Pastor’s Pen 07/04/2021

Pastor’s Pen 07/04/2021

Pride!

The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil. Pride and  arrogance and the way of evil and perverted speech I hate.- Proverbs 8:13

President Biden, on June 1, 2021, wrote the following;

NOW, THEREFORE, I, JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR.,  President of the United States of America, by   virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States,   do hereby proclaim June 2021 as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Pride Month.       I call upon the people of the United States to     recognize the achievements of the LGBTQ+     community, to celebrate the great diversity of   the American people, and wave their flags of pride high.

Never before has there been a time in our nation’s history where sin is so celebrated and God’s laws so despised. It is not enough that men and women sin against a holy God; now, they want everyone to celebrate their sin. When all barriers to man’s sinful nature are removed,     the result is total depravity. There is nothing that           becomes off-limits. How long will it be before the           remaining barriers of perversion lifted? The acronym LGBTQ+. The plus is added to include + Pansexual,+ Agender,+ Gender Queer,+ Bigender,+ Gender Variant,    + Pangender. However, this list is ever-evolving to justify any new perversion of man’s identity.

In Romans 1, we see what happens when people turn from God. John MacArthur preached a sermon on August 20, 2006, out of Romans 1, and he said this,

“God will abandon sinners to their own choices and the consequences of those choices. And just what is this abandoning act on God’s part? It is the removal of restraining grace. It is when God lets go and turns a society over to its own sinful freedoms and the results of those freedoms.       No Scripture more directly confronts this abandonment and its consequences than           Romans 1 does. Here is the most graphic and the most comprehensive discussion of what it means to be abandoned by God. And it is the best passage that I know of to explain the moral chaos and the confusion that we experience in our own nation at this very time. God’s wrath is already at work in our culture. We’re not waiting for it; we are currently experiencing it.”

That sermon was written and preached 15 years ago.   Unfortunately, it has only gotten worse. So, that begs   the question of what we can do as followers of Christ. First, we must remember we were just like every other sinner before we were saved.

“Or do you not know that the unrighteous will  not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be        deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor     idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of    you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God ( 1 Corinthians 6:9-11).

Before we are too quick to write all of these people off,   we must remember that we would still be lost in our sins without God’s grace. Therefore, we need to be careful that we do not succumb to pride in our own “righteousness.” Oh, and you know what that looks like. You start thinking, “I would never do what they do,” and “I know I was a  sinner but not like those perverts.” The truth is that we    all were sinners domed to hell, and it is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, that separates us   from the lost.

Secondly, we must stand for truth and the Gospel. In 2 Corinthians 5:20, Paul reminds us, “Therefore, we are  ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.” As ambassadors for Christ, we are reminded that    we are just passing through this world (John 17:16) and that while we are here, we are to be the salt and light to    a lost and dying world.

What say you Christian, are you willing to make a difference? Do you love the Lord enough to be obedient to His call in your life?

Your shepherd,

Pastor Mark

 

Link to the sermon:  https://www.gty.org/ when-god-abandons-a-nation

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.