The United States is a hot mess of disunity. If you’re not at war with someone over what they think, you’re not in the game. How do you learn what the game is, who sets the rules, or how to choose a winning strategy? How do you realize Christian victory in our post-Christian society?
I’ve noticed that the rules keep changing. There’s no security for anyone or any particular philosophy or creed except, “Whatever.”
“Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men, according to the basic principles of the world, and not according to Christ.” (Colossians 2:8).
What you believe at your last breath doesn’t matter one whit unless what you believe is true. The lies of the world have no power in eternity. There’s only one source of Truth. It not only matters why you believe what you believe, it matters if what you believe is real.
New Creations in Christ aren’t 30-day wonders or one-act plays, but flesh and blood people on a journey of continuing discovery, transformation and purpose, daily becoming more like Jesus by the grace of God.
God Lost the Skirmish
The world shifted from God over man (God) to Man over god (Not God) in 1859 when much of the world left the past behind in favor of progressive doctrines that deny God’s influence, power, and very existence.
While researching Fifteen Minutes into Eternity, I learned that almost everything wrong in western cultures today was either introduced or changed course in 1859.
It was the beginning of humanism, “settled science”, modern medicine, progressive sociology, and a theology based on human nature rather than God’s Holy Spirit.
1859 -Pivotal Year in Human History
The fuse detonating the 1859 explosion was lit in the Garden of Eden and we’re in free-fall. Where you find yourself in eternity depends on what you believe and what you do about it. Declare your choice between God and Not God because there’s precious little time left on the clock.
“It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.”-the first line of A Tale of Two Cities
Tidbits of 1859 Trivia
- Charles Darwin publishes On the Origin of Species
- John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry initiated the American Civil War
- John Tyndall introduced issue of climate change due to atmospheric gases.
- Karl Marx (Communist Manifesto) published the preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy.
- Samuel Smiles publishes the first Self Help book entitled Self-Help; with Illustrations of Character and Conduct also called “the bible of mid-Victorian liberalism”
- Dan Sickles was acquitted of murder in the first use of the insanity plea in a US court.
- Southern Baptist Theological Seminary was founded.
- John Nelson Darby introduced Dispensationalism.
- Civil ceremony replaced religious marriage in Mexico.
- Philadelphia A’s organize to play “town ball” which became baseball 20 years later
- Australian Rules Football first ‘laws of the game’ published
- First dog show held at Newcastle-on-Tyne, England
- Otis Tufts patents the elevator
- Inaugural air mail flight (in a balloon) took off from Lafayette, Indiana
- First successful oil well drilled by Edwin Drake, Pennsylvania
- Pullman sleeping cars first placed in service
- Ferdinand Carre invented the ammonia vapor-compression system for refrigeration, which became the most widely used. Vapor compression is still the system most used today.
Major news stories of 1859 include abortion, children on drugs, rapture, racism, troubles with Mexico and Cuba, and man-made climate change. The State of the Union in 1859 addressed the same issues we face today, ranging from the US southern border to the unprofitable postal service.
News With Constituencies
Such topics today are news stories with constituencies. Every special interest, from abortion activists to #BlackonCampus, thinks it should be King of the Hill and that all others should endorse them and live on leftovers.
No unity remains in the United States of America except what pulls the lost into self-centered microcosms of human fear.
There isn’t one thing everyone in the USA would agree on. There isn’t one thing every “Christian” would agree on. Nothing unites. The result is infighting.
The USA is no more immune to human nature than were the Israelites. As a result, human law transforms based upon which “we” is in charge; what’s good today may be evil tomorrow. The only law unchanged from the beginning is that established by God.
God has been banished from our land because human nature fears, rejects, and seeks to eliminate that which it does not understand or is not like we are.
Keep Your Eyes on Eternity
For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.-1 Timothy 1:7
The battle rages between human nature and the Holy Spirit. Living in a world of turmoil isn’t easy, but it’s manageable. God offers opportunity, blessing, and eternal security in every era, whether blissfully peaceful or horrifyingly evil.
Living victoriously in an imploding culture is cause to mourn, but not to fear or fall. Don’t be blinded by media magicians, but keep your eyes on eternity.
Christian victory stands under the Light of Christ, which is brighter today than it’s ever been because His return is closer.
The darkness of delusion claiming victory over God in 1859 was a very premature conclusion. When the dust of human history settles, God will have the clear victory.
And so will you.
“Every knee shall bow and every tongue confess…”
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.”-Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities (1859)
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