Our culture deals with the pervasive sin of sexual immorality to the point where many people just view sex outside of marriage (in every way possible) as “normal.”

It’s a serious problem, and the root of a lot of the current cultural chaos.

At Illinois Family Institute’s 2023 Worldview Conference, Dr. John Diggs spoke on “The Consequences of Sexual Immorality.” He does a deep dive into the consequences of sexual immorality, including STD’s, why it’s such big deal, and how the confusion about gender increases unbiblical disorder.

Please watch and share!

I grew up as a “Cashew.” For those who are unfamiliar with that term, a “cashew” is a person with one Catholic parent and one Jewish parent. Though in my case, neither of my parents practiced their respective faiths very often.

I distinctly remember when I was a child, my mother taking me to church a couple of times on Christmas Eve for midnight Mass. On Jewish holidays, I’d sometimes go over to a cousin’s house the day after Yom Kippur to “break the fast” (even though we never actually fasted…but that was not brought up).

That was the extent of my religious upbringing. I lived as a pagan for the first 22 years of my life.

When the Lord radically saved me in August 2002 through a Bible study with a Korean missionary, I had a very strong desire to share the gospel with everyone I knew, especially the Jewish side of my family because I knew that they outright rejected Jesus as Messiah. One day, early on in my walk with the Lord, I read the words of the Apostle Paul in Romans 1:16,

…I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Gentile.

I was struck that the verse talks about both sides of my family, and since it says, “to the Jew first,” I decided that my dad’s side would be the ones upon whom I would focus my early evangelistic zeal. Though sometimes that zeal was mixed with a certain youthful lack of wisdom, it was always with the intention to see my family come to faith in Christ.

Romans 1:16 is a fascinating verse because it contains Paul’s own “Ordo Missionis” – his Order of Missions. A further study of the Book of Acts confirms this, because even though the mighty Apostle says in Romans 11:13 that he was commissioned as the “Apostle to the Gentiles,” whenever he traveled on his missionary journeys, he went to the synagogue first to preach Jesus to the Jews (See: Acts 13:5, 13:14, 14:1, 17:1-2, 17:10, 17:17, 18:4-5, 18:19, 19:8, 21:27, and 28:17-30).

For Paul, preaching the Good News of the Risen Messiah to his kinsman was his priority for two reasons. First, because of his love for his people and deep desire for them to know the Messiah, whom he had previously fought so hard against. And Second, because Paul was convinced that their salvation would mean “life from the dead” (Rom 11:15).

These simple Bible truths drove my own passion as well. So then, even within Paul’s own ministry in Acts, he always went to the Jew first. Think about that. The Apostle to the Gentiles always went into the synagogue in every town to preach to the Gospel to the Jewish people. Paul’s ministry should be an example to us, but I don’t think his pattern of evangelism happens much anymore.

To be sure, “to the Jew first” certainly doesn’t mean “to the Jew last” or “to the Jew never.” Jewish ministry is important to God. Jesus says, “the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few, therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into his harvest field.”

There is a great need for Christians to have a heart to share the Gospel with Jews. There are indeed very few missionaries to Jewish people, and what has happened as a result is that the Jewish people today, en masse, are like sheep without a shepherd. I have done Jewish missions work in some capacity for almost 20 years, but the Jewish people are still mostly an “unreached” people group, even in America.

As hard as that may be to believe, consider this: how many Jewish missionaries does your church support? Perhaps you DO have one or two, and that’s great! But then my follow up question is, how often to YOU personally share the Gospel? To the Jew first and also to the Gentile – that was Paul’s order of missions.

What is yours?

I am writing this article to encourage my brothers and sisters to have a heart for their Jewish neighbor, and witness to them in a loving, sensitive, and appropriate way. Not boasting over those branches that were cut off, but pleading with them to be grafted back in. They need the Good News! They need to hear that Jesus the Messiah of Israel has come, and He has opened heaven to all who believe in Him, through his atoning death and resurrection. Keith Green, my favorite Jewish singer once sang:

“Oh, bless me, Lord! Bless me, Lord!” You know, it’s all I ever hear! No one aches. No one hurts. No one even sheds one tear. But, He cries, He weeps, He bleeds. And He cares for your needs. And you just lay back and keep soaking it in.

Oh, can’t you see such sin?! ‘Cause He brings people to your door, and you turn them away, as you smile and say: “God bless you! Be at peace!” And all Heaven just weeps ’cause Jesus came to your door. You left Him out on the streets…

I certainly don’t want to be that kind of Christian, yet I still see so much of it in me. So much selfishness, so much fear, so much navel-gazing, so much laziness…God have mercy. But how can I stay silent? My Jewish neighbors need Jesus! There is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved!

I am going to go out into the mission field with a renewed sense of love and compassion for my people. Will you join me? Open your mouth and share the Gospel with your Jewish neighbor today. Don’t be afraid! Listen to Paul who says, “follow me as I follow Christ!”

O Zion, You who bring good tidings, Get up into the high mountain; O Jerusalem, You who bring good tidings, Lift up your voice with strength, Lift it up, be not afraid; Say to the cities of Judah, “Behold your God!” –Isaiah 40:9

We are pleased to announce that former state legislator Peter Breen has been added to our line-up of speakers for the IFI Special Forum on Religious Liberty.  In addition to being a pro-life hero, Peter leads the Thomas More Society’s Legal Team in service of its Life, Family, and Religious Liberty missions.

Peter recently testified in front of an Illinois House committee to highlight the legal and practical flaws of SB 1909 – a bill designed to punish traditional Christian beliefs about the sanctity of human life at pregnancy resource centers (PRCs) throughout Illinois. SB 1909 allows the Attorney General to investigate any PRC and levy fines up to $50,000 against any PRC that the he/she “believes” is engaging in deceptive practices.

What are false and deceptive practices? Any information the Attorney General believes is deceptive.

Once the Attorney General concludes its formal investigation with your tax dollars and imposes the fine against the PRC, the law would allow the Attorney General to provide this biased information to a person to file a civil suit against the PRC for more monetary damages. You can imagine the damage this will cause.

Planned Parenthood and Attorney General staff testified in favor of this freedom-quashing bill. Their argument contained no complaints (not one) that could be verified — they were all anecdotal accounts they claimed to have witnessed at PRC’s or heard second hand.

In fact, before the hearing, Peter had requested that the Attorney General’s Office provide all complaints it received against PRC’s in the last 10 years. Their response? Zero. Zero complaints against pregnancy care centers have been documented. There is simply no demand from “we the people” for a bill like this. It’s another opportunity for Big Abortion and their allies in the General Assembly to go after and bully people of faith into silence.

Make no mistake, this is an infringement on the First Amendment rights of those who work and/or volunteer at PRCs and want to save preborn babies and minister to women facing unplanned pregnancies. Specifically, this quashes our right to freely exercise our religiously informed views about what abortion does to mother and baby. These beliefs are shared by the vast majority of orthodox Christians, Jews and Muslims.

The state has no business regulating speech it doesn’t like. Yet tyrants at the Illinois State Capitol passed SB 1909 and sent it to the Governor for his signature.

The Illinois Senate passed this bill on March 31^st by a vote of 36 to 19.

The Illinois House passed this bill on May 10^th by a vote of 72 to 40.

Click HERE to listen to this week’s IFA podcast in which Monte Larrick interviews Peter Breen.

Join us on Thursday, June 1st! You won’t want to miss hearing from Peter Breen and the plans to challenge this unconstitutional law in court as well as hear from our featured speaker, Ambassador Sam Brownback, who serves as chairman of the National Committee for Religious Freedom. He will report on the international situation in countries like China, Nicaragua, and Nigeria, as well as domestic attempts to eradicate religiously informed conscience rights for medical professionals and those working at pregnancy centers.

We will also be joined by Arielle Del Turco, Family Research Council’s Director of the Center for Religious Liberty and co-author of the organization’s “Hostility Against Churches” report. This new report “indicates that criminal acts against churches have been steadily on the rise for the past several years… The first three months of 2023 saw approximately 3x the number of acts of hostility perpetrated against churches compared to the same timeframe last year.

Religious liberty requires our vigilance because its degradation affects the exercise of every other constitutional right. Literally, our freedom is at stake.

“[T]hat the opinions of men are not the object of civil government, nor under its jurisdiction;
that to suffer the civil magistrate to intrude his powers into the field of opinion and to restrain
the profession or propagation of principles on supposition of their ill tendency is a dangerous fallacy,
which at once destroys all religious liberty.” ~Thomas Jefferson, 1779.

Religious liberty is often called our “first freedom,” as all other human rights stem from it. It is an unalienable right given to us by Almighty God, who expects us to be good stewards of this gift, not only for ourselves but for posterity and as an example for the world and all those who yearn for true liberty.

–>Click HERE for more info.

We fully recognize that religious liberty is under attack here at home and around the world. The rights to pray, worship freely, and take our religiously informed views into the public square without fear of persecution or harassment are being diminished.

Join IFI as we host a special forum featuring Ambassador Sam Brownback, who serves as co-chair of the International Religious Freedom (IRF) Summit and chairman of the National Committee for Religious Freedom. He will report on the international situation in countries like China, Nicaragua, and Nigeria, as well as domestic attempts to eradicate religiously informed conscience rights for medical professionals and those working at pregnancy centers.

We will also be joined by Arielle Del Turco, Family Research Council’s Director of the Center for Religious Liberty and co-author of the organization’s “Hostility Against Churches” report. This new report “indicates that criminal acts against churches have been steadily on the rise for the past several years… The first three months of 2023 saw approximately 3x the number of acts of hostility perpetrated against churches in the same timeframe last year.”

What: IFI Special Forum on Religious Liberty
Where: Jubilee Church in Medinah
When: Thursday, June 1st at 7 PM
Why: Religious liberty is the bedrock of all human rights
Cost: Free – invite your like-minded friends

UPDATE:  We are pleased to announce that former state legislator Peter Breen has been added to our line-up of speakers for the IFI Special Forum on Religious Liberty.  In addition to being a pro-life hero, Peter leads the Thomas More Society’s Legal Team in service of its Life, Family, and Religious Liberty missions.

Background
In the aftermath of the BLM riots and COVID lockdowns in 2020, churches across America have been increasingly under attack. While the riots and looting leveled off (with some notable, recent exceptions in Chicago and some other big cities), the attacks on churches continue to escalate.

The violence manifests in a variety of ways, including acts of arson, graffiti of satanic messages, rocks and bricks thrown through windows, statues destroyed (often with heads cut off), and illegal disruptions of church services.

According to a report from June 2022, the Department of Homeland Security privately warned the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops of “credible threats” against Catholic churches and clergy after the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

In the wake of an arson attack against Wisconsin Family Action, FBI agents reached out to IFI and other pro-life organizations with a warning: “The threat environment [will] become more dynamic as several high-profile events could be exploited to justify acts of violence against a range of possible targets,” including “faith-based institutions” and “houses of worship”.

As our culture drifts away from God, the Bible, and Christian mores, the concept of religious freedom is quickly being sacrificed to the religion of woke-ism. There are good reasons why the Apostle Paul tells us to “walk circumspectly” or look carefully at how we live, “not as fools but as wise…because the days are evil,” and to “understand what the will of the Lord is” (Ephesians 5:15–17).

The Christian faith must offer truth to a dark and decaying culture. If religious liberty is diminished further, we will have a harder and harder time challenging the corrupting lies that are being sold to our culture.

The Christian message must be able to freely expose false beliefs and practices while illuminating God’s way (Psalm 119:15). The free exercise of religious liberty is the best way to point the world to the eternal hope found only in Jesus (Matthew 11:28).

Arielle Del Turco, in an article from April 2021, made this point:

Religious freedom will not endure by laws alone, although the law should include robust protections for religious freedom. Religious freedom also relies on cultural support.

By consistently living out our faith in the public square, we can foster a culture that respects religious freedom. So, pray in public, share your faith, and do not compromise your beliefs. Your constitutionally guaranteed right to freedom of religion protects your ability to live according to your convictions. So, use it. Live according to your faith and defend the rights of others to do the same.

We do not yet face the kind of violent persecution experienced by many people of faith around the world. Praise God we still have an amazing degree of religious liberty and the political tools to preserve the blessings of this Constitutional Republic. Upholding religious liberty is the first step in preserving God’s gift of self-government.

Religious liberty requires our vigilance because its degradation affects the exercise of every other constitutional right. We would do well to make it a priority.

“[T]hat the opinions of men are not the object of civil government, nor under its jurisdiction;
that to suffer the civil magistrate to intrude his powers into the field of opinion and to restrain
the profession or propagation of principles on supposition of their ill tendency is a dangerous fallacy,
which at once destroys all religious liberty.” ~Thomas Jefferson, 1779.

Thursday, May 18, 2023 marks the 1,993rd anniversary of the ascension of Jesus Christ into heaven. Unlike Christmas and Easter, this celebration of the culmination of our Lord’s earthly ministry does not receive much attention culturally. In some nations, Ascension Day was a public holiday, but in our post-Christian era, we have adopted new “holy” days.

So, what happened on that amazing day almost 2,000 years ago? Jesus and his disciples were gathered on the Mount of Olives just across the valley from Jerusalem, and in the sight of His disciples, Jesus was taken up into heaven. From the description that we are given in Acts, Jesus entered the Shekinah cloud, the supernatural cloud that was sometimes manifested to show God’s presence.

Through His ascension, Jesus Christ now rules from Heaven at the right hand of the Father until He returns to judge the living and the dead.

“This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven.” ~Acts 1:11b

It is important to keep in mind that Jesus, the eternal Son of God, exists in Heaven in His glorified human body. His physical body is not present on the earth any longer. However, because of His truly divine nature, we are not separated at all from our risen and ascended Lord. In addition, we have the continued ministry of the Holy Spirit. We should commemorate the powerful coming of the Holy Spirit just ten days after Ascension Day, on Sunday, May 28, 2023.

Question 49 of the Heidelberg Catechism asks, “What benefit do we receive from Christ’s ascension to heaven?”

Three points of benefit are shared in the answer:

First, our Advocate, the one who intercedes for us and rules over us, is in the presence of His Father in heaven.

Second, we have our flesh in heaven, which provides us complete assurance that He, as the Head, will also one day take us to Himself.

Third, we have been given the Holy Spirit as the assurance that our great God will complete the work of redemption and the renewal of all creation. It is through the Holy Spirit that we are able to seek those things which are above and not just things on the earth.

So, what does this all mean for us as Christians living in an increasingly hostile world now, where it seems that things are only getting worse? The Christian life is always one of faith, based on the truth God has given to us, and it is assured through the Holy Spirit. The prophet Habakkuk, in assessing the tumult of the nation of Judah and the horror of the coming Babylonian invasion, was told the just shall live by faith. The key to faith is knowing the truth that God has revealed to us.

“For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.” ~1 John 5:4

Second, we consider that we are not the first generation to live through incredible difficulty. As much as we lament the situation we are facing, we must keep in mind that those who came before us endured even greater trials. They were strengthened as they looked to the Lord; we must do the same.

Third, the glorious truth of our Lord’s ascension and victory must be kept in mind especially when we are tempted to compromise. Satan has nothing to offer us. The world has nothing to offer us. Let us make sure we keep our focus where it ought to be.

The Apostle Paul in Colossians 3, after challenging the believers in Colossae to keep their focus on things above, then gave warning about putting to death fleshly desires: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness. The wrath of God is coming on the sons of disobedience.

The victory belongs to Christ, but we must make sure we live and fight on His terms! Take time today to rejoice in the triumph of our Lord. May this glorious truth equip you for continued spiritual battle.

“Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.” ~Romans 8:37

God is loving, we are told, and thus accepts us as we are.  The idea that God will judge people for their sins is now so unpopular that few are willing to state it publicly, and many pastors have sadly bowed to the pressure to present a palatable God, a doting “Grandpa” who silently approves of His children regardless of their conduct.

If you have been caught up in this heresy, I warn you to retreat to truth.  God not only has a much higher standard of righteousness than we do, His standard is absolute perfection!

Many years ago, I spoke with a friend, a biblical counselor, regarding the problem of perfectionism.  We have all dealt with perfectionists.  They can be demanding at times!  Maybe you are one!  My friend noted sternly that only God has the right to be a perfectionist for He alone is perfect!

Most of us are not perfectionists, but therein lies a different problem.  Because we do not demand perfection from others (how could we as often as we fail?), we assume that God does not demand perfection from us.  But He does!  Matthew 5:48 reads, “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect” (KJV). No, He does not expect perfection immediately, but do not confuse His patience with tolerance.   At some point, we will be brought individually to account for every time we fail to match His perfect righteousness and holiness.   That ought to be very troubling to us!

God’s perfection is related to, among other things, His holiness, righteousness, and justice.  In all of His eternal existence God has never varied from absolute perfection.  He has never erred in even the smallest way.  And being Creator and Steward of the universe, He takes responsibility for everything that happens within its boundaries, which means that we all must live by His rules.

Our failure to match God’s perfections has an important moral element.  It is not just that we are not as strong or intelligent as God is, we adamantly refuse to do His will!  Every human act is tainted by self-will rather than God service.  Scriptures declare that “the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked,” (Jer. 17:9, NKJV).  The sad tale of mankind’s history is sufficient proof of this!  Everything we do is unsatisfactory to God!

Some philosophers have reasoned that God is so great that He is indifferent to what we do.  We neither add to Him nor take away from Him and thus we need not concern ourselves with the issue of our sinfulness.  It does seem unreasonable (to us) that God would care about what insignificant beings like us do.  However, it is due to His infiniteness that these things do matter.  Acts large or small to us are identical in scale to Him.  His infiniteness extends both directions on the linear scale.

God is not just infinitely greater than we humans. As Creator and Sustainer of the universe, He has the moral responsibility to separate from and condemn all who fall short of His holy perfections.  He commands, “Be holy for I am holy!”  Lest I be misunderstood, God cannot wink at human moral failure, which Scripture labels as sin.  It is in His eternal constitution to repudiate everything that fails to conform to His holiness.  He cannot soften His wrath against it.

In the same way that a company is responsible for the conduct of its employees, God is ultimately responsible for what transpires on planet Earth.  Ironically, while He hates wickedness, and has gone to great lengths to expose and oppose it, He is often blamed for the evils that sinners perpetrate day-after-day contrary to His will and word!  Because of His grace He is willing to “take the blame” for the moment but understand that such an injustice must and will be corrected.  He is blameless!

As Creator He is owed love, allegiance, and submission, yet people have thumbed their noses at Him and rejected His authority and His call on their lives.  Mankind’s failure is not only a matter of quantity, it is a failure of quality.  It is not that He expects us to accomplish ABC and we are only able to do A and B.  Rather, we spurn His commands and do the opposite.  He created us to bring glory to Him, but we shame Him instead.

Even we, having created a work of art, literature, or some other accomplishment, expect to get the credit for it.  Millions of lawsuits attest to the fact that we do not accept others getting or taking credit for our work!  But in our relationship with God, we do worse!  We not only fail to give Him the credit (glory) due Him for who He is and what He does, we seek to take His glory to ourselves!  We stand in awe of a DaVinci painting, or listen in rapture to a Beethoven symphony, but curse Christ, the God who with a word created the beauty of a sunset, a daffodil, and the glorious galaxies and seek to take credit for talents and abilities He “loaned” to us!

Glorifying God is not just crediting Him for who He is and what He does.  It is matching His moral perfections.  He is personally flawless and demands the same from His creation for which He is responsible.  He can tolerate no flaws in His universe.  Our every sin is a blight on His name and reputation and must be corrected.  He will not forever take the blame for our conduct, nor will He allow others to claim credit for His gracious acts.  Ultimately, He will set the record straight.

If there were aliens from other galaxies (and there are not), but if there were and they visited planet Earth, they might well ask, “Who is responsible for this horrific mess?”  A casual observer may blame God, but that conclusion would not stand.  Every broken heart, every dark blot on creation derives from the failure of created beings, not the Creator.  You and I cannot escape our accountability.  We must come to terms with God.

If you love God, you are offended by that which offends God, and you want His good name cleared.  You look with great expectation to the day when He will set the record straight and the guilty parties will be punished.  If you do not love God, I warn you that the days of evading your responsibility will have an end.

Judgement day is coming!  You may believe you can avoid God forever, but the Bible states that there will be a day when “every knee shall bow. . . and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,” (Phil. 2:10-11, NKJV).  This includes every soul in Heaven, Earth, and Hell.  And the standard by which each will be measured will not be one of their own devising, but rather the perfections of Jesus Christ!

In moments of quietness, when you have found yourself examining your own heart, you know that God’s word is true: you stand guilty.  We all stand guilty, not of mere incompetence, but of rebellion!  This fact is born out not only in our consciences, but in the dark and bloody history of humanity.  Rejecting this truth would be understandable if there were no escape from the resultant condemnation.  Denial is a common coping mechanism for those who have no hope.

But there is hope!  Wonderful hope!  And it only requires our acknowledgement of the truth, turning from sin (confession) and an acceptance of God’s forgiveness purchased by Christ on the cross!  And His forgiveness does more than simply wash away our sin.  It changes us!  First Corinthians 15:51 says that “we shall be changed,” and texts like Psalm 17:15 and I John 3:2 declare what that change entails: “We shall be like Him!”  We will be rendered perfect just as He is perfect!

Which brings us to the other side to this coin.  Because God is perfect, He will and must keep His word!  He said he would judge sinners, so He will.  But He also, as early as Genesis 3:16, promised to provide a Savior, and He has done just that!  While His perfections doom all who fall short of them, His perfections also provide grace to all who come under the shadow of His wings!

How can you say no?

We’ve all seen the bumper sticker that spells COEXIST by combining the symbols of major world religions in a convenient order. The bumper sticker seems reasonable; after all, isn’t it just representing the world as it is—people of many religions all existing side by side in the same space? If that were all the bumper sticker meant, then I might consider putting one on my car; it’s an obviously true fact about the world. However, the sticker means much more than that—it doesn’t just commend the idea of people of many different religions all living in the same space, it preaches the doctrine that the ideas promoted by many different religions must be appreciated at the same level.

The distinction between accepting people and accepting ideas is a subtle yet fundamental concept when it comes to discussing tolerance, and today’s world has gotten it exactly backwards. The unruly protest sparked by Riley Gaines‘ talk at San Francisco State University earlier this month is a case in point.

Gaines, a former NCAA swimmer who has held the All-American champ title 12 times, gave a talk at San Francisco State University on April 6 to speak out against the inclusion of transgender women in female sports. Given that Gaines’ message is unpopular in many universities, it was entirely to be expected that she would have received some pushback and perhaps had to engage in some difficult conversations. And one wouldn’t expect much different to occur at a university — an institution ostensibly dedicated to pursuing and disseminating truth, which often requires a clash of conflicting ideas.

But Gaines received far more than uncomfortable conversation—she received a shouting attack. Angry supporters of women’s-sports-trans-inclusion got so verbally violent and physically intimidating that city police had to arrive to help Gaines safely exit the campus. View a short video of the ugly interaction here (this video does contain profanity), which shows an irate trans supporter shouting the mantra “trans rights are human rights” mixed with foul language.

How can an ideology so dedicated to “tolerance” produce adherents who are so obviously intolerant? Herein lies our critical distinction tolerating ideas and tolerating people are two entirely different things. When people praise “tolerance” as a virtue, much of its appeal comes
from the traditional understanding of the word. Tolerance traditionally means that when there are other people who disagree with you, you ought to respect them as fellow human beings, even if you don’t agree with their ideas.

Under this interpretation of tolerance, people can vigorously argue, debate, and refute each other, but at the end of the day they all realize that they each retain special dignity by virtue of simply being human beings created in God’s image, and they can part ways still respecting each other.

However, the contemporary interpretation of “tolerance” flips things on its head. To many, the word still deceptively retains the dignity associated with its noble meaning, but it is now completely redefined: tolerance means that when there are other people who disagree with you, you must accept their ideas as if they were worthy of belief. Attempting to refute, persuade, or even advocate ideas contrary to someone else’s beliefs thus becomes aggression and intolerance.

The problem with this interpretation is that there really are no grounds for accepting all ideas equally. I can accept and respect all other human beings because they are fellow human beings created in the image of God, but should I be forced to readily accept all ideas by virtue of them being… well… “fellow ideas” with my own? To say such implies that all ideas—by virtue of simply being ideas—are worthy of acceptance or respect. But, unlike people, ideas can be stack-ranked according to value. The idea that “gravity is real” is a whole lot more valuable than the idea that “gravity isn’t real.”

Unfortunately, this contemporary definition of tolerance is often accompanied by intolerance of people—the exact opposite of its traditional definition. The protestors at Gaines’ talk disagreed with her ideas, but translated that into attacks on her as a person.

Our culture desperately needs to recover the proper virtue of tolerance—accepting all people, but not all ideas.

On Tuesday, April 18th, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments for a monumental religious liberty case known as Groff v. DeJoy. At the heart of this case are the questions: do American citizens have Constitutionally protected rights under the First Amendment to the “free exercise” of their faith in the workplace, and; are employers obligated to grant reasonable religious accommodations.

Christian mail carrier Gerald Groff requested the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) for a religious accommodation that would excuse him from working on Sundays after they started doing Amazon package deliveries so that he could observe the Sabbath and live by his Christian faith. The fact that regular mail isn’t delivered by the USPS on Sundays was a major factor in Groff’s choosing to work there over a decade ago. USPS refused to grant him the accommodation and Groff chose to resign rather than be fired.

Groff is appealing to the U.S. Supreme Court in hopes it will overturn its ominus 1977 precedent in Trans World Airlines, Inc. v. Hardison, which enabled employers to deny religious accommodations. Liberty Counsel filed an amicus brief in the case asking the U.S. Supreme Court to restore Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which provides protection against religious discrimination. Their the amicus brief asserts in their summary:

This Court should overrule the interpretation in Trans World Airlines, Inc. v. Hardison that Title VII does not require an employer to accommodate an employee’s religious beliefs if doing so would impose more than a de minimis burden on the employer. Hardison’s de minimis standard—found nowhere in the Title VII’s text or legislative history—has led to absurd results, allowing employers to discriminate against religious employees with impunity, thereby forcing workers to choose between their religious beliefs and their jobs.

The U.S. Supreme Court justices spent much of the hearing debating the exact meanings of “undue hardship” and “de minimis.”

Groff’s attorney, Aaron Streett, recommended that the justices “construe undue hardship according to its plain text to mean significant difficulty or expense,” which would be consistent with the language in the accommodation standard of the “Americans with Disabilities Act.”

Arguing on behalf of the Biden administration, U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar told the court that Hardison adequately protects religious exercise, to which Justice Samuel Alito responded, “I’m really struck by that because we have amicus briefs here by many representatives of many minority religions, Muslims, Hindus, Orthodox Jews, Seventh Day Adventists, and they all say that is just not true, and that Hardison has violated their right to religious liberty.”

Chief Justice John Roberts spoke about changes in religious liberty case law since the Hardison ruling, arguing that religious protections had been expanded.

Thankfully, it appears that the conservative justices are poised to rule in favor of Groff and the religious liberty of every employee. The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to rule over this case by the summer.

A version of this article was originally published by Wisconsin Family Action.

Many years ago, I asked a gentleman from Japan why he had come to the United States.  His reply startled me. He said that he had come to the U.S. to find Christianity because it is the religion of love and therefore had to be the right religion!  He saw a connection between Christianity, the love it manifested, and the United States.

America has never technically been a “Christian nation,” but was founded largely on Christian principles, making it the freest and most inviting place to live in world history, as witnessed by the millions who still desire to come here! There is only one reason for the hatred of the Left for this country, and it has to do primarily with power.  Leftists hunger for power, but America’s Constitution, political philosophy, and Christianity make tyranny difficult to implement here.

Christianity is probably their biggest obstacle. As poorly as we Christians have followed Christ, Christianity is still a visible representation of God, and God stands firmly with the “meek and humble,” not the totalitarian.  The optics of government crushing people known for compassion, sacrifice, and patience is not good!

Therefore, Leftists understand that Christianity must be weakened and corrupted in order to destroy its public image and reputation before they can gain the control they seek over the American people.  But how can that be accomplished when the public’s view of Christianity has been mostly positive for centuries?  It has been known as “the religion of love” worldwide!  Estimates put U.S. Christian charitable giving at fifty billion or more annually; so how do you turn the tide of public opinion against compassionate, loving, and law-abiding citizens?

Besides the obvious question of why anyone would want to destroy the greatest, freest, most generous country in history, is the question of how it would be possible to fool enough Americans to cause them to join in bringing their own country to its knees.  How does one turn a nation that has been considered “Christian” from its infancy, four hundred years ago, against itself?  How does one successfully malign a religious philosophy known for promoting kindness, love, generosity, patience, and “turning the other cheek?”

As we have seen, they did it by getting control of the nation’s cultural forums, normalizing lying and creating a false narrative about Christianity.  They invested heavily in magnifying individual Christian’s failures and glossing over and ignoring Christianity’s and the nation’s virtues and successes.  They have managed also, with help from a complicit, dishonest media, to turn good into evil and evil into good.

We will discover an amazing parallel situation in the Book of Daniel. That great Jewish man, Daniel, was taken as a teen to Babylon and trained to stand in the palace of the king. He was wiser than his age would suggest, and he became a trusted adviser not only to Nebuchadnezzar but also to subsequent rulers, so much so that not many years later, Darius the King was giving serious consideration to making him the second ruler over the entire Median empire.  This plan was not well received by other political leaders who had their own ambitions; so, they hatched a plot to destroy Daniel’s credibility and possibly end his life.

This is where we find an interesting connection to current politics.

In Daniel 6, we discover these conniving politicians gathered to discuss how they might undermine Daniel’s favor with Darius.  However, the text notes that concerning Daniel “they could find no charge or fault, because he was faithful; nor was there any error or fault found against him. Then these men said, ‘We shall not find any charge against this Daniel unless we find it against him concerning the law of his God.’”  They deduced that the only way to defeat Daniel was to place him in a situation where he had to choose between God and the king; and they knew what his choice would be!

Thereupon, these power-hungry politicians advanced their plan. Behind a façade of concern for the King, and under the guise of promoting unity and harmony in the kingdom, (Does their virtue signaling and flattery sound familiar?) they convinced Darius to sign a temporary law requiring everyone to pray only to him. This seemingly innocuous requirement, of course, put the Jehovah worshipping Daniel at odds with the law of the land! Instantly, the most faithful aid to the King had become a criminal facing punishment in a den of lions!

Did America’s Leftists read the book of Daniel to learn how to turn America’s most compassionate community into outcast “haters and bigots” virtually overnight?  Who knows, but if they did, they did not read far enough!  Regardless, their tactic is apparently working for the moment.  With the Left’s juggernaut of “wokeness” and “tolerance” for aberrant behavior they have temporarily placed anyone with Christian convictions in the position of appearing to be unloving and divisive!

And, like the Median politicians’ ploy of forcing everyone (specifically targeting Daniel, a worshipper of God) to accept idolatry or pay a price, the Left is creating a political landscape in America where failure to worship at their altar will also be costly.  (Interesting that nearly three-thousand years later the target of the Left is also worshippers of God; and like Daniel’s situation, a basis for accusing Christians must be created from nothing!)

In the same way that Daniel’s coworkers sought to force him to irrationally worship a mere man or face death, so Leftists today demand that Christians celebrate a number of destructive lies or suffer serious consequences.

Sadly, corrupt political ambition, like all sin, blinds those who are governed by it, and in Daniel’s situation the efforts of the corrupt politicians to destroy him came back to bite them, (no pun intended).  Their plan to have Daniel eaten by Lions became their own destiny!

I do not know the short or long term consequences of the Left’s efforts to normalize immorality and gain political supremacy in the United States, but I do know that God will bring every work of every man into judgment at some time; and the consequences of the Left’s deliberate destruction of so much that is good, and their obstinate rejection of truth and godliness will not go unnoticed by God.

As for us Christians?  By God’s grace we will grow in our convictions, in our numbers, and in our Christlikeness, and through grace and mercy reflect the holy, good, and righteous character of our Great God and Savior Jesus Christ to people who desperately need Him but have not yet recognized it!

I was, for a short time during college, a volunteer fireman, and my responsibility was to operate the equipment while more experienced firemen entered the burning building.  Following a fire at one house, another student who had gone inside told me how he stood in the smoke-filled kitchen spraying water at the flames to no avail.  It wasn’t until he realized that he was facing a mirrored wall and that the flames were actually behind him that he turned and was able to extinguish the fire.  As long as he was sending water in the wrong direction the fire continued unabated.

With every mass shooting in America there is a repetition of the same demands from the Left to take “substantive” action against guns and gun owners to stop such tragedies.  These demands go nowhere because sensible people understand that, like spraying water at a mirror instead of the fire, such actions will not and cannot make a difference.

You will never solve a problem so long as you are aiming at the wrong target.  We are not dealing with people who are under the control of God or law.  In other words, good people do not kill each other and do not need gun control!  As Paul wrote in I Timothy 1:9, the law is made “for the lawless and insubordinate, for the ungodly and for sinners. . . for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers. . . . “

Tragically, murder has been with us from the very beginning of human history.  I expect we are all familiar with Cain’s killing of Abel.  And in the approximately six thousand years since, things have not improved.  Cain did not need a firearm to kill his brother, and the absence of such weapons has never been an obstacle to those who are bent on killing someone.

So, is there a “Christian” view of guns?  Does the Bible give us any indication of what God might say about such things?  A former president mocked traditional Americans for relying on their “God and guns.”  Clearly, Leftists delight in throwing Scripture texts or generalities into our faces thinking they can embarrass us into yielding to their demands.

But their efforts are based upon twisted understandings of the Bible, passages taken out of context, or simply ignoring important relevant texts.  Superficially, one might think that God would frown on the existence and use of guns in general, but to conclude this would be to overlook a large body of Scripture.  And it is clear that the only people who would benefit from taking firearms from law abiding Americans would be criminals and tyrants.

A thorough examination of the subject would require writing a book, so the best we can do here is to hit a few high points.  God’s heart can be seen in the fact that the first environment He created for us was that of a garden, symbolizing both beauty and serenity.  It was mankind who introduced discord and violence to creation, and we learned immediately that God disapproved of that violence.

While allowing Cain to live following his killing of his brother, God, shortly thereafter (Gen. 9:6) instituted the death penalty for murder, declaring that murderers were to be executed.  Thus, God’s justice requires that violence be met with violence.

Interestingly, there is no evidence in Scripture for a wholesale surrender of peaceful people to violent people.  “Turning the other cheek,” which we read of in Matthew five applies in the context of Christ’s Kingdom (which was rejected then but will be established in the future) where God will take revenge for His people.  Therefore, if God approves of meeting violence with lethal force, if necessary, it only makes sense that guns are not forbidden by Him.

It is certainly applicable to the topic to consider that David, a “man after God’s own heart” used a high-velocity projectile (slingshot) to take out the giant, Goliath.  Modern studies suggest that a stone released from an ancient sling would have the approximate killing power of a  44 magnum!  David became the progenitor of the Davidic dynasty, from which Christ, the world’s future Ruler has come, and it was he who noted that God taught his “hands to make war.”

God is not anti-war when there is an evil, mortal enemy to fight.

Third, the Apostle Paul addressed the responsibility of a man to his family.  In I Timothy 5:8 he wrote that if a man does not provide the essentials for his family, “especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”  The idea that providing for one’s family includes food and a roof over their heads but not their protection against intruders is ludicrous.

Virtually whatever a man needs to keep his family safe is legitimate, and with the weapons available to criminals, one has no alternative but to be able to meet force with force, if need be.  This would include firearms.

Finally, the US Constitution provides in its Second Amendment a protection of the individual’s God given right to own firearms for the express purpose of protecting “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness;” and only the naïve would say that this amendment provides merely for hunting.  Rather, its intention was for the citizen to protect himself and his family from a tyrannical government, which the colonists had just defeated in a bloody war.

It is precisely for this reason that Leftists beat the drum for more gun control.  The most significant obstacle to their achieving a strangle hold on the American public is the citizens’ right to “keep and bear arms.”

Therefore, all who love liberty and life and understand that these are God given rights, will not yield an inch in the battle for the Second Amendment.  What we must understand is the Left’s willingness to allow and even create suffering for the nation’s citizens in their quest for power.  They cynically believe that if enough innocent people die, eventually tender-hearted citizens will change their minds and allow the government to disarm the public.  Once the public is sufficiently disarmed, our chains will be forged and we will be subjugated, just as they are in China, North Korea, Russia, Venezuela, and other socialist countries.

Do we understand that the Left has no interest in stopping these killings?  There are substantial things that could be done to reduce the killings without violating the Constitution, but the Left fabricates reasons to oppose them all.  We who are truly concerned about the deaths of innocent people struggle to accept the fact that Leftists, whether politicians or academics, don’t care!  Every week in cities like Chicago there are killings equivalent to a mass shooting, yet those in charge do nothing.

There are also over one hundred thousand drug related deaths annually in America, and the Left’s response is to make those drugs more available and curtail efforts to interdict the narcotics crossing the southern border.  Their utter lack of concern for these tragedies underscores the fact that Leftists, regardless of their rhetoric, do not care for America’s citizens, even the children.

What can be done?  The evidence is that training and arming teachers and other staff at every school would be one quick and effective improvement.  But you will get no encouragement from the Left in this.  And there are other available options we won’t get into here because I would like to go to the two most important and effective tools in the tool chest, both of which are hated by the Left.

First, reintroduce students to God and the Bible.  “We can’t have a state church,” you say.  Well, we already do, it’s called Humanism, its priests are teachers, and its cathedrals are the public schools.  But, even at that, the expression “separation of church and state” is seriously misunderstood.  Few Christians want a state church, but all desire to see the principles of righteousness that are sourced in Christianity taught to the Nation’s children.

There is a great difference between a “state church” and teaching morality and goodness to children.  Under the guise of “protecting” children from a state church Leftists have thrown out the principles that are essential to a healthy culture, good citizenry, and safe neighborhoods.

Leftists hate Christianity so virulently that they would rather have the chaos and death across the culture than to hear someone proclaim, “Thus saith the Lord!”  They deeply resent being told that lying, cheating, stealing, and adultery are sinful, but they have no problem declaring that traditional values are evil!

They claim that children are “damaged” by being told about God and their accountability to Him.  Apparently, having a sense of guilt (for which Christianity also provides relief) is worse to Leftists than dying of violence or a drug overdose!   Regardless, the issue is not whether somethings are good and some evil, but rather, who decides what is good and what is evil!

The Left went public with its war on God and the Bible in the 1960s, and that war has only escalated over time.  The horrific violence witnessed daily across America is just one consequence.  One could ask, “America, how is this war on God working out for you?”  The best thing America could do to encourage a God-consciousness in young people.

The second thing we must do, which is related to the creation of a cultural God-consciousness, is to reinvigorate the traditional family.  The chaotic culture we now have is clearly the opposite of a safe, stable culture that would not produce these mass shootings.  The single most important factor in a safe, stable culture is intact, traditional families.  This is indisputable.  Just as darkness cannot exist in the presence of light, chaos cannot exist in a stable society! Duh!  Only a brainwashed Leftist would seek to dispute this.  But it is in fact the very reason for the Leftists’ war against the family.

They understand that the public would never yield to their tyranny if we were experiencing a safe, stable, and prosperous culture.  Understand this: the violence, unrest, and destruction we have witnessed over the last several years are not the natural manifestations of a normal culture.  It has all been orchestrated to achieve a simple objective: the subjugation of the American people.

Opponents of liberty seek to shame those of us who love America’s freedoms with false narratives regarding love.  No, love is not tolerant toward those who would destroy that which is good and right.  A good man does not sit idly watching intruders victimize his family.  As long as predators exist, good men will protect those they love!

“Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD,” is not merely a pleasant platitude.  It is the one most essential element for a peaceful, prosperous nation.  I again call on all Americans to repent and submit to the Holy, yet gracious Lord and God, Jesus Christ!

Sadly, so long as fallen mankind and tyrants run things here, weapons will be necessary to protect one’s life and liberties.  When Christ, the Prince of peace reigns, however, we will see such things come to an end and weapons will be repurposed into plows and pruning hooks!  Eden will be restored!

Will you be there?

America’s children are being targeted by sex predators. Their recruiters are already in our schools and libraries. These “transgender” people need your children as converts. Consider:

• Children returning from school carrying “gender unicorn lessons,” which teach strange ideas of sex and gender.
• Public libraries are conditioning your children through “drag queen readings” to get children familiar with these recruiters.
• Schools are hiding from parents that they’re giving puberty blocking drugs to their children.

The transgender people insist that they be allowed to access and recruit children, and that you accept them as being of their assumed sex – even in private places like separate-sex bathrooms. They claim, “trans rights are civil rights.”

If you oppose them, you’re charged with genocide- of mass murdering hordes of children. But, if you don’t oppose them, you’ll end up losing your rights as parents and all of the children will be prey to sexual and financial abuse. Read on to become aware of how the transgender agenda destroys parents’ oversight, age of consent, and causes bodily harm to their young victims.

Sexually flailing against God’s creation

People practicing homosexuality want to be accepted as normal by society. That is what the “love is love” campaign is all about. Likewise, people practicing transgender behaviors want us to affirm their choices. Why, then, do Christians actively oppose homosexuality and transgenderism? It’s not out of hate for these people, but because God hates these behaviors. Even if we wanted to affirm them, we couldn’t do that and also have a God-honoring society.

In Genesis, we read how God created everything, including Adam (a man) and Eve (a woman). God told Adam “from any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die” (Gen. 2:16-17, NASB). But Adam decided he didn’t trust God’s version of good and evil, and sought his own understanding. This was the sin of Adam– that he pursued his own version of right and wrong.

Homosexuality is a manifestation of Adam’s sin. God hates it because, at its root, it is rebellion against Him and rejecting His creation. They’ll have man-to-man, or woman-to-woman, sex and curse us if we tell them that this is wrong. An article from Got Questions calls it “shaking our fists at God.”

Homosexuality is not the cause of a society’s decline, but it is a symptom of it; it is the result of people making themselves the final authorities. Romans 1 gives the natural digression of a society that has chosen idolatry and sinful pleasure instead of obedience to God. The downward spiral begins with denying that God has absolute authority over His creation (Romans 1:21-23).

The result of a society’s rejection of God’s rule in their lives is that God gives “them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator” (Romans 1:24-25). Verses 26 and 27 say, “Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.” The phrase “God gave them over” means that, when we insist on shaking our fists at God, He finally lets us have the perversion we demand. And that is a judgment in itself. Homosexual behavior is the result of ignoring God and trying to create our own truth. When we defy God’s clear instruction, we reap the “due penalty” of our disobedience (2 Thessalonians 1:8-9; Revelation 21:8).

Transgenderism is a variant of homosexuality. The important difference between them is that a man or woman claims to be of the other sex – an assertion in defiance of the facts. It’s another claim of godhood, that someone can declare their own sex and it becomes true because they say so. We’re all supposed to chime in and affirm this claim, much like throwing a pinch of incense to Caesar. Frequently, but not always, transgender behavior also includes surgical removal of a person’s sex organs.

A key thing about transgenderism is how you can’t just ignore it. People are in your face about you acknowledging the sex assertion, and about you using “preferred pronouns.” Woe to you if you disagree with them. Walter Hudson, a state legislator from Minnesota, commented about this:

We used to take our differences a lot more seriously. But we eventually settled on a social contract rooted in classical liberalism, the notion that neighbors should be able to peacefully co-exist without demanding renunciation of sacred belief. The transgender community has not received that memo. Despite individual exceptions, the general rule among the dominant trans culture is an illiberal insistence upon affirmation. It’s not enough for them to believe that “transgender women are women.” You must believe it too. You must confess it with your mouth upon every social interaction. You must call a guy cosmetically altered to appear as a woman “she,” or you will be found guilty of heresy and summarily convicted in the court of public opinion. At the very least, your sentence will be social censure and condemnation. More likely, you will lose your job or face other grave consequences that hobble your capacity to live…

The dominant trans culture has successfully employed a repressive cultural strategy of social censure and unearned indignation to enforce a code of conduct that “affirms” their beliefs. Of course, it amounts to gaslighting. No one believes that the man cosmetically altered to appear as a woman has become a woman. But you’re expected to “affirm” that lie with every use of a “preferred pronoun” as an act of fealty and submission. It’s enforced with severe social censure for violations of trans decorum, which typically involves being treated as beneath contempt.

Christians aspire to proclaim the gospel, and to build a Christian society (Matt. 13:33, 28:18-20). America still has a strong Christian influence, and our standards of right and wrong are measured by what the Bible says. God hates homosexuality, in either form, and judges a society that approves of it (Gen. 19:15-26; Rom. 1:26-27). This means that building a Christian society includes opposing homosexuality and transgenderism.

Transgenderism brings unwelcome surprises

Are Christians being meanies, not letting an “oppressed minority” experience full acceptance into American society? No, we’re trying to protect our society from predators, who would use this acceptance to exploit and hurt children. After everything is said and done, this conflict is over recruiting children into transgenderism.

Consider the rage over a  Texas bill, which would ban sexual transition surgery on minors. And look at the concern about a Florida bill that, only modestly, regulates when transgender concepts could be taught in public schools. It certainly is about the children.

If America gives these advocates what they demand, if they convince us that it’s fair and just to yield to their claims, then look at the life-changing surprises awaiting us.

Surprise #1: Transgender education is already in American schools

Of the things a people can expect of society, perhaps protecting the vulnerable is its most important task. And children are its most vulnerable group, because they’re innocent of how the world might mistreat them. American society provides them special protection through concepts like “age of consent,” and by the understanding that their parents are their legal guardians. This has been consistently confirmed, most famously in the Wisconsin v. Yoder Supreme Court case:

The history and culture of Western civilization reflect a strong tradition of parental concern for the nurture and upbringing of their children. This primary role of the parents in the upbringing of their children is now established beyond debate as an enduring American tradition.

However, teaching children about transgender behaviors has already been forced into public schools, without seeking parents’ consent and usually without notice. It’s done because  teachers believe that the students belong to them. In practice, teachers, administrators, and school boards act like they can they can do as they please with their students.

They approve, not merely permit, teaching transgenderism, and seek to indocrinate students even in kindergarten. They teach propaganda like “assigned sex at birth”and “gender unicorns.” They even seek to reach three-year-old children with these lessons! To evade parental oversight, they counsel children in secret, and deny what they’re doing.

Don’t be fooled in thinking that your “excellent school district” doesn’t do that stuff. They probably do already, for so much of their agenda is set by state bureaucracies. Remember what Ronald Reagan said: “Trust, but verify.”

Surprise #2: Transgender agenda overrules “age of consent”

The point of the “age of consent” is that the parents protect a child from making uninformed or immature decisions. The child increasingly learns how the world works, and his or her parents give increased personal control.

Young children know nothing about how “gender-affirming” therapy changes the body’s development. Even drug therapy has permanent consequences. If you stop taking the drugs the body doesn’t play “catch-up” for the years of missed development. No youth of nine or ten has the wisdom, or skepticism, to understand the implications of tampering with puberty.

Non-parental counselors are conflicted, having self-interests to not tell the youth of any potential problems. We used to call people like this “predators” and “child exploiters.” Yet transgender advocates demand that youth be allowed to make these decisions without parental approval. For example, the Minnesota Lt. Governor said, “when our children tell us who they are, it is our job as grown-ups to listen and to believe them,” she added. “That’s what it means to be a good parent.” Not true, because a good parent looks for the best interests of a child, and much of love means saying “no.”

Surprise #3: All ages of consent could be nullified

If a child can consent, without having parental approval, to body-altering procedures, even surgery, then the “age of consent” is nullified. Perhaps some advocate will then petition a judge that the sexual age of consent should also be nullified. A similar argument exists for removing the minimum age for entering into financial contracts. This results in many exploiters, and many hurt children.

Surprise #4: Parental oversight would effectively be abolished

In a transgender-affirming world, a child can ask for, and expect to get, body-altering treatments without parental permission. And the schools can effectively ignore the parents, teaching things and transitioning youth without their parents’ knowledge. After all of that, what is left of parental oversight?

In Minnesota, the enmity towards parents is so strong that the legislature passed a law, making the state a sanctuary for children who want to run away and get transgender treatment there. And the state will fight the parents when they ask for the return of their child. By the way, isn’t it a crime for an adult to help a child make that journey across state lines?

Let’s take this farther. If parental oversight isn’t respected, then what purpose is served by a family? Why should society, or the law, honor it? In 1920 the socialists in Soviet Russia asked this question, and decided that abolishing the family was a good idea. That turned out horribly, and families were again honored – but only after many lives were ruined.

Affirming transgender behavior opens a big box of trouble

As you see, we can’t simply say “let them have their way” and we all live happily together. A decision to normalize, to affirm, transgender behavior, in the scope they want it for, will soon lead to widespread child exploitation and neutering of the protective family environment. This would be a major change in American society. Decisions like this shouldn’t be made by manipulating some judges, or through bureaucracy. It is a major deal, and demands public debate.

Opposing transgender agenda is not genocide

We’ve seen how submitting to transgender demands would cause much harm to American children. A Christian culture ought to prevent this harm by rejecting their assertions, and not changing society to suit these demands. At minimum this means:

• A man might claim to be a woman, or a woman a man. But that doesn’t grant any rights or privileges other than those of the person’s biological sex.
• A person doesn’t have any legal right to require others to recognize him or her as their claimed, non-biological, sex.
• Civil rights laws don’t favor someone’s pretending to his or her non-biological sex.

However, transgender activists claim that opposing them amounts to genocide. Here’s the advocacy site, OutFront Magazine, claiming that denying transitioning drugs or surgery amounts to a crime against humanity:

While, of course, this convention, passed by the Third United Nations General Assembly in 1948, does not specifically mention sexual orientation, gender identity, romantic orientation, etcetera, the objects of the oppression of the queer community, including the trans community, such communities should obviously be included under such a definition.

The sentiment of the opening clause is that, in short, genocide is the purposeful destruction of an oppressed societal out-group on the basis that they are that group, and such unequivocally includes the entirety of the queer community.

Regarding the transgender community specifically, many enacted policies, or policies attempting to be enacted, in the modern-day meet such a definition. The aforementioned policies of banning transgender healthcare for trans youths are potentially the most egregious instances of violation of this definition of genocide.

Puberty blockers and hormone replacement therapy, the topics of these policies, have been shown to drastically reduce the horrifically high suicide rate of transgender youths, saving lives. To block trans youth from such a treatment manufactures a higher suicide rate and thus manufacture more suicides, more deaths within the transgender community, specifically amongst youth.

That is, it’s genocide because they wish it were so. But they are preying on our youth, and blaming us when their targets despair. It seems far more likely that the children are hanging out with the wrong adults, “groomers” if you will. And according to the articles I provided earlier, our public school teachers and employees seem to be at the forefront of transgender recruitment.

On the Dr. Phil show, a transgender man (biological female) named Reece explains her decision process. Note that she thinks that using transitioning drugs at age eight is a really fine and normal thing. And if you should deny these drugs, she thinks that this would be genocide.

One of Dr. Phil’s guests not only defended trans medical procedures for minors but claimed that it is absolutely vital for their mental health.

“Being able to start my transition at 11 was just so overwhelming and scary, but exciting, and I feel grateful. Say that a trans person came out at 8, and they had to wait till they were 18 to start hormone replacement therapy and not even able to get puberty blockers so their body has to fully now go through puberty,” Reece, a trans man, said. “That now makes transitioning 10 times more hard and traumatizing.”

Reece went on to say that legal regulations to prevent these procedures being done to minors is akin to mass-murder.

“It’s extremely important for trans youth to be able to transition at puberty, I think, without that, all of these kids who know who they are deep down inside would never get the opportunity to live their childhood as their truth. And I think that’s just horrendous. And I think it’s just transgender genocide. If I was not able to transition at the age I was, I would not have made it to 18. I do not think the government should be denying trans health care. It’s life-saving healthcare,” Reece said.

The guest went on to contradict themselves when describing hesitation to actually go through with a double mastectomy at a young age and deciding to “wait till I’m older.”

Reece then said, “I didn’t want to wait. I was eligible at 15. I went to get it at 15 and I just was too young to go through with it at that age for myself personally, but someone who has a bigger chest who is also that age would definitely need it if they felt like they did and I think they should be able to get it.”

These two articles underline that the transgender community wants your children. After all, it’s hard to assume the appearance of the other sex after you already have adult genitals. So they evangelize the children early, before puberty, especially before they’ve got the wisdom to resist.

In a more general sense, stopping this agenda will indeed shut down the transgender community. Without getting easy converts, it won’t be much fun for them to do their role playing. But it’s not genocide. By that logic, you may as well claim that enforcing traffic laws is “genocide against speeders.” So saying “genocide” is just using a scary word. Why not also call us “fascists” and “racists,” to get full value out of using scary sounding, but no longer meaningful, words.

Don’t be afraid to eliminate child abuse, and child maiming, by opposing the transgender agenda. But this agenda would be implemented not through legislation, but by top politicians changing bureaucratic rules, such as the words in the Civil Rights Act. We must be loud and persistent in getting our politicians to behave, because we really do care.

For the last century, the United States of America has engaged in a great secular experiment: what if we pretended that God was irrelevant? What if we pretended that we could make laws that ignored God? Could the ‘public square’ be a place of free, rational discourse—free from claims about the implications of Christian theism on public life? This pretended neutrality has served to reveal one thing: that the line between secularism and paganism is dangerously thin. I’ll revisit that point later, but let’s first take a brief diversion into the hazy world of Cannabis and Constitutionalism.

The International Church of Cannabis (yes, you read that right) is in the midst of a battle with the city of Denver, Colorado, over what the ‘church’ claims to be its First Amendment rights to religious freedom. The battle began after the ‘church’ was ordered to remove an eleven-foot, bright pink statue that it erected on their property, a street corner in a residential area.

Striking, isn’t it? A religious group dedicated to smoking weed is appealing to the U.S. Constitution on the grounds of the First Amendment, an amendment designed to protect the Christian conscience. Now, without getting into debates about originalism versus living Constitutionalism, what does this tells us about the state of our nation? More than anything else, it indicates that the Constitution is no longer fit for the American people. Or perhaps it is more appropriate to put it the other way: the American people are no longer fit for the Constitution.

The Constitution has very little to say about God—it only mentions God indirectly, noting that the document was drafted ‘in the year of our Lord, 1787.’ While some might want to read this as a latent atheism in the Founders (or at least an etiolated deism), there is another way to explain the apparent lack of God. As John Adams famously said, “the Constitution was made only for a religious and moral people, and is wholly inadequate for any other.” That is to say, the Constitution presupposes widespread belief in God and the accompanying Christian social behaviors that stabilize a society.

Nevertheless, the lack of explicitly Christian language in the Constitution has been exploited as a ‘get out of morality free’ card by progressives for the last 150 years. And that’s just how we find the International Church of Cannabis appealing to their ‘Constitutionally-protected’ religious freedoms. Because our nation—Christians included—has gone along with the belief that the Constitution, and consequently all law, can exist and preserve social order without a Christian foundation, we now find ourselves confronted with open paganism.

Why is this the case? Why does a silent secularism end up manifesting itself as open paganism? Because nature abhors a vacuum. If there is a moral vacuum, something has to fill it. Man is homo adorans, he was created to worship something, so when God is stripped of his public relevance, the public will find other things to worship, like cannabis, or himself, or whatever that thing on the courthouse in New York is.

Secularism is never truly secular. There is always a god of the system. In a liberal democracy such as our own, the god is demos, the people. Just listen to any political pundit invoking Omniscient Polls and Almighty Consensus—such things are imbued with godlike characteristics, and everyone must fall down and worship before demos.

Christians must reclaim the public square, not ceding an inch to secularism. We must not buy into the notion that laws can be value-neutral. Law, morality, and social order have no rational basis other than the Triune God of Scripture.

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

I realize that there are many definitions of what a Christian is, but I am writing to those of you who have, like me, trusted Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior and have been born again.

We live in perilous times, and for the first time in hundreds of years on this continent, we face serious opposition and potential persecution.  It is not a pleasant thought, and we will find it very tempting to compromise truth, or just remain silent.  But that is not really an option!  Whether it will come to actual persecution as our brothers and sisters in China, North Korea and elsewhere face, only God knows.  Either way, it should not surprise us that we are hated by people of the world and especially by the Left.  Jesus noted when He was here that the world hated Him, and thus they would hate those who chose to follow Him.  In fact, He stated in Matthew 5, “Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake.  Rejoice and be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in heaven!” (Matt 5:11, 12 NKJV).  As poorly as we Christians have followed Christ, (and we must admit to failing Him), the aura of Christ still somehow shines through and those who hate Him also hate what they see of Him in us.  Interestingly, humorist Mark Twain noted that “there is nothing more irritating than a good example!”  Righteousness intimidates unrighteousness, and light angers those who love darkness.

America has been richly blessed beyond all other nations in history, and those of us who know our nation’s history, and are aware of how God has blessed the entire world through America, hate to see her attacked, and slandered.  Most people throughout time have lived under one type of tyrant or another.  Whether they were called kings, emperors, pharaohs, premiers, or comrades, the lives of average citizens were generally unpleasant, often miserable, and certainly not free.  Whether God, in His grace, renews our liberties or not hangs in the balance at the moment, but we must understand that Scriptures are clear that there will be no place like America during the final years of world history just prior to Christ establishing His kingdom.  We do not know God’s plan for this country, upon which He “shed His grace.”

However, this is not a call for passivity!  Because we do not know God’s mind, we should continue pleading for an extension of His grace to America.  But too many Christians appear to believe that merely asking for God’s blessing is sufficient.  I read and hear many people saying, “God bless America” without and reference to the fact that America has turned its back to God!  On what basis do we expect His blessings?  We should consider a relevant text found in II Chronicles where God specifically addresses this subject.  II Chronicles 7:14, while written for Israel and not the United States, still presents the theological pathway to a place where God might bestow His blessing, and that pathway begins with humility and repentance.  There is no reason for Christians to think that God will pour out His rich grace on America when multitudes of Christians live like the world and persist in activities and attitudes that are disgusting to His holiness!  Parents know better than to give treats to children who are disobeying them.  Do we think that God is not as wise as parents?

The “world system” is at war with God, and James warned in his letter that Christians who seek to please the world rather than God are like adulterers.  He noted, “he who would be a friend of the world makes himself the enemy of God!”  We cannot serve two masters; we must make our choice!  Twenty-eight-year-old missionary, Jim Elliot, who was martyred for his faith in 1956, wrote, “he is no fool who gives what he cannot keep, to gain what he cannot lose.”

Whatever gain you might make, or think you make by going along with the world will be short-lived at best and may cost you eternal blessings.  Christ said, “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. . . .” (Matt. 6:19 NKJV).  It is not surprising when those who see this world as all there is, have no scruples in taking for themselves whatever they want without regard to the impact and cost to others.  But we Christians ought to know better.  It is a foolish Christian who allows himself to be tricked into thinking this world offers more than Christ does, or that we can please both the world and God!

I would like to urge every Christian who reads this to do some honest soul-searching to determine to what length they have compromised God’s word and righteousness in order to get along and avoid the world’s displeasure.  In whatever way you have failed in obedience, repent today, and accept God’s grace.  Whether it has been overt sinfulness, or passive silence in the face of the wickedness of our culture, determine to stand now!  Bring your spiritual, cultural, political, and personal choices into harmony with God’s revealed will.  Rebuke the evils of the culture, reaching out with the compassion of Christ to those injured by the prevalent hedonism of the day, and point hungry hearts to Christ!  He alone can save and bring hope and peace!

If we equivocate with our message.  If we remain silent in the face of evil.  If we are passive in dealing with the lies being foisted upon America and especially the children and young people, we will be failing God, and we will be failing those whose lives are being destroyed.  Have you considered the despair that characterizes millions of American young people who hear nothing but the nihilism and hopelessness of secularism that dominates the educational establishment and contemporary culture?  Do the deaths of tens of thousands of children and young adults through drug poisoning and suicide every year mean nothing?  Are you aware of the innocent little children being exploited and groomed by the sexualized curriculum of public education and public libraries?  God calls us to “deliver them that are drawn onto death. . . . “  (Prov. 24:11 KJV).

We have no way of knowing whether God’s gracious face will shine once more upon America;  but if He does not revive the nation, if we have been faithful to the One who redeemed us with His own blood on the cross, He will welcome us one day to His home with a “well done, good and faithful servant!”

Few Christians have been given great wealth or power, but everyone of us has been called to point people to the cross of Christ where they find forgiveness, peace, and joy for eternity; and that is a great calling and is well worth whatever little it might cost us here.

But there may be some who read this and wonder what I mean by the term “born again.”  Unfortunately, the expression has been hijacked for a variety of other uses and has been maligned by many.  However, Jesus Christ, in the third chapter of the Gospel of John, stated that one must be “born again” to see and enter His Kingdom!  For that reason, it is very important that you know what it really means.

Paul, the Apostle, wrote that everyone enters this world spiritually “dead in trespasses and sin.”  Death, in this context, refers to our being separated from God.  God, being perfectly holy and righteous, must and did separate Himself from us sinners, for “there is none righteous, no, not one,” (Rom. 3:10 NKJV).  Death is alienation from God, life is to be in fellowship with, or connected to God.  Thus, we all begin at the same place: spiritually “dead.”  However, when we understand that Jesus Christ’s death on the cross in our place “paid” the penalty for our sin, and that He offers us forgiveness when we repent and trust Him, the pathway to life becomes available to us.  Therefore, if we turn from our sin, ask, and trust Him for forgiveness, we are “born again” and become His children! (John 1:12).  We are at that moment given spiritual “life” for the first time and will never die spiritually; that is, we will never be separated from God again!  “For God so loved the world that He gave His Only Begotten Son, that whoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”  (John 3:16 NKJV).

If you have spoken with God, asked for His forgiveness and asked Him to make you His child, based upon the fact that Jesus paid for your sin, we would love to hear from you!

Who would ever have imagined that free speech would be at risk in America, and that by, among others, members of the Media? Have journalists forgotten that it has been practitioners of their art who have so often been the target of tyrants? The freedom to speak one’s mind is so obviously good, to hate it is like hating babies! Oh, right! Leftists hate babies, too. There are few things more frightening than to know you could be punished or imprisoned for saying the wrong thing! We have indeed fallen behind the looking glass! What a bizarre twist on things that a liberty which multitudes have sacrificed their lives to obtain is now considered evil by the Left and members of the Media!

Speech necessarily follows thinking; thus, it is not surprising that the Left has attacked independent thinking as well.  By controlling much of academia, media, and cultural forums like Hollywood, the Left has been quite effective in controlling the public conversation of the nation, and therefore largely determining what millions of Americans think about.

Someone has said, “thinking is the hardest work there is, and that’s why so few do!”  So, on top of our natural resistance to the hard work of serious thought, the Left punishes those who think for themselves.  It is no wonder that young people miseducated at the feet of these radicals are incapable of critical thinking or providing an argument for their political or cultural assertions.  Consider what happens to those who question the “group think” of Leftism.  Have you noticed how quickly they cannibalize any of their own if they go astray?

The situation we are facing, where questioning the orthodoxy of Leftism brings an instant backlash, is akin to being seated as a juror in a trial where you are told the defendant is guilty beforehand.  He has no attorney, is allowed no defense, and if you, as a juror, raise a question you are accused of abetting the defendant in his crime.  Would we not all be shocked by such a trial and see that the defendant was doomed?  Would you want to be the defendant in such a trial?  Such is the situation when speech is not free.

It should not go unnoticed that our cultural leaders, the majority of whom are Left leaning, go to great lengths to eliminate educational options for the average American while sending their own children to high quality or elite schools.  Young people with critical thinking skills are a serious threat to those in power, thus, every effort is made to discourage their education.

The Left has a thousand excuses for covering the ears of young people. They are “protecting them” from you name it: hate speech, bigotry, or whatever.  But, if they truly seek an end to such evils, the best way to accomplish that goal is to allow an open debate where the “sunlight” of truth exposes error.  And they would also inculcate in those students a passion for truth!  That is the rub, of course.  Leftists hate truth (because it exposes their perfidy) and claim it does not exist, even as they demand we believe what they say (as if it were truth).  Very interesting.  So, they seek to keep everyone in darkness.  Well, As Abraham Lincoln said, “you can fool some of the people all the time; and you can fool all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.”

We’re not fooled!

Ironic, is it not, that the Washington Post carries the slogan on its masthead, “Democracy dies in darkness.”  Yet they and their co-conspirators are the purveyors of darkness!

Free speech is messy.  Some people say nasty things and promote horrible ideas.  But it is a tragic reality of history that the good, the ideal, the wonderful ideas have often been hated by the powers that be and never saw the light of day because speech was not free.  Squelching of speech has always been the tool of tyrants.

In order to control speech, one must control thinking; and to control people’s thoughts one must be coercive.  This is where the hideous ideas of “reeducation” and “expunge” come into play, ideas now being bantered about by Leftists and our Media elite to be applied to those who disagree with them.  For the first time in my life, I am hearing Americans say that they are “terrified” of their leaders!

Restricting free speech may bring about a small good, but it does infinite harm by protecting wicked people and inhibiting good ideas that, if accepted, might benefit everyone.  If the restrictions now being put in place by Leftists and big tech were in place in the US in the Eighteen Hundreds, slavery might have survived a hundred years longer in the South.

While there is an appearance of merit to the notion that someone ought to control what people hear, and thus what they think, it is ill conceived and dangerous.  Only those who wish us harm promote such things.  As someone has rightly said, “the best antidote to bad free speech is more free speech!” This is desirable to all except the purveyor of bad speech!  Good people seek free and open dialogue!

And the flip is also true, only people with evil intentions will oppose it!

Not much time has passed since Christian baker Jack Phillips fought to defend his choice not to make cakes celebrating homosexual unions (2018), and Christian florist Baronelle Stutzman dealt with multiple lawsuits regarding her choice not to arrange flowers for similar functions (2021). Yet, earlier this December, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments for 303 Creative v. Elenis, a case which is shaping up to be the next high-profile skirmish between the homosexual movement and Christian providers of wedding services. The civil rights snipers are at the same old game again—this time zeroing in on Christian wedding website designer Lorie Smith.

IFI’s cultural affairs writer Laurie Higgins has already slashed apart the argument against Smith in a mic-drop opinion piece on this case. And with legal battles like these, it’s often very easy to uncover the left’s real agenda, an agenda that deserves a floodlight and an industrial-size vacuum cleaner. But while it’s not hard to see where the left is going, it’s often harder to see how they even got here in the first place. Our society has gone through decades of liberalization—supposedly intended to free us from government censorship—but is now beholding the rise of censorship yet again.

For its first century and a half, America was a nation permeated by Christian values. These values didn’t just sit nice and proper in the pews on Sunday morning—they actually influenced the country. In 1811, eminent jurist James Kent issued the landmark ruling People v. Ruggles, upholding a blasphemy case on the grounds that “we are a Christian people, and the morality of the country is deeply ingrafted upon Christianity.” This case stood as good law for well over a century, joined by a host of other cases all agreeing that the government—even while submitting to the free speech protections of the First Amendment—had proper authority to prohibit blasphemy.

Some cases explicitly acknowledged that this was because Christian morals undergirded so much of our society (see Updegraph v. Commonwealth [1824], State v. Chandler [1837]), and others painted it more broadly as maintaining societal order (see Commonwealth v. Kneeland [1838], State v. Mockus [1921], Oney v. Oklahoma City [1941]). Whether it was openly stated or subtly implied, our nation’s legal system acknowledged that Christianity occupied a special place in our societal fabric. Therefore, government had legitimate authority to censor blasphemy in order to preserve legitimate community standards. But that wasn’t all: if you were propagating such other types of caustic speech as the lewd, the obscene, the profane, the libelous, or fighting words, the First Amendment would not save you (see Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire [1942]).

However, this state of affairs did not last forever. In a series of unfortunate developments in 20th-century legal opinion, America’s culture and law began to view “expression” as a good in-and-of-itself, regardless of whether the expression communicated something good or bad. Because “expression” became a good of its own, this now meant that any attempts to suppress the act of speaking—whether you were publicly displaying a four-letter word in a courthouse or publishing pornography—were harmful to society, and violations of the First Amendment (see Cohen v. California [1971] and Miller v. California [1973], respectively). And therefore, the label “freedom of expression” was now all that was needed to ward off those oppressive government censors trying to stamp out individualism and human dignity with their mumbo-jumbo about public morality.

After Burstyn v. Wilson (1952), blasphemy laws themselves were relegated to the dustbin along with all those other archaic colonial relics of religious intolerance. We had now entered a blessed era in which freedom of expression was king, and we could forget about any absolute standards for public morality because we had opened up our society to an open marketplace of ideas. Everything anyone wanted to say—except for the rare case of a clear and present danger—was given a fair hearing, Christians and pornographers alike.

If that sounds odd, it’s because it is. The contemporary interpretation of the First Amendment strives for a weirdly laissez-faire society in which our only definite core value is the absence of any definite core values. And so, Christians and pornographers now team up against the common enemy of “censorship,” which is really the only enemy left in the ring—now that we’ve given a big warm hug to all contradictory points of view at the same time. This self-contradictory societal plan might have tottered along for a few decades, but we are beginning to see it fall before our eyes. Core values are what hold societies together. Without them, societies are merely amorphous population statistics, without any form of identity. Thus, every society has an orthodoxy which it enforces, and now that we’ve evicted Christianity and swept the house clean, a new orthodoxy has moved in. Now we’ve gotten to the 303 Creative case.

The new orthodoxy is the religion of tolerance, and its blasphemy laws are creatively re-named “hate speech” laws. If you tolerate—i.e., accept and affirm—whatever manners of sinful behavior are dictated by societal winds, you can expect to live a happy and peaceful life. If, however, you dare to promote and live out ideas that blaspheme against the prevailing orthodoxy, say, that marriage is an institution ordained by God to join one man and one woman together for life, you can expect to be hounded by the government.

“Wait a minute!” you say, “Aren’t we supposed to be living in a society where we can all speak our mind and live out our own religious convictions?” “Ah, yes,” is the reply, “but of course that doesn’t apply to hateful [translation: blasphemous] speech like yours. You can say what you want as long as you don’t offend other people [translation: the prevailing orthodoxy]. Since your conscience contradicts the fundamental principles of tolerance, you must violate your conscience or pay the price.”

And here the real gloves have come off. The period of liberalization was really just a transition period from one form of censorship to another. In the name of freedom of expression and liberation from ideological tyranny, we threw off the yoke of Christian morality and the accompanying government powers to suppress caustic expression that eroded that foundation. But societies are defined by core ideas—and attempting to value the absence of core values just doesn’t cut it. When we removed the Christian set of core values, it was only a matter of time before we found something else to take its place. And now our censorship policies are moving right back to where we started, this time saluting to the devil instead of to the Lord.

In light of this, it’s time for Christians to stop playing the game that we can all get along without having any rules for getting along. Society will have rules for getting along—the question is whether those will be rules honoring to the Lord or disobedient to Him. As it is now, we relegate Christianity to the personal and private, and acquiesce to the lie that the Constitution requires such a separation of church and state that anything Christian is banned from the realm of public policy. We huddle up next to the pornographers and violent video game manufacturers, and appeal to the fading mantras of “freedom of expression” to justify living out our basic Christian convictions, completely ceding the possibility that there is something objectively true and good about Christianity, something objectively true and good about God’s design for marriage, something objectively true and good about God’s created sexuality. God created the world with a certain created order, and law has an obligation to reflect that order. Period.

Because the legal system runs on precedent, Christian lawyers will often have to appeal to misguided precedent to win needed victories for the side of truth. But it’s important to not let the short game overshadow the long game. The more we appeal to misguided precedent, the more we cement it in legal tradition and the harder it is to eradicate. We must always keep in mind that the ultimate reason we fight to defend the Lorie Smiths of the world is not because censorship is bad. It is because evil is bad—objectively bad, and ought to be so in the eyes of the law—and Lorie Smith is standing for the good.