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Enough is enough-- a layman's view

Joan Parker

Introduction

Thinking of our task, I find Paul's "ambassador" concept (2 Cor 5:18-20) very helpful. Ambassadors need to be faithful to their commission and they also need to communicate so that their message is heard. There is no point in upsetting somebody simply by personal abrasiveness, but neither is there any point in so wrapping up what is said that the message is lost in a fog of amiable confusion. Those who watched "Middlemarch" earlier this year will know exactly what I mean when I say that Mr Brooke is no rôle model for an ambassador. Ambassadors have sometimes to say hard things. They need to be certain of their message and of their right to give it. As we hold on to this idea of ambassadorship, it is also relevant to give thought to tactics - are we being reactive, or proactive? Or like the little Dutch hero, are we in danger of running out of fingers with which to plug the holes in the sea defences? At which points do we say "That is enough" - to ourselves, and also to the world?

I therefore want to think first about the nature of the cultural territory we are operating in and the implications for us as Christians; then to look at the key areas of women's ministry, marriage and the family, and singleness; and finally consider briefly what can be done to counter the drift.

Drift is a fundamental problem for us all. It is easy in a busy life to be carried along on a tide of cultural assumptions without realising the dangers ahead. We are very familiar with the culture in which we live, we are surrounded by it; its messages infiltrate from newspapers, magazines, TV, radio, advertisements. Its assumptions begin to take hold. We begin to accommodate - in how we live, how we think, though perhaps not in doctrine - yet. We do not notice how very alien this territory is. I remember singing as a very young Christian the chorus "This world is not my home, I'm only passing through" - but that biblical concept of being strangers and pilgrims is one we can do with keeping in mind. There is a real sense in which we don't belong - we are here with a mission. And this "difference" can be very attractive. Rodney Clapp in "Families at the Crossroads" points out that people searching for an identity will be attracted to a community that has some sense of where it has come from and where it is going. It is very important that we hold on to our purpose and integrity.

Five secular hazards

There are several aspects of current secular attitudes and assumptions that are particularly important in thinking about drift, the danger of accommodation of faith and practice. Most are far from new; in the main they are the outworking of unregenerate human nature, a factor which is both a warning beacon and a relief - a warning because as Paul points out we always live in the tension between our sinful and our Spirit-led natures, and a relief because this awareness clarifies the issues.

  1. First, individualism, the tendency to take to oneself the absolute right of self-determination, the denial of the validity of external authority and obligation. We see this in Eden, when the woman "saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food, pleasing to the eye, and desirable for gaining wisdom" - and decided to eat it. We see it through the rise and fall of Israel and Judah, always in terms of morality - "each of us has turned to his own way ..." and "Israel's watchmen ... lack understanding; they all turn to their own way, each seeks his own gain ... saying let us drink our fill ... tomorrow will be like today or even far better" (Is 56)

    It is not new. Individualism is always modern; it dresses up as brave and heroic. In reality, anyone who has had extended contact with toddlers can recognise it as immaturity. Although we still suffer in the church in some ways from the effects of the Age of Enlightenment, the eighteenth century did produce Edmund Burke, the political theorist, who recognised the issues here and expressed them with clarity:

    "Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites ... Society cannot exist unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere, and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without".

    He saw the answer in terms of Reason; in fact the real answers are far less flattering to human pride.

    Unrestrained individualism produces, and in turn is produced by, a loosening of moral ties and a lessened respect for authority - something very evident in the 1960s and 70s. There is not time to trace the threads in detail, but this was the period that saw the introduction of the Steel Abortion Act (1967), the widespread availability of the Pill, wide dissemination of feminist propaganda, and not least, the publication of "Honest to God". At the same time, taxation support began to tilt away from the family. Lifestyle has become increasingly a "private" as opposed to a community concern, - though interest of a prurient nature seems insatiable. Between 1961 and 1989 the divorce rate increased from 27,000 to 164,000; the rate of remarriage after divorce, and of cohabiting before marriage both increased tenfold.

    Individualism at this level inevitably involves a loss of moral absolutes - the emergence of relative truth; - what is true for you may not be true for me - which begins to make nonsense of meaning as well as morality. If truth is not true, what is it? Laymen spend most of their lives in secular settings and these are pervasive and superficially attractive ideas. In our churches, do we see any of these relativisms influencing attitudes to scriptural standards of living? to the interpretation of scripture? to commitment of time and money to Christian service? to authority? to issues of guidance - "God told me to ..."?

    However, the New Testament speaks of the church in terms of a body, a building - we are meant to be interdependent parts of a whole. Yes, we are individually loved by God, with each hair counted, but we are not meant to be isolated, independent, individualistic in our Christian living. We need the abrasiveness as well as the strength of other Christians; and we need the accountability of mutual dependence.

  2. Hard on the heels of individualism comes preoccupation with self, self-fulfilment as a goal, me-centredness - one of the major dynamics of the secular world. Bookshops have whole sections devoted to self-fulfilment, self-development, realisation of potential and so on. They are often sited beside things like astrology and eastern mysticism. It is part of the pull of the New Age movement. The Times recently carried this comment on the New Age:

    "Senior figures in the Church of England are particularly concerned about the influence of New Age philosophies on the liberal wing of the church, where some vicars no longer believe in any transcendent God, and others endorse New Age theories of a feminine god and the primacy of the individual" (16 June 94).

    To look within oneself rather than to the authority of scripture is to court disaster. I read the other day about a holiday package concerned with "developing poise, charm and a magic personality". The brochure goes on:

    "many people do not realise how much they could influence others simply by what they say and how they say it. Those who realise this radiate enthusiasm, hold the attention of their listeners with bright, sparkling conversation that attracts friends and opportunities wherever they go ..."

    Preoccupation with self comes in spiritual clothes too. Christian bookshops seem to carry large numbers of this sort of title, from "100 ways to find peace", to "Free to be slim" and "Finding the love of your life". I am not saying that it is wrong to want to fulfil one's potential, develop one's gifts, find healing. I spend a lot of time helping Christians with these things. The question is to do with motivation (what is wholeness for?) and with focus (on oneself or on Christ?). The Christian life is full of paradox. It was Jesus who said "Whoever wants to save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for me will find it". It is the principle of Philippians 2, where we see Jesus himself raised "to the highest place", via humility and relinquishment of rights. We are required to look outward in service, to be Christ-centred, not me-centred. But this is not the world's way, and "what's in it for me?" is a powerful force in human nature. I came across this account of one church's approach to giving:

    The members of St Luke's Lutheran Church have a money-back guarantee. They donate to the church for 90 days, then, if they think they have made a mistake, or did not receive a blessing, they can have their money back. The programme is called "God's guarantee", and the pastor is confident it will work. "We trust God to keep his promises so much, that we are offering this money-back policy", he said.

    The language and values of the market-place. We have probably all had the experience of God's overflow of generosity as we give to him - but do we give in order to get back? Is this what Jesus was commending when he noticed the poor widow making her offering in the temple? Is it Christian - or secular?

  3. Preoccupation with "me" has insidious effects on society at large and no one who opens a newspaper or hears news broadcasts can be unaware of the pervasiveness of the present day insistence on "rights" (and the allied concept of "discrimination"). But in any society, if rights are not balanced by responsibilities, they nurture discontent and envy. There is a lack of balance. The arguments are often specious. I shall consider later how this area has been particularly evident in the discussion on gender issues in the church.

  4. Language becomes a casualty, something evident today in the tyranny of "political correctness". It is easy to laugh at the wilder extremes of the movement - where "bald" becomes "follically challenged", "disabled" becomes "differently abled", "ugly" - "aesthetically challenged", where it is no longer acceptable to use the terms "deaf to argument" and "man-hours". Some of this is simply a well-meaning but muddled wish to avoid causing offence. However, changing the label doesn't alter the condition, so that what begins as purely descriptive becomes pejorative if there is no accompanying change of attitude. You can see it in the labels for mentally handicapped and elderly people - both conditions we feel a bit uncomfortable about - where the earnest euphemism of one generation becomes the offensive label of the next. This is why we have moved, step by step, from the "idiot" of earlier centuries through "cretin" and "mentally handicapped" to the current "person with learning difficulties".

    Of course, words change meaning imperceptibly in the course of ordinary living - I was fascinated as a young student of English language to realise that in the sixteenth century "presently" meant immediately. Today, "in a minute" and "just a second" are well down the same path. It says something about human nature!

    But other changes represent a conscious and deliberate attempt by a pressure group to manipulate opinion and alter language in a manner favourable to their cause. Most of the feminist-driven changes come into this category, some betraying an alarming lack of language awareness and common sense. For example, there have been bookshops in London which have "herstory" shelves along with "history" ones; some feminists would like to say "femstruate" instead of "menstruate". I once worked for an organisation that issued a memorandum to the effect that the plastic bags which the waste bins were emptied into would no longer be called "black bags" because the adjective was offensive to non-white workers. I don't think we had any, and if we had, I wonder if they would have found that use of the word offensive before being told that they should. More seriously, a London borough last year tried to bar a childminder who possessed a gollywog. Playgroups are subject to regulations which lay down, among other things, that they must have a range of ethnically correct dolls. I give these examples because they move on from the manufacture of obviously silly words - which will succumb to robust common sense - to more insidious issues of control and conformity. This was recognised in the Commons last year, when an MP pointed out:

    "PC is destroying the English language. It is an exercise in brainwashing and indoctrination, and a loathsome form of propaganda and thought control. It is intellectual censorship in universities which must be resisted." (Alan Duncan, Rutland and Melton)

    Schumpeter maintained "that a society like ours" by the very logic of its civilisation "creates, educates and subsidises a class of specialists in social unrest - the intelligentsia who wield the power of the spoken and written word without direct responsibility for practical affairs". (N. Dennis "Rising Crime").

    Norman Dennis, a sociologist who is also a socialist, and not naturally given to supporting Tory MPs, is, like Alan Duncan, seriously concerned about the rôle of the universities on both sides of the Atlantic. He sees a disregard and contempt for fact among the "new class of conformist intellectuals", pointing out that social affairs intellectuals are strongly inclined to subscribe to the politically correct doctrines of the day - with the result that, instead of being "havens for fearless seekers after truth" universities have become easy berths for conformists who are fearful of being labelled "politically incorrect". We need to be wary of ideology that takes no account of fact (dismissed as "facticity").

    Yet however much the facts are ignored or denied in these circles, the damage inflicted on society by crime and family break-up continues. "Political correctness" sets out to avoid causing offence, but this new conformity is the stable it has largely come from. Paradoxically it nurtures discontent by focusing attention on the many ways one might possibly be offended. It encourages an attitude of seeing offence where none was intended. It is superficially attractive, and of course it is right that we should not set out to hurt anybody's feelings. But do you see the speciousness of the argument? It becomes a dangerous denial of truth. When Paul spoke of being all things to all men in order to reach them with the gospel, he was referring to his willingness to forgo legitimate personal freedoms (1 Cor 9:19ff) in order to be listened to by those among whom he was preaching. That is different from altering the truth of his message in response to demand, and different from merging into the prevailing culture to conduct a civilised debate where no one will say anything that might upset anyone else.

    Speaking of liberalism, Alister McGrath points out that

    "cultural accommodation, initially seen as a virtue, has now proved to make Christian theology a hostage to the dominant cultural ideology in a manner that shows alarming parallels with the situation that developed in the German church crisis of the mid-thirties".

    Commenting on this, Bishop Michael Marshall says that

    "Even as late as 1936, the General Assembly of the Church of England overwhelmingly passed a resolution supporting Hitler's brave attempts to pull Germany together. Churchill was decidedly condemned as very politically incorrect."

    He goes on:

    "I (have) met many Anglican Sudanese exiles and heard something of the great suffering inflicted upon Sudanese Christians (by Islamic fundamentalists). How strange that we hear nothing of this. The tyranny of political correctness demands that we are highly selective in the causes we rush forward to defend".

    The question for the church is how far we can go in accommodating to prevailing fashion in politically correct language and thought, since language does colour thought and attitude. We saw this in the recent debates about the homosexual age of consent. The debate was conducted largely in terms of equality of rights rather than in terms of moral equivalence - that was almost entirely conceded by default. A debate about equality is different from one about morality.

    We are most obviously confronted by the PC lobby over inclusive, non gender-specific language, and many Christians have obediently reprogrammed their vocabulary to accommodate "humankind", "layperson", "spokeswoman", "chairperson" - or even "chair". All unnecessary (and patronising) because "chairman", "spokesman" and so on have for generations carried the meaning "the person chairing the meeting" and "the person speaking on behalf of the organisation", indicating the function they are carrying out, rather than focusing on specific gender. The new words immediately shift attention towards the person rather than their rôle - something not necessarily helpful. I find the deliberate alteration of language in response to a pressure group abhorrent. Languages change and grow naturally - but much of this engineered change seems to restrict, flatten out and impoverish, as in the tendency to stress gender equality by minimising distinctions and unique significance. It is also insidious, usually part of a wider agenda.

    I remember hearing a story once about a man who was travelling in the Sahara with a camel. One night he crawled into his small tent and, just as he was going to sleep, his camel spoke. He said how bitterly cold it was outside, and could he just put his nose inside the tent for comfort? Well, the traveller was a compassionate man - probably a Christian - and so he said "OK, just your nose, mind." So the camel put his nose inside and the man went to sleep. A bit later, the camel prodded him with his nose and when he woke up, said how extremely cold his ears were, and could he just put his head inside the tent? The man said "Well, alright - but only your head, mind". So the camel put his head right in, and it was a bit crowded, but in some ways rather nice, and the man felt it was warmer as well, and he went back to sleep. A bit later, the camel nudged him awake and said how extremely cold his left shoulder was ... and so it went on, until long before dawn the man found himself bundled out unceremoniously into the cold of the desert. One thing had led to another. Something similar can happen to truth and biblical integrity when we travel the cultural accommodation road. Would we begin if we could see the end?

    Some will know of the conference in Minneapolis last November which was part of the World Council of Churches "Decade of Churches in Solidarity with Women". Over 2,000 women attended this event, planned by women leaders from mainline denominations. Participants looked to pantheism and the gnostic gospels to Re-Imagine a new god and new salvation. "I don't think we need folks hanging on crosses and blood dripping and weird stuff" said one feminist theologian. And someone else - "If we cannot imagine Jesus as a tree, as a river, as wind, and as rain, we are doomed together". The worship was of the goddess Sophia, who apparently is the female face of the psyche, "the place in you where the universe resides". And much more - self preoccupied, erotic, and blasphemous rubbish.

    But I wonder how many were drawn into that event having begun by affirming other religions, by taking on board what seem like the courtesies of political correctness. How big is the step from an "inclusive" liturgy to addressing God as "Mother"? And then ..? Words are powerful. If the "unthinkable" of one generation becomes "debatable", it gradually becomes familiar enough to be "possible" and then quickly "defensible". Can we use the language of the politically correct, or even of the market place, without also taking on board their values?

  5. The fifth factor in encouraging drift and confusion, one that has serious implications for our children, is the steady transmission of false values - materialism, violence, and so on, through television, newspapers and film, but particularly television, because it is within the home. The media have a lot of power, in that you tend to believe something if you hear it often enough, particularly if you have no other source of information by which to make a judgement; powerful too because of the human tendency to absorb, and copy attitudes and modes of behaviour from what we see around us. That is particularly the case with drama. Perhaps we are not sufficiently aware of 'soaps' as culture transmitters, modelling behaviour and relationships for our children; nor of how subtly attitudes and values are shaped by what we see. Thankfully the tide seems now about to turn on the issue of violent and pornographic videos, but not without resistance.

    We need also to be aware of the implications of the assumption in our schools that knowledge is value-free, and that topics such as sexual behaviour should be discussed in a morally neutral way. Commenting on the sex education lesson for 10 year-olds in a Yorkshire school that hit the headlines earlier his year, Janet Daley pointed out that it could not be value-free, however neutral the teacher:

    "They will listen to the teacher's suggestion that they act out adultery, and they will know that what is being said is that infidelity is normal and acceptable. They will gather that safety from pregnancy and disease are the only constraints in one's sexual behaviour. They will note that their teacher treats all sexual experience as unobjectionable and inherently interesting, and they will take this as encouragement to experiment. Before they are old enough to understand what sexual desire is, they will have absorbed a comprehensive sexual philosophy as thoroughly as if they had been drilled by a doctrinaire autocrat'. (The Times 24.3.94)

    Children absorb attitudes and values almost by osmosis; and so do we.

    Paul points out that "the god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ" (2 Cor 4:4), so it is not surprising that they are groping from one idea to another. But the attitudes and values we've been considering seep into the church also. Shortly before he died, Francis Schaeffer said "Tell me what the world is saying today and I will tell you what the church will be saying seven years from now". Paul saw the mind as the key. What we think determines how we live - and we have a choice. He tells us to refuse to conform to the pattern of this world. the thinking we have considered so far. We have to let our minds be renewed, so that Christ can transform our thinking and our living. (Romans 12:2)

Three important issues

Women's ministry

Issues surrounding women's ministry have been very much confused by secular concepts such as equality, rights, discrimination, inclusivity. It has been seen almost entirely in terms of ordination to the priesthood - a good example, in itself, of the sequence from "unthinkable" to "defensible". There has been an emotive use of false alternatives, implying that if ordination were barred it would mean that women's ministry was to do with making the tea and doing the flowers. The attitude to service betrayed by this sort of remark is regrettable; I also believe that the implication that the only "real" ministry is that of the priesthood shifts the focus from service to status in a way that is not helpful to the development of whole body ministry. Arguments based on rights belong in the secular arena, but much of the discussion rages round "equality" - and demonstrates how difficult logical debate is. Of course we are all equal in terms of being sinners loved and redeemed in Christ; we are of equal value, but we are each unique, none of us exactly the same as anyone else. This, surely, is a reason for delight in seeing the mosaic God creates as he puts us together, each able to function better in his service because of another. It's not a cause for envy and dissatisfaction. What we do - our rôle in the body of Christ - is the arena within which we exercise the Christian graces. And I know from my own experience that God wastes nothing that we allow him to touch.

We hear a lot about self-esteem these days, and it is an important issue. But we need to guard against the seepage of secular values, because our self-esteem is only really secure when it's related to who we are in Christ. It is fragile when linked to what we do, or to whether we are noticed, or to whether we are "successful".

However, it is clearly helpful to the whole body to have spheres of service, ministries, recognised. I think it is a pity that the Order of Deaconesses is no longer an option, and that the diaconate is largely seen as a preparatory year before being ordained priest. Perhaps there is scope for some sort of local "in-house" validation and recognition of rôle. Women obviously have a rôle in counselling, praying with, teaching other women and children - not because they are not "good enough" to help men - but because they know the stresses of life for women and they often have "getting-alongside" skills. I firmly believe that men would benefit from a similar level of support from other men and that male friendship is something to be encouraged in the church.

There is room for a kaleidoscope of service and evangelism and I believe we need to recover that awareness in the aftermath of the ordination of women debates, to counter the narrowed focus. Ironically those debates seemed to centre more on the iconic issues around presidency at the Eucharist, than on questions of leadership and headship, the area where there is biblical guidance.

Marriage and the family

The God-given complementarity of man and woman is particularly relevant in marriage and family. In spite of Virginia Bottomley's muddled assertions to the contrary, family breakdown and the accelerating divorce rate pose a severe threat to the stability of society. There are many pressures, not least the subtle shift from a view of marriage based on covenant (Christian marriage), to one based on contract, which is much more akin to the values of the market place; it assumes that the individuals define the marriage. Covenant-type marriage sees marriage as a way of life that will itself shape and form the individuals who are totally committed to each other. This is the setting which nurtures children and stabilises adults - yet this is increasingly seen as too demanding and too risky. But the harmony of leadership lovingly offered, and support willingly given, is something worth working for.

Research shows what common sense has always known, that children placed high in their parents' allocation of time and attention show superior academic skills compared to children receiving less. Quantity of time, not quality is the central variable. There is also a body of research showing that fathers have a particular rôle in the establishing of gender-specific behaviour (and that there is also a genetic base for this). (Carlson in "The Family" ed. Davies). Not popular with the extreme feminist lobby, but common sense that children use their parents as rôle models. Norman Dennis notes a progressively reducing pressure on boys and young men to become responsible and competent husbands and fathers, which is very dangerous:

"If we are looking for something that has profoundly changed for young males in the 20 or 30 years many of them have gone on the rampage ... it is in the social definition of what it is to be a mature man, and social definition is partly the work of a society's intellectuals. Their work is always slow in helping to create a culture, but can be swift in dismantling it. Under modern conditions ... the undermining of other people's hard-won culture by pressure group propaganda is their facile and enduring achievement; they can easily destroy what it passes their wit to rebuild".(Dennis - Rising Crime)

One militant feminist changed her point of view completely after having a child, and recognised the damage radical feminists have done:

  • they have undermined and denigrated the option of motherhood as a career
  • they have viewed children as commodities without unique individualised emotional needs
  • they have perpetuated the myth that "other" care is as good as "mother" care
  • they have not challenged the Establishment view that mothers are economically inactive.

(Kathy Gyngell in "Equal and Different" - Harper)

It would be unwise to be complacent, to feel safe from these influences because we know the biblical teaching on marriage, and the importance of stable family life. We are subject to the same pressures. How much time do the fathers in our congregations spend with their children? How many mothers are in full-time work outside of the home? How much of this pressure is from the siren voices of the media saying that homemaking is boring, that professional qualifications must not be "wasted"?

Are we selling out to materialism without realising it? Possibly - but many will be forced into this way of life by economic circumstances. We need to think whether there is any way we can help, within our fellowships.

It is not only emotional and ideological pressures that threaten the family - the tax system has penalised single-earner families since the 1960s. The supervision and care of children cannot but suffer when both parents work full-time outside the home. Patricia Morgan, a sociologist specialising in family issues points out:

"the trade-off between full-time maternal employment and child development is seen in its negative relationship with educational stimulation at home, academic achievement and behaviour recorded at various ages, regardless of socio-economic status"(Liberating Women ..ed. Quest)

This is not just a problem of an underclass.

Michael Harper, in "Equal and Different" also points to the fact that the idealisms of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (incorporated into British law in 1990) undermine parental authority and control. The family is under pressure.

Singleness

But singleness too is a problem for many in the church. Paul saw singleness as a desirable state - superior in some ways to marriage, because those of us who are single can be more wholehearted and flexible in serving the Lord. However, singleness is difficult in a society which seems to be obsessed with sex, and there can be real loneliness. I believe we should be more aware of the single members of our fellowships and recognise their strengths and their struggles. They are not second class citizens, and they are not failures. We need each other.

A response

So, what is the way ahead - what can be done to stem the tide of cultural accommodation? How can we say "enough"? To return to the ambassador image we started with, such a person is always conscious of the fact that he is not in his own country; he is clear about his identity, his rôle, and where he belongs. As Christians, we have a responsibility to speak out moral truth in our society, to be salt and light. Dr Joanne May, an American psychologist maintains that:

"the church no longer leads in the discipline and moral development of society. It simply responds to the dysfunctions of a society in decay".

Some are speaking out in the areas of homosexuality, abortion, education and so on. Speaking out brings one on a collision course with vested interests and with the anarchic intelligentsia referred to by Norman Dennis. It is not easy and the argument is often emotive rather than logical. For instance, even in the face of mounting acceptance by professionals that watching violent videos is in fact harmful to children, there are still those, some in the industry, who maintain that there is no causal relationship between watching a specific video and committing a specific crime. But this is not the charge. The real damage is that video violence and pornography normalises such acts in the mind - moving them from "unthinkable" towards "possible", deadening sensitivity.

To be effective in this public domain it is important to be well informed and then to be strategic and proactive, rather than "simply responding" to some one else's agenda. Being informed is just the beginning; it is very difficult to speak against evil in society and at the same time hold out the redeeming love of Christ to the sinner. Evangelicals are often dismissed as being "against homosexuals" or "against addicts"; we need to work at loving the person without condoning the practice. The fact that such clear messages are almost deliberately not heard doesn't mean, I believe, that we should give up the attempt. The wisdom of the Holy Spirit is very much needed in this public ministry.

One of the most positive things to be done is to find ways of using the media to counter the propaganda of pressure groups intent on destroying the traditional concept of the family as a value base. This involves the positive presentation of the genuine alternative to contract-type marriage; it involves confronting government and the feminist lobby over the destructive weighting of family tax law; it involves confronting the assumption that one's value is to do with earnings and material standards; it also involves emphasising the needs of children for consistent and secure home life . It is worth doing.

But what about the church? How can we help each other maintain Christian identity?, to say "Enough"? The writer to the Hebrews is quite clear about our dual responsibility:

"See to it, brothers, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one another daily ... so that none of you may be hardened by sin's deceitfulness." (Heb 3:12,13)

We each have a responsibility for our own heart, but also a responsibility for each other, to encourage, to "put heart into", to be alongside.

We need to pray; we need to know the Lord. The more we know Him, the more we are grounded in His word, the less likely we are to drift, to accommodate. I came across the true story of someone who was once trained by an American bank to recognise counterfeit notes. They did it by setting her to count piles of genuine notes day after day after day. She didn't need to spend any time at all studying counterfeits - she recognised them instantly because she knew the genuine article so well that anything else stood out.

So we need to be well taught in the scriptures; the word of God needs to be preached with integrity so that the people of God can be built up and equipped for service.

We need to nurture genuine love for each other, and we need to take seriously our responsibility to teach our children. Three times in Deuteronomy, Moses reminded the Israelites of the importance of remembering what God had done and teaching their children:

"Teach (these laws) to your children, and to their children after them" (Deut 4:9)

"Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up" (Deut 6:6.7)

If we do not, they will be completely vulnerable to the false values around them in society. This is what happened to the Israelites after Joshua died:

"After that whole generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation grew up who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel. Then ... they served the Baals" (Judges 2:10,11).

We need to be vigilant. We need to be well taught. We need to be led so that the body of Christ may be built up and each part do its work, that his name may be glorified.

Bibliography

  • N. Dennis, Rising Crime and the Dismembered Family, IEA
  • J. Davies (ed.), The Family: is it just another lifestyle?, IEA
  • N. Dennis, G Erdos, Families without Fatherhood, IEA
  • R. Clapp, Families at the Crossroads, IVP
  • M. Harper, Equal and Different, Hodder
  • Piper & Grudem, Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, Crossway (see also their website)
  • C. Quest (ed.), Liberating Women from Modern Feminism, IEA
  • Reports of Re-Imagining Conference: Christianity Today April 94
  • CEN 10 June 94
  • Faith & Reason Spring 94