The Federal Government acting under the direction of the President
through the Department of Justice has taken legal action against the State of
North Carolina, charging the state’s recent law defining access to
gender-specific bathrooms on the basis of biological sex is a violation of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964. And if that was not sufficiently troubling and
egregious, the President issued a letter through the Department of Education
instructing all public schools to provide equal access to transgendered
students to the bathrooms, locker rooms, and showers of their choice regardless
of biological sex or parental objections. Such actions by the federal
government would have been unthinkable less than a decade ago. We now live in a
nation that regards abortion and same sex marriage as constitutional rights and
that regards transgenderism as a protected class with civil rights.
No doubt some Christians think this has happened due to the
indifference, lack of involvement, and political timidity of religious
conservatives. But this is a misdiagnosis. There are no political solutions to
spiritual problems, and while a reformation-minded leader like Hezekiah or
Josiah can encourage national repentance and forestall moral deterioration, these
are but minor and meager victories in the context of the larger culture war. “The
whole world lies in the power of the evil one” (1Jn. 5:19), and no political
policy will make it otherwise. We are seeing Romans 1:18-32 played out in the
halls of our government and universities and on our city streets. Progressive
politicians have only hastened the inevitable, and were they replaced with
consistent conservatives (if such politicians even exist), they would be
powerless to deal with the root issue: the problem of the human heart.
If
you think America’s problems are primarily political in nature or can be
resolved by political means, you are part of the problem. Sincere but
profoundly misguided Christians have sought political remedies for decades even
as the visible church has been gradually destroyed by theological liberalism,
grace-less legalism, morally corrupt cheap grace, and mega-ministry models that
prioritize numerical success over spiritual faithfulness and focus on programs
built around felt-needs rather than preaching that proclaims Christ as the only
solution to man’s true need. America must repent, but the Church needs to do so
first. –JME
