan beliefs and
practices are getting into mainline denominations. For example, two Methodist
clergywomen participated in a croning ritual (a witchcraft initiation ritual).
They both wrote articles praising their experience in
Wellsprings, a journal for Methodist
clergywomen. When contacted by Insight on
the News, both women confirmed their participation in the croning ritual,
and said that their bishop (a woman) had also participated. When the bishop was
contacted, she said that she “witnessed many croning rituals.” [1]
That is the third
stage: rebellion and paganism.
To get some idea of
the degree to which paganism is taking over our society, look at how far we have
fallen morally. Pagan morals are directly opposed to Biblical morality. Our
movies and TV and other entertainment often promote pagan values, and many
Christians watch it.
The Caananites had
temple prostitutes, and they were men as well as women, and children as well as
adults. As a result, when the Israelites turned to worshiping Caananite gods,
they became promiscuous, they practiced homosexuality, and they had sex with
children. In addition, they also killed babies, because some of the Caananite
gods (such as Molech) required that they sacrifice their babies.
v v v
How far has America
fallen into paganism? And what are the potential consequences, according to the
cycle that is described in the Book of Judges?
In 1950, most people
were virgins when they were married. But now that has become rare because sex
before marriage has become the norm.
I never even heard
of homosexuality until the 1960s, when I befriended a girl in college who turned
out to be bisexual. These days, some children are hearing about homosexuality in
kindergarten in our public schools. And some school kids are being forced to act
like homosexuals. For example, in one school, girls 13 and 14 years old were
told by their teacher to ask other girls for a lesbian kiss.[2]
Today, children are
becoming sexually active at incredibly young ages. For example, two
five-year-old children in kindergarten had sex in their classroom’s bathroom.[3]
Kids in public schools are having sex in the hallways, on the stairs, and even
in classrooms.[4]
You may think,
“Well, at least we don’t sacrifice babies to pagan gods.” True, but we have
killed 55 million babies through abortion.[5] In addition, a woman who is a
pagan and a psychologist wrote a book titled
The Sacrament of Abortion. She calls
abortion “a sacred act” that is a sacrifice to the goddess Artemis (also known
as Diana).[6]
What about adults
having sex with children? Well, some psychologists and academicians are trying
to normalize pedophilia. Instead of protecting children from sexual predators,
they want to be sensitive to the feelings and sexual orientation of pedophiles,
which they have given a name that sounds nicer. They call them “minor-attracted
persons.”[7]
Another indication
of how pagan we have become is the fact that occultism is becoming mainstream.
Witchcraft, sorcery, fortune telling, and consulting the dead (necromancy) are
strictly forbidden in the Bible. But they have become commonplace. According to
a study done in 2006, three out of four teenagers have engaged in “psychic or
witchcraft-related activity.” Many of them participated in seances, tried to
cast a spell, or mixed a magic potion.[8]
In the Book of
Judges, once the nation of Israel worshiped pagan gods and goddesses (which
includes rejecting Biblical morality in favor of pagan moral standards), then
they were heading for judgment. The next thing that happened was famine, war,
plagues, and slavery. Could those things happen in America?
In the alternative
news I read about the potential for another major war, perhaps even a world war.
Food is already more expensive because unusual weather is hurting crops. In
addition, bees are dying off, and they are needed to pollinate crops. Some
people are afraid that the American dollar will lose its value, resulting is
hyperinflation.
The mainstream media
often tells us about diseases that have people worried about the possibility of
a pandemic. In addition, one out of four teenaged girls in America has at least
one sexually transmitted disease.[9]
You may ask, “What
about slavery?” Well, if we wind up with a dictatorship, then we could have
slave labor. The Nazis had slave labor in their concentration camps. The
Russians, Chinese, and North Koreans have it in their labor camps today.
Modern America has
not seen famine or plagues, and we have never lost a war. And I hope that such
things will never happen to us. However, we are not immune to them.
Of course, God could
protect us from all of that—if we repent and turn back to Him:
“If my people, which
are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and
turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive
their sin, and will heal their land.” (2 Chronicles 7:14)
We have some good,
solid Christians in America. But there were also some faithful Israelites during
the time of the Babylonian captivity. Daniel was a Godly man, but he had to go
into captivity along with his people. And so did Shadrach and Mesach and
Abednego. They suffered a lot because of the sins of their countrymen. The
problem is that so much of Israel had abandoned God and turned away to pagan
gods. The faithful ones like Daniel were small in number compared to those who
went “whoring after other gods.” (Judges 2:17)
Even if the people
all around us turn away from God and Biblical morality, we need to hold on to
our integrity. We are doing it for God, not for men. That is part of being
faithful to Him.
If our nation
suffers because it has turned away from God, then we still need to be faithful
to Him. Like Daniel. And like Shadrach, Mesach, and Abednego.
The most important
thing is our relationship with God. If we love Him, then He will make ALL things
work out for our long-term, eternal good. (Romans 8:28) We are never at the
mercy of men or circumstances, because no matter what happens, God can bring
good out of it.
Conversely, for
those who don’t love God, nothing will do them any good. Even if they have a
pleasant life here on earth, it won’t do them any good in the long term, because
when they die, they will wind up in hell.
The bottom line is
our relationship with God—not our circumstances.
In the musical
Fiddler on the Roof, Reb Tevye sings
a song to his wife: “Do You Love Me?” Well, God has been asking us that question
all through history. Every single person who was ever born has to answer that
question. And they don’t just answer it in words. They answer it by how they
live, and how they relate to God.
Unfortunately, most
people reject God. He created them, and He loves them, but they reject Him.
Something else is more important to them. Something else takes first place
instead of God. (The Bible calls that idolatry.) Jesus told us:
“Enter ye in at the
strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to
destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate,
and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.”
(Matthew 7:13-14)
God has suffered so
much unrequited love. That’s all the more reason for us to love Him. He created
us so that we could love Him. So let’s love Him deeply, and faithfully, and
consistently. And let’s do whatever we can to help others love Him.
Worldviews
The worldview of
Christians should be based on the Bible, and on their understanding of, and
relationship with, the Lord Jesus Christ. However, we live in a world with many
other beliefs, values, and ways of thinking.
Christians have a
very different worldview from that of pagans and New Agers. They have different
approaches to theology, philosophy, psychology, morality, child rearing, and
other areas of life.
We need to respect
people with other worldviews, because all men and women are created in the image
of God. (Genesis 1:26-28) In addition, Jesus died for all of us, in order to
make it possible for us to become rightly related to God and go to Heaven. If
Jesus thinks that the people we disagree with are worth dying for, then we
should respect them and love them for His sake.
We can love and
respect people without agreeing with them. We can even love them when they do
things that are quite hurtful. For example, when Betsy ten Boom was in a Nazi
concentration camp, she forgave the Nazi guards who did cruel things to her, and
she prayed for them.
After the war was
over, Betsy’s sister Corrie encountered one of those guards. He had become a
Christian after the war. Corrie was able to love him, in spite of the cruel
things that he had done in the past. They hugged each other and wept.
When Corrie heard
that the man who had betrayed her family was in prison and was going to be
executed, she wrote him a letter telling him that she forgave him, and telling
him about the love and forgiveness of Jesus. That man became a Christian before
he was killed, and Corrie rejoiced because of it.
Now respecting
people with other worldviews does not
mean that we should compromise our own Christian worldview. All worldviews are
not equal, and all “paths” do
not lead to the same place.
For example, if the
atheists are right, then when we die, we will all stop existing. If the New
Agers and Hindus are right, then when we die, we will be reincarnated. If the
Christians are right, then when we die we will go to Heaven or we will go to
hell.
They cannot all be
right, because the end results are so radically different.
As Christians, we
need to stand firm in our faith, and not apologize for our Biblical worldview.
We will be vindicated in eternity. In the meantime, we should show love to
people who don’t know Jesus as their Lord and Savior. And we should pray for
their salvation.
On a practical note,
loving people does not necessarily mean that we trust their judgment. If their
moral standards are different from ours, then we should not let them babysit our
children. And we would be foolish to be business partners with them. Also, we
should not get romantically involved with them. The Bible warns us not to be
“unequally yoked.” (2 Corinthians 6:14)
We need to protect
our children from the influence of such people. And we need to be careful not to
allow our faith or our morals to become compromised by them.
Attempts to Blend Christianity with Other Religions
There are a number
of attempts to blend Christianity with other religions on a world-wide scale.
You can read about them in “Unveiling the Global Interfaith Agenda.”[10]
There are also other
attempts to merge Christianity with different religions. For example, Chrislam
tries to combine Christianity with Islam. There are people who call themselves
Christian witches (i.e., combining Christianity with Wicca). There are attempts
to mix Christianity with Hinduism, and with Buddhism, and with Shamanism. (A
shaman is a Native American medicine man.) Some people claim to be Christian
witch doctors or Christian sorcerers. You can buy a book about Christian
Voodoo.[11]
In 2009, Barna did a
survey of worldviews among American adults. Only 19 percent of “born again
Christians” in the United States have a Biblical worldview. That is less than
one out of five. Among the population as a whole, nine percent of adults have a
Biblical worldview. Among American adults
between the ages of 18 and 23, less than one-half of one percent have a Biblical
worldview.[12]
Nominal Christians
are people who are Christians in name only. They call themselves Christians, but
they really aren’t. They ignore, or deny, foundational Christian doctrines, and
they don’t try to live the way that God told us to live, as described in the
Bible. Such people can fit in with other religions. However, real Christians
aren’t able to do that. Biblical Christianity cannot mix with other religions.
To compare it to
something physical in everyday life, you cannot mix oil and water. Because of
their very nature, they just don’t mix. You can put them in a glass jar and
shake them until they seem to be blended, but then they will separate and the
oil will rise to the top of the jar.
To carry that
analogy further, if you add an emulsifier, then they can mix. It goes against
their nature, but the emulsifier bridges that gap. In real life, Christians who
are under severe pressure (such as the fear of prison or torture or death) may
go against their nature and try to blend in with whatever is politically
correct. That happened in Nazi Germany. I’ve seen pictures of church altars with
swasticas on them. However, Jesus
warned us not to make such compromises:
“Whosoever therefore
shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is
in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before
my Father which is in heaven.” (Matthew 10:32-33)
These days, it is
not politically correct to be “exclusive” by claiming that Jesus Christ is the
only way to salvation. However, we need to be Biblically correct rather than
politically correct. The antidote to the fear of men is the fear of the Lord.
Jesus warned us:
“And fear not them
which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him
which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.” (Matthew 10:28)
Jesus made it clear
that He is the only way to be right with God the Father. There is no other
source of salvation. He said:
“I am the way, the
truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” (John 14:6)
“I am the door: by
me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find
pasture. The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I
am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.
I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.” (John
10:7-11)
NOTES
1. “Wicca Infiltrates the Churches—Wiccan Rituals Gaining
Popularity in Christian Churches” by Catherine Edwards,
Insight on the News, December 6,
1999.
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1571/is_45_15/ai_58050620
2. “Middle School Girls Forced to Ask Classmates for
‘Lesbian Kiss’ During Anti-Bullying Presentation,” April 20, 2013.
http://christiannews.net/2013/04/20/middle-school-girls-forced-to-ask-classmates-for-lesbian-kiss-during-anti-bullying-presentation
3. “Two Kindergarten Five-Year-Olds Caught Having Sex in
Bathroom,” February 25, 2014.
www.examiner.com/article/two-kindergarten-5-year-olds-caught-having
sex-bathroom-teacher-may-be-fired
4. “Sex and the Public Schools,” February 24, 2014.
http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/sex-and-the-public-schools
5. “Abortion’s Toll of 55 Million Called ‘Genocide,’”
January 21, 2014.
www.wnd.com/2014/01/abortions-toll-of-55-million-called-genocide
6. Dr. Ginette Paris discusses her book
The Sacrament of Abortion on
her website. She is a psychologist, a therapist, and a professor at the Pacifica
Institute in Santa Barbara, California. She is also a pagan. Her website
includes sections on “pagan meditations” and “pagan grace.”
www.ginetteparis.com/psychologyofabortion/readexcerptonabortion.html
7. “Pedophilia the Next ‘Sexual-Rights’ Rebolution?
Academia, Psychologists Expanding
LGBT Argument to ‘Minor-Attracted Persons,’” January 2, 2014.
www.wnd.com/2014/01/pedophilia-the-next-sexual-rights-revolution
8. “New Research Explores Teenage Views and Behavior
Regarding the Supernatural,” January 23, 2006.
www.barna.org/barna-update/article/5-barna-update/164-new-research-explores-teenage-views-and-behavior-regarding-the-supernatural
9. “Sex and the Public Schools,” February 24, 2014.
http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/sex-and-the-public-schools
10. “Unveiling the Global Interfaith Agenda,” October 2,
2011.
www.crossroad.to/articles2/forcing‑change/11/interfaith.htm
11. I found all of these attempts to mix Christianity with
other religions by doing a quick search on the Internet. You can easily find
them for yourself. Just search for “Christian” plus any other religion or
spiritual practice that you can think of.
12. “Barna Survey Examines Changes in Worldview Among
Christians over the Past 13 Years,” March 6, 2009.
www.barna.org/barna-update-21-transformation-252-barna-survey-examines-changes-in-worldview-among-christians-over-the-past-13-years