Sin, wickedness and depravity affect all of us. If we say one thing and do something else, we have only ourselves to blame when you criticize us — quite correctly so — for not following our own standards of right and wrong.
Liberalism does not believe in objective standards of right and wrong. Neither of you are liberals, or you wouldn't be here. But please ask yourselves whether your form of secular conservatism is simply what people not that many years ago would have called licentiousness.
109 posted on Mon Sep 17 2012 14:34:17 GMT-0500 (Central Daylight Time) by wagglebee: “I think it is pretty safe to say that Christianity (Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox) has been under constant and escalating attack by satanic secularism for the past two and a half centuries.”
You are sure right about that! And what Vaquero and Trailhkr1 are saying is very good proof of what happens when we succumb to those constant and escalating attacks.
112 posted on Mon Sep 17 2012 18:24:33 GMT-0500 (Central Daylight Time) by trailhkr1: “You are generalizing. Not all people think this way. Most couples still wait for marriage to have kids.”
Check the rates of births to unmarried couples. I wish your statement were true.
I'm guessing your intent was to say that most men and women who are in committed relationships would prefer to wait to have a child until they get married. If so, we agree; things aren't yet as bad as they could be. However, would you not agree that lots of babies are born to women who are not part of a “couple” because they weren't in a committed relationship or because their boyfriends got cold feet and walked out when their girlfriends got pregnant?
112 posted on Mon Sep 17 2012 18:24:33 GMT-0500 (Central Daylight Time) by trailhkr1: “A couple in my hometown have lived together for 35+ years, 4 kids. He is a contractor by trade and has practically rebuilt the church they attend for no payment and his wife is the lightning rod in the church on various meetings and getting things done. Do you really think God looks at them less over another married Christian couple who just attend church but don't do much?”
What I think doesn't count. What God thinks does count. And he hasn't made an amendment to the Ten Commandments.
Important questions need to be asked about why this man and women are so active in their church. Good works don't get people into heaven, and **ESPECIALLY** not good works done in an attempt to “balance out” other sinful activity.
Look, I don't know these people and I don't want to make assumptions about motives. I don't know why they have lived together for 35 years and had four kids without getting married, and I don't know why their church has tolerated this situation. I'd want to know them and ask questions first. Without knowing the answers to some important questions there are limits to what can be said about these people, but it certainly appears that no matter what their reasons for living together without marrying, a lot of blame belongs to the pastor who has allowed this situation to go on for so many years.
Would we tolerate a man and woman openly shoplifting from Wal-Mart for 35 years (eighth commandment)?
How about a man and woman openly killing people for 35 years (sixth commandment)?
How about someone lying and slandering fellow church members for 35 years (ninth commandment) or coveting other church members’ houses, wives, or means of transportation (tenth commandment)? Oh, that one’s harder — too many churches **DO** tolerate what they call gossiping and backbiting, not realizing it is often lying, and too many churches do tolerate a “Keeping up with the Joneses” attitude which turns Sunday morning church into a fashion parade.
More could be said on this, but those of us who are (correctly) quick to criticize Vaquero, Trailhkr1, and others for their open support of Seventh Commandment violations need to make sure we aren't guilty of tolerating violations of other commandments, using the same logic as them but applying it to different commandments. And that's a warning to myself just as much if not more than to others.
112 posted on Mon Sep 17 2012 18:24:33 GMT-0500 (Central Daylight Time) by trailhkr1: “When I was still religious in college my sophmore and junior years I was very active in “Campus Crusade for Christ”. None of the people in that organization were slooting around/hooking up with randoms but 75-80% of couples in a relationship were having premarital sex...and that is a realistic figure. I lived in a coed dorm with many of these people and saw it. That is just how it is today. I have only 2 guys in HS/college and the workforce who said they were waiting until marriage.”
You had the integrity to admit you are no longer “religious” and have left what I'm guessing you would call “organized religion.” Have you considered that maybe the hypocrisy of these people in Campus Crusade played a part in that decision?
I generally avoid anecdotal arguments since my experience is my own and doesn't necessarily prove anything to anyone else who hasn't shared that experience. That's a key part of the problem with liberalism, by the way — focusing on sharing of experience rather than teaching fixed standards of right and wrong.
However, my experience with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship and Campus Crusade for Christ was very different from yours. I was an IVCF member at two different schools (I transferred from one college to another when I changed my major) and at the first college I was close friends with a number of Campus Crusade people. The chapters I saw of both organizations were composed of high-demand, high-commitment people who were living lifestyles that were radically different from their fellow college students.
All three chapters were pretty strongly criticized by “moderate” Christians on both campuses for being composed of “radical” and “extreme” people — sort of the way GOP-elite and RINOs look at Free Republic. There is simply no way that either of those organizations would have tolerated a member sleeping with their girlfriend or boyfriend.
I'm painfully aware of what has happened to InterVarsity in more recent years. I know enough staff people in Campus Crusade that what you are saying surprises me, but I have no reason to disbelieve what you're saying. Assuming what you say is true — and it probably is — the student leaders in that Campus Crusade chapter and the staff member assigned to that chapter have some serious accounting they're going to have to be doing to the Christ who died on the cross to save sinners from their sins.
113 posted on Mon Sep 17 2012 18:47:08 GMT-0500 (Central Daylight Time) by trailhkr1: “A year or so ago my gf and I were going to work out about 5:30 am and we pass the house of the associate pastor of a local nondenominational church. He is a very strong Christian and well liked. He is in his early 30’s. We know him well because he works out with us on occasion. Saw HIS girlfriend leaving the side door of his house walking to her car parked out front with DEW all over the windshield......we still laugh about that one.”
Your story proves a point you probably did not intend to make.
Non-believers watch the conduct of Christians and especially of Christian leaders. I don't know what this youth pastor was doing with his girlfriend in that house overnight (though your guess is probably correct). I have no desire to make excuses for his behavior. What I do know is that youth pastor, far from being a “strong Christian,” has given you and your girlfriend a reason to laugh at him long after the event.
Your stories are a clear warning to the rest of us that when we're tempted to compromise, we'd better remember that the world is watching what we do and they will laugh at us if we say one thing and do something else.
Look, Trailhkr1, I was converted out of a non-Christian environment. I'm not any kind of angel, and I'm certainly not naive — I am well aware of how much wickedness is out there.
You've shared some stories. Here's one of mine. I'm writing an article this morning on a mother who is an Army civilian employee who provided alcohol to a teenage sex party in her home involving her own daughter and numerous other teenagers, probably somewhere in excess of twenty different kids having group sex. Three of the situations involved consensual sex with minors that are considered statutory rape; the other sexual activity apparently involved people who were close enough in age that it wasn't statutory rape.
Is that enough to prove my point that I'm not some Pollyanna pie-in-the-sky naive Christian who doesn't know what goes on in the world? If not, I could cite hundreds of other sex crimes I've covered over the last quarter-century, up to and including mothers photographing their young daughters having sex with dogs, and the pastor of a very large church being deposed for “gross sexual misconduct” with at least 19 and probably 21 different women in his church.
While I didn't have sex with anyone until my wedding night, that was mostly because as a non-Christian other “socially acceptable” sins were dominating my life. Sins tend to cancel each other out, and if someone is dedicating his life to the pursuit of power and prestige, they're likely to avoid doing things which put those goals at risk.
What the sins I was committing as a non-Christian focused on greed and power, they were just as evil in God's eyes.
God's standards are very, very high. Gross sexual immorality is just one of many things tearing apart the United States, but it's not the only one.
As Christians, we need to pay close attention to what Wagglebee wrote. He is absolutely right that Christianity “has been under constant and escalating attack by satanic secularism for the past two and a half centuries.” Sexual immorality is an important arrow in the devil's quiver, but it is not the only one.
verbose...ain’t ya?
I grew up in a very strict Christian home and attended Catholic grade school from grades 1-8.
You've shared some stories. Here's one of mine. I could cite hundreds of other sex crimes I've covered over the last quarter-century, up to and including mothers photographing their young daughters having sex with dogs, and the pastor of a very large church being deposed for “gross sexual misconduct” with at least 19 and probably 21 different women in his church.
These are very serious crimes and no sane person thinks these are acceptable..but to compare these examples to 2 couples having premarital sex in a loving, committed relationship is a vast stretch.
I don't know why they have lived together for 35 years and had four kids without getting married, and I don't know why their church has tolerated this situation. but it certainly appears that no matter what their reasons for living together without marrying, a lot of blame belongs to the pastor who has allowed this situation to go on for so many years.
It's none of the pastors business and the arrangement is between the couple and God. Lot of people do way worse sins than living together(that no one knows about) and still go to church. If a pastor started checking people at the door for "sins" the churches would be empty.
As for you examples of the 6, 8 and 9 Commandments who is not against them?? And the seventh as well (adultery).
Early biblical talk about the 7th Commandment related to adultery with people having EXTRAmarital sex. Heck even in early Roman times it was NOT illegal for a husband to have sex with a slave or an unmarried woman. I believe early Judaism did not condemn sex outside a married situation.i.e two unmarried people.
TBH I go back and forth regarding my belief in God but in a nutshell I would think God looks at the whole persons life, how they led it, treated other people, helped people who are less fortunate, and does not sweat the small stuff (couple people getting a little nookie who love each other).