CRISIS AT CHRISTMAS

Mary came close to being a single mother that first Christmas. Her pregnancy, outside of a consummated marriage would have been the scandal of the village. In that culture, a pledge to be married could only be broken by divorce. If the angel had not enlightened Joseph, Mary would have quietly born the child of an unknown father.

This highlights a growing tragedy. As we have discussed earlier, many consider children a by-product of sex and of less importance than the desires of the parents. This lie has fostered another: a child’s biological parents have no meaning in a child’s life. It is even embedded in current legislation that rearranges family groupings with complete disregard for biological succession, with no mechanism for the need to trace it.

As we all know, a child’s identity is embedded from the DNA of the biological parents, not just in physical features, but in personality, talents, dispositions, and potential transmitted diseases. The majority of adopted children, as well as those born without knowledge of one or both parents will seek their birth parents at some point in their life—for many it is an intense life-long quest.

They continually ask: “Who am I? Why do I do what I do?” For an unknown father, that is often accompanied by a nagging sense of deficiency: “He is half of who I am.” Adoptive parents, of course, cannot replace the biological transmission from birth parents, but as the child grows, they increasingly deposit a legacy from their own personality and resources that demonstrate true fatherhood.

Joseph, as a legal adoptive parent, had a distinctive and necessary role to play, pointing out the importance of adoptive parents. Even our sonship with God is often expressed as adoption in the New Testament, with the full heritage adoption provides. In the case of Joseph, his heritage was critical to Jesus.

Jesus’ lineage listed traced from David in Matt 1:16 shows Joseph, married to Mary, as the legal father of Jesus. This traces the legal claim of Jesus to David’s throne. But Luke chapter three gives us a separate lineage, also traced from David, showing Joseph the son of Heli, not Jacob as in Matthew. The lineage was always though the firstborn sons; but in this case, Joseph was the son-in-law of Heli. This lineage, traced through Mary, proved Jesus’ claim by bloodline to David’s throne.

So this Christmas, as always, we are celebrating the birth of a King who will return to this planet soon to reclaim David’s throne, and provide the “peace on earth” the angels first predicted.

As I and my family celebrate the birth of Christ this year, I will take a break from posting further blogs to this site until about mid-January. We will meet again then. In the meantime, we wish you a renewed joy of this Christmas season.

COMMITMENT TO OUR CHILDREN

The current spate of legislation entrenching transgender desires into law will continue to increase the plight of children born to such indeterminate relationships. But for those of us in traditional marriages, raising children is no easy matter either. But they have a good start with the created value of a mother and father. Some simple steps we can all take can enhance this ideal.

First, don’t try to bring up good children! That is beyond our ability and mandate. In the end, children will make their own decisions, either because of us or in spite of us. Instead, we should decide we are going to be good parents—not easy, but largely an achievable goal.

While some adult children will blame their personal faults and inabilities on their parents, most will recognize their parents were also imperfect. Besides, if we can blame our parents, then they can blame their parents, all the way back to Adam and Eve! Then none of us has any personal responsibility.

Second, if we are Christians, it is essential that we take our faith seriously. I fervently believe Christian ideals and teaching are the basis for a productive and joyful life, just as they have been the bedrock until recently for western civilization. Children may not follow our instruction, but they will certainly reject superficial lip service to our faith. If our faith is not the formative basis for our lives, why should they accept it?

Third, there is another, less tangible, benefit to our children for maintaining an ardent faith in Jesus Christ. Whatever path our children will follow, God will remain with them because of our allegiance to God. Solomon fell away from his faith in God, but God’s response waited until after his death for the sake of David his father, 1 Kings 11:9–13.

In fact, the nation of Judah benefitted from David’s faithfulness long after Solomon’s death, despite the evil practices of subsequent kings, 2 Kings 8:16–19. Even the Ten Commandments, which provide for punishment to the third generation of those who follow their own personal idolatries, bless a thousand generations descending from those who love and follow Him.

And, of course, the blessing on the children for the faithfulness of their parents, will affect the nation they live in. The current slide from respect for God into chaos in western civilization may not yet be feeling the full effects of its insanity, because of God’s patience based on the faith of its forbears. So for our children and our nation, let’s retain a passionate belief and practice of our faith.

“Oh may all who come behind us find us faithful,” (Steve Green)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eERKnxzNzwg

PLANKS AND SPLINTERS

An attitude in the Church toward homosexuality generally bothers me, and should concern us all. While most Christians would agree that Scripture speaks against it, Scripture censures us all for other sexual acts many churchgoers practice with little objection from the pulpit.

As we follow the leading of the Spirit we find freedom and life, but our sinful nature continually tries to draw us back into bondage and death. Bondage to drugs, sex, pornography and other pursuits is only a symptom of our major addiction that encompasses them all: opposition to God, and it’s called sin.

We were sinners before conversion, but afterwards we still fight the war that rages between the sinful nature and the indwelling Spirit. Paul experienced it, Romans 7:21–23, 8:12–14, Galatians 5:16–18, and we must acknowledge it.

The created ideal of marriage is an extension of the truth about God Himself—the love and unity in the Trinity. All that breaks marriage or opposes it is a lie. We cannot live with a lie: it will increasingly torment us, and eventually collapse in on itself.

We are all aware of adultery in the Church. High profile cases make the news, and congregations acknowledge the occasional “moral failure” of one of its leaders. That is only the tip of the iceberg. For every known event, many go unreported and both perpetrator and victim suffer in silence.

Adultery—whether with the same or opposite sex—includes sexual liaisons before marriage. The sex act alters the brain chemistry attaching the partners together. The idea “they will become one flesh,” Genesis 2:24, is more than a picturesque idea; it’s a physical response. In this sense, adultery against a future marriage partner has already occurred.

Pornography, pernicious and addictive, is included in adultery, by Jesus’ use of the Greek word porneia (sexual uncleanness) from which “pornography” comes. He uses it for “marital unfaithfulness” in Matthew 5:32 and 19:9, and those watching pornography commit “adultery with her in his heart,” Matthew 5:28.

All of us struggle with some area of life opposed to the Spirit, different but always equal deviations from God’s ideal. The Spirit is the “paraclete,” One who comes alongside to bring conviction and change, John 16:8–11. As Spirit-filled believers it is also our mandate: to come alongside those who struggle with sin as we ourselves did, not with smug judgment, but with sympathetic love.

If we hide and refuse to stare down these enemies within—both personally and corporately—we engage in the Pharisaical hypocrisy Jesus regularly scorned, placing burdens on others we still carry ourselves. Let’s remove the plank in our own eye before we criticize the splinter in the eye of another.

Let him who is without sin cast the first stone!

SEX: THE GATEWAY FROM GOD

Ever wondered why sex is such a big thing in our current western culture? Someone once said sex is the soft underbelly of the law, meaning that of the Ten Commandments, the seventh, “do not commit adultery,” is the easiest to discredit.

Our culture has largely dispensed with the first four commandments, which define our relationship with God, considering Him irrelevant. That leaves only human judgment to decide whether the six remaining commandments—those governing human relationships—are valid. The current approach to interpersonal law advocates ruling on harm inflicted.

This naturally assumes any form of sex between consenting adults is a victim-less act outside the “harm” category, and the prohibition unreasonable. However, the remaining five commandments, honouring parents, murder, stealing, slander—and particularly coveting which produces the desire for the foregoing acts—always produce a victim.

However, when sexual sin is tolerated, it undermines the other commandments. If illicit sexual acts can be justified, the remainder of the commandments are open to challenge if convenient to the perpetrator. And the foremost vehicle for this process is the current atomization of truth. Postmodernism teaches truth is “relative”; everyone carries his or her own truth.

Once truth becomes a matter of personal opinion, the standard of good and evil is also subject to political or personal convenience. The enrichment of major banks gained from homeowner’s losses in the US to the wholesale destruction of children in the womb come to mind.

Remember, in the end, the Ten Commandments aim to produce a well-functioning society. An important concern for the seventh commandment, and similar prohibitions, is to minimize the number of children at risk in aberrant relationships. But the overriding concern is the widening of destructive effects to our civilized society by the abuse of sex.

All liaisons, other than opposite sex intercourse, are infertile. The Increase of atypical relationships only adds to the death wish of a society that kills its progeny in the womb, and euthanizes its living. Furthermore, proponents of free sexual expression reject the instructions against it, and with no underlying truth to support their claim, they necessarily need to silence opposition. This drift into moral anarchy is already evident.

Perhaps the reverse is true. Many may now consider one man and one woman for every marriage outdated, but as a basic truth, it’s practice might bring back respect for the other components of the law. It should start with all Christians who claim to follow God’s law, but all who maintain this ideal might stem the current destructive process.