Weekend Bible Reflections With Jon
that we all need to follow Jesus.
The God of the unadulterated Christianity found only within the entirety of Scripture condemns hate and prejudice. He shows racism to be the foolishness it has always been when we read passages like the one above which teach how we all were created by God and descend from Adam, and thus are all part of only one race... the human race. In Christianity there is “neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus” ( Galatians 3: 28). The simple, beautiful teaching of what we call “the Golden Rule” – “So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them...” ( Matthew 7: 12) – would by itself end hate if we all would simply abide by it. The Christianity of the Bible commands that we share the love God has for all of us with each other without exception. How much better this world would be if we all were faithfully obedient Christians!
Should we be surprised at the decay in our culture and the promotion of bigotry when even the idea of God is mocked in favor of the ridiculous notion that mankind is descended from animals? Consider, perhaps surprisingly for some, Charles Darwin’s “The Origin of Species.” The original edition was titled, “The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection – or The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.” Think about what that title is promoting for a minute. James Fields, Jr. would likely approve. In his second book, “The Descent of Man,” in the context of elevating “the Caucasian” over the rest of humanity, Darwin wrote, “At some future period... the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace the savage races throughout the world...” Read the writings of Darwin and the followers of his day and you’ll see that his evolutionary theory teaches and promotes racism. Sadly, we can expect nothing but hate and prejudice to continue to flourish among us as long as our society continues to take steps away from Jesus and embrace the sinful hedonism and humanism which naturally comes about when a culture increasingly rejects both the existence and teachings of the biblical God.
The malice and loathing so many in our culture feel towards one another will flourish even more if Christians continue to not only keep their faith to themselves out of fear of mockery and ostracism, but also fail to strengthen their faith through honest, intellectual study of the Bible instead of watching America’s Got Talent every second of their free time. If you want both yourself, your children and grandchildren, your friends and neighbors and anyone else to “walk not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers,” then your “delight” must be “in the law of the Lord, and on His law ( you must) meditate day and night” (Psalm 1: 1- 2) and you must teach others to do the same ( 2 Timothy 2: 2; Deuteronomy 6: 67). Many churchgoers don’t do this. Rather, they “set their minds on the things that are on earth” rather than “seek the things that are above” ( Colossians 3: 1- 2). Our time is spent working longer and longer hours simply so we can have the luxuries of life, and using the majority of our free time watching television and surfing the Internet. We go to church less and less, we read our Bibles less and less, and we talk to others about our faith less and less while talking about our favorite sports teams and our political ideologies more and more.
Our society suffers as a result. If things are to change for the better, it must start with you and me taking God off the backburner and putting Him first in deed as well as in word.