America is being judged.
I feel it deep down in my bones.
I see it all around me.
There is a denial of sin.
There is a lack of discernment about the eternal and unchanging laws of God.
There is a failure in the church to be the salt and the light in a culture spiraling into the moral abyss.
Let me caution my countrymen that this path leads only to destruction.
I urge you to take some time to study Romans 1.
We're told beginning in verse 18 what brings on the wrath of God. It applies equally to individuals and nations.
This chapter tells us we are without excuse – believers and non-believers alike. Every man and woman knows the difference between right and wrong – righteousness and unrighteousness. God has showed us all – even to those who have never read the Bible.
"For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse," it tells us in verse 20.
America's serious problems today are, at their root, spiritual.
"Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things," we're told in verse 21 through 23.
This makes me think about the way it is common for Americans today to worship nature instead of nature's God. And what's the result of that? We are literally remaking our entire world – our ideas about property, duty, values and morality to conform with protecting the planet from the phantom problem of overproduction of carbon dioxide that, we are told, will lead to global warming. The gravest "sin" we can commit today is leaving a carbon footprint.
But let's see where the Bible tells us this kind of foolhardy thinking leads.
"Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves: Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was meet," we're told in verses 24 through 27.
Not being accountable to God and His laws leads an individual or a nation inevitably into sexual sin. Do we not see the evidence of this in our country today? Do we not see it every time we turn on the television? Do we not see it all around us – in our schools, in the books we read, on the Internet, in our movies? Have we not become a sex-obsessed culture – particularly one that justifies and rationalizes and apologizes even for abominations like homosexuality, widely considered immoral by believers and non-believers alike just 25 years ago?
And what follows that path?
Read on in verses 28 through 32: "And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, Without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful: Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them."
Again, this sounds to me like the society in which we live today.
And I want you to take particular note of the last line: The sin is not only doing these things but in taking pleasure in those who do.
Far too many in the church are doing just that today – excusing, rationalizing the rampant sin so pervasive in our country.
It can't go on much longer.
Be warned, America. There's still time to repent – but I don't know how much time.