Worldview

Discerning What Is Best
With Dr Rex Rogers

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Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 13 March 2023

Has it ever seemed to you that the world we live in is topsy-turvy, inside out, upside down, not like you remember it was when you were a kid?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #75 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

It seems to me that we are experiencing spiritual warfare on nearly all fronts. Perhaps it has always been this way, or maybe it was like this at another time, but either way, it certainly seems like we are witnessing a new pagan onslaught every week, not just in so-called “spiritual matters” pertaining to religion but in every activity of our culture.

Let me illustrate with a few examples:

Same-sex marriage, recognized as legal by the Supreme Court of the United States in Obergefell v Hodgesin 2015. This direct attack on the God-ordained nuclear or traditional family plays an increasingly prominent role in American society with actors portraying same-sex couples on sit-coms, Pete Buttigieg, so-called “Mayor Pete,” married to a man since 2018 and serving as Secretary of Transportation for the Biden Administration, and even Christian adoption agencies now placing children with LGBTQ and same-sex couples.

LGBTQ, the idea human beings may select their sexuality as a matter of psychology and preference rather than biology, including the dangerous false ideology of transgenderism, continues to dominate public education from kindergarten to graduate school. This includes a direct attack on parental rights. Since sexual orientation is now increasingly considered a civil right, something that gives these lifestyle choices protected status in employment and other sectors of society, LGBTQ ideology has almost achieved normative status in American culture.

Gender confusion, which includes not only transgenderism but androgyny, radical feminism, macho male chauvinism and toxic masculinity. When a nominee for the Supreme Court of the United States cannot answer the question, “Can you define the word ‘woman’?” then you know the culture is in trouble. How else can any logical person interpret the Biden Administration recently presenting an “International Women Of Courage Award” to a biological male who identifies as female? This gender confusion includes gender fluidity resulting in more than 100 genders now catalogued as possible and real. This includes not simply the polite expectation but the demand often backed by corporate or governmental authority that public servants like teachers must use the gender-neutral pronouns non-binary people select. This includes trans men or trans women demandingaccess to public-facility male or female bathrooms in concert with their trans identity, not their actual biology. This includes trans athletes, specifically men posing as trans women, be permitted to compete in girl’s and women’s sports events. States that have pushed back on this movement, in an attempt to protect girls and women, are regularly labeled in the press, not as defenders of Title IX, fairness, or female athletes, but rather as “anti-trans.” Since we no longer know what a man or woman is and since some believe that men can become pregnant, then we no longer have a basis for truth or reality. We do not have anything to pass on to our children but hellish disorder.

Black Lives Matter, LGTBQ activists, Planned Parenthood, ACLU, and others promoting progressive leftist philosophy are on record opposed to the traditional, nuclear family. They seek to undermine the nuclear family of father and mother married in a lifelong monogamous relationship because this divine biblical ideal cannot be allowed to stand if they are to be successful promoting their sexually perverted, emotionally twisted, libertine options. This includes a promotion of the Marxist ideas promoting race and class conflict, which are imbedded in critical race theory, an attempt to rewrite the nation’s history to obliterate from the record America’s original Judeo-Christian foundation.

Abortion, legal since Roe v Wade(1973) and now altered by the Supreme Court of the United States in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Organization (2022), saying no right to abortion is found in the United States Constitution, abortion is now being curtailed in various ways in several states. The immediate effect was to make abortion an even more divisive political issue. We’re rightfully disturbed by 60 million killed in WWII, 30 million ruthlessly slain under Russia’s Stalin, and the 50 million eliminated under China’s Mao.Yet in the US alone since 1973, abortion goes on with more than 64.6 million killed in the womb. We are literally using infanticide to eradicate our future. This is the height of nihilism.

Illegal narcotics, a pandemic-like impact via which “more than 106,000 persons in the U.S. died from drug-involved overdose in 2021, including illicit drugs and prescription opioids.” This annual figure is almost twice the number who died in the 10-year Viet Nam War. Fentanyl is the primary driver now, a cheap, made-in-Mexico product, the deadliest form of opioid. While people who take drugs talk of getting “high,” what they get over time is “low,” lower than low because drugs are nothing more than an attempt to deaden spiritual pain. Drugs are hopelessness used as a medicine for hopelessness.

There are many other cultural endeavors imbued with an anti-biblical set of values and goals.

Scienceis no longer a search for truth based upon hypotheses, unbiased measurement of reality, and conclusions rooted in evidence. Now, science is just another place for leftists to play God, demanding we believe them, not our own eyes, logic, history, or nature. Entertainment is dominated by non-Christian, humanistic, materialistic values worshipping celebrity, fame, and fortune, all presented with what’s become a near wall-to-wall use of the F-word. The law, once the realm of giants like Chief Justice John Marshall, or even fictional barristers committed to truth like Perry Mason, is now the playground of soft-on-crime, politically correct, ideologically driven, do-nothing District Attorneys whose claim to fame is how many criminals they did not prosecute. Consequently, when our legal system does not hold perpetrators accountable, the bad actors win, returning to the streets to loot and wreak havoc again. This is the source of increasing incidences of random violence in the country.

The fact that these kinds of activities are now commonplace in American society is due to the culture’s rejection of God, or at least the idea of absolute truth, morality, and consequently, accountability. We’re engaged in moral chaos and moral freefall.

We can no longer define right and wrong, have lost the ability to recognize goodness and beauty so the arts are falling apart, lost the importance and value of children, lost integrating truth without which we get the chaos, diversity run amok, and centrifugal forces we see at work throughout society, lost what it means to be made in the image of God wherein there is no hierarchy or better race within created humanity, lost our responsibility and role within the nuclear family so we live lives of expressive individualism and selfishness, and lost the meaning and source of forgiveness, therefore also of transformation, change, and hope.

Satan, our adversary the Devil, is the roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. He is the father of lies and the chief promoter of division. If we believe a lie and Satan can divide us, he makes us, the Church, weaker.

I don’t know when or where demonic activity takes place in the US, and I cannot necessarily tell when evident evil is sourced in demonic influence or simply the darkness in the person(s) involved. But whether we pinpoint demonic activity as such, I do believe it exits and that demons—Satan’s stormtroopers—are enjoying more and more freedom to spread their diabolic influence.

But we should not fear. We should work to be ready to give an answer for the hope that we have in Christ, and Scripture says, “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore, put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then” (Eph 6:10-14).

Well, we’ll see you again soon. This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends. For more Christian commentary, check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com.

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

*This podcast blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact me or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com/, or connect with me at www.linkedin.com/in/rexmrogers.

Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 16 January 2023

Has it dawned on you that 21^st Century American culture is not unlike the Roman culture of the 1^st Century Church, dominated by idolatrous pseudoreligion and pagan ideas antithetical to Christianity?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #64 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

There are those who describe American religion today as a combination of beliefs they label Moralistic Therapeutic Deism. And certainly, a case can be made for this. Moralistic therapeutic deism is a made-up worldview with which many Americans operate, whether consciously or not.

Its primary beliefs include:

God wants people to be good, nice, and fair to each other.
The central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about yourself.
God is not really involved in our lives except when God is needed to resolve a problem.
Good people go to heaven when they die.

According to the veteran researcher George Barna, “Practitioners of Moralistic Therapeutic Deism are not anti-religion or anti-Christianity. They just are not willing to surrender themselves to authentic Christianity’s demands—or to believe that a real faith would even make such demands of them.”

Overlapping Moralistic Therapeutic Deism are a set of radical leftist ideas called Woke philosophy. This is an “Ism” rooted in Marxist thought. It focuses on oppression and victimhood, class, race, and gender conflict. It rejects Judeo-Christian beliefs and values, especially moral absolutes and teachings regarding sexuality and the family, and it seeks to erase everything about America’s past because America is considered bad or even evil.

Woke philosophy, also known as Social Justice Ideology or Critical Race Theory – Yes, I know these terms are used distinctively and have their own definitions, but the overlap is so extensive as to blur the lines between these false ideas. In practice, the terms are used interchangeably.

I called Woke philosophy a pseudoreligion because its proponents, and they are now legion, look not to traditional religion but promote Wokeism as the overarching narrative or worldview that explains all of life. They place their blind faith in Woke assumptions and theories and argue these views must be adopted in civic society. Further, they believe everyone who disagrees is not simply wrong but intolerant bigots, people whose ideas or voice must be “cancelled.”

For example, University of Southern California Social Work department just announced it will remove the word “field” from its academic administrative vocabulary, that is, it will convert its Office of Field Education to the Office of Practicum Education because the word “field” somehow has racist connotations—“going into the field” or doing “field work.” Apparently, the university is concerned this word will trigger certain ethnic students and make it impossible for them to function on the campus.

Odd thing is, back on Grandpa Rogers’ farm in Ohio I earned my first dollar going into the field and doing field work. None of us considered it racist.

The computer sciences at many universities are ditching terms like "master" and "slave" for similar reasons. And in some housing designs and architecture there will no longer be a “master bedroom,” which apparently smacks of patriarchy and racism.

Standford University is encouraging students and faculty—I said encouraging but this is administration policy—not to call themselves American. According to the Stanford University Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative, (this is a mouthful in itself – think about it. This committee is going to eliminate harmful language, something no culture has done since Adam and Eve). Anyway, according to this committee “the term ‘American’ often refers to people from the United States only, thereby insinuating that the US is the most important country in the Americas (which is actually made up of 42 countries)."

So, a term that’s been used since the 1500s on maps, was used in the Declaration of Independence July 1776, was declared official by the Continental Congress in September 1776, and is today the actual name of the United States of America is suddenly no longer acceptable on this learned campus.

Professors and staff members who disagree with these mandates, particularly if they dare to push back, are in danger of losing their positions. The same is true for university, government, military, and increasingly corporate policies that require employees to use whatever gender pronouns any staff member, student, or customer wishes to use. Refuse, and you will attract investigation; you may lose your job.

Wokeism argues a person’s identity cannot be separated from the group, usually race or ethnicity. There is no individuality, an idea that is antithetical to Christianity. In Wokeism, the only sin is the sin of the oppressor. Victims get a free pass. In Wokeism, what matters is power.

Wokeism promotes: Pol correctness and a psychological triggering category called micro-aggressions, LGBTQ sexuality including drag queens, the idea sex is not binary but something socially or individually constructed called gender, sex education, or rather, sexualizing of children via explicit curricula in public schools, the politicization and racialization of sports, anti-racism via critical race theory, which in practice reinforces racism with concepts like white supremacy, defunding the police, officials telling police to stand down, prosecutors not prosecuting crimes, looting, or arson, abortion on demand, a concept called “equity,” which means equality of results or outcomes based not on merit but race or gender and perceived oppression, rejects science, reason, history, and biology, and even attempts to curtail or silence freedom of speech because opinions different from the Woke holy list are forbidden.

This means Wokeism is inherently authoritarian; if individuals are lost into the group, and contrary ideas are verboten, the only way to accomplish this is through the coercive power of the state.

Wokeism also advocates for so-called inclusive religion—again a racial/ethnic categorization—and works to suppress religious liberty in favor of its secular left utopian vision.

Wokeism is nauseating in its drive to defeat the traditional and moral in favor of the irrational. Those who embrace these ideas are cultish in their worldview.

This is the pseudoreligion that motivated the people a few months ago who demanded decades or even century-old public statues be torn down if somehow the statue violated their new sensibilities.

This is the pseudoreligion that compels people to sanitize public life and discourse of anything that is remotely Judeo-Christian in character, including holidays, public prayers, even the Pledge of Allegiance.

The pseudoreligion of Woke philosophy, alongside Moralistic Therapeutic Deism, is now the dominant and demanding legalistic false religion of American culture.

Christianity still has a seat at the table but not the head of the table and in many cases is muzzled. This trend will continue.

Politics offers no effective solutions to our cultural problems because what we face today are spiritual problems.

In his book, Strange New World, Carl Trueman makes this powerful observation on how we should then live in the face of a dominant pseudoreligion:

“The Psalms present a view of the Christian life that is marked by joy but that also knows sorrow and loss. They set the struggles of the present in the context of God’s great actions in times past and promises for the future.”

“By setting forth a grand picture of God and the promise of future rest, they help us to keep perspective—theological and emotional—on the events of the present.”

Trueman’s point is that the psalmist, the shepherd king David, faced all manner of threatening circumstances during his life. He shared them all with the Lord, but he didn’t stop there.

David then rehearsed the past works of God in creation and God’s promises of future presence in our lives.

David found hope and peace and strength to fight the good fight, by acknowledging God walked beside and before him.

So should we.

And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 03 June 2022

Have your heard American politics described as Left and Right? Or perhaps Liberal and Conservative, but now there is this new designation, Left or Progressive? What does all this mean?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #27 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

American culture and therefore politics is divided. Actually, more than divided, it is polarized. We don’t just disagree. We disagree vehemently, sad to say, often hatefully.

This polarization has affected every corner of our culture, including education, entertainment, sports, and religion. On every issue, people line up on one of two sides, what is called the Right or what is called the Left.

The Right is generally considered synonymous with Conservative, and maybe Republican, but not all Republicans are Conservative and not all Conservatives are Republican.

The Right tends to believe in God and country, the existence of absolute truth, personal initiative and responsibility, individual liberty and freedom of religion and speech, national identity and patriotism, capitalism or free enterprise along with equal opportunity, the traditional family, and justice based upon objective and equal law and order.

There was a time not long ago when we typically did not say, Left, but said Liberal.

Interestingly, now forgotten, those who embraced a Liberal point of view were not that different from those who embraced the Right or a Conservative point of view. Sure, Liberal and Conservative differed on the extent of government involvement, but Liberals then and, actually now, tend to believe in God and country, the idea of truth, liberty and freedom of religion and speech, national identity and patriotism, the traditional family, even free enterprise and certainly blind justice based upon identifiable principles of law and order.

Sound familiar? Both Conservatives and Liberals acknowledged America had made terrible mistakes in its past, for no country comprised of sinful people is perfect. But both also celebrated the historical fact that America had made sacrifices and progress toward realizing its founding ideals, that it was the home of the brave and the land of the free.

Then along about the time of the 1960s things began to change. Something called the Left, and more recently Progressives, began to emerge with a set of beliefs diametrically opposed to what the Right or Conservatives believe.

And though media still often uses the terms Liberal and Left interchangeably, this is misleading at best and does not recognize the profoundly different values promoted by the Left, not the least of which is rejection of their own country.

The Left now represents a set of beliefs sharply distinguishable from Liberals and certainly of Conservatives or the Right.

Think of the comedian Bill Maher, a self-avowed Liberal in the classical sense, an atheist or at least agnostic, a brilliant mind and talent capable of hilarious observations and comebacks. He is a Liberal, a late-night talk show host you’d think would embrace the Left and its so-called progressive ideas. But he does not. In fact, he has repeatedly and incisively skewered the illogic, arrogance, and utter lack of realism of the Left, labeling them a threat to liberalism and a free society. He thinks the Left is, well, Nuts, and he’s a Liberal.

What’s ironic if maybe sad is that the best critic of the Left is not someone on the Right but a Liberal, Bill Maher. His monologues on the Left’s excesses are a call to sanity, something the Left with its pell-mell rush to embrace of Woke philosophy does not understand.

The Left tends to eat its own if anyone dares to question basic ideas. This is what cancel culture is about.

J.K. Rowling, the incredibly successful British author of the Harry Potter books, is and always has been a Liberal, clearly and unapologetically. But now she has been systematically vilified, disinvited from a celebration of one of her own movies, criticized by the young actors her books help to make rich and famous, and in general, cancelled. Except she is so wealthy, smart, and therefore powerful, she can push back.

What was J.K. Rowling’s grave offense? She believes in biology. She thinks men are men and women are women, and she argues transgender ideology is a threat to girls and women. Interestingly, she’s not opposed to LGB, nor does she moralize on any of this, she just thinks science is real and gender is not fluid. That’s it.

This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends.

So, what does the Left believe?

Secular – no creed or Scripture, hostile to religion, no God, generally supports secularizationand total separation of church and state.
Since God did not create human beings in his image, we are socially constructed, either through some social determinism as if we are animals, or through a humanist belief we can make ourselves anything we want to be.
Reject the moral categories of Judeo-Christianity and believe truth is not identified or received but created.
The Left’s compass is guided by power, race, and class.
Since there is no Sovereign God there is no personal sin, so our problems are not moral but social and economics explains most behaviors.
Human beings define their own existence based upon their feelings, subjective, so we end up with rollercoaster emotions and a mentality of endless victimhood.
The Left’s view of humanity promotes a sense of entitlement and a lack of gratitude, hence we are forever unhappy.
The source of improvement is inside us, thus we need to know ourselves and to “dialogue” with others because through dialogue, not debate that implies disagreement or antithesis, but discussion that always must end in a synthesis of ideas, for no idea is wrong or bad.
The Left affirms a strong centrist government and distrusts freedom of speech.
The Left tends to reject national identity and patriotism, then proclaims we are world citizens, typically anti-American, anti-Israel, and anti-Western Civilization, which for the Left’s is an euphemisms for White Supremacy.
Sexual liberation including LGBTQ+, new socially defined gender identity, so biology is irrelevant.
The Left promotes fear and hysteria, anxiety, hence safetyism, for all this increases its power.

From a Christian worldview point of view, the Left is wrong in its pre-theoretical assumptions top to bottom. Once any philosophy rejects God and truth, there’s nothing left but power, which is the Left’s stock in trade.

Sadly, Leftist ideas have hugely and maybe surreptitiously influenced Christian churches and Christian nonprofit organizations in both Europe and the United States, meaning these churches and organizations offer a message little different from the culture around them. Of worse, are often presenting a view contrary to the Word of God as one that advances it.

The Left’s views are morally unsustainable. No human beings can live long and certainly not in a healthy or joyful manner based upon Leftist unbiblical philosophy.

The results of Leftism include: ennui, loss of sense of purpose and creativity or intellectual curiosity and excitement, declining industrial innovation, loss of hope including a desire to marry or have children, fear rather than risk-taking, division, disillusionment, anxiety, despair, a culture of death, an existentialism that gives way to secular nihilism, and…hopelessness.

The Left is now promoting social justice ideology in schools, entertainment, business, and churches. This ideology rejects transcendent biblical morality in favor of an arbitrary, ever-changing “do what’s right in our own eyes” ethic that is sexually licentious and racially divisive. While this is done in the name of advancing what the Left calls the oppressed, what really happens is it creates power for a new set of Leftist oppressors who do not believe in God, grace, or forgiveness.

The Left is godless, irrational, and seductive.

There is no room for Christian compromise with the Left.

Our task in this moment is both great and strategic. Believers must learn to articulate biblical theology. We must learn how to apply our faith in a rapidly changing world, and we must stand for truth in the face of error.

Well, we’ll see you again soon. For more Christian commentary, be sure to subscribe to this podcast, Discerning What Is Best, or check my website, r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com. And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.

Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 24 May 2022

The ancient Greek philosophers famously said, “Know thyself,” even inscribed the phrase on the temple walls to their idol gods, and perhaps this is good advice as far as it goes. But in knowing ourselves, what do we learn, and can we really trust ourselves?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #25 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

Many years ago, when we lived near New York City where I served as a Christian college administrator, we attended our daughter’s Eighth Grade graduation ceremony. It was a nice outdoor affair conducted with the usual academic pomp and circumstance, complete with commencement speaker and individual diplomas. It was a nice experience for our daughter and her friends.

While I know it is rare indeed to remember anything a commencement speaker says, I’ve never forgotten this speaker’s presentation. This was back in the day when self-esteem was the huge educational if not cultural fad of the moment. Everyone was into raising their self-esteem and books were pouring off the shelves, especially those aimed at women or children.

This speaker, no doubt with good intentions, used the words self, self-esteem, self-awareness, self-acceptance, self-care, even self-actualization at least twenty times in her mercifully brief speech. It was overwhelming. Basically, her message to the graduates was, you owe it to yourself to take care of yourself and the best way to do this is to look inside yourself and pursue whatever your authentic self wishes to do or be.

It all sounded like a wonderful experience of freedom and self-fulfillment.

This exaltation of the self has not gone away in American or Western culture. The self-esteem movement ran hot for some time, eventually resulting in among other things, trophies for every player, effusive praise in the face of error or lack of learning, feel-good affirmations for any and all behavior, thus a generation of children growing up (but not maturing) with a sense of entitlement, little in the way of expectation, a limited work ethic, no vision for themselves, an inability to deal with loss they were never asked to experience, and a sense of meaninglessness.

Some have blamed this movement for the so-called “snowflakes” entering higher education today, students so emotionally fragile that mere unpleasant words trigger their ability to function normally, hence, the arrival of “safe spaces” and politically correct lists of vocabulary allowed in the classroom. And sadly if ironically, for all this attention to the self, young people today are unhappy.

Add to this the ubiquitous Internet: Every day, online influencers essentially say the same thing in thousands of Instagram posts, TikTok videos, and websites promoting products that ostensibly improve the self.

Celebrities model this message as they post daily logs of their lives built around their appearance—beauty and fashion—materialistic excess, jet set lifestyles, opulent homes, non-stop parties, sensuality, and promiscuity.

Whatever they desire, they do, because, well, they are the beautiful people whose lives are a model for us all. No one says it, but the message is, hedonism is healthy.

Self-actualization, indeed, self-aggrandizement, is the ultimate path to the good life, to utopia, to heaven on earth.

Now I understand that some individuals, perhaps because they have been badly mistreated by parents or others, suffer from a serious lack of personal confidence, i.e., self-esteem. I understand this condition, particularly when resulting from emotional or psychological damage, is a very difficult challenge to overcome. I am not minimizing those peoples’ pain or otherwise ignoring their hurt. We should care about them. There is a biblical understanding and a Christian way to encourage and help these people.

This podcast is about Discerning What Is Best. If you find this thought-provoking and helpful, follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Download an episode for your friends.

What I am saying is that while personal confidence and self-esteem rightly understood are wonderful blessings, promoting a philosophy rooted in humanism – self-esteem or specifically the self, as the answer to all our life problems, does not work.

We hear bland statements like, “Just believe in yourself,” or “Practice self-love,” or “One of the deepest ways to increase confidence is to connect to your inner power.”

Or how about, “The more you believe in yourself, the more you could trust yourself. The more you trust yourself, the less you compare yourself to others.”
― Roy T. Bennett.

“Spirituality is not adopting more beliefs and assumptions but uncovering the best in you.” ― Amit Ray, Beautify Your Breath – Beautify Your Life.

“No one knows your truth but you. If you're secure in yourself, no one and no(thing) can touch you.” ― Brittany Burgunder.

The problem with all these comments that in essence say, Trust yourself, is that yourself is inherently untrustworthy. That’s right, you the self, and me the self, are untrustworthy.

The time in which we live is often called Postmodernity, and the dominant philosophy of our day is called Postmodernism. “Postmodernism views human beings as autonomous, self-determining agents…Gone is any notion of a transcendent, objective moral law, or even the natural laws of modernity. Reality is now subjective, the product of human minds.”

“Because postmodernism sees all reality as subjective, we no longer have a basis for human rights. Life and liberty have been replaced by a new overarching human right: ‘The right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.’” But this autonomous self, little gods, leads to social chaos. (Scott David Allen. Why Social Justice Is Not Biblical Justice.)

On the other hand, a Judeo-Christian worldview sees our times and our place in it differently, which is to say, accurately. While we as human beings are made in the image of God and as such are blessed with eternal value, significance, and meaning, while made in the image of God we are blessed with a right and righteous sense that God loves each and every one of us. We as individual selves are somebody. We can and should, therefore, possess a humble self-esteem based upon this knowledge.

But because of the Fall, because of sin, each human being is born in sin and possesses a sinful, depraved heart.

Jer. 17:9 reminds us, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?”

Rom. 3:10 says, “As it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one.”

Rom. 3:23 states, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

And there is a remedy,

“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8).

In the book of Ephesians, the Apostle Paul speaks directly to the issue:

“You were taught with regard to the former way of life to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires, to be made new in the attitude of your minds, and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness” (Eph. 4:22-24).

The Word of God describes humanity as we are – created in God’s image and uniquely, ultimately valuable, that is, We all matter. But we are also members of a sinful, fallen human race, capable of great evil and in need of redemption provided through Christ.

The point is, if we simply look inside ourselves, we find a sinful heart. We find someone untrustworthy. We find attitudes and values that do not conform to what God wants for us, which is to say what is best for us.

So, if we really want to improve ourselves, to change the self, we need to look not inside but outside ourselves to gain perspective, to know who we are, and to discover what may be done to bless our lives.

The self cannot fix or save itself. Let me say that again, the self cannot fix or save itself.

Pursuing the self’s natural desires leads us into hopeless hedonism, a toxic brew of shiny objects that only leads us on the broad path of destruction.

Meanwhile, God has not left us adrift. So, don’t trust yourself.

Rather,

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart

And lean not on your own understanding;

In all your ways acknowledge him,

And he will make your paths straight” (Prov. 3:5-6).

Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 10 May 2022

It seems that everywhere we turn these days someone is talking about social justice. It seems like the right thing to do, but is it, and more importantly, how is social justice different from biblical justice?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #23 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

Social justice has become a watchword for political discourse in the past few years. It sounds good, sounds like what every decent person should be concerned about.

But what activists mean by “social justice” is considerably different from what the words used to mean in everyday parlance, and more importantly, it’s now become clear that social justice is not the same as biblical justice.

The best resource on this topic that I have seen is Scott David Allen’s book, Why Social Justice is not Biblical Justice. He defines the two phrases this way:

Biblical Justice is “Conformity to God’s moral standard as revealed in the Ten Commandments and the Royal Law: ‘love your neighbor as yourself.”’

Social Justice is “Deconstructing traditional systems and structures deemed to be oppressive, and redistributing power and resources from oppressors to their victims in the pursuit of equality of outcomes.”

In other words, the moral teaching of Scripture contrasts sharply with what is passing today as a means to a just society.

Allen notes that a biblical worldview describes human beings as made in the image of God, whereas social justice ideology argues “we are children of society, fashioned by its social constructions and the power dynamics they maintain.”

This is the critical difference. Biblical justice exalts and obeys God. Social justice ideology omits him entirely and introduces a surrogate—you, me, or society. And remember what Os Guinness said, either you worship God, or you worship an idol, even if that idol is you, me, or society.

Real justice, Allen notes, is truth conforming to a fixed point of reference, a higher law. “Without the higher law, justice is arbitrary and changeable based on whoever wields power.” God, not the self, not humanity, not government, “is the moral plumb line who determines what is good and right for all peoples, for all eras.”

Social justice ideology has made enormous inroads in virtually every corner of our culture. Promoting their ostensible ideology of fairness and equity, social justice activists have taken over education, Kindergarten to graduate school, media and entertainment, corporations, and politics as a speed that boggles the mind.

Social justice ideology brings with it far more than a concern for diversity, equality, and inclusion, the oft-heard mantra. It brings a counterfeit theology, something the Apostle Paul warned us about in Col. 2:8, when he said, “See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ.”

And what’s more, the social justice ideology blitzkrieg, while right there in front of us, still seems to have taken a lot of Christians, churches, church leaders, and even Christian universities unawares. And while I dislike thinking this, it appears that some Christians, churches, church or mission leaders, and faculty and staff members at Christian universities have knowingly embraced what is at bottom a worldview antithetical to biblical Christianity.

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Disconnected from God and his moral will, social justice ideology affirms the following:

1—The human mind, not God, is source of ultimate reality.

2—Objective truth, reason, logic, evidence are simply the tools of oppressors. One can therefore only know “truth” through victims’ “lived out experiences.”

3—Personal identity is wholly socially constructed via class, race, gender, sexual orientation, etc., and individuals do not really matter.

4—Promote division as path to power.

Oppressors vs morally innocent victims
Class vs Capitalism, Property Owners
Race-minorities vs White supremacy or “whiteness.”
Females vs Males, i.e., patriarchy.
Gender-LGBTQ+ vs Judeo-Christian morality and natural family.

5—Argue not for equality of opportunity, or even equality before the law, but for equity, a vague sense of fairness defined as “if someone has more, it’s unfair.”

6-Systematically redefine words based upon its values, then masquerades these words to the public in outright deception, terms like women’s rights, binary, inclusiveness, tolerance, empowerment, even male and female.

Depending upon the word or phrase, these words or phrases may not be “bad” as such but buttressed by redefinition in the interest of social justice, they become tools with which to deceive the public.

Social justice ideology is now a secular religion, embraced by many people on what is now called the Left, the so-called “progressive” wing of philosophy, religion, and politics. This secular worldview strives to attract converts to its false theology and false politics. To do this, the points of the spear are always one of two things:

Race,now often promoted by a subset of social justice ideology called critical race theory,
Sex, defined as LGBTQ+, and gender identity.

The Left unrelentingly propagates its views, even while its cancel culture inclination works to silence opposing points of view. The Left literally sells the public with deception:

that all racial or ethnic minorities are ipso factovictims of society, and
that any person who defines his/her sexuality as one of the ever-expanding 112 gender options, is somehow a victim of society.

Victimhood can include anything, but certainly bullying, lack of access and equity, trauma, mental illness, and more. For a public in the past 30 years that assumes every person must have unfettered path to self-actualization, this has become an easy sell.

People think they are doing good by expanding heretofore unknown justice. They feel good about themselves and often virtue signal online.

Social justice ideology sees injustice as, well, a social problem, but this is a critical mistake, for injustice is a moral problem. According to the Word of God, what human beings need as a remedy for sin is heart transformation, which is to say spiritual regeneration, salvation in Christ.

This is not a conspiracy theory. What I’ve said is not exaggeration. The social justice revolution is happening across American culture.

I am familiar with several Christian ministries already divided, weakened, and possibly lost to the Christian faith because staff members have either knowingly or unawares embraced this false worldview.

Unless we resist and unless in the providence of God, he intervenes, the American Church is in trouble and the America we thought we knew is fast disappearing.

Details: Written by Rex M. Rogers; Published: 26 April 2022

The United States fought one Civil War to end slavery, North vs South, brother against brother, a war that defined our character for decades to come. Is it possible that we’ve entered upon another civil war, this one a “cold” war that will also define our character?

Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #21 of Discerning What Is Best, a podcast applying unchanging biblical principles in a rapidly changing world, and a Christian worldview to current issues and everyday life.

America is at war with itself. The combatants are not Republican vs Democrat, not Liberal vs Conservative, not Black vs White, or men vs women, or rich vs poor.

The warfare in which we’re now fully engaged pits those, on the one hand, who believe the Bible is the authoritative, trustworthy Word of God, versus those, on the other hand, who reject the Word and absolute truth. Or if you want to think of it more broadly, those who affirm Judeo-Christian values vs those who reject Judeo-Christian values.

When the battle became Truth vs No truth, we entered upon a worldview civil war.

It’s literally a war for the soul of American culture, for the continuing prospects of democracy and free government, for the future of the United States of America as it is presently known, and, of course, for the hearts of individuals who choose sides.

When I reread those lines, frankly, it sounds like over-the-top exaggeration, sort of sensationalistic, shock value hyperbole.

But sadly, I really don’t think so, and a lot of notable Christian and/or conservative thinkers today are worrying aloud about exactly, the same thing.

As Dennis Prager put it, the dividing line in the US between the Left and Right, is not belief in God per se, but in one’s view of Scripture, man-made or divinely inspired.

We spend a lot of emotional and intellectual capital worrying about which political party is in power and what their leaders are going to do next. But truth be told, while politics matters, politics does not matter as much as we think, for it is downstream from our public moral consensus, if there is a consensus anymore.

And neither political party completely or effectively offers a solution. They can’t, because politics cannot resolve spiritual conflict.

A few years ago before he went to heaven, Chuck Colson said it another way: “The death of moral truth has fractured America into two warring camps, with each side’s preferences hardening into an ideology.”

Christian philosopher and social commentator, Os Guinness, later agreed, observing, “the most important battle is the ideological one in America.”

Colson noted that since there is now no such thing as truth, all principles are merely personal preferences. Everything is “socially constructed” and rational arguments no longer work.

We’re in the shape we’re in because of what G. K. Chesterton observed years back: when people stop believing in God, they don’t believe in nothing, they believe anything.

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Those who reject the authority of Scripture, embrace a set of ideas and ideals antithetical to Judeo-Christian values and, therefore, to much that America has stood for from its inception. To make matters worse, this anti-Christian, progressive, Leftist worldview, promotes views and actions that are themselves morally unsustainable. These progressive Leftist views don’t work. They do harm.

As Judeo-Christian values have been rapidly jettisoned during the pandemic years, these values have taken their place in the public’s moral universe.

But consider what progressives think, they:

Reject God and the idea of truth, with a consequence there is no real individual accountability, can be no science, and no standard for criminal justice.
Denigrate religion in general and specifically reject Judeo-Christian values, meaning there is no basis for human rights, individual freedom, freedom of speech.
Behavior, including sinful choices, is medicalized, or spiritual matters are transmuted into mental health issues.
Normalize sexual immorality – consider what’s happening recently with Disney.
Reject E Pluribus Unum and patriotism for in an idealization and idolization of race, and so-called multiculturalism. What matters is not oneness but division, for this is the progressive path to power.
Mock the traditional family, promote abortion,
Promote rights without responsibility.
Favor equality – or rather now “equity,” (a vague sense of fairness that defines fair as no differences, especially income disparity, among human beings is allowed).
Embrace politics via big government, not individual effort, and not religious faith, as the way to transform the world.

Progressives have created their own “Ten Commandments,” a secular Top Five:

There is no God, no evil, no afterlife, reward or punishment.
Human beings are self-determined by their own feelings.
Unfettered sex is whatever you want it to be with whatever consenting person you wish whenever you wish. (By the way, the idea of “consent” is going to be the next thing to go out the window. It has to be jettisoned, because it stands in the way of the Left’s demand to do whatever is right in their own eyes.)
Race is ultimate, defining everyone, and White Supremacy is the root of all injustice.
Economic equity is the end all, be all of life.

Is America really at war with itself? I think it is. We battle every day on a worldview level, but most people probably don’t even recognize it, for they get caught up the practical if secondary matters of the moment.

But none of this should cause Christians undue anxiety and certainly no loss of faith. Now that we know more about what the opposition believes and stands for, we need to be sure we know what we as Christians believe and stand for:

I--We know that the Savior, Jesus, existed before the foundation of the world. And we know that “in him all things were created; Things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible,” (Col 1:16). That “He is before all things and in him all things hold together” (Col 1.17).

II--We know the Scripture is true and trustworthy, that it is what it claims that it is, the inspired Word of God, written for all times, countries, and cultures.

III--We know that God is sovereign, that he is not surprised by anything taking place around us, that he will give us wisdom in knowing how to respond, and that he wants us to remain faithful, “in the world, but not of the world,” even as he commands us to go “into the world.”

IV--We know God will one day bring all things to account.

My 90-year-old Mother believes we are living in the last days, the end times. More and more I think she is correct, though we cannot be sure.

But in this Second American Civil War our task is clear, to: “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect” (2 Pet. 3:15).

Well, we’ll see you again soon. For more Christian commentary, be sure to subscribe to this podcast, Discerning What Is Best, or check my website,r-e-x-m as in Martin, that’s rexmrogers.com. And remember, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm.