Barnes: There is hope, for He has given us the remedy – Elizabethtown Bladen Journal

Last weels column concluded with the statement, We want to drive the newest car we can finance, dress very well, smell sweet, and make a knock-out impression. Appearances matter more, to many, in this superficial, performative age of reality television, Facebook, and the ubiquitous video screen, than do substance, values, moral principle, and character. It all goes with narcissism and nihilism, both a belief in nothing except what I want.

What we wanted grew from one car for each family household, to a car for every eligible driver, in each family household. In maybe 40 years, from about the 40s until the 70s or 80s. I noticed it happening all around, and in our own family. It is no wonder that carbon emissions skyrocketed in this country. As I wrote last week, we have wanted it all. I confess to the same malady.

Adolf Hitler bought the death of God lie and weaponized it through Naziism to deceive his nation and ravage the world. The devils lie of death of God always fosters the claim that we ourselves are gods, capable of being gods unto ourselves. Hitlers term for Aryan supremacy was the ubermensch, the overman. With a dead God dethroned and no longer believed, Hitler claimed pseudo-divine status for the overman, the man over all, god unto himself. Why shouldnt gods have what they want? It follows, doesnt it?

This present manifestation of the death of God blasphemy is degrading us, choking us, disfiguring the image of God in us, and if we stay this course, it will doom us. Much more than a political matter, our predicament is fundamentally a spiritual matter of ultimate importance.

So, now what? Do we invest our hopes in scientific artificial intelligence? Some now assert that we stand on the frontier of that epoch. God forbid! That way follows the same old formulaic lie, decked out in silicon disguise! Ubermensch on steroids! (I plan to say much more about this in a later column.)

We were, and are, warned by the biblical prophets. By Paul. By Christ Jesus Himself.

What did we trade off in these last decades of capitulation and decline? What did we get in the trade? Our era traded off loyal commitment in loving, bonded relationships and stable families, for satisfaction of perverse sexual craving, through adultery, pornography, and indiscrinate hookups, in wasted lifestyles. Pop music rarely mentions falling in love anymore, as it nearly always did in the 40s and 50s and some years afterward.

Instead, commitment in romantic love and lasting marriage was traded off for exploitation and the predatory excitement of no-name, on-the-fly hook-ups. Or perhaps a few months of shacking up until boredom signaled time to move on. Tina Turner nailed it with Whats Love Got To Do With It? Remember that? Remember the hurt, and angry disappointment, in Tina s lyrics and voice?

This era traded off concern for our neighbor for getting ahead at all costs, keeping up with the Joneses, and leaving them in the dust and the rearview mirror. Too seldom have we helped others in need without thought of whats in it for me? Even the good deeds have been done to make a good impression.

Jesus said that what is not done in faith is sin. And we give scarcely a thought to starving children in Madagascar, those too far away to be considered neighbors, or to be impressed by us.

This eras sorry gain has been meaningless lives of scrounging out a living, spending it all on ourselves, chasing the good life, plundering Earths resources, aimlessness, and spiritual starvation. Can you see it? Look around. It may be hard to spot the wasted lives. They can look well-fed, well-dressed, and well-situated.

For a time.

It runs out.

Still, there is hope. God gives the remedy. But it comes at a cost. Repent. Repent, saith the Lord. Take heed: sincere repentance is not a rote formula. Sincere repentance costs deep, wrenching grief and mourning, over a wicked heart and a sinful lifestyle. Sincere repentance demands giving up our sin, hating our sin, and sackcloth-and-ashes sorrow, over sin against a Living God. Sorrow like Davids. Like Isaiahs. And conversion to love of God. Like theirs.

Furthermore, discipleship, following Jesus, comes at a sacrificial cost. Taking up a cross means death, the death of wanting to have it our way, to get what we want, just like we want, as much as we want. Conversion and faithful discipleship cost our lives, our souls, our all: Love so amazing, so divine, demands my life, my soul, my all, (Isaac Watts, When I Survey the Wondrous Cross). Amen.

Sincere repentance, Almighty Gods amazing grace and forgiveness of sin, conversion, and following our Lord in cross-bearing for His glory and His kingdom, are humankinds one salvation. One. God offers it still.

And joy! Rejoice! God has not given up on us! In Christ Jesus, its shouting time, whirling about with joy time! Everyday! Christmas is coming!

Thanks be to God.

Dr. Elizabeth Barnes is a retired professor emerita of Christian Theology and Ethics at the Baptist Theological Seminary in Richmond, Virginia, and a resident of White Lake.

Originally posted here:

Barnes: There is hope, for He has given us the remedy - Elizabethtown Bladen Journal