[pieceofthepuzzle]

I don't think it's been just a case of the world turning its back on God or Christianity. IMHO, Christianity has been targeted by the left for much of the last century, and it continues. The approach was to discredit Christianity as a superstitious belief system that is perpetuated in large measure among the ‘uneducated’, and that can't stand up to ‘intellectual’ scrutiny. This strategy has had an impact. Ironically, Islam, with the clinging to barbaric practices of centuries past, is less scrutinized by the ‘intelligentsia’ than is Christianity.

Ironically, it is actually the dogma of the pseudo-intellectuals in society that is the most vulnerable to critical thought, and this scrutiny is what needs to happen. Political correctness is just one element of an extensive philosophical construct that has been perpetuated in Western society as ‘modern’ and ‘progressive’. IMHO, we should be moving forward, and our understanding of the world growing from generation to generation, but the way to do this is not by suppressing conversation and individual thought, and not by propagating a specific way of thinking such as that which is ubiquitous on almost every college campus.

To me, God is truth, and to be a truth seeker is the highest order of intellectual activity. Further, fervent secularism is also a ‘belief’ system, and requires a lot of blind faith. To stop the slide away from spirituality of which you write, IMHO we need to fight back against the false characterizations of spiritual thought and faith as anti-modern and anti-intellectual. Nothing could be further from the truth.

[Jim W N]

Go for it my FRiend. I’m with you.

However, I also find that it helps me to wage this good fight of faith and freedom with an awareness of the overall context within which I am living and dealing. It helps me to feel less like I am beating the air or shadow boxing because I feel I’ve got a pretty good grip on what I’m dealing with. So some time ago, I asked God to show me how HE sees these times we are living.

I believe we are in the end times and Jesus’ return is imminent and the End is at hand. But even though it could happen at any time, I have reason to believe it won’t be for a few decades yet. I also think the Book of Revelation gives us insight into the state of the world just before Jesus comes back to take us to be with him - the last church age - the Laodicean Church age where Jesus is on the OUTSIDE knocking and asking to be let back in.

I believe this godless age began around 1900 and is characterized by a spirit of anti-christ that basically shuts out Jesus around the world because, it says, “I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing [including God]” (Rev 3:17).

But I also think we have a remnant of the preceding Philadelphia Church, the alive church, and I have hope that God will send out his light one last time to round up all he can before it all comes crashing down. We all have our part. May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ shine brightly through us in these last days.