Where is our focus in society today? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
I have been pondering lately and this is still open-ended, as all our ponderings should be, about where the focus is in our society and many of the connections come across various lines of thought. For example, this past Saturday I had Mormons come and visit me. If you have ever dialogued with them, you know where they point to every time. It is an experience. It is the burning in the bosom.
I am also going through a book called Irreparable Damage written from a secular perspective on teenage girls coming out as transgender. Part of the work today is affirmation therapy where it looks like if a patient claims to be transgender, well, they are, and it’s best to affirm their attitude and if the parents don’t the child could kill themselves. It is not about why they feel this way or if they should. The inner attitude is given precedence.
While driving, I am also going through Peggy Orenstein’s book on CD, Girls and Sex. Last night, I heard her talk about how girls are having operations done on their genitals while they are teenagers merely for the sake of appearance. These operations do not improve sexual pleasure or function and can actually impede it. Still, these girls are doing this just to make sure they don’t gross a boy out in a possible sexual encounter. As an aside, if you are a parent of girls, either teenage or on their way, you really need to read this book and see what’s coming.
All of these have a common theme and it runs throughout our society. We live in a world where we talk so much about how we feel and talk very little about how we are. Not only that, we are responsible for how everyone else outside of us feels. This does not mean we cause unnecessary pain, but the only person we are in control of us is ourselves. If you feel offended and hurt by what I say or do, it could be I’m a jerk, but it could also be that you need to work on how you receive information and process it.
We don’t often ask what kind of character we are producing. Do we feel good about ourselves, as per the self-esteem movement? That is what is most important to people today. What should be of utmost importance is what kind of character we are producing. Are we becoming good and virtuous people?
After all, there are many times where we should not feel good. I think of my friend David Wood. When his mother died, he was able to go out to a diner and hang out with his friends like normal. Why? Not because he’s heartless, but because he is actually a sociopath and feels no sadness when someone dies.
Sometimes, we may think that is a good position to be in, but would we really want that always? If your loved one died, would you not want to be able to feel the sorrow and mourn it. Sometimes, we want to treat the sorrow as if it is the problem when sorrow can be healthy at times. If you are a normal person and you feel nothing when a loved one dies, that is a cause of concern.
Suppose you are an alcoholic. One of the most loving things someone can do is to not affirm you in your alcoholism. You might need someone to get in your face and tell you you have a problem and are destroying your life unless you get some help. If that’s what it takes to wake you up, that’s what it takes.
This is also true in evangelism. I know some people who didn’t become Christians until someone had the guts to get in their face and tell them they were a sinner. If you want to find gentle Jesus, meek and mild, do not go to the New Testament. He’s not there. This is the Jesus who referred to His own chief apostle as Satan at one point and who called the Pharisees sons of Hell. He was gentle on those who recognized their lack, but on others, He was highly confrontational.
Let’s also talk about the girls having operations done. Too often we are discussing how girls feel about their bodies. Boys can think this way too, but it is largely girls. Very ltitle time is discussed asking what they do with their bodies. Are they using their bodies in a way that is proper to the nature of the body?
For those of us who are Christians, we would contend that the modern sexual ethic is a war against reality. It is our prediction that the further we go down this road, the more chaos will break apart in society. One can only bump against reality for so long before reality will bump back and reality won’t care if it hurts us or not.
Instead of starting with how we feel per se, we should start with how we are. What are we being? What are we doing? A negative feeling could be a bad way of thinking we need to drop, or it could be an indication that we are doing something that is wrong.
If we hold to objective morality in any sense and to objective goodness, there is a right and a wrong to be done. There is a real good to be sought and real evil to be avoided. (Note that I singularized the good and generalized the evil. There’s a reason for that.) If none of those are true, then let’s eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die. If they are true, then we could feel great about ourselves and be on the path to destruction.
Think about Brave New World. In this society, everyone was feeling good about themselves and it was a pleasure-oriented society, but it was a nightmare as well. The people didn’t know it and were slaves to their passions and their science both. This is not to say passions and science are bad things, but they are not meant to control us either.
There is no easy solution to this as our society is very far gone in this measure. For those of us who are Christians, it is a return to character and virtue that will most help us out here, working on ourselves and on our children especially. It will also be an open pursuit of virtue as well. We will need to seek to be holy, especially since our own book tells us in Hebrews 12 that without holiness no one will see the Lord. If we want to see Him, we have to be holy.
Again, this is open-ended and with all my posts, I hope this leads to discussion all the more. I look forward to your thoughts.
In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)
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