Standing For The Truth In A
Woke and Cancelled Culture
Psalm 11:1-3
This is a very important interesting psalm. Let’s walk through these three verses together.
V-1 What David Should Do – have courage to stay and stand.
V-2 What The Enemy Does – the wicked are attacking the righteous.
V-3 What Can The Righteous Do – if the foundations are being destroyed. We can stand for the truth no matter what the cost may be.
Think about the foundations around us today that are being destroyed by a Woke and Cancelled Culture.
** Family Values Father, Mother, Children. The family as God design.
** Faith in the Foundation of our Nation – no Bible, no Christ, no not even the 10 commandments in our court houses.
** Fidelity that is Reliability, faithfulness
** Financial Stability
** Future of Hope for our children and grandchildren
John Phillips in his commentary on Psalm 11:3 says; "If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?" David cried. The word "foundations" comes from a Hebrew word meaning "the settled order of things." David likened society to a building. The foundation of society is law and order, justice and truth. If law and order, justice and truth are undermined in a society then what can the righteous do? In the original text the form of the question is such that David can find no answer.
These are the very foundations which are being destroyed in western society today. Law, order, truth, justice, morality, decency, integrity. Humanist and woke crowd views prevail in our schools, our courts, our government, and in the media. A determined attack is being mounted against everything decent, moral, and Christian in our society. The foundations are being destroyed to make room for the coming reign of the man of sin.” Who will be the anti-christ
Beloved make no mistake the foundations of our nation and culture are being destroyed by a Woke Culture as we are living in the last days before the midnight cry. This in not just my opinion but recently Franklin Graham spoke on May 22, 2023 to the National Religious Broadcasters convention in Orlando, Florida.
Franklin Graham said:
“I believe there is a coming storm that we all need to be ready for,The world has deteriorated so quickly. We cannot be deceived and we can’t be fooled. We need to get ready and be prepared.”
Graham said believers in the United States are “living in a cancel culture that wants to destroy Christian organizations,” adding that “we cannot back up, we can’t retreat, don’t apologize for the Gospel — just declare it, just preach it.”
“They want us to shut our mouths, they don’t want to hear from us. If you're not going to preach the Gospel, you don't have anything to worry about,” he said.
“If you’re not going to talk about sin, you’re not going to have anything to worry about; but if you’re going to proclaim the Gospel, they’re going to try to shut you up.”
Franklin Graham spoke earlier on May 19th at the graduation at Liberty University in Lynchburg, VA and said to the graduates: that “this class will stand for truth,” noting that “our world is changing.”
“It has changed so much, just in the time since you set foot on this campus a few years ago,” said Graham. “Think how much it has changed. The increase in violence, the moral decline.”
“I can’t help but think that the heart of God is grieved as He looks at our world today. Our country. Oh, I love our country, but it's in a downward spiral morally, spiritually, economically, politically.”
Graham went on to say that he believed the nation was “in a freefall” because the country had “turned our back on God and His truth,” urging the graduates to be a “beacon of light,” “standing on the Word of God” while living in “a culture of confusion and lies.”
Graham declared that “the Bible doesn’t contain truth, it is the truth,” adding that “every Word of God is true” and that “truth is not what you say it is, truth is what God says it is.”
Graham quoted John 14:6, “Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me,’” explaining to those gathered that “Jesus is not a way to God, He is the way to God.”
“Many churches today have compromised on the authority and truth of God’s holy word. Many of our politicians and leaders have bought into the lies of culture and the woke ideology,” Graham warned.
“The world wants you to believe that we are more than just male and female, that we can be transgender, whatever we choose to identify as. That’s a lie. It’s just a lie from Hell.”
Graham added that “the world wants you to believe that homosexuality is OK as long as it's between two people in a ‘loving relationship.’ That’s a lie. Its sin. It’s a sin against God.”
“The world wants you to believe that you can have sex with anyone you want to have sex with as long as it's consensual. It’s a lie. God made sex to be in a marriage relationship, between a man and woman,” he continued. “The world wants you to believe that abortion is OK, that it’s a woman’s choice. It’s a lie. It’s a choice, but it's murder. It’s a sin.”
Graham continued:
Where does all this come from? It comes from Hell. It comes from Satan. He’s the author and he’s the father of lies. You see, the world wants you to sit down and shut up. No, don’t you do that. I want you to stand up, to shout out, to lift up your voice, to lift up the truth.”
Pastor David Jeremiah wrote:
“It is one of the great ironies of our age that while we are living during a time when almost any behavior is celebrated no matter how sinful, we are simultaneously living in a time
where any small misstep, public or private, could be the catalyst of our own social and financial ruin.
That is the phenomenon in which a person may have
made an innocuous comment or even a statement of truth
only to be pounced on by an online mob and called upon to
apologize, step down, resign. Some people lose their jobs;
some even receive death threats. Whether a person being
attacked actually did anything wrong is irrelevant, as is
whether or not they apologize. Even if their innocence is later proven in court, the damage has been done.
Several writers of the NT made end time prophesies about the rise of this type of brokenness. What they prophesied about tomorrow is increasingly happening today.”
Paul a prisoner of Christ in Rome wrote to Timothy to warn him about the Last Day Woke and Cancelled Culture. June is Gay Pride Month, and this perverted lifestyle is being pushed down our throats as natural and normal. No it is not. Remember Sodom and Gomorrah. Genesis 18:20 says, “And the LORD said, Because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grievous.”
Turn with me to Romans 1: 24-32.
Now Turn with me now to 2 Timothy 3:1-5. From these verses we learn several truths.
** Selfish people
** Splintered Families
** Shattered Societies
Let me address and talk about what we are seeing that is destroying our foundations and it is called WOKENESS and just what does that mean?
One scholar of Critical Theory and wokeness, Michael Young, defined it like so: “Woke: the view that society is oppressive; oppression is the result of identity-based discrimination (racism, sexism, homophobia); which operates via systemic power through cultural supremacy; which we are socialized into; and the solution to this is to rebuild to the whole system.”
Woke: the view that
-society is oppressive
-oppression is the result of identity based discrimination (racism, sexism, homophobia)
-which operates via systemic power through cultural supremacy
-which we are socialized into
– and the solution to this is to rebuild the whole system
Wokeness, as defined, is nothing less than the call for the entire American system of equal justice before the law; equality of opportunity, not outcome; judging people by the content of their character, not the color of their skin; and natural order to be thrown out the window.
In short, wokeness proposes an alternative future of an classless Marxist utopia, one that can never come to pass. Then it looks at some real and some imagined disparities in the existing society and critiques it for being oppressive based on sex, gender, religion, etc. Now that it has revealed the disparities, it calls for social action to rectify the oppressions.
So, rest assured, wokeness is not, as the proponents like to claim, simply “being awake to and aware of social disparities and injustice.” Wokeness is nothing less than a complete rejection of Western Civilization and its foundation — Christianity. It’s a counterfeit religion built on the false promises of a Marxist utopia. If we let it, it will replace God in a heartbeat and force the entire nation to worship DEI quotas, ESG scores, and cross-sex pronouns instead.
Because of this, Christians and conservatives must reject — and fight against — wokeness everywhere we encounter it.
Just this past week and good Christian company that we all know and like which is Chick-Fil-A just hired a VP of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. Whatever happened to just hiring people based on their character and competence? DEI is a slippery slope to go woke, go broke,” Chick-Fil-A said “We understand that the path toward Better at Together looks different for every business,” states Chick-fil-A on a page on its corporate website dedicated to the DEI campaign. DEI (diversity, equality, inclusion) campaign is part of the WOKE movement to change America.
In biblical terms, wokeness is our modern version of King Nebuchadnezzar’s golden statue in Daniel 3. It is the idol of our present day, and just about all of the powers that be — media, colleges, corporations, and government — are demanding that we bow to it. That we call all white people oppressors. That we pretend men can be women. That we act like we don’t even know what a woman is. That looting and rioting are “fiery but mostly peaceful” protests. That George Floyd was some martyred saint. That children should get groomed in the classroom by LGBTQIA+ teachers or mutilated as part of “gender-affirming” care. That 2+2 doesn’t always equal 4.
As Christians, we must refuse to bow to the idol of wokeness. We must, like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, speak the truth about God and reality. That’s wokeness. It’s critical social justice. It’s a false religion. It’s the biggest threat facing our nation today. This means that Christians cannot avoid the fight or keep playing footsie with it. We must drive it back into the darkness through the preaching of the Gospel and savvy political maneuvering. It’s no exaggeration to say that the very future of our country — and our children’s lives — depend on it.
This culture of Wokeness that Cancels people who will not march to their tune means. Turn with me to Matthew 24:10-12; 21-22. Jesus predicted a series of signs that will foreshadow the end of history. They are:
** A Culture of DISAPPROVAL V-10 – the vitriol we see on social media today is evidence of something new and disturbing.
** A Culture of DISHONESTY V-11 – Jesus warns us about the rise of many false prophets who will deceive the multitudes (Matt. 24:11)
** A Culture of DISENGAGEMENT V-12 – people what to withdraw from society in any possible V-12.
The question now is – Where Do We Go From Here. Turn with me in your Bible to Ephesians 5:8-21.
** Walk In Love – Vs.1-2
** Walk In Light Vs. 8-10 – those who are radiant and who walk in the light demonstrate the fruit of the Spirit in all goodness, righteousness and truth.
** Walk In Truth Vs. 11-14 – we are now told to reveal the Darkness we see.
** Walk In Wisdom Vs. 15-21 – Paul tells us the “days are evil” therefore we need wisdom and the fruit of the Holy Spirit to sustain us in this broken Canceled and Woke culture.
