PRIDE:
As we have hit mid-to-late May, we can see the month of June coming on the horizon. This is the month that our current culture has labeled as "pride month", the month where people belonging to the LGBT movement flagrantly flaunt their "pride" in their sexual deviancy.
If you're anything like me the tremors in the earth can be felt long ahead of time, as we begin to see corporate ad campaigns, posters/flags, and all manner of iconography adorn every shop window so that they may begin their virtue signal well in advance. Every logo and social media post will soon be displayed in an array of colors to show solidarity with those who subscribe to these ideologies. As Christians, we would be foolish to not see the spiritual warfare that is being displayed here, and the preparation being done by the forces of the enemy. It is like the occupation of a foreign power coming into our streets and placing the banner of their country upon every house and high-place as a declaration of ownership. An ownership that they do not possess. It is a flaunting of the enemy over a gracious and merciful God who desires to see them turn from their sin and know Him, while instead they suppress the truth in their unrighteousness (Romans 1:18). It is clear that we are in the midst of a spiritual war.
So then, Christian, how are you preparing for it? Unfortunately, I think most years we come up to "pride month" and our only means of spiritual defense is an eye roll, a throwing up of our hands, and a dismissive wave. What can possibly be done about it? We will simply sit back as these dangerous ideas spread, and contain our outrage to the living room sofa, and rants to those whom we know already agree with us. We would rather just lay low as Christians the entire month of June and let the enemy have the battle. But do you not know that this is a battle for the souls of men? That every war and battle has its casualties? The fact of the matter is that our sitting back and allowing the enemy to have a strong foothold in our society through a month long celebration of sexual immorality, leads to people believing this is an acceptable practice or idea to hold. That laying with a man, as one would with a woman (Leviticus 18:22), and treating God's natural order of things as something to be disregarded, is a socially acceptable idea without repercussion. No, friend, rather it heaps judgement upon the heads of those who condone or perform it. People will be enticed by the lusts of their flesh, and dragged away by earthly desire to eternal damnation and death (James 1:14).
As an example, Look at the good friend of the famous YouTuber, Mr. Beast, who recently came out as transexual. This was a man who was married with multiple children, and even, at one time, was a professing Christian. But through the perversion of this current day ideology, he has walked down a path of sexual perversion resulting in him leaving his wife and children, and now claiming himself to be a woman. This is a shameful course of action that ought to be met with ridicule and ire. Through his selfish lusts, this man has decimated the dynamic of his family. His children will grow up without a father. His wife is left cold and alone without a husband. His house has become one that produces nothing but death and sorrow. And all anyone is left with is a man who decided that he liked wearing dresses more than his duty, and calling, of being a good father and husband to his family. Its disgusting, and all of these thoughts and actions have been condoned, and even encouraged, by a culture that has been taught to celebrate these ideas, including the idea that we should simply "speak our truth" and "live our best life", and ideas that have taught that the family structure is inherently oppressive, or something to be discarded. These ideas that promote self above sacrifice, duty, or responsibility. Because of the prominence and advance of these cultural doctrines, it is quite simply not enough to just bide our time and grit our teeth through the month, and hope that everyone comes to their senses by July. This is a war, not an uncomfortable dinner table. And while the weight of saving a person from Hell is not one we are to bear (as we have no power to save, nor to change hearts), we are called to obedience in the preaching of the gospel and striking forth against the powers of darkness that we see moving around us.
KNOW THY ENEMY:
The first step to fighting any war is to know your enemy. So, first I'd like to break down some of the LGBT movement and the underlying ideas so that we may combat them from a biblical perspective. Its important to note that I won't be covering all angles here, and much will need to be left out as there is a lot to be said about the topic. To start, I think its important to look at some relevant scripture. Ephesians 6:12 says "For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places". We would do well to remember that the ideas that we are attempting to refute are spiritual in nature, and that we are not merely wrestling against the ideas of men. This is a spiritual battle in which people are corrupted by demonic thoughts and ideas that lead them to gratifying the lusts and desires of their flesh. With this being the case, it is likely that you will run into one of two types of people who affirm these damaging practices. In either case we must be careful to use discernment in determining our approach to the things of God.
The first would be someone who is open to the idea of God, someone who has an active conscience and knows, at least on some level, that what they, or others, are doing is wrong. They may be a practicing homosexual, or even someone that has simply been told that these are the "correct" ideas to have about LGBT topics and issues. Regardless, these are the types of people that are primed for the hearing of the gospel, and the harvest of God. These are the types of people who are willing to ask, and answer, questions about God, and are receptive to hearing the Bible's viewpoint on creation and its structured order. The second type of person is who I would describe as the "enemy of God". These are the types of people who have completely neglected their conscience, and are openly hostile to the orthodox Christian teaching. They will almost certainly shout you down, threaten your life, and call you a prejudiced bigot for trying to assert any degree of deviation from their viewpoint. These people need the gospel too, but I fear that now-a-days many Christians have become over-focused on this people-group, and are far too likely to cast their pearls before swine (Matthew 7:6). They have placed so much significance on the "furthest out" person from God, that they often neglect the other type of person who genuinely desires to know more. I speculate that this is because of a selfish, innate desire in them to feel useful; that if they are somehow able to present the gospel in such a way that this supremely wicked sinner can come to know the grace of God, that they can feel accomplished and justified in their faith. That they can truly feel like they were a part of something. That they can feel righteous in some way. This is nothing more than sinful Christian pride and idolatry. When they do this, they place themselves in the position of God, believing themselves to have the power to save, and selfishly making the conversion stories of lost souls about themselves and their own efforts. If this is you, take warning from Matthew 7:21-23. Not all who come to Jesus on the last day and say "Lord, Lord" will enter the kingdom of heaven. Notice what these "workers of lawlessness" say to Jesus. "Have we not prophesied, cast out demons, and done mighty works in your name?". They trusted in their works to justify them. They made the things of God about themselves and their own justification. The reality is that these people who are "enemies of God" want to destroy you and everything you stand for. They need the gospel, and someone to tell it to them, but you need not waste additional time and resource pouring gasoline onto an open fire, or with tip-toeing around biblical truth for fear of being offensive to these people. We, as modern day Christians, don't like to admit it, but there comes a time when one must shake off the dust from our sandals and move on (Matthew 10:14); trusting that a seed has been planted whenever the word of God is spoken. We might think of this as "giving up" but I would posit that it is actually just being a wise steward of your time and resources. With that truth in mind, and knowing that these battles in which we find ourselves are spiritual in nature, we should also be able to remove any personal offense in these conversations. It is easy to be defensive on behalf of God in the face of his enemies, or even be personally hurt by someone bashing our beliefs, but Christian, remember that you have the truth living in you. The truth that has already won the spiritual war. It is not the "my truth" as seen in culture, It is the truth. Speak it plainly. We would not get offended at someone who firmly believed that the sky was red and thought we were idiots for thinking otherwise, because we know the truth. Likewise in our faith, let us hold it with humility and without defensiveness.
Now that we've broken down the nature of these ideas, let's deal with some of the ideas themselves. Almost all of the prominence seen in these cultural, anti-Christian movements, comes from the idea of critical theory. Critical theory is a philosophical idea rooted in Marxism that separates all people into two different groups of oppressed or oppressor. Which group you fall into largely depends on whether your characteristics fit with the majority or the minority of the population. People who are male, white, in decent physical shape, believe in biblical principals, make a certain amount of money, perform well in school or jobs, or have access to certain amenities, will belong in the class of "oppressor" because they are part of the majority, or are seen as privileged in some way. Being ethnic, female or non-binary, disabled, mentally disordered, atheist (or really any religion that isn't Christianity), poor or unemployed, will fit you snuggly into the category of "oppressed". Because of this ideology, many who are merely born into a certain ethnicity and are trying to make a decent life for themselves, are made to not only feel like they have committed some grievous sin, but that they are actively oppressing the people of the other group by doing so. Likewise, since such a terrible act of injustice has been committed to this lower people group, it is only fair that you, as a member of the more privileged group, do everything in your power to help pay for their disadvantages at your own expense. Because of this, the person who is the most oppressed, or fits into the most minority classes, has the most sway and power in culture. This may seem like it has nothing to do with "pride month" or LGBT issues, but have you ever looked at the "pride flag"? You'll quickly notice that along with the rainbow (and the light blue/pink for transexuals), there are also the colors black and brown to show solidarity with peoples of those ethnic groups. But what does being black or brown have to do with how you sexually identify? It doesn't. It's just another way to tack on oppression points to the cause, so that should you speak out against it you can not only be labeled a homophobe, but a racist, too. It is an ideology that plays upon the hearts and emotions of people to manipulate us and get us to bend the knee to the sovereign rule of identity politics. If you've ever wondered how these ideas rose so quickly to social acceptance, this is it. People were indoctrinated to believe that celebration and affirmation were the only answer, because anything else would be oppressive and downright tyrannical. Many, including too many in the modern day church, have bought into this hook, line, and sinker. If anything, it's especially natural for Christians, as we are all too familiar with tales of oppression. Just looking at the Bible we are met with all manner of stories of oppression towards God's people. the Israelites in Egypt, the Israelites in exile, the prophets in Israel, Jesus and the Pharisees, the early church in Rome, the disciples in literally every town they went to evangelize in. Everywhere we see tales of oppression. So when we are told we have become the oppressors to this entire group of people, we are given pause. We don't want to be like the villains and tyrants of scripture do we? We want to show people the love of Christ, right? I mean, who they choose to sleep with doesn't affect me, right? All of these things are wrong in this context, but we have been shamed into believing that if we don't affirm these ideals then we are no better than the evil men in scripture.
THE SHIELD OF SHAME:
Let's explore the idea of shame for a minute. If you've read my other post on "the blade of mockery", then I would like to talk about the other side of the same coin, that being what I will call "the shield of shame". The shield of shame does not shield you from the blade of mockery, but rather I'm building an armory of things that I believe we ought to equip ourselves with as Christians. These two things work together, not counter to eachother.
Shame is an emotion that has been largely excluded from modern day culture. We live in a time where it is not acceptable in any way, shape, or form to shame someone for an action or lifestyle that they choose to partake in. This largely comes from the idea I touched on before of "speaking your truth", and the idea that there are no lifestyles that are objectively any better or any worse than someone else's. We live in a culture where subjectivity rules, and everyone is told to do what is right in their own eyes, and define for themselves what makes life meaningful or worthwhile. This sounds good on paper, but in reality is tragically ignorant. For example, if we look at the Bible, we see a plethora of indictments against those who do right in their own eyes, and not in the eyes of the Lord (Judges 17:6, Deut. 12:8, Proverbs 14:12, and many examples in Kings where it is called "doing what is evil in the sight of the Lord, i.e. idol worship). Truly, we live in a day where everyone is guilty of doing such a thing. People have become their own god, their own idol, and they regularly sacrifice their true God-given responsibilities, honor, duties, and morals in order to serve themselves. It is an act of self-worship. As a result, we see this shameful behavior instead become an act of self glorification. Phillipians 3:19 hits the nail on the head when it says "their glory is in their shame". They revel in their shameful behavior, and we should realize that this is not how things were created to be.
Rather, we should know that shame is an emotion that is given by God that protects us from shameful behavior. It is our sense of shame that keeps us from doing that which we ought not do. In this regard, it is like a shield for our souls that keeps us from corrupting conduct and actions. It is the power of the Holy Spirit, through our God-given conscience, that tells us when we mess up, and of our need to be sanctified (or desire to not sin again/continue down the path of evil). Notice, however, that this sense of shame comes with moral objectivity. Our shame should be filtered through the standard of God, through the revelation of his unchanging word, and not merely through our emotions. This is the difference between Christians and the world, as the world will only judge something's merit and value based on feeling. Shame, also, is not something to be wallowed in either. It is a helpful tool in keeping us from shameful acts, but we should also know that those who are in Christ will not ultimately be put to shame (Romans 10:11), and that Jesus bore our shame on the cross.
However, like I mentioned previously, we have seen a reversal or upheaval of this in modern culture. Christians are not meant to be ultimately put to shame, and yet we are shamed by culture for subscribing to God's word and will. We have been made to feel shame for what, by God's standards, is not shameful. Yet those in culture who are committing shameful, awful, and abominable sins against themselves and their creator, are being celebrated and touted as heroes. Well friends, if you, like me, know anything about medieval combat (I suspect I may be in a minority here), then you would know that shields were just as effective as a weapon as they were a defensive tool. It is clear that the created order of shame has been subverted, echoing the enemy's natural tendency to pervert God's good design in creation. It has been seen since Genesis 3 that the enemy loves swapping around the way things God made them. So, it is clear then, that we as Christians should be aiming to take back the created order of all things that the enemy has pretended to stake claim over. Shame should be used as an offensive tool against the powers of darkness to stay the hands of wicked, evil man who desires to defile that which is good. It is only because we live in a culture where these things are so accepted that they continue to rise! So why then are we dormant? Why then, when people mention their flagrant and open defiling of themselves and others, are we not openly disgusted? The fact of the matter is that 20-30 years ago, these modern sexual ideas would have been seen as completely outrageous, and rightfully so! It was because of the shame that was present in that day for doing shameful things, that they were not pushed down this snowballing path of sexual immorality and destruction. Shame should not be just a defensive tactic for us, but it needs to be reclaimed as an offensive tactic for the glory of God and for the souls of man. Christian, this is a battle that needs to be fought, and is ultimately already won. You who are in Christ, cannot lose. So, in obedience, we should be going forth into these tough conversations ready and willing to share the truth, knowing that the knowledge of the truth brings forth the shame that so radically changes societies. I desire to see that change for my sake, for their sakes, and for the sake of our future generations. Go, then, with faith, knowing that He has already overcome the world (John 16:33).
REFLECT
2 Corinthians 10:3-6
"For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. And we will be ready to punish every act of disobedience, once your obedience is complete."
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