The Battle for the Soul of America

The Battle for the Soul of America
“The Truth of God’s Word Vs. the Lies of Wokeism”
Romans 1:18-32

Wayne J. Edwards, Pastor

   The culture war in the Western world is Satan’s final effort to destroy the last hindrance to the establishment of the New World Order.

• The battleground is the traditional, biblical family of a father, a mother, and children born to or adopted by them.
• The issue is the truth of God’s Word against the satanic lies of the new religion of wokeism.
• Satan’s chief weapon is deception, for if he can get the majority of people to believe his lies, the moral foundations upon which this culture was built will crumble, and “If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?” (Psalm 11:3)
• If Christians are to win this battle, God’s people must stand up, stand on, and stand for the truth of God’s Word, for the eternal destiny of our children hangs in the balance.

   In Romans 1:18, Paul wrote, “The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.”

• When God’s Word is suppressed, Satan fills that vacuum with his lies, and God then gives that society over to:
  • 24 – “Uncleanness.”
  • 26 – “Vile Passions.”
  • 28 – “A debased mind.”
  • A Debased Mind, a mind so corrupted and so perverted, it only thinks of new ways to express evil, and that is where our society is today.
• Every facet of the U.S. Government now operates according to an organizational framework called DEI. (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion), which promotes the fair treatment and participation of all people, especially those who feel discriminated against because of their race, sexual lifestyle, or chosen gender.
• This is “Wokeism,” a religion that masquerades under the guise of compassion and justice, but underneath is an evil ideology that is incompatible with Western values and a Biblical worldview.
• The goal of this movement is to rebuild the Western culture to embrace the goals of “Wokeism,” i.e., to complete the “Fundamental Transformation of America.”
• Under the guise of political correctness and social justice, the goal of this movement, which is based on cultural Marxism, is to require everyone to embrace the sin of homosexuality.
  • The goal of public education is no longer to prepare children to be productive citizens of society, and to be able to think for themselves, and to reason things out for themselves.
  • The goal of public education is to indoctrinate children in the “woke” ideology, to prepare them to live in the world of Marxist Socialism, where they will own nothing but be happy.
• This perversion has been accepted in colleges, universities, and seminaries, and it is now being manifested in many churches, as the gospel has been redefined to achieve the goals of “Wokeism” rather than one’s eternal salvation.
• This is evidence of God’s judgment, for when God judges a nation of people, He first sends them wicked rulers and false pastors and teachers, and then finally, strong delusion.

   There are different aspects to God’s wrath:

• The consequential wrath of God – whatever you sow, that shall you also reap.
• The cataclysmic wrath of God – floods, fires, earthquakes, and violent storms that reflect the judgment of God.
• The eschatological wrath of God – the wrath that will be poured out during the Tribulation upon those who refused to receive Jesus Christ as their Savior and Lord.
• The eternal wrath of God – that final and forever punishment God releases upon those unrepentant sinners, i.e., everlasting death.
• In this passage, Paul is speaking of the wrath of abandonment, when God simply turns His back upon a society.

“Your iniquities have separated you from your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you, that He will not hear.”
Isaiah 59:2

1.  The first step to God’s abandonment is sexual immorality – Vs. 24 – “God gave them up to uncleanness.”

• When a society becomes pornographic, the character of that society becomes immoral, and what begins in the heart is manifested in the way we dress and address our bodies.
• After the sexual revolution of the 1960s, the dress code for women became lustful and paraded through the movies, TV shows, and now through the internet, with over 42 million porn sites.
• In the U.S., while 55% of married men and 25% of married women say they watch pornography at least once a month, an estimated 200,000 adults are addicted to pornography.
• A boy’s first exposure to pornography happens around the age of 11. Today, 65% of young men say they watch pornography regularly.
• The pornography industry’s annual revenue is more than the NFL, NBA, and MLB combined and more than the revenues of ABC, CBS, and NBC combined.
• 47% of Americans say pornography is a problem in their home, with 56% of divorces involving one party having an obsessive interest in pornographic material and fantasies.
• The greatest threat to pre-teen and teenage girls today is TikTok.

2.  The second step of God’s abandonment is homosexuality – Vs. 26 – “God gave them over to degrading passions.”

• God gave men and women normal passions to seek a life mate and to continue to populate the world.
• Degrading passions lowers the standard of normal sexual desires to the level of self-pleasure.
• 26-27 – “For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature. Likewise, the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another.”
• While the feminist movement of the 1960s had a positive impact on the status of women in the workplace, there was an equal, if not greater negative impact on marriage and the family as the number of marriages decreased and the level of promiscuity increased.
• The traditional family model was so destroyed that over 40% of children in America today are born to single mothers.
• Today, millions of women have equality in the workplace, but they are without the love and companionship that can only be found in the bonds of marriage and the family.
• Likewise, 60% of young men, 30 years of age and younger, are not only single, but they are romantically uninvolved, friendless, and very lonely.
• Nearly half of all young adults are single, which answers the rise in the use of social media, pornography, and their interest in homosexuality.

3.  The third step of God’s abandonment is a depraved mind – Vs. 28 – “Just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind.”

• First, the heart is rotten, then the body is infected, and finally, the mind becomes so immorally corrupt that it can no longer think, reason, or function correctly.
• Even though the law of God is still written on their hearts, their conscience has been so seared by their sins they do not have the intellectual ability to respond to the conviction of the Holy Spirit.
• They participate in flagrant, violent, sickening sin without restraint, remorse, or regret.

   In Galatians 6:7, Paul said: “Do not be deceived: God is not to be mocked. Whatever a man sows, he will reap in return. The one who sows to please his flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction.”

• Generations ago, our grandparents & great-grandparents suppressed the truth about God, sin, and the eternal consequences of unbelief in Jesus Christ as the only Savior.
• They sowed to the winds of the flesh, and we are now reaping the whirlwind of God’s anger against our society.
  • In verse 19, Paul said, that which can be known about God has been made available to all men.
  • In Romans 2, Paul said God had placed His moral law in the hearts of all men.
  • The Western culture has had the Holy Scriptures for many centuries, informing us of the full and final revelation of God in the Person and work of Jesus Christ.
• However, in the late 1920s, America’s higher educational institutions began to suppress the revealed truth about God to justify their sins.
  • First, through the theory of evolution, denying God as the Creator and Sustainer of the universe, thereby reducing man’s accountability to Him.
  • Second, through “higher criticism” of the Holy Scriptures, questioning the inerrancy, infallibility, and accuracy of the Bible, and therefore its authority over our lives.
• What began as an academic evaluation of the Scriptures morphed into a serious questioning of the Scriptures, which led to a more relaxed interpretation of the Scriptures.
• The result was a relaxed definition of sin. Rather than call sinners to repentance, preachers became pseudo psychologists encouraging their people to overcome their negative thoughts, feelings, and actions, by raising their self-esteem, rather than confessing their sins and repenting of them.
• What Bishop Robert Sheen and Robert Schuller began in the 50s – the 80s, Rick Warren and Bill Hybels continued into the 2,000s and that shallow gospel continues to be preached today by Joel Osteen and thousands of others.
• So, the sins of our society are rarely addressed from today’s pulpits. In fact, in most churches, to call any kind of evil behavior a sin worthy of death would be unthinkable.

   But, not only was there a suppression of the truth about God, there was also a suppression of the truth of God’s Word.

• 21 – “Even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened.”
  • Believing he could live without having to answer to God, mankind found itself abandoned by God and under His wrath.
• 23 – “They exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.”
  • K. Chesterton said: “When men choose not to believe in God, they do not hereafter believe in nothing, they become capable of believing in anything.”

   While for many years, the evangelical church of America had the largest number of believers and sent out the largest number of missionaries, those days are no more.

• Today’s evangelicals not only deny the essential doctrines of the Christian Faith, but they also deny the reality of sin and therefore, our need for a Savior.
• They have devised another gospel, supportive of the woke agenda, to: “Articulate a way of being a Christian that is an alternative to the traditional Christian faith portrayed in the public realm.”

   While we can’t help but be outraged by the cultural evil in which we live, we cannot become so mad at the world that we take it out on those being deceived by Satan’s lies.

• Our mission as Christians, and therefore, the mission of the Church is to be the heart, voice, and hands of Jesus in this depraved world.
• Knowing what is ahead, we need to make sure our hearts are right with God and at peace with others, in so far as it possible unto us.
• As parents and grandparents, we must stop giving in to the darkness but rather do what we can to shine the light of Christ in this dark and dying world.
• However, “The light that shines the farthest shines the brightest at home!” Missionary C.T. Studd