By Brian Massie, A Watchman on the Wall
and Leonard Gilbert, Bible Scholar

The November 7th election and passage of Issue 1 has most Bible believers shaking their heads in disbelief that our State, our society, has accepted the “right” to murder a child, up to and including, the date of birth! It appears the mantra “my body, my choice”, is now the foundational principle, the cornerstone if you will, for the State of Ohio moving forward.

It is our belief that we will rue the day that we accepted child sacrifice as normal behavior. Are we then to assume that there is no “line in the sand”, and all, heretofore, perversions are fair game? Are pedophilia and pederasty now acceptable? How about bestiality? What about taking pictures in bathrooms without the individual’s consent?

Oh, yes, evil works in incremental steps!

We believe that we have lost our moral compass, and we see and hear signs of it throughout our government schools, and questionable moral decisions by school administrators and school board members.

We wondered what role do our churches play in today’s society? Is the Catholic church preaching the revealed Word of God, or have they succumbed to the culture so as not to offend anyone? Have the Protestant churches bought into “do not judge”, “turn the other cheek”, “love conquers all” preaching that basically turns churches into feel good places of worship that only wishes to be salvation ministries?

We asked ourselves if the churches in Lake County impacted the voters on Issue 1? We know the Catholic churches had some “Vote No” signs, but were the parishioners listening? We analyzed the votes on Issue 1 by polling locations. Here are the results of our analysis. Please remember that the “YES” vote authorized the sacrificing of children through abortion.

We freely admit that this is not a scientific study since not all voters voting at a church polling location goes to that church, or any church for that matter. However, we think it does provide a solid indication of the mindset of the majority of church goers, regardless of religious affiliation.

Overall, Lake County was 3.72% percentage points higher than the overall State average. The Catholic church polling locations were the highest percentage at 62.09%.

Here is what the numbers tell us:

1. We have compromised with evil.
2. We are destroying the next generation.
3. We are causing the little ones to stumble.
4. We shall reap what we have sown.
5. There are false prophets among us.
6. We have turned our back to God.

In summary, the churches have failed us.

God may not have left the building, but many people have turned their backs to God and have accepted paganism! They are worshipping the creation and not the creator!

*****

Leonard Gilbert gives his Biblical views on what has happened to our society.

We are an ungodly society (no fear of God), an uneducated society (thanks to Marxist/socialistic training from the public education system), and we have an impotent church (primarily internally focused).

Ungodly Society

To break this down further, when we consider the fear of God, Proverbs 1:7 states the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.   But fools despise wisdom and instruction.   

The first commandment states that you shall have no other Gods before me.   The second commandment states that you shall not make unto thee any graven images.

Our nation as a whole has allowed anything in the name of religion to exist.  This whole notion that one can worship God as he or she fits does not sit well with the God of this Universe because he clearly states that he is a Jealous God.

Deuteronomy 6:15 states (for the Lord your God is a jealous God among you), lest the anger of the Lord your God be aroused against you and destroy you from the face of the earth. 

Do people understand the seriousness of that commandment?  To get a sense of how far we have strayed away from the Protestant Reformation Era, just take a look at all the different sects that lay claim that they have the truth.  It is very easy to see devastating impact of the Enlightenment Era (17th and 18th century).   As for the Protestant Reformation Era, this country was built by biblically literate citizens.  The Puritans applied the Bible to their vocation, marriage, economics, family, education, politics, social ethics, social action, as well as personal piety, devotion, worship, and theological study, a movement in which the Bible was central to everything.  Contrary to the Enlightenment Era, which was man centered and not God centered.  

This Era also fueled human reasoning even with salvation (not new but a resurgence), natural rights (fuels abortion), and fueled worldviews (Darwinism, Marxism, Socialism) which are all anti God and just another religion.  In a nutshell, since we are a culture of death (via abortion), that confirms we have no fear of God when we are told in His word not to murder.   

Uneducated Society

Now how does education (specifically public education), play a role in the expansion or growth of the Enlightment Era?  First of all, education is inherently religious. 

Proverbs 9:10

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.

Proverbs 4:5

Get Wisdom!  Get Understanding!

Do not forget, nor turn away from the words of my mouth.

If you recall, the Protestants made a break with the Catholic church because of doctrinal issues (which still exists today) and that was the whole basis of the Exodus from Europe.   However, when they were thinking of public education, the impetus included religious reasons.  There were some differences in how they thought this should be managed.  But there was always the underpinning of independence and self-government as opposed to state control (John Calvin).  This is very different than the Marxist/Socialist view.  

When the education movement was highjacked by the Progressives/Marxist and other man centered religious influences, public education was to be controlled by the State.   So, from its very inception with that thought process, public education is incapable of existing without socialism.  And it is still that way today.  

Joel McDurmon stated in his book Restoring America (One County at a Time) that the very nature of the system requires the government to claim ownership over at least a portion of every individual’s property.  In addition to that, the most significant devastating impact would be to use the classroom to promote the socialist agenda.

 As Hitler stated, you can have the adults, I just need the children.   As you know with any communist movement, the goal is to destroy the church, the family, and businesses.   And you are trying to tell me that this is not religious?  You can see this unfolding right before your eyes.  Most people that were educated in the public system were well trained communists and did not even know it.  And some still don’t.  And by the way, this is not exclusive to pagans or non-Christians.  Many so-called Christians have been duped as well.  The communists have done their job.  They have been so effective, that not only are we espousing communist principles, we would die to keep them.  Now that is insanity!!   Couple that with an ungodly society and I am sure you can paint the picture. 

Just a few things that should be noted (1789-1835):

New England had public or common schools that existed with some tax support. (Some people still wanted government support, but it was not by popular demand)

The rest of the US educational systems were operating with little to no interference from government. 

By 1720, Boston has more private schools than public.  It was very common that parents educated their children via home tutors, private academies, and church schools. And there was not an issue with educating the poor children when you have a prosperous society. 

An Impotent Church

If you take a step back in history you will find that the church used to be the conscience of the state.  Our very system of government models the characteristics of the church.  The principle of how church members elected ministers and officers for church was extended to government for the election of governors and legislators.  That model came out of the system of self-government which was also the basis for education.  As stated earlier, as we became more man centered, there were many religious movements and various sects that started to expand.  One powerful movement was the rise of Unitarianism.   

It first arose in Europe, and it was a direct attack against Calvinism.  It was man centered.  There was a direct takeover of Harvard by 1805. 

Now as for how the church operated, it should be noted that there were some differences in structure, such as church polity, doctrine, etc., but the core foundation of the total depravity of man was not a foreign concept.  Over time with man centered thinking and communist even infiltrating the church, many myths started to become prevalent in the church.  Some of the key ones that should be noted was as follows:

– The Bible is only concerned with salvation.

– Religion and politics should be kept separate.

The Bible is only concerned with salvation myth.

God put Adam and Eve on the earth for action.   Gen 2:15 states that they were supposed to cultivate and keep the garden.  Christian responsibility did not go away.  God is the maker of Heaven and earth, and he desires that his will be done on both.

Matthew 6:10:

Your kingdom come.
Your will be done
On earth as it is in heaven.

The command to subdue the earth means “bringing all earth’s systems and processes into a state of optimum productivity and utility, offering the greatest glory to God and benefit to mankind.”  (Henry Morris – The Biblical Basis for Modern Science)

While Jesus was on the earth, he worked as a carpenter. This reinforces the work mandate from the Garden (physical labor).  He received early training at home.  He also healed people and provided food for the masses.   The Bible also states that we are to take care of the widows and orphans.  There is action associated with Salvation. 

The Bible message of Salvation is the starting point and central to the Bible.  But it does not end there.  A baby Christian has to grow and dig deeper.  (Hebrews 5:11-14).  If you do not understand the Bible, morality will make no sense.  God defines what is normal!

Religion and politics should be kept separate.

When I pose the question can morality be legislated, the first response is always no. However, the not so obvious answer is yes.  Law is nothing more than legislated morality.  All law is a reflection of some moral code. There are tens of thousands of laws on the books that tell each and every one of us how we should live — from how fast we can drive our cars to how much money we have to pay in taxes (Gary DeMar – Myths, Lies, and Half-Truths). 

So then, it’s not a question of whether morality will be legislated, but whose view of morality will be legislated? Legislating morality is an inescapable concept.   You have to decide if something is right or wrong. 

Another question that also arises is whether or not there is a separation of church and State?   The surprising answer is yes.  The church has a specific role and the government has a different role.  But is that the right question to ask?  The right question that should be asked is whether or not there is separation between religion and state? The answer is NO!  It is impossible to separate religion from anything. 

Some religious or moral system is giving meaning to all laws and courts no matter how loudly legislators may scream that they are being “religiously neutral.”  (Gary DeMar – God and Government – Volume 1).  So, with that in mind, the reality is that while there is a functional separation between Church and State, they are not independent of each other.   Because the Founding Fathers were aware of this, a little unknown fact was that the first amendment was influenced by the fact that they wanted the church to be able to speak freely because that is where the truth could be found.  

What about the voice of the church? A little history here might help.  Most people do not realize that when Hitler rose to power, he was elected to office.  The people were all duped thinking that he could save the day because of the economic disaster facing Germany.  And by the way, we are not far from it.  In any event, the first thing that Hitler knew that he would have to do to get into office was that he went on a mission to shut down the church. 

Many pastors paid the ultimate price if they were saying things from the pulpit to expose him.   Does this remind you of anything that was done here to muzzle the church?   Even though it holds no water based on the original intent of the constitution, we have bought into it hook line and sinker.  Even Abraham Lincoln, known to many as honest Abe, had pastors arrested, and shut down printing presses if they did not adhere to his way of thinking.  

In a nutshell, when a pastor says that the church is only supposed to preach the gospel, the question that I have for him is what is the gospel.  If religion is at the core, Christianity needs to be the driver for law and politics (It should be the only foundation).   The Bible is to be used as a guideline for government and the people. 

Christians have the duty to speak the truth. 

Preachers and teachers are not to “shrink from declaring the whole purpose of God” (Acts 20:27). If a topic is in the Bible, then pastors are obligated to preach on it. The clergy cannot faithfully expound the Word of God without dealing with virtually every social and political question.  The Bible speaks not only about salvation but about God’s law with respect to the state, money, land, natural resources, just weights and measures, criminal law, and a variety of other subjects.  The clergy are not to intermeddle in politics, but they must proclaim the Word of God. 

There is a difference: political intermeddling is a concern over partisan issues: preaching should be concerned with Biblical doctrines irrespective of person and parties. If you have not heard all of this from the pulpit, you have not heard the whole gospel! (R.J Rushdoony)

This summary is not here to provide a message of gloom and doom.  But I can comfortably tell you that God has made it clear in His Word that there are consequences for sin.   Not just on an individual basis.  He states the same for nations as well.  So, we are well on our way for a massive whooping. 

In the end, there will be a fear of God.  I just pray that you are one of the souls that will be spared.  When most people think of hell, they think of fire and brimstone.  But God can unleash hell right here on earth (Deuteronomy 28:47-48).  And for those who are waiting for the rapture (which I have not been able to find that word in the Bible), just remember that when Rome was destroyed, even the Christians had to endure the suffering as well.  He also punished the Israelites when they were disobedient.  

When God makes a promise, He fulfills it.  We are basically, like the Israelites of old.  So, this is nothing new.   

The end of the world, as how the masses see it from a human perspective and with their corrupted minds, may not be in their near future.   However, we know that a spanking (retribution) is imminent. We need to repent (turn away from the things that are offensive to God) on an individual and national scale. 

Unless the Lord saves us, we are doomed. 

*****

Thanks to our Geauga Lobbyist

https://answersingenesis.org/family/marriage/paganism-and-the-transexual-revolution/

Paganism and the Transsexual Revolution

by Simon Turpin on October 22, 2019

For much of the twentieth century, the western world lived under the umbrella of the Christian worldview. People, even though they may not have been Christian, generally built their presuppositions about the world on the Christian worldview.

For example, marriage would have been rightfully understood to be one man and woman united in a lifelong covenant under God (see Matthew 19:3–9). However, the western world now rejects the idea that there is one eternal, true, and living creator

God who has revealed himself to his creation and defined what morality, marriage, and sexuality is. While many things have no doubt helped erode the Christian worldview in the west, there can be no doubt that the Darwinian revolution that began in the 1800s paved the way for the sexual revolution that took place in the 1960s.1 Today, we are seeing the fruit of the sexual revolution reaped in western culture as many of the radicals of the 1960s have long occupied influential places in government, universities, and media and have used these platforms to spread their worldview. In our modern western culture, the twisted and corrupt changes that are taking place display themselves in the following behaviors (among others):

• Homosexuality
• Bisexuality
• Polygamy
• Pansexuality
• Transgenderism
• Transvestitism
• Non-binarism

Where did all these beliefs come from? The current sexual agenda that is being promoted in our culture by these graduates of the sixties culture is part and parcel of a neo-pagan view of the world that has shaped the current millennial generation.2 What is happening now in western culture is not just the influence of secularism but also the return of ancient paganism (i.e., those who worship creation). Although many may view paganism as an outdated religion that was practiced by people many thousands of years ago, it is alive and well today. In his book The Other Worldview, theologian Peter Jones points this out:

“The sexual agenda is just a visible symbol of a powerful, century-long deconstruction of the Christian worldview and its replacement with a pagan [monistic] cosmology, of which sexuality is a sacrament.”

The neo-pagan worldview is essentially monistic (attributing oneness or singleness to existence) and is founded upon an eastern worldview. The monistic worldview “. . . sees the world as self-creating (or perpetually existing) and self-explanatory. Everything is made up of the same stuff, whether matter, spirit, or a mixture. . . . Although there is apparent differentiation and even hierarchy, all distinctions are, in principle, eliminated, and everything has the same worth.”4 It is important to understand that the practice of homosexuality and transgenderism have not appeared in a vacuum, but the celebration of them is the perfect expression of a neo-pagan (monistic) worldview.5 It has even been noted, for example, that the worldview behind transgenderism embraces the ancient philosophy of Gnosticism, in which the real self is something other than a material body.6

Nothing New Under the Sun

The different sexual identities that are being promoted and celebrated by many in our culture today are shreds of evidence that the west has now adopted a neo-pagan worldview: the worship of creation. In Romans 1, Paul specifically focuses on the idolatry of the pagan world resulting from their suppression of God’s revelation in creation (Romans 1:18–20). The outcome of this suppression of the truth was foreseen:

Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen (Romans 1:24–25, NKJV).

The Bible makes it clear that there are only two worldviews: worship of the creature (in a thousand different forms) or worship of the Creator.7 The reason that there are only two worldviews is because there are only two kinds of mind in this world: the debased mind (Romans 1:28; cf. 8:7) and the discerning mind (Romans 12:2).8 The debased mind, trapped in sin, believes the lie and worships and serves the creature rather than the Creator. Whereas, the discerning mind has been transformed, having been freed from sin, and is now free to worship and serve the Creator. In order to remove the Christian worldview, the neo-pagan worldview must erode the distinction between the Creator and the creature. Once people reject God as Creator and instead turn to worship of the creation, this leads to sexual revolution:

For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done (Romans 1:26–28).

All for One?

It is no surprise that, since the beginning of the sexual revolution in the 1960s, we have witnessed a progressive public sexual tsunami. All the above beliefs are now part and parcel of the western worldview and examples of how morality has become so twisted and corrupted. Cultural approval of issues such as homosexuality and transgenderism is a progressive development of a whole analysis of monistic thinking (the denial of distinctions between God and the world). The goal of neo-paganism is to relativize everything that seems different, to join the opposites and get rid of the distinctions God has made in his creation because of their belief that all is “one” (i.e., non-binary = not two). For example, heterosexuality celebrates otherness (Greek, héteros = other) whereas homosexuality (Greek, homo = same) celebrates the sameness of everything, which is the definition of the neo-pagan worldview. In the biblical worldview, however, distinctions are the product of the Creator’s work in creation:

And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness (Genesis 1:4).

And God said, “Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.”. . . And God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas (Genesis 1:6, 9–10).

And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. . .And God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night —and the stars. And God set them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good (Genesis 1:14–18).

And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds. . . Then God said, “Let us make man in our image. . . ” (Genesis 1:25–26).

In Genesis 1, God separates things in creation by putting them in their proper places, and he also creates different kinds of creatures, and then declares his creation to be “very good” (Genesis 1:31). It is important to realize that distinctions are the essence of Christianity and the creation:

• Creator and creature
• Christ and Satan
• Monotheism and polytheism
• Love of God and love of neighbour
• Life and death
• Truth and falsehood
• Holiness and sin
• Heaven and hell

Basic Distinctions

Perhaps the most important distinction in Genesis 1 is God’s creation of mankind:

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them (Genesis 1:27).

In Genesis 1 and 2, there are several things about the distinction between male and female that are important for us to understand as they are being eroded away today by the neo-pagan worldview. First, the distinction between male and female is a biological reality and not something that is socially or self-constructed. What made Adam and Eve “male and female” is that they were told to be “fruitful and multiply and fill the earth” (Genesis 1:28). The fact that the man and woman can procreate tells us what God means by “male and female” as this is what their reproductive systems have been designed to do. In Genesis 2:18, God told Adam: “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” When God sought a “helper” fit for Adam, he chose neither an animal nor an exact duplicate of the man, but instead he created a woman—uniquely formed for intimacy, companionship, co-workmanship, and pro-creation (Genesis 2:22). God joined together the first man Adam (1 Corinthians 15:45) and the first woman, who was taken from his side, called Eve (Genesis 3:20). The fact that Adam and Eve are made for each other is indicated in the wordplay of man (iysh) and woman (ishshah) (see Genesis 2:23). This specific association is a reflection of the fact that when a man and a woman leave their father and mother, they become “one flesh” (Genesis 2:24; cf. Matthew 19:5). Only a female “helper” could help Adam fulfil the command to be “fruitful and multiply”, make Adam recognize the “one flesh” aspect of the marriage covenant and is a social manifestation of a biological reality as she is able to do what Adam cannot do–in that she can bear children. The distinction between maleness and femaleness is not self-constructed, but rather is constructed by God and is to be celebrated as being very good.

One Solution

The one solution to this problem of the neo-pagan worldview is the biblical worldview, as it rightly sees distinctions in the world: the main one being that God is our Creator and mankind is his creation. In the biblical worldview, mankind’s main problem is that our sin separates us from a holy God, and therefore we are dependent on him and cannot save ourselves (see Ephesians 2:8–9). The answer to this problem is the act of God, whereby he reconciles his creatures back to himself through the death and resurrection of his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ (see Colossians 1:20).

*****

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