Many in our country today are claiming to be “woke”.
Being “woke” started as being attune to racist behaviors and attitudes several years ago. As a Christian, we should all be opposed to racism, treating people differently because of their skin color, their accent, their family heritage, or where they were born. After all, all of mankind is made in God’s own image. We are called to love all people.
But being “woke” has morphed into much bigger philosophies and world views — being “woke” today is being progressive, rejecting the traditions of the past as oppressive and racist. This includes many fundamental beliefs and institutions in our world today, not the least of which, includes the church.
History is being redefined on a daily basis.
Fundamental truths are being thrown out with the garbage.
All the while, the morals in our society are quickly sliding further and further into decay.
Instead of punishing the wrongdoers, we make the wrongs to be right.
Instead of consequences for breaking the rules, we punish those who attempt to enforce the rules.
Our country today is out of control.
This same mentality is now attacking churches in Canada.
(https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2021/july/dark-days-for-religious-liberty-journalist-likens-canadian-church-arsons-to-kristallnacht)
(https://aleteia.org/2021/07/09/more-churches-in-canada-and-one-in-la-burn/)
In Canada, churches are being burned down in apparent retaliation for the reported abuses of indigenous children in schools on the reservations.
Since June 21, there have been fires at 10 Canadian churches — mostly Catholic — and over 20 acts of vandalism at churches.
The leader of British Columbia Civil Liberties Association endorses the arsons, calling for even more churches to be set ablaze. Harsha Walia, the executive director tweeted “Burn it all down.”
Gerald Butts, the former Canadian principal secretary to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, described the arsons as “understandable.”
Bishop Gregory Bittman of Nelson, in British Columbia’s West Kootenay (coo - ten - a) region said, “We’re all moral human beings, we have emotions, but it’s to do something constructive with the emotions, not destructive.… [The arson] just reinforces and continues the anger … it’s not going to solve the issues.”
What a mess our world is in.
Instead of trying to change the future to make it better, people in Canada are trying to burn it down with the past.
Though we are not burning churches down in America, the same kind of mentality of retaliation for past sins is destroying America today as well!
I believe all of this insanity is a direct result of the church falling asleep.
We are just like Eutychus in Acts 20. We are sitting there, not actively listening to the messages of the Gospel, to the messages of hope, to the messages of repentance. We dose off to sleep when we should have been paying attention.
The church has become apathetic to the attitudes, events, and problems of the world. Maybe it’s because we are afraid of bringing attention to ourselves. Maybe it’s because we are afraid of making enemies. Maybe we are afraid of being persecuted. Maybe we are just simply afraid to stand up for what is right.
But the time is coming that if we are not careful, the church will fall out of the window, landing on the ground below, dead.
That’s the future of the church if we do not wake up!
We need an awakening in the church in our country today!
(https://www.christianpost.com/news/ted-cruz-calls-on-church-to-wake-up-to-defeat-woke-assault.html
CP Politics, Monday, June 21, 2021)
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, called for the Church to “wake up” if the “woke assault” is to be defeated in the United States, promising during his speech at the Faith & Freedom Coalition's "Road to Majority" conference on Friday, June 28, that a “revival is coming.”
Cruz’s address to the crowd of Christian conservatives gathered for the national evangelical grassroots organization's annual conference centered around two messages: the need to "defend America" and a coming revival.
“If we are going to defeat the woke assault, then all of us need to wake up,” he said.
“The slumbering Church needs to wake up...," Cruz continued. "We need to wake up. We need to energize. We need to engage. … We can win and we will win.”
This isn’t the first time, though, that the church has dozed off to sleep.
(https://www.history.com/topics/british-history/great-awakening)
In a not so long ago time, secular rationalism was growing rampantly, and religious faithfulness was waining. People were “enlightened” during this time. Focus was on science and logic, and religion was written off out the picture.
“Christians were feeling complacent with their methods of worship, and some were disillusioned with how wealth and rationalism were dominating culture.”
Sounds a lot like our world today, doesn’t it. Interestingly, it was during the 1700s.
Through the great preaching and leadership of men like Jonathan Edwards, George Whitefield and others, a revival was sparked in America. They preached a message of fundamentals, to awaken the Christian faith and “return to a religion that was relevant to the people of the day.”
They preached and focused on the basics:
- Because of Adam and Eve’s sin, all people are born sinners
- Sin without salvation will send a person to hell
- All people can be saved if they confess their sins to God, seek forgiveness, and accept God’s grace
- All people can have a direct and emotional connection with God
We need that kind of awakening in 2021. We need the church to wake up today!
The time has come.
Paul writes in Romans 13 what will be our key text over the next few weeks:
11 … [U]nderstanding the present time: The hour has already come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. 12 The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. 13 Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy. 14 Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh. (Romans 13, NIV)
Wake up, church! Wake up from your slumber because time is running out!
Wake up, church!
And as a start, we need to wake up the truth!
Our founding fathers wrote these words:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Self-evident. We would be hard pressed today to get someone to write such firm words.
Nothing today is self-evident any more.
Nothing is certain.
What is truth after all?
1 + 1 always = 2, unless you are trying to change the truth.
We try to pass off theories as truth. Theories are not truth, just a proposition about someone’s opinions of the truth.
Very subjective.
(The Death of Truth in our Culture
Matt Schneider, "What Is Truth?" Mockingbird blog
https://www.preachingtoday.com/illustrations/2018/september/death-of-truth-in-our-culture.html
Copied from Preaching Today)
The concept of truth has been dying a slow death for many years and has become more noticeable in the past decade or so. In the early 2000s, comedian Stephen Colbert picked up on this cultural phenomenon by coining the term "truthiness," which went on to become Merriam-Webster's word of the year in 2006. Similarly, in 2016 in the wake of our presidential election, Brexit, and accusations across the political spectrum about "fake news," Oxford Dictionaries named "post-truth" its word of the year. Shortly thereafter, commenting on the presidential inauguration, Kellyanne Conway famously spoke of "alternative facts." In response, Time blazoned the question "Is Truth Dead?" on its April 3, 2017 cover.
Then in 2018, former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani claimed "truth isn't truth" during an interview with Chuck Todd on NBC. Of course let's not forget Bill Clinton splitting hairs over the definition of "sexual relations" and existentially pondering what an attorney's definition of "is" is back in 1998. Truthiness has cut both ways across the aisle in our post-truth age.
Truth isn’t under attack just in the world. It’s under attack in the church:
(Biblical Truth
By Bobby Scobey
Copied from Sermon Central)
Both George Gallup and George Barna, eminent pollsters and close church observers, have noted declining biblical literacy in the church. The majority of born-again Christian do not believe in absolute truth. 60% of Americans can’t name five of the Ten Commandments. 50% of high school seniors think Sodom and Gomorrah were married.
Pastors were not much better informed than the average church member. Barna found that 49% of Protestant pastors reject core biblical beliefs. Our ignorance and willfulness are crippling us.
Without truth, the gospel is perverted. Most churchgoing adults reject the accuracy of the Bible, they reject the existence of Satan and they reject the sinlessness of Jesus. Many, therefore, see no need to evangelize and believe that good works are one of the keys to persuading God to forgive their sins.
The world has lost the truth!
How today, then, can we awaken the truth in our world?
1. I think we need to start with the basics — what do we need to know about the truth today?
We need to understand that first and foremost truth comes from God.
God’s laws and commands are ultimate truth.
Listen to the words of the Psalmist in Psalm 119:
137 You are righteous, Lord,
and your laws are right.
138 The statutes you have laid down are
righteous;
they are fully trustworthy.
139 My zeal wears me out,
for my enemies ignore your words.
140 Your promises have been thoroughly
tested,
and your servant loves them.
141 Though I am lowly and despised,
I do not forget your precepts.
142 Your righteousness is everlasting
and your law is true.
143 Trouble and distress have come upon
me,
but your commands give me delight.
144 Your statutes are always righteous;
give me understanding that I may live.
(Psalm 119, NIV)
If we want to know the truth, we need to get to know God’s words!
(Scripture-Drenched Life
https://www.preachingtoday.com/illustrations/1996/april/1673.html
Dennis Martin. "Faith in the Middle Ages," Christian History, no. 49.
Copied from Preaching Today)
Medieval society so valued constant prayer that many people made substantial donations to monasteries so that monks and nuns, largely freed from manual labor, could become "professional" prayer warriors on behalf of the rest of society. In fact, many monks and nuns, in obedience to Paul's command to "pray without ceasing," lived an institutional life of prayer, praying day and night.
I tell you that because if the chief monastic activity was prayer, what would be better suited than the Jewish-Christian prayer book, the Psalms?
Most Benedictine monks and nuns chanted all 150 psalms once a week in a cycle of seven daily "hours." Thus the first thing required of new monks or nuns was learning to read, if they did not already know how. Second, they had to memorize the Psalms, which might take anywhere from six months to two years. The Rule of the Master, a forerunner of Benedict's Rule, says that monks traveling on monastery business should take with them wax tablets covered with Psalms to memorize.
The monks lived a Scripture-saturated life. Every moment of their lives was dedicated to prayer and the memorization of Scripture. It was how they viewed the world. It was how they viewed life. They lived and breathed God’s very words passed down to them in writing. It was how they taught men, women, and children to live — by the Scriptures!
When you go back and look, the Scripture-saturated life of a medieval monk is evident in the spiritual writings monks and nuns left behind. Consider the works of Gregory the Great, Julian of Norwich, and Bernard of Clairvaux. Their writings are, in many places, nothing but a web of Scripture quotations and allusions.
For example, the following passage from Bernard's On Loving God, which is typical, contains at least 12 biblical quotations or allusions. Listen to what he wrote:
"The faithful know how totally they need Jesus and him crucified [(1 Corinthians 2:2)]. While they admire and embrace in him the charity that surpasses all knowledge [(Ephesians 3:19)], they are ashamed at failing to give what little they have in return for so great a love and honor. Easily they love more who realize they are loved more: 'He loves less to whom less is given' [(Luke 7:43), (Luke 7:47); cf. (Luke 12:48)]. Indeed, the Jew and pagan are not spurred on by such a wound of love as the church experiences, who says, 'I am wounded by love' [(Song of Songs 2:5), Old Latin version, cf. (Song of Songs 4:9)], and again, 'Cushion me about with flowers, pile up apples around me, for I languish with love' " [(Song of Songs 2:5), Vulgate].
"The church sees King Solomon with the diadem his mother had placed on his head [(Song of Songs 3:11), cf. (1 Kings 1)]. She sees the Father's only Son carrying his cross [(John 19:17), (John 19:25)], the Lord of majesty [(1 Corinthians 2:8), Old Latin version], slapped and covered with spittle; she sees the Author of life and glory [(Acts 3:15)] pierced by nails, wounded by a lance [(John 19:34), (John 19:25)], saturated with abuse [(Lamentations 3:30)], and finally laying down his precious life for his friends [(Jeremiah 12:7), (John 15:13)]."
Not every medieval monk or nun was so immersed in Scripture, and there were periods when the Bible was neglected, but many monks and nuns were so steeped in the Bible, they could hardly express themselves without quoting it.
If only we had one ounce of the commitment to Scripture they had.
If God’s word is the truth, then the one who brought the word to earth must also be the truth.
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. (John 1, NIV)
Jesus was God’s very word brought to mankind.
Here’s what Jesus had to say about Himself:
6 … “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me….” (John 14, NIV)
When it comes to truth, Jesus is it!
Jesus is the truth!
When we wonder what to do, Jesus is the right answer.
When we wonder which way to go, Jesus is the moral compass we need, directing the true paths of our lives.
When you look at our world, it is functioning without a moral compass — going whichever way feels good at any given time or place, regardless of the immediate and long term consequences.
The world is floundering around in the turbulent waters without a guide — doing whatever it wants, however it wants, whenever it wants.
I can’t imagine living without some kind of sense of knowing where I should be going.
(The Woman Who Gets Lost Every Day
Mary McLaurine, " I can't follow a map or directions, and at 61 I still get lost and frightened," Washington Post (1-22-17)
Copied from Preaching Today
https://www.preachingtoday.com/illustrations/2018/may/woman-who-gets-lost-every-day.html)
Mary McLaurine understands that way of living, though, literally. You see, she has an unusual condition called developmental topographical disorientation, or DTD. This means she can't form a mental map or image of her surroundings. Unlike most people, Mary has no internal compass. Here's how she described a typical incident of dealing with her DTD:
“I was staying a friend's home and decided to take their dog Otis for a walk. As I started back, I had no idea where I was. I was only blocks from where I had started my walk, but I was lost. Fear and adrenaline pulsed through my veins and I began to sweat profusely. My surroundings looked completely unfamiliar. It was as though I'd been dropped into the middle of a foreign land.
“I hadn't written down the address of the home where I was staying. Walking in any direction would be just a guess: Am I getting closer to or farther away? Would I have had to knock on someone's door to use their phone to call the police? How could I expect them to return me to a place if I had no address to provide?”
Fortunately, Mary found someone to guide her back to her house. With DTD there is no brain injury—no car accident, no brain tumor, or stroke. People who have this condition, basically get lost every day in the most familiar surroundings. Mary continues: "Those of us struggling with this disorder are often left with feelings of anxiety, depression, isolation, and self-doubt."
Feelings that in general are on the rise today in the world because there’s no moral compass to guide their steps, to help them get to know where to go.
Thank goodness you and I know the truth — and that truth is Jesus. That doesn’t mean the path will be smooth and without trouble. That doesn’t mean we will not feel emotions of anxiety, isolation, self-doubt. It just means we can have confidence in the truth.
And as Jesus said, the truth will set us free.
2 So what do we need to do with the truth this morning to awaken truth in our lives?
We need to trust the truth.
David said in Psalm 25:
4 Make me to know your ways, O Lord; teach me your paths. 5 Lead me in your truth and teach me, for you are the God of my salvation; for you I wait all the day long. (Psalm 25, ESV)
This is the way.
Lead me, God, in your truth.
Help me, God, know and trust your truth.
It is a decision we must make in our lives — to consciously choose to follow and trust the truth, that is Jesus.
Now, make no mistake: regardless of our decision, the world will continue to attack, oppose, and discount the truth.
The world will continue to ridicule the truth because they cannot understand the truth when seeking to understand through the lens of the world.
Paul said it this way:
14 The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. (1 Corinthians 2, NIV)
Make the decision to trust the truth.
Then make the decision to accept the truth.
32 [Jesus said], “…[Y]ou will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8, NIV)
Surrender the arguments in our hearts against what God teaches and against where God leads us.
Make room in our minds and hearts for God’s truth.
Accept Jesus into our hearts and minds each and every day.
Surrender our will to the will of God.
Once we trust the truth and accept the truth, we must then live by the truth.
We must put on the belt of truth that Paul speaks of in Ephesians 6 (Eph. 6:14).
Truth is the belt that holds us all together.
Truth is the unifying constant that keeps us headed in the right direction — keeps our armor of light intact and in it’s right place.
Let every decision we make, every action we take, every thought we contemplate be based and guided by the truth that comes from God and through God.
Conclusion
This morning, we need to wake up, church! We must wake up, learn, teach, and defend the truth.
But too often we find ourselves trying to explain away Scripture.
(https://www.bibleref.com/Revelation/22/Revelation-22-19.html)
We are warned in Revelation 22:18 and 19:
18 I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this scroll: If anyone adds anything to them, God will add to that person the plagues described in this scroll. 19 And if anyone takes words away from this scroll of prophecy, God will take away from that person any share in the tree of life and in the Holy City, which are described in this scroll. (Revelation 22, NIV)
God warned against "adding" to Revelation, presumably by either adding to the text or trying to force in meanings which the Holy Spirit did not intend.
God's warned here against detracting from the book of Revelation and presumably from all Scripture. As with the prior warning, this can be taken to mean editing the text, or trying to explain away or misinterpret those aspects of the message we don't like (1 Corinthians 4:6).
Anyone who detracts from Scripture hurts not only others but also himself. We need the entire body of Scripture to believe right and to behave right. We dare not reject passages of Scripture because they convict us or contradict what we believe. We cannot choose to believe some passages are from God and others are not. We must never read Scripture as if we're prepared to use scissors to cut out what we don't like. A modern tendency is to consider a passage God's Word only if it speaks to us. Scripture is God's objective truth and not subject to human opinion.
Stop explaining away or discounting Scriptures.
Stop apologizing for the truth.
Instead, Paul encourages us to speak the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15).
Understand that the world will not change, for these are evil days.
The world has hardened its heart to the truth as evidenced by the philosophies and world views that so dominate our culture today.
Persecution will come if we make the decision to oppose the falsehoods of the world.
We will be ridiculed for taking a stand on the things of old.
We will be called religious radicals or right wing fanaticals. We will be called uninformed. We will be called unenlightened. We will be called many, many things.
We will be opposed.
But this is the calling for those who are called to live a life dedicated to the one and only Truth.
It is not an excuse for us to not stand up for what is right, what is true, what is holy, what is absolute.
Remember that in the end, all of the attacks on truth happening in our time, in these days, are just temporary. We are promised that one day every knee will bow and every tongue will confess the truth — Jesus is Lord.
This morning, I encourage you to take a spiritual journey in your own life. Take some time to examine your own feelings about the truth. Come to grips with what the truth is, from where it comes, and how we must respond to it.
We need to wake up as Christians and as the church.
We must quit being blown around by all kinds of doctrines and beliefs so prevalent in our world. We must stand firm for what is right.
(What Is Truth?
By Terry Laughlin
Copied from Sermon Central)
I want to leave you, this morning, with the story of a man nearly two thousand years ago who himself wrestled with truth. His name was Pontius Pilate.
God’s Word records this dramatic interchange in the book of John, Chapters 18 and 19. Jesus, speaking to Pilate, said “For this I have come into the world, to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.” (John 18:37)
Pilate answers with those immortal words, “What is truth?”
The irony and tragedy of the situation is that Truth Himself was standing directly in front of Pilate at that very moment, awaiting the judgment of this Roman ruler who was wilting under the weight of political intrigue and mob pressure. Jesus, Truth personified, stood quietly waiting. Pilate squirmed and sweated because he had no solid foundation on which to stand.
Pilate initially attempted some fancy political maneuvering which failed to bail him out of his mess. In the end, even though he rightly believed Jesus to be innocent of the charges against Him, Pilate ordered Him to be brutally flogged and crucified.
Pilate then did an amazing thing. As recorded in Matt. 27:24, he washed his hands in front of the crowd and declared himself innocent of the death and bloodshed of Jesus Christ.
Pilate “believed” Jesus, but he refused to stand firmly for the truth. He was afraid for his power, wealth and position. He was afraid of what the people might think of him if he refused to be like them.
Is that us today? Are we unwilling to commit our lives to Christ because we are afraid of what others will think of us?
Pilate tried to excuse his own sin and selfishness. He thought that trying hard to do what was right would be judged as worthy as actually doing what was right. He hoped he had the authority to declare himself innocent.
How about us today? Are we counting on being “good enough” to earn heaven?
Are we excusing ourselves and our sin based on the world’s interpretation of truth — on false ideas and hopes?
Jesus Christ is the ONLY way to God the Father and to eternal life. The path to heaven is a narrow, one-way road. Jesus said that “...only a few will find it.”
Jesus was and still is “…the way, and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but through ” the Truth. (John 14: 6)
Today, we can believe whatever we want. What we cannot do, however, is choose the consequences of believing that which is not true. Failing to believe, OR failing to act on, the Truth will result in our being eternally lost, whether we agree or not. That is the absolute truth.
This morning, it’s time to wake up! It’s time to put on the belt of truth. It’s time to put our hope and our faith in the absolute truth, which is Jesus Christ, the very Word of God.
