Most Americans believe that our culture is decaying, and that moral
decline presents the greatest danger we face. Writers and speakers from
different positions on the philosophical or political spectrum have
commented with dismay upon this decadence, and preachers have given many
sermons on it. Hardly anything can serve to verify for the public mind
the authority of the Bible more than the cultural decline of our country
over the past thirty-five years. Actually, the downward slide began much
earlier than this, but the rapidity of the descent has greatly increased
since the middle sixties. Anyway, Romans 1 has been illustrated before
our eyes. Truth without righteousness has led to the darkening of the
mind. Darkened minds have perverted truth. Perverted truth has brought
moral weakness, which has given way to sexual immorality and perversion.
Now we see more and more the fruit of "a reprobate mind" that
acknowledges no God or moral law and allows for every kind of cruelty,
wickedness, and evil. It's all Romans 1. The Bible calls the moral decay
that results from unheeded and then rejected truth "corruption."In the
Hebrew of Deuteronomy 31 and 32 the word for "corrupt" in the phases "ye
will utterly corrupt yourselves" and "they have corrupted themselves" is
a word that has the idea of decay. Moses was given a song to teach the
Israelites that would serve as a warning against the cultural and
spiritual corruption that comes when God and His Law are neglected. "For
I know that after my death ye will utterly corrupt yourselves, and turn
aside from the way which I have commanded you; and evil will befall you
in the latter days; because ye will do evil in the sight of the Lord, to
provoke him to anger through the work of your hands." (Deuteronomy 31:29)
Believers in the true God must always be concerned about cultural
corruption because at its root it is rejection of divine authority. But
believers are also interested in saving souls, and so many in our times
have been willing to forget about the culture in order to bring sinners
to the church. This strategy is a great mistake and has denied many a
ministry the blessing of God.
The idea is widely accepted among evangelicals that if cultural
corruption is resisted by churches, the unsaved we are trying to reach
will be "turned off" by our antiquated ways and unwilling to listen to
our message. Isn't there a way to preach the Gospel in language and with
trappings acceptable to modern man? A Christian youth movement years ago
used the slogan "Anchored to the Rock: Geared to the Times." Cannot the
church be geared to the times while still anchored to the Rock? Sadly,
however, when we gear the Gospel to the times we can end up floating
downstream with the flow of cultural decadence, while trying to win as
many souls as we can before we all go over the falls of societal
collapse. This scenario is acceptable to some Christians, but it does not
represent the will of God for His church. We ought to preach the Gospel
and uphold all the rest of God's truth at the same time. The churches
should seek to preserve people from corruption as well as damnation. But
most are doing everything but this.
In no area are evangelical churches going along with cultural decay more
than in the field of music. More and more (probably most) supposedly
orthodox churches today are inviting people to come and hear their
"contemporary" music. Actually the style called "Contemporary Christian
Music" can be more accurately defined as rock'n'roll! Some of it is hard
rock; some is soft rock; some is "rockabilly"; some is 1950's or 1960's
rock; but all so-called C.C.M. is rock music. When pressed about this
issue, young church musicians admit that the genre is rock, but they
argue that musical style is a neutral medium; that only the words convey
a message. Of course no true artist will say that his art conveys no
message. Every serious painter or composer believes that some philosophy
or statement is being communicated through his art. The creators of the
rock'n'roll style of music always claimed that their songs expressed the
revolutionary themes of a new generation: rebellion against authority and
abandonment of sexual restraints. Not only have the originators of this
style defined its message in this way, but also the best analysts of
cultural decline have recognized this as the meaning of rock.
In 1987, Professor Allan Bloom at the University of Chicago wrote what
the Chicago Tribune said "may be the most important work of its kind by an
American since World War II." It is a book with the title, The Closing of
the American Mind, and it deals in depth with the role of higher
education in the current cultural decline. A whole chapter early in the
book is given to "Music." Professor Bloom observes,
"Nothing is more singular about this generation than its addiction to
music. . .Today a very large portion of young people between the ages of
ten and twenty live for music. It is their passion; nothing else excites
them as it does; they cannot take seriously anything alien to music. .
.Rock music is as unquestioned and unproblematic as the air the students
breathe. . .But rock music has one appeal only, a barbaric appeal, to
sexual desire. . .Young people know that rock has the beat of sexual
intercourse. . .The inevitable corollary of such sexual interest is
rebellion against the parental authority that represses it. . ."
The professor says much more and convincingly links rock music to the
elements of societal upheaval that have nearly destroyed the moral
structure of our culture in the past thirty-five years. Any thoughtful
observer can see that this is true. Rock music is the anthem of the
revolt against God.
Judge Robert Bork was kept from serving on the United States Supreme
Court, but he has not been kept from commenting on our cultural and moral
decline. His latest book, Slouching Towards Gomorrah, has been widely
read and acclaimed, and has brought the former Yale University law
professor and U.S. Court of Appeals justice to the forefront of public
discussion. In his book, he repeatedly refers to the role of rock music
in our society's problems. He says in the Introduction that the rock
songs of the sixties were among the "harbingers of a new culture" that
overcame the old and took over the country. Later in the book he says
that this music joined with other factors that "intensified the
rebelliousness of the young."
"Portable radios became widely available so that youths could choose
their music without parental supervision. No longer must they sit in the
living room with their parents and siblings to listen to the radio
together. The music they now listened to was rock and roll, which their
parents hated. It would be difficult to overstate the cultural importance
of that music. Visiting Yugoslavia in that era, Irving Kristol learned
that the regime banned rock because it was subversive of authority. In a
personal communication he remarked that rock and roll is subversive of
all authority that of Western democracies, bourgeois families, schools,
and church as well as communist dictatorships. Those in the rock business
understood very well that the music's subversion of authority was a large
part of its appeal to the young."
Anyone who has read Bork's book, or Bloom's best-seller (and most
evangelical leaders have), understands the corrupting character of rock
music. Why then do churches use it?
Another form of capitulation to the cultural decay is the wholesale
abandonment of the Bible of our forefathers by the "forward-looking"
churchmen of our day. Many have been consumed by a passion to please
modern textual scholarship and to make the language of scripture clear
and appealing to an educationally-weak public. As a result, they have
lost sight of the significance of the King James Bible to American
culture. Amazingly accurate in its translation of the traditional Greek
and Hebrew text, and profoundly exquisite in its classical English style,
the old Bible is one of the marvels of all time. Its phrases and verses
have been woven throughout our literature for many years, and its moral
precepts have long been the foundation of our society. However, the
proliferation of "new versions" of the Bible and the eagerness of
clergymen to use them have served to dethrone the monarch of books in
America, and have driven its lofty lines from American minds and
publications. New translations have not helped our people understand the
Bible as much as they have confused them about the Bible. Fewer recognize
Bible passages as each year passes, and even fewer try to memorize them.
Without a standard English version of the scripture, how can anyone quote
the Bible with any accepted consistency? The Bible played a big part in
American culture for a long time, but no longer. The fault must largely
be placed upon the churches that have run after the latest Bible fad
instead of preserving the old Bible at least for its cultural importance.
The courts did not remove God's Word from its once prominent place in our
public life; the churches did, in their mad dash to keep up with the
times.
The changes that have come in society with the changing of the times have
to a large degree been simply new stages in our corruption. This is why
it is important for the churches to maintain rather than revise their
moral and behavioral standards. If the definition of Christian living
changes every time society moves its moral boundaries, the so-called
Christian of tomorrow will be living the way a so-called sinner lives
today! It is capitulation to corruption that has caused churches to back
away from Bible-based standards. In order not to appear "negative" or
"judgmental," preachers skip over scripture passages and churches neglect
Bible teachings. Thus they become part of the problem rather than part of
the solution.
Recently, a very famous evangelist lamented on television the fact that
the great successes of his crusades over the years had produced no
visible effect on the moral decline of his country. The reason for the
sad truthfulness of this observation is the general unwillingness of
evangelicals to resist the corruption of our society from an unswervingly
Biblical standpoint. Extreme examples of the delay, such as legal
abortions and assisted suicide, are protested by some when enough
non-Christians share their moral outrage, but these same evangelicals and
fundamentalists are often involved in other ways in the very corruption
of society that has produced the extremes. Certainly every church ought
to stand in every community as an institution that resists cultural
decay.
"Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour,
wherewith shall it be salted? It is thenceforth good for nothing, but to
be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men."
Monthly Article
Wed, September 1999
by Dr. Rick Flanders
currently Pastor of
Juniata Baptist Church
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Juniata Baptist Church
5656 Washburn Road
Vassar, MI 48768
juniatabaptist@juno.com
(517) 823-7848
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Dr. Rick Flanders Biographical Data
Converted in 1963 through a radio ministry.
Earned B.A. and M.A. degrees from Bob Jones University.
Honorary D.D. from Pensacola Christian College.
Pastor at Juniata Baptist Church since 1973.
On BCPM Board, (Baptist Church Planting Ministry)
and also MACS. (Michigan Association of Christian School)
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- Articles published in the;
- Sword of the Lord
- Baptist Preacher,
- Frontline,
- Christian View of the News,
- Pulpit Helps,
- Maranatha Watchman
- Church Bus News,
- and other national periodicals.
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