Culture and the Word of God

“In fact, everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evildoers and impostors will go from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.  All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” (II Timothy 3:12-17 NIV)

Rob Bell, the former mega church pastor and now host of his own show on the Oprah Winfrey Network, was back in the news this week as a result of his and his wife’s comments regarding same-sex marriage.  In an interview with Oprah, he said this when asked when will the church approve homosexual marriage:

"We're moments away. I think culture is already there and the church will continue to be even more irrelevant when it quotes letters from 2,000 years ago as their best defense, when you have in front of you flesh-and-blood people who are your brothers and sisters and aunts and uncles and co-workers and neighbors and they love each other and just want to go through life with someone." 

Then his wife added, "There are churches who are moving forward and there are churches who are almost regressing and making it more of a battle."  

This is the challenge every generation of Christians has dealt with and why Paul’s admonition to Timothy is so important.  From the very beginning, the strategy of the Enemy has been to get people to ignore God’s Word (Genesis 3:1-6).  And the Bells, it appears, have fallen into that trap.  

If you read Paul’s words, to follow God’s Word is guaranteed to elicit persecution from the wider world because the world is in rebellion against God.  Paul calls upon Timothy to live a godly life in the midst of the ungodliness.  And how does he tell him to do that?  By knowing and following the Scriptures, the very ones the Bells dismiss as old and irrelevant.  

The pull of the culture will always be away from God and away from His Word.  The only anchor we have in the midst of the swirling currents is the Word.  It teaches us what God desires of us; it rebukes us in the midst of our foolish thinking and behavior; it corrects us when, even with good intentions, we don’t understand the truth and get off the path; and it trains us in how to live righteous lives, not as we prefer, but as God desires we live.  

In Eden, Eve and Adam failed to trust God.  Instead, they went with what they were told by an outsider who’s intent was to draw them away from their Creator.  Today people like the Bells tell us that we should trust the direction culture is leading us rather than some 2000-year-old writings.  In other words, don’t trust the God-breathed Scriptures. They will do all they can to get us to go with the cultural current and they will ridicule, and even persecute, us if we don’t.  

There is a price to pay if we are to follow Paul’s guidance to Timothy, but the question comes down to this: In whom do we have a greater trust, the God who is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8) or the culture of men and women which is constantly changing?

Today, recognize that while much of the world scoffs at the Scriptures being the Word of God with the authority that is inherit to it, God intends for His Word to show us His will and how to live our lives.  Trusting God and living according to His Word is never irrelevant or out-of-date.  

© Jim Musser 2015