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It’s never easy or pleasant to lose a friend to death, so how should a Christian respond to this event that is, according to Scripture, part of life?
Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #161 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.
From time to time, I find myself talking to a younger person or persons who indicate they have not experienced something like awaking to aches and pains that occur seemingly for no reason, or a highly stressful or traumatic challenge in their education, career, or life, or the death of a loved one or close friend.
When I hear this, I usually respond by saying, “Well, you just haven’t lived long enough.” What I mean, of course, is that these things happen in every human being’s life, sooner or later, because we live in what we learn in Scripture is a fallen world.
Life happens, and one of the things that happens is that eventually we hear of the death of a loved one or close friend, maybe even a lifelong friend.
This recently happened to my wife, Sarah, and me, and within a week we traveled to West Virginia to support his wife and attend our friend’s funeral.
Our friend was Robert, or Bob, Opperman, with his wife Carol. We first met just three years after Sarah’s and my marriage when we accepted a teaching position in a Christian school in Cross Lanes, WV.
Sarah and Carol hit it off as young moms trying to figure out how to raise little girls, and not long thereafter, little boys too. We did not know it then, but there were more children yet to come.
Bob and I were social studies and history teachers, and we liked to talk politics and current events. Bob was originally from Oregon, and I quickly discovered that his ancestors crossed the country on the Oregon Trail. As a guy who read a lot of Western history then and now, I found it fascinating that I actually knew someone whose great-grandparents had trekked the Oregon Trail, and since then I’ve read everything I could get my hands on about the trail.
When I first heard Bob had passed at age 77, slipping away in a matter of a week after experiencing a medical episode, I thought about our relationship. The first thing that came to my mind was a line from a movie. In the movie, “Robinhood,” starring Russell Crowe, an older gentleman, a Baron, approached Robin about conveying a message to another older gentleman. The Baron mentioned his elder friend’s name to Robin and said, “We were young men together.”
I don’t know why that line hit me the way it did the first time I heard it, but it did, and as I said, it was the first thing that came to my mind when I thought about Bob’s passing. We were young men together.
Most of our time together took place in our twenties. Later in life, because of where we lived, we’d see each other maybe once or twice every year or so, but the friendship we forged as young men lasted a lifetime. Just a few months before, Sarah and I had been in the area for her eldest sister’s funeral, and that night we had a 3–4-hour dinner at the Cracker Barrel with Bob and Carol. We picked up right where we left off. We talked, caught up, laughed, and had a great time rooted in a friendship that had been established more than forty years before.
Bob, as I said, was born and raised in Oregon. He loved Oregon and talked about it if not every day, then every other day. We’d say, “Bob, why don’t you and Carol move to Oregon?” And nothing happened. Again later, “Bob, why don’t you and Carol move to Oregon?” Nothing happened. Then we discovered that Carol was a West Virginia girl all the way through to the bone. Bob loved Oregon and Carol loved West Virginia. What are you going to do? Well, Bob loved Oregon, but he loved Carol more, so he chose to live out his life in West Virginia and came to love the history of his adopted state too.
One year, the four of us flew to Portland, rented a truck, and traveled east into the mountains to Bob’s home territory. We met many of his relatives. And from the vantage point of high on a range of hills we looked out and saw 10-12 plumes of smoke from forest fires, and one morning we exited the hotel to find ash covering the ground, amazing experiences for Midwesterners. Eventually, we got to Greenhorn, the location of Bob’s family’s old cabin, a shack really, and a closed down goldmine. That, too, was an amazing experience and one Bob reveled in sharing with his friends.
Bob was a man’s man and as such from time to time he’d say or do something goofy or illogical. We all do this, men. It’s built into our DNA, and the ladies know it. God knew it. In the Garden of Eden God looked at Adam and said, “It’s not good for man to be alone,” so he created women to help keep us out of trouble.
But being a guy, Bob would periodically say or do something goofy or illogical. When he did, his wife Carol would look at him, look at us, roll her eyes, and say, “Well, he’s not very smart, but he’s cute.” Every time I heard that comment, and I heard it a lot, I thought it was fall out of your chair hilarious. He’s not very smart, but he’s cute.
I’ve thought about this, men. The ladies know we’re not very smart, but if at the end of the day our wives still think we’re cute, well, I’ll take it. You can build a good life on that.
Bob was also a guy who cared about people and liked to help people. He helped me at times. Along the way, he developed several handyman skills. One summer after school was out, which turned out to be the last year we lived in West Virginia, we decided to take on the project of re-shingling a house with a good-sized roof. Bob knew more about this than me, but I was young and had muscle, so it worked out. At some point in the project, we sat down on the roof peak to take a break and for reasons I do not remember, I chose that time to tell my friend that I was enrolling at the University of Cincinnati in the fall to pursue a doctorate, which meant I would not be returning to our Christian school.
Bob looked at me and said, “Wow, where do you see yourself in 10 years?” That question stopped me in my tracks. It’s not that I hadn’t thought about the future, making the decision I was making about more education. It’s just that that question made me stop and think about things with a bigger, broader perspective.
Turns out, over the next forty-odd years of working in higher level administration, I had many occasions wherein a younger staff member would come to see me seeking counsel about pursuing advanced degrees, putting their hat in the ring for another position, or considering leaving one organization to join another. Every time, I’d eventually ask them, “Where do you see yourself in 10 years?” Or sometimes I’d shorten it to 5 years because thinking out ten years seemed too daunting to some people. It’s a great question, and I was able at least twice to remind Bob that he’d asked me this, tell him how I’d been able to pay it forward, and thank him for blessing me with his insight.
Losing a lifelong friend is not easy or pleasant. We grieve. Sometimes you hear people say Christians should not grieve, but this is incorrect. Of course, Christians grieve; we just should grieve differently. Grief is remembrance. We remember the one who has passed. If that person did not matter, we would not bother remembering. We would not grieve. But they do matter, and death is a transition.
God never told us we had to like death. In fact, death is described in Scripture as the enemy (1 Cor. 15:26). So, we don’t have to like death, but we need not be afraid of it (Matt 10:28).
Still, death is a separation, so there is a sense of loss for those left behind among the living.
But I like to remember the biblical theology that when one of God’s saints—people who know the Lord as Savior—passes on, he or she is absent from the body, present with the Lord (2 Cor. 5:8). So, a Christian friend like Bob who has passed is not “gone,” as in no longer in existence or somehow extinguished.
Nor do I believe Bob is sleeping, because I do not think Scripture warrants that.
No, our Christian friends like Bob who have passed are not “gone” but merely “absent,” now more alive than ever in heaven, not simply R.I.P. “Resting in Peace,” but R.I.P. “Rejoicing in peace.”
The beauty of the Christian faith and of the Word of God is that the Lord did not leave us wondering. He told us exactly where our dearly departed loved ones and friends are. If they were believers, they are now in heaven with the Lord.
Bob and I were young men together. He has crossed over Jordan. Someday, when it is my turn, I will see him again.
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.
© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024
*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 or https://twitter.com/RexMRogers.
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Why are Western European nations, Canada, and the United States opening their borders to mass immigration?
Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #160 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.
The first day President Joe Biden took office in January 2021, he signed executive orders changing United States policy regarding immigrants, opening the southern border to a free flow of illegal migrants that have walked or swam into the US every day since.
President Biden’s actions regarding illegal immigrants, which he has enlarged and enhanced repeatedly since, is a conscious decision to defy and ignore the laws of these United States. In other words, lawlessness began in and has continued from the Oval Office.
“As of January 2024, more than 7.2 million migrants had illegally crossed into the U.S. over the Southwest border during U.S. President Joe Biden's administration — a number higher than the individual populations of 36 states.” Illegal immigration is literally changing the American political landscape, threatening the wellbeing and security of American citizens, and, Mr. Biden hopes, building a new base of voters for his socialist views.
Immigration has, therefore, become a major issue in the 2024 presidential election campaign.
Why?
- Illegal migrants break the law as their first act entering the U.S.
- Migrants are shipped to cities like Denver, Chicago, NYC in numbers that now far outstrip the cities’ financial and functional capacity to handle them.
- Migrants are often “fake refugees,” coming not to learn the language and culture and assimilate but to demand freebie entitlements including phones, hotel rooms, food, drivers’ license, insurance, even abortions.
- Insofar as migrants work, and thousands do not, they are taking jobs from American citizens.
- Migrants who do not want to assimilate, which appears to be many if not most of them, not only in the U.S. but in Western European countries, are unhappy, angry, make religious demands, engage in higher levels of crime.
- Some migrants—difficult to tell how many—are religious zealots coming to America with plans to agitate, riot, and otherwise create mayhem, as they are presently doing in European cities, in an intentional effort to disrupt what they consider the Great Satan society.
“Borders globally (are supposed to) serve as the demarcation lines that define the territories of countries, signifying sovereignty and control. In essence, an open border is one where people can come and go without restrictions.”
Let me be clear. I am not opposed to immigration or immigrants but to open border illegal immigration.
“Those (like me who are) opposed to open border policies argue that an influx of migration risks overwhelming public services, cities face the risk of over-population and some experts say migration presents a security risk.”
Western nations have been opening borders to increased immigration for a variety of reasons, including:
- Economic Growth: Theoretically, immigrants can help fill labor shortages in various sectors, from high-tech industries to agriculture. They could contributeto economic growth by providing labor, starting businesses, and paying taxes.
- Demographic Challenges: Many Western countries face aging populations and declining birth rates. Supposedly, immigration helps counteract these trends by bringing in younger workers who can support aging populations through their labor and contributions to social security systems.
- Cultural Diversity and Innovation: Immigrants bring diverse perspectives and skills, which can lead to greater innovation and cultural enrichment. Diverse societies are often more dynamic and adaptable.
- Humanitarian Responsibilities: Western nations often have commitments to accept refugees and asylum seekers fleeing war, persecution, and natural disasters. This is both called a moral obligation and a requirement under international law, yet many countries of the world take in no immigrants at all.
- Globalization and International Relations: As global interconnectivity increases, immigration policies can reflect broader geopolitical strategies and relationships with other countries.
- Addressing Labor Market Needs: Certain industries in Western countries rely heavily on immigrant labor, for example, healthcare, construction, and agriculture.
- Legal and Ethical Considerations: Many Western nations have legal frameworks that protect the rights of immigrants and promote family reunification, which can lead to higher immigration numbers.
Multiculturalism has significantly influenced Western nations' approach to mass immigration by shaping policies and attitudes towards cultural diversity and inclusion.
- Cultural Enrichment: Multiculturalism promotes the idea that cultural diversity enriches society by introducing a variety of perspectives, traditions, and practices. This belief has led to more open attitudes towards accepting immigrants from diverse backgrounds.
- Social Cohesion: Multiculturalism emphasizes the importance of social cohesion through the integration of diverse groups. It encourages mutual respect and understanding, which helps create a more welcoming environment for immigrants.
- Human Rights and Equality: Multiculturalism is often linked with human rights and the idea that all individuals, regardless of their background, should have equal opportunities.
- Economic Benefits: Embracing multiculturalism is seen as a way to leverage the economic benefits of immigration. Diverse workforces are often more innovative and better able to compete in a globalized economy.
While multiculturalism may have played a positive role in shaping immigration policies, it is also met with challenges and criticisms. Debates continue over the balance between celebrating diversity and maintaining social cohesion, the impact of immigration on national identity, and the best ways to integrate newcomers into society.
Why then are Western nations opening their borders in what looks like an irrational form of cultural or national suicide?
- As I noted earlier, “over much of the world, birth rates are plunging and populations are ageing. This means that there will be fewer workers to support older people and growth. And this means that most countries will increasingly need to rely on migration.”
- Western nations, beginning with Germany, bought into the idea of multiculturalism, a misguided philosophy that claims all cultures are relative, meaning none are better or worse than others. The reunification of Germany in 1990 and subsequent policies, including the 2000 Immigration Act, marked a more open approach to immigration.
- Western nations also embraced moral relativism, meaning truth cannot be identified, nor can better or best, right or wrong, thus the host nations neutered themselves with no ability to enforce their own laws or stop illicit behaviors like groping women in the streets.
- Western nations opened borders to people whose beliefs and values did not align with the host country, who did not really want to assimilate by learning the language or adopting mores and traditions, who rather wished to balkanize into their own ghettoes, who brought with them pagan outlooks on male/female relationships, family, and work, none of which matched the host society, and which generated reaction and division, which true believers in multiculturalism then labeled racism.
- Migrants arrived from largely Muslim countries which share few to no values in common with Western culture. These new Muslim migrants used the religious liberty of the host countries to promote their own anti-freedom religious views as understood in Sharia law, and often orchestrated provocative in-the-street mass praying toward Mecca, blocking pedestrian and vehicle traffic. Their motives were not religious or personal freedom as much as social domination and economic entitlement.
On balance, the wholesale embrace of open borders, mass immigration, the false teaching of multiculturalism and moral relativism, have resulted not in economic boom but social chaos and unrest, ongoing protests, inter-tribal street-level infighting, residents vs new arrivals, religious tension, and the very real possibility that Western European nations are in the act of committing national and cultural suicide.
Meanwhile, immigrants who seek admission legally are subjected to higher costs and often delayed indefinitely.
This is not racism to say this. It is objectively true, and under the current Administration’s policies, the U.S. may not be far behind the turmoil of Western Europe.
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.
© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024
*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 or https://twitter.com/RexMRogers.
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Is America becoming a banana republic, one where political opponents take shots with bullets not just words?
Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #159 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.
Saturday, July 13, at a Butler, PA campaign rally, a young man fired his rifle multiple times toward former President Donald J. Trump, injuring him and two others in the crowd, and sadly killing a firefighter attempting to shield his family.
It brought back memories of Mar 30. 1981, the last time a President was injured in an assassination attempt when President Ronald Reagan was shot at short range, rushed to a Washington, DC, hospital, and survived a bullet that had narrowly missed his heart.
Reagan looked at doctors in surgery and said, “I hope you all are Republicans.” Standing near the foot of the operating table was [chief of surgery] Joe Giordano, who happened to be a die-hard liberal. “Today, Mr. President,” Giordano said, “we are all Republicans.” Later, the President told his wife, “Honey, I forgot to duck.”
Trump’s in the moment, “Fight, Fight, Fight,” is reminiscent of this earlier time when a leader proved his mettle under duress. Some media coverage since have tried to make this comment, together with Trump’s raised fist, into some kind of fascist rallying cry. But “the crowd at the rally chanted ‘USA! USA! USA!’ in response, the sense of unity and determination was palpable. This intriguing reaction demonstrated the deep connection between Trump and his base, even in the face of violence and danger.”
While the first president, George Washington, was elected unanimously in 1789, American presidential political campaigns since have been rough and tumble affairs. These campaigns have sometimes been marked by vitriolic rhetoric and political violence:
- Election of 1800 (Thomas Jefferson vs. John Adams):
- Thomas Jefferson was labeled an atheist and accused of wanting to undermine the morality of America.
- Though not directly related to the campaign itself, the charged political atmosphere contributed to the duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr in 1804, resulting in Hamilton's death.
- Election of 1828 (Andrew Jackson vs. John Quincy Adams):
- Andrew Jackson was accused of being a "jackass" and a barbarian, with allegations regarding his inadvertently bigamous marriage to Rachel Donelson – Jackson and Rachel thought her former husband had secured a divorce when it turned out he had not. Rachel died just days after Jackson’s election, and she never served as First Lady. Jackson believed his political opposition’s cruel comments about his wife led to her early death and he never forgave them.
- Election of 1860 (Abraham Lincoln vs. multiple candidates):
- Abraham Lincoln was called a "black Republican" and was accused of being an abolitionist who would incite racial equality and violence.
- Lincoln was ultimately assassinated by John Wilkes Booth shortly after his re-election in 1864.
- Election of 1968 (Richard Nixon vs. Hubert Humphrey):
- The year was marked by significant political violence, including the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy.
- The Democratic National Convention in Chicago was marred by violentclashes between police and anti-war protesters.
- Election of 1972 (Richard Nixon vs. George McGovern):
- The campaign included the Watergate scandal, leading to political turmoil and Nixon's eventual resignation.
- On May 15, 1972, third party candidate George Wallace was shot while campaigning in Laurel, Maryland. One bullet lodged in his spinal column leaving him paralyzed from the waist down the rest of his life.
So American presidential politics has always been a raucous time, yet there is no question that the rhetoric and vitriol in the campaigns of the new millennium have gotten uglier.
Can we change this? I hope so, but as I said in a SAT-7 USA blog about the assassination attempt, I believe we’re dealing not so much with a political as a spiritual problem.
We live in a fallen world, and we know that since at least the 1960s, American culture has aggressively and rapidly secularized in many ways and paganized in others.
Both Christian and conservative observers have been noting threatening developments, among them:
- rejection of the Sovereign God of the Bible,
- embracing moral relativism,
- emphasis upon feelings,
- celebrating cultish values regarding race, sexuality,
- promotion of happiness or the self as the ultimate measure of wellbeing in life,
- trading a Christian for a utilitarian view of life, thus a baby may be discarded if not wanted,
These trends help to create a culture that is anxious, pessimistic, and looking for someone, i.e., others, to blame for our problems. Add to this a significant increase in end-of-the-world climate change alarmism, fear of global viruses, terrorism, and doomsday population projections, and one gets a culture that is confused, chaotic, backward, and characterized by an ill-defined rage.
Our political leaders reflect some of this. In an angry age, is it then any wonder that President Joe Biden and Former President Donald J. Trump can be rather nasty in their comments about their opponents? It’s not good, but it is predictable.
One interesting aftermath of the assassination attempt is the number of people, including Mr. Trump and members of his family, along with favorable media figures, who are saying the bullet missed because of the providence of God.
People are saying God is not through with Donald J. Trump, that he was spared by a direct act of God in order to help restore America to its former ideals and bounty.
Now I have no problem with people, least of all the candidate and those around him, acknowledging God’s presence, blessings, and providence, because I believe the Sovereign God of the Universe is indeed involved in our daily lives. God was there in Butler, PA, and he was not surprised by what occurred. Yes, I believe he has a will and a plan for Mr. Trump, for America, for all of us.
I do have a problem, though, with some memes – images developed for sharing online – I’ve seen that, to me, cross over into what scholars call civil religion. These memes feature Mr. Trump in various god-like scenarios, perhaps being uplifted by angels or kneeling while wrapped in the US flag as divine light from above shines down on him. Some memes portray Mr. Trump as a savior, and sometimes seem to worship him. These memes look like and remind me of icons of saints that I’ve seen in churches.
So, God providentially protected Mr. Trump. OK, I then wonder what people would be saying if Mr. Trump had been slain. Would they then be talking about God’s providence?
We know this in our own lives when we or a loved one is very ill. We pray for their healing, and sometimes God answers that prayer affirmatively. But sometimes God answers that prayer negatively and we or our loved one advances in the illness, at times even unto death. Did God love and protect us when he healed but not love and protect us when he did not heal?
Again, I am not against acknowledging God’s engagement in American culture and politics. Nor am I knocking, much less making fun of, those who praise God for his providence in sparing Mr. Trump’s life. During his recovery, Mr. Reagan made similar observations about God’s will, and Mr. Reagan’s life and purpose. If anything, we should obey more of the Lord’s Word and seek his engagement. I am simply cautioning us not to baptize any political figure as other than the man or woman that they are.
Like us, American presidents are not perfect. We are commanded to pray for our leaders: “I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way” (1 Tim 2:1-2).
But Scripture also reminds us who really is in charge of our future, saying, “Put not your trust in princes,in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation. When his breath departs, he returns to the earth; on that very day his plans perish” (Ps. 146:3-4).
May God grant the USA and its political leaders providence, protection, peace, and prosperity.
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.
© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024
*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 or https://twitter.com/RexMRogers.
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Is sex Satan’s best playing field, or have the forces of evil already won the morality culture wars and now Satan is moving on to other issues, like the rejection of truth, racism, or even climate change?
Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #158 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.
As I’ve noted before, gender fluidity, the idea sex is changeable, or what’s now called transgenderism, is the current cultural soup du jour. It’s everywhere and seems to have become an outright unstoppable juggernaut.
We hear that people finding their “real sex” as opposed to their born-this-way biological sex is some kind of great brave new world. But sadly, it is not.
We hear this controversy is about sex, but it’s not really about sex; certainly not just sex. It’s about identity, who we are.
Trans ideology is not about lust or licentiousness. It’s about declaring that human beings can create “their truth,” be their own gods. It’s about idolatry. If male and female are simply arbitrary categories, then anything goes. Morality, modesty, masculine and feminine don’t really exist. We’re all just some hybrid social construct.
It’s true that for a variety of reasons, men or women have dressed or “passed” as the other sex for centuries. It is only in our lifetime that the idea a man or woman can actually become the other sex, and in so doing embrace their real sex, has seemingly been made possible via hormone therapy and the surgical technology to remove or reconstruct sexual organs.
But even these so-called “treatments” are secondary to the heart and mind proclaiming “Me, I decide who I am.”
While “the first documented male-to-female sex reassignment surgery took place in 1930, “the word transgender…which came into wider use in the 1990s after public health officials adopted it, is often used as an umbrella term for all rejections of the norm, from cross-dressers who are generally happy in their assigned gender to transsexuals.”
Since the 1990s, in an astonishingly rapid fashion, the American populace has adopted a “normalized” view of LGBTQ, and more recently, argued transgenderism is a civil rights matter.
Until 2013, gender dysphoria—confusion about one’s sexuality—was categorized as a disorder, not a dysphoria, by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. The World Health Organization, W.H.O., did not move gender incongruence from mental disorders to sexual health issues until 2019.
In 2014, Time issued a cover entitled “The Transgender Tipping Point: America’s Next Civil Rights Frontier.”
Two developments in 2015 acted like critical mass for transgender momentum: the Supreme Court of the United States case Obergefell v Hodges giving same-sex couples the right to marry and Olympic Gold Medalist Bruce “Call Me Caitlyn” Jenner’s Vanity Fair cover.
Then in 2016, the Obama Administration Department of Education redefined “sex” in Title IX to include “gender identity,” making it a civil rights issue. The Departments of Education and Justice required all sex-segregated facilities to be based on gender identity not biological sex.
The Biden Administration, with the President saying to LGBTQ people “I’ve got your back,” consistently advocates for legal changes giving trans individuals – a person born male identifying as female or born female identifying as male – access to sex-segregated events, services, facilities, sports competitions.
Transgenderism has become a cultural juggernaut.
American taxpayers now must pay for gender reassignment surgery for active military personnel or veterans who opt for it.
Disney is adding…queer characters in children’s programming, and is changing its long-standing greeting, “Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls,” from its Magic Kingdom fireworks show, to “Good evening, dreamers of all ages!” to promote what it calls “inclusivity.”
The Cartoon Network is normalizing gender pronouns: It’s comic strip states, “‘We can’t tell someone’s gender just by looking at them, and we shouldn’t assume we know. There are many gender identities beyond ‘girl’ or ‘boy’: some people don’t identify as any gender!’” This is considered children’s programming.
California inmates may now request prisons aligned with their gender choices, no matter their biological sex, and once there, are eligible for costly taxpayer supported gender reassignment surgery. California bans state employee travel to several states considered discriminatory toward LGBTQ individuals.
University athletics personnel are pressuring the NCAA to withdraw or not schedule collegiate athletic events in states that have passed bills requiring athletes to compete in sports befitting their biological sex. More than 25 states are considering or have passed bills labeled by the press as “anti-trans athlete” legislation.
The NFL issued a video saying, “Football is gay…Football is transgender.” Of course, it’s easy to virtue signal corporate activism-a la-profit-motive with a rainbow-colored NFL logo because transgender athletes aren’t going head-to-head in competition like they are beginning to do in other sports.
Serious concerns are being expressed by LGB athletes that allowing transgender athletes into women’s competitions will destroy women’s sports. Some fear Title IX will be eviscerated. “Several prominent female athletes have spoken out against relaxing the traditional standards, arguing the ramifications will be drastic for women’s sports.”
We’re told the idea that men are stronger athletes than women or that sex is binary is due to misogyny and white supremacy.
But it’s gender madness. Some are trying to address the madness by calling for separate transgender competitions.
LGBTQ demands are on a collision course with religious liberty.
Transgenderism politics aggressively attacks the authority of Scripture, often indirectly by repositioning words like accepting, love, inclusive, or tolerance. They call disagreement, hate or bigotry, and they’ve been amazingly successful at pushing this Devil’s delusion into mainstream American culture.
In American culture, as touted by LGBTQ+ activists and others in the “woke” universe, Christianity is increasingly seen as optional, hateful, bigoted, discriminatory, repressive, malevolent, irrelevant, or unnecessary.
LGBTQ+ cannot accomplish activists’ ideological or worldview goals until religion, including Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, is marginalized or legally banished from cultural influence. Gender ideology and biblical Christianity can only co-exist in a First Amendment society, something activists have not so far demonstrated they can accept.
Christians who sleep-walk through this movement will do transgender people, the Church, and the country a grave disservice.
The rapid success transgenderism has achieved in just a handful of years puts “America…farther down this road than any other country in the Western world. In other words, at this moment of crisis for Western Civilization, or for what we used to call Christendom, the leading country of the free world is pulling the wrong way.”
While religious liberty is at stake in this “all-out cultural war to eradicate all influence of biblical values in our culture,” Christians tend to look upon transgenderism as just a matter of morality. It is that but much more.
We are in a cultural moment in which gender ideology is directly challenging the legitimacy of the Judeo-Christian heritage of the American system.
Gender ideology is not simply questioning the Bible or the Church or religion but the foundational American ideals that helped “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.”
The Democrat and Republican Parties are not standing in the gap. But “values matter because they translate into behavior. If (parties) become a big tent of moral relativism, who will fight for transmission of the values that sustain life and freedom?”
Not to resist, not to speak the truth in love, not to reason, not to stand in the gap defending life, dignity, freedom, and hope is to give in to irrationality, idolatry, division, destruction, and death.
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.
© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024
*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 or https://twitter.com/RexMRogers.
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- Written by Rex M. Rogers
What sort of philosophy leads a seemingly intelligent person to conclude that a boy can be a girl, a girl can be a boy, men and women can identify as whatever gender appeals to them?
Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #157 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.
I don’t remember much about my 0-6 years of life, nor do I remember that I understood the difference in a boy or a girl, in part because I’d just learned I was a boy and what this meant. In grade school, I remember beginning to understand the difference in a boy and a girl, then not liking girls much because, well, they were different. You know, the “ooh” factor; girls had cooties.
Later in junior high school, I recollect beginning to understand that girls are not only different but different in certain interesting ways. I did not know much about this, but Dad gave me a “Birds and the Bees” talk a couple of times.
Dad was a part time barber, so whenever he concluded I’d benefit from a life lesson, he decided I needed a haircut. When you’re in a barber chair you can’t get away. Trapped in a barber chair in an otherwise empty barber shop is a perfect place to hear about the “Birds and the Bees.”
Of course, in the natural process of things, in high school, I decided those ways in which girls were different from boys were downright attractive and a source of endless fascination. God knew this. He planted these inclinations in me and every other human being because he created us male and female, and he did this so that we would be blessed with male/female companionship—remember, “It’s not good that man should be alone” (Gen. 2:18)—so that we would find enjoyment in male/female marriage relationship, and eventually so that we would in the words of the Old Testament book of Genesis, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth,” (1:28), i.e., we’d perpetuate the human race.
Now if you are normal, typical, balanced, healthy, you resonate with what I’m saying. You get it. You likely remember similar maturing thoughts, emotions, and bodies in your youth. Best of all, you too understand the difference in a boy and a girl.
Some of you, like me, were privileged to be present in the room at the birth of your own child, either as the mother delivering the newborn or as the bamboozled new father. You saw for yourself that boys and girls are born with their distinguishing biological differences, and while we couldn’t see them, also born with distinguishing emotional, psychological, and maybe other divinely appointed differences.
Given all this, why are there people walking around today who claim they cannot define the difference in a boy or a girl or a man or a woman? Remember US Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson who during her confirmation hearings was asked by Senator Marsha Blackburn, “Can you define ‘woman’?” Jackson said, “I’m not a biologist. I’m a judge.” She was still confirmed as a Justice.
People say they cannot recognize the difference in the sexes and argue neither can medical professionals. In this view, only the newborn babe can later “say what or who they are.”
So, we are now treated to the insanity of sex education in kindergarten and elementary school, not just the differences in boys and girls, but age-inappropriate teaching, blatantly encouraging children to question their own sex, or what is now called gender.
Obviously, there are moral and scientific implications to this, but there are also practical, educational implications. Time spent on gender nonsense is time not spent on reading, writing, and arithmetic, history, science, and certainly not character or civics education. We trade essential instruction that would benefit students’ futures for elective, unseemly instruction that is not only nonessential but harmful.
Gender fluidity is the cultural soup du jour.
It’s the latest craze that’s morphed beyond political correctness to indisputable orthodoxy. Dissent is not permitted. If you ask questions, based upon common sense, biology, a few thousand years of human history, or even religious conviction, you’re a bigot, a hater.
Proponents (especially activists) of gender fluidity believe biology is not destiny. In their view, biological sex is mutable, something “assigned” at birth. One’s “real sex” is determined by one’s feelings about gender, conveniently presented as an ever-lengthening spectrum of choices (some social media are offering 112 gender choices).
This gender transition, we are told, liberates and makes the person whole. Except it does not. Neither do any of the other hybrid gender identities ostensibly resulting from the newly declared fact of gender fluidity.
We know that people who experience gender dysphoria often endure genuine painful depression, detachment, fear, anxiety, and distress. Nothing in this podcast suggests gender dysphoria is not real, consequential, or concerning. Certainly, no perspective here suggests people struggling with gender dysphoria are crazy, weird, perverted, or otherwise undeserving of caring and kindness.
Think about this. Gender dysphoria is not sinful. It’s a feeling, some say rooted in mental disorder, some in emotional and psychological confusion, but gender dysphoria is just feelings, a subjective confusion, and only that unless acted upon.
People with discordant thoughts about sex and gender need compassion not condemnation. They need love, help, caring, and hope.
This podcast is about gender fluidity and the ideology that has grown up supporting it. That ideology is fast becoming a kind of orthodoxy activists are marketing with religious zeal. Corporations, academia and athletics, health and medicine, the military, and governments have climbed on the bandwagon, all in the name of inclusiveness and non-discrimination.
But let’s think biologically. Approximately 37.2 trillion cells comprise the adult human body. That’s T for trillion, another incredible testimony of the omniscience and omnipotence of our Creator God.
“Each cell of the body contains a full set of chromosomes.”
“Humans have 46 chromosomes in 23 pairs. We inherit 23 chromosomes from our mother and 23 chromosomes from our father. The chromosomes in the first 22 pairs are identical in a normal cell and they are the same in both genders. The 23rd pair is the sex chromosome and therefore determines the sex of the individual. This chromosome is either XX for female or XY for male.”
“Whatever set of chromosomes a person has when they are born cannot be changed. This is because chromosomes are in all the cells that make up our bodies. To change a person’s chromosomes would mean changing trillion of cells! There’s no technology…that can change a chromosome in all of a person’s cells.”
“While the condition of gender dysphoria…is real and deserves sympathy, it does not erase the fact of biological sex. Human beings are male or female down to the level of their DNA, and males and females have different biochemistry even before they are born.”
Consequently, sex is not “assigned” at birth. It begins with conception and can be determined on ultrasounds prior to birth. Sex is literally hard-wired in the human design via the trillions of cells in the human body.
So, one’s sexuality is deeper than anatomy, appearance, feelings, or expression. Our sex is part and parcel of who we are, and it cannot be changed no matter what drugs or hormones we might take and no matter what surgical procedures, including extensive gender reassignment surgery, we might choose to endure.
Remarkable intellect Thomas Sowell once observed, “Reality does not go away when it is ignored.” No amount of Pride parades including transgender people, no number of President Biden’s appointment of trans bureaucrats is ever going to change reality.
Scripture says, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Gen 1:27). This is truth for God is truth. Transgenderism is an attack on the truth of divine design.
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.
© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024
*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 or https://twitter.com/RexMRogers.
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- Written by Rex M. Rogers
Have you wondered if there is an explanation for the upheaval we’re witnessing in American culture these past few months?
Hi, I’m Rex Rogers and this is episode #156 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.
When I was a teenager and young man, there was a fellow who appeared on television every night – Walter Cronkite. By virtue of his professional endeavors and earned reputation he was known for years as “the most trusted man in America.” For nineteen years, he was the anchor for the CBS Evening News and each evening in his deep baritone he’d sign-off with his famous, “And that’s the way it is.” And we believed him. We believed he gave us the truth because we believed in truth, and we trusted his presentation as truth.
Now, there are no Walter Cronkites and we’re swamped with “misinformation” and “disinformation,” politically biased information programs we still call “news,” the wall-to-wall angst of social media, “cheap fakes” videos, and A.I. or artificial intelligence making possible “deep fake” videos wherein people are featured saying outlandish things they never said. Now, we no longer believe there such a thing as truth.
In the New Testament, Jesus is put on trial in front of Roman governor Pontius Pilate who eventually asks the question, “What is truth?” (Jn 18:37-38). It is an existential question all human beings ask. But as English scholar Francis Bacon noted in a year 1625 essay entitled, “On Truth,” Pilate does not hang around to get an answer.
Fast forward to the period called Modernity, stretching from the Enlightenment to post-WWII, people asked the question because they believed in truth. They believed truth could be researched and discovered, and they believed we could do this using human reason, and later science and technology. The 1960s television program, “Star Trek,” perfectly presented this worldview with each episode’s problem eventually resolved by a combination of Captain Kirk’s plucky leadership and Mr. Spock’s logic. Maybe Captain Kirk would sometimes take a risk by “going with his gut,” but for the most part, emotion played a secondary role, even comic relief, coming from Dr. “Bones” McCoy’s needling of Mr. Spock’s rational mind.
Just a decade later, the movie “Star Wars” hit the big screen and in this film series we’re presented with an enormous shift in worldview. While the characters had science and technology, what they relied upon to win their good vs evil morality play was feelings. Now, truth is suspect. Obi-wan Kenobi, the sort of Christ-figure who eventually sacrifices himself for the characters and later returns in the spirit to help them, shared with Luke Skywalker what he called “Truth, from a certain point of view.” He advises Luke, a fledgling Jedi, to “search your feelings” and to “trust the Force,” an energy field that is in all things, including human beings, and a means by which the Jedi can gain power. Truth is not really knowable.
Now what matters is subjective mind control via the Force, a pantheistic idea borrowed from eastern philosophy and religion. Not reason, not science, not Modernity’s search for truth, just feelings. This is postmodernity.
When Oprah Winfrey spoke at the 2018 Golden Globe Awards she said, “Speaking your truth is the most powerful tool we all have.” This is postmodernity. This is the “post-Truth” culture in which we now live.
In this view, as in “Star Wars,” truth is whatever we say it is. Lies then become a way of life.
Lies often have a religious-sounding language, like “Believe in yourself” when Jesus said, “Believe in me.” Like “Follow your heart,” when Scripture says the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked (Jer. 17:9), and Jesus said, “Follow me.” Like “Live your truth,” when Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” Like “I am free to be me,” when Jesus said, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
For Christians who believe in truth, who believe God is truth, our challenge is greater than ever. Where once, during the Modern period, one could speak to another non-Christian about our belief in truth, and whether they accepted or affirmed or believed as we did, they would at least recognize and generally acknowledge that truth exists.
Now, in the Postmodern, “post-Truth” era of moral relativism wherein it is believed nothing can be known for sure and the best one can do is, like Oprah, speak “your truth” or “my truth,” now our challenge is to interact with people who likely do not even acknowledge that anything can be known, that truth is even possible. They are left only with their subjective feelings, uncertainty, and often, anxiety.
And it gets more complicated because by now at least two generations of American youth have attended public schools wherein God, truth, morality, purpose, accountability, and hope have all been undermined, deconstructed, rejected, or destroyed. Gen Z and maybe also many Millennials no longer are certain about anything, least of all truth.
Live your truth versus live the truth. It’s a big difference. No God, they say? Then no truth. No truth? Then there is no morality, science, education, law or order or justice or mercy, aesthetics=beauty or art, trust, purpose or vision or aspiration or meaning or achievement, respect for life or individual dignity, civility, freedom. There is only division, confusion, lawlessness, chaos, insecurity.Post-Truth culture – possibly a new Dark Age. This is America 2024.
America is experiencing Romans 1 come to life via “ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools” Rom. 1:18, 21-22.
Our culture’s view of freedom is somewhat similar. Now it is believed “freedom is the ability to do whatever I want, whenever I want, with whomever I want!” Each individual becomes his own God, master and decider of good and evil. But what the culture promotes as freedom is really addiction and indulgence. It is as Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin” John 8:34. Consequently, there is less freedom and for many, no freedom.
God warned us about how easy it is to get trapped by an Ism, a set of beliefs, values, and choices that lead us onto the broad road to destruction. God 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” Col 2:8.
Jesus warned us about the Devil, the Father of lies. The Word of God warned us about false prophets and teachers, and about the sinful inclinations of our own hearts.
But as Christians, truth-seekers, truth-believers, we know God is truth. We know truth is the unchanging, reliable, ultimate standard by which all things are measured. moral compass, guiding actions and attitudes Truth cannot be relative. It is not a matter of opinion or perspective. If perceived truth is relative, it is not truth. To say there is no truth for all people is to declare a truth. Truth is not subjective or relative, not an opinion or preference. Truth is inescapable because reality is inescapable.
How then do we live in a post-Truth culture?
- Anchor yourself in Truth. “The Gospel is the antidote to a post-truth, post-fact culture.” “Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist,” Eph 6:14. Christianity is based upon objective truth. Jesus died and was resurrected.
- Keep your politics in submission to your faith. Politics is important and can be influential based upon righteous values, but politics is not a panacea for our problems primarily because our problems are mainly spiritual not political.
- Still called to be salt and light.
- Speak the truth in love.
- Be prepared to suffer. In 1 Peter mentions the word suffering 16 times. Suffering = persecution, trials, temptations, insults, and evil acts intended to harm and destroy, 2 Tim 3:12. If we live as truth-tellers, then we can expect pushback. Jesus said, “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you” John 15:18.
“Our hope comes from outside any system or person because it comes from Christ. Hope is the ultimate antidote to cynicism. In a world that’s growing more cynical by the minute, hope is one of the most radical things you can do.”
In Roman times, soldiers developed a phrase for conveying their highest commitment when they said “Goodbye” or went into battle. They said to one another, “Strength and Honor” and tapped their chests. Perhaps Christians should develop a phrase to that conveys our beliefs. We could say, “Truth and Freedom” and tap our chests.
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.
© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2024
*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 or https://twitter.com/RexMRogers.