To the Non-Christian Who Sees the World Going Crazy

A game of hot and cold

You don’t have to be a Christian to see the insanity of today’s world.

For most everybody, it’s plain to see that developments like ever-changing pronouns, drag queen story hour, and hormone therapy for teenagers are disturbingly abnormal. “You don’t have to be religious to see how dangerous this is,” some might say.

And that’s true.

For that reason, we’re starting to see the rise of the “Cultural Christian”—people who appreciate the benefits Christianity confers on society yet still do not bow before Christ themselves.

Richard Dawkins, arguably the face of the rabid New Atheists 10-15 years ago, shockingly called himself a Cultural Christian a few months back. He loves hymns and Christmas carols and doesn’t want to see Ramadan celebrated, even if he doesn’t personally believe. He noted he’d much rather see churches stay afloat than mosques be constructed, too.

Just this week, world’s richest man Elon Musk also called himself a Cultural Christian while being interviewed by Jordan Peterson—a man who has also extolled Christianity’s influence on the West without fully committing himself to Christ. Musk has decried the “woke mind virus” that has given us rampant transgenderism and pointed to the importance of Jesus’ teachings on forgiveness and turning the other cheek.

A tide is turning. The presence of real evil is opening a lot of eyes to how much we (churchgoers included) have taken Christian influence for granted and how bad things might get if it keeps being pushed aside.

Even here in the rural Bible belt, many younger people don’t go to church but they know what they see on TV and what is unfolding in the political realm is harmful. They know that, on some level, God is not pleased with it and there has to be a better way.

This article is an appeal to such people.

I understand why you see a fecklessness in the church that makes you skeptical of Christianity’s ability to withstand the wickedness (stay tuned for the next article for more on that). But the church and her ability to wield God’s Word to reveal truth and expose error is the only way out of this. In other words…

You don’t have to be a Bible-reading, church-attending saint to oppose the insanity of today’s world.

But, you do if you’re going to effectively fight against this insanity.

Why? Because your well-placed aversion to the insanity is based on a standard of some kind. You know it’s wrong. But do you know what’s right?

For one particular example of the insanity, let’s take the trans-ing of children. In saying gender therapy is wrong, you’re inevitably appealing to a higher standard. But unless you’re accepting God as that higher standard, you don’t have a leg to stand on. It’s just one person’s word against another’s.

Here’s the hard part: when you appeal to God’s standard, you have to accept the whole thing. Divorce, fornication, porn, lust, male/feminine roles… either He gets to rule on sex and gender, or He doesn’t.

That leaves many wanting a compromise position. Maybe they want to roll things back about 10 years, right after Obergefell made gay marriage the law of the land. Nobody was putting men in women’s sports, and bathroom choices were a fringe issue.

Others might go past that to bring back a 90s standard of sexuality – a man was a man, a woman was a woman, homosexuals were acknowledged but not given much room (“don’t ask don’t tell,” DOMA, etc.). “What people do in the privacy of their bedroom is their business.”

Others will loudly “amen” all of the above, but when you say “Hey, you can’t fornicate, either,” their line has been crossed.

But compromises inevitably slide right back down the slippery slope for two reasons.

First, because of the principle the compromise was built on.

During those “conservative” 90s nobody batted an eye at Jerry & Elaine or Ross & Rachel’s fornication. Why not? Because we had already established that there’s little other standard beyond “do what feels good” and “as long as it doesn’t hurt anybody, who cares?” YOU are in control, and neither God nor anyone else can say otherwise.

With that principle in place, why *wouldn’t* we end up at monkey pox, drag queen story hour, genital reassignments, and everything else we’re seeing today? If 1 man + 1 woman for life is not the standard, then we don’t have one. And if we don’t have one, anything goes.

Second, because pluralism is a lie.

Either a man, a woman, and their children is the normative way to construct a family, or every alternative family is equally legitimate. A society can only believe one of these two options at any given time. That’s why we went from every TV show depicting the nuclear family, to slowly introducing homosexuals into sitcoms, to “Queer Eye,” and “Will and Grace,” to pride parades on “Blues Clues.”

Cultural Christians are starting to get this. But the hardest step is the last one.

So as you’re seeing the insanity unfold, realize it’s all pushing you back toward God and His ultimate standard. Confess His Lordship over all things – sex and gender included – repent of your sins, and be baptized into Christ. Don’t be a Cultural Christian. Just be a Christian.

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Notes

• Speaking of insanity, this week’s Think Deeper Podcast takes on our culture’s view of child-bearing, the declining birth rates, and whether God expects married couples to have children.

• Thanks to all who subscribe, with a special thanks to my paying subscribers! I made the decision a while back to stop locking new articles and let support be purely a donor decision, and the response has been so great you’ve vaulted me into the “Substack Bestsellers” category!
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