Oddities

America’s Greatest Sin—And How It Sets the Stage for the Antichrist

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If you’re a normal human being of any thoughtfulness, you must be wondering,

Why the heck does everything in American life seem crazy right now?

If you’re like me, you’re trying to make sense of some of the inanity you’re seeing in the news. Heaven knows I’ve been trying to find some common thread.

Take a look at the following and ask what that commonality might be:

  • The ascendency of Donald Trump, Ben Carson, and Bernie Sanders
  • The hunt for the “murderer” of Cecil the Lion
  • The Kim Davis case in Kentucky and the rapid rise in support for same-sex marriage
  • The decline of Christianity in America
  • The failure of the Planned Parenthood videos
  • The pornification of everything

If you don’t see the connection, don’t feel bad. I only just realized it myself.

What ties those six items together is one concept:

Novelty

Let’s unpack this by starting with the last item on the list.

Scientists have studied pornography and its effects on the brain, and they’ve been startled at their findings. Pornography’s addictiveness is linked heavily to novelty. The porn addict is more addicted to the newness of every image seen than he or she is to the actual content of the image itself. It’s why porn addicts can’t be satisfied with seeing a pornographic image; instead, it must be one they’ve not seen before. That portion of the brain that resonates with novelty must be fed.

Internet, novelty

Trump, Carson, and Sanders are doing well in political polls for the very reason that everyone they are running against is a dyed-in-the-wool, tired politician of the kind we’ve all seen a million times before. But that trio is new, fresh.

The reason the Cecil the Lion case blew up is as much about our boredom with hunting down typical bad guys as it was about the actual killing of a notable animal. Ho hum with the mass murder of human beings (boring, old news), but some American dentist shot a famous lion! That’s different.

America’s boredom explains why only Christians interested in fighting abortion were entranced by the Planned Parenthood videos. Abortion? To everyone else, this is a dead horse. One the same “fanatics” keep flogging. Really, time to move on to something new!

Such as same-sex marriage. Soon to be followed by plural marriage. Soon to be followed by whatever new form of marriage we can dream up. Heck, even Christians are spinning this toward the novel when we talk about this being the FIRST DOCUMENTED CASE of Christians (Kim Davis and her supporters) being persecuted in America (which it isn’t, but hey, some of us want it to be).

And on and on.

Novelty. Not just idols, but NEW idols. Every single day.

This obsession with novelty may very well be America’s greatest sin.

When you start to think about it, that sin of obsession with novelty begins to make sense of the nonsensical. It can explain almost everything. Why people stand in line for the latest iPhone. Why you can’t engage people in conversations with any meaning. The enthrall of social media and its cascade of what is happening right now. All of it revolves around novelty.

Give us something new.

Which is why I think, in part, that Christianity is suffering in the West. It’s old, ancient even. Everyone is used to it. Even people who aren’t Christians can spout something about Christianity. And just like Asian religions swept America in the 1960s, Islam (new here, unusual, different) is making inroads in America. This seems otherwise crazy in light of 9/11, but not if novelty is the driving force. This also explains the sudden appeal of atheism. In a world filled with religions, how novel is NO religion?

This is why I believe America is in even deeper trouble than we may understand. It’s why we may be setting the stage for Antichrist or the Antichrist, depending on whether you believe it’s a generalized concept or an actual entity.

Because when Antichrist comes, the characteristic that will most likely define it/him/her will be novelty. It/him/her will gain acclaim for “freshness,” newness, and differentness. The Bible says that Antichrist and the minions supporting it/him/her will be known for the miraculous. And what sucker among us isn’t hankerin’ to see a miracle or two. Because, hey, novel. May even be the top trending news item on Facebook.

God knows we’re primed.

Do American Christians Want to Be the Church?

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Church gone fuzzyFor all the handwringing about half-hearted evangelism and declining church attendance…

For all the lamentations about lack of community…

For all the conflicting PR about organic, emerging, institutional, house, simple, and traditional churches…

For all the grousing about spiritual gifts, cessationism, charismania, and talents…

And for all the preoccupation with politics, Kardashians, Dancing with the Stars winners/losers, sports fanaticism, the “right” schools, the future, the Consitutution, police states, ISIS, endless End Times “prophecies,” and every last minuscule thing that has precious little to do with being a Child of God…

I am increasingly concerned that Christians in America have no desire to be the Church. We just don’t.

We talk like we do, but it’s mostly talk.

I confess that this is true of me as well. I am not exempt. I talk big, but I struggle to find ways to make the things I talk about work. I think this is true of most people in America. Something must be done; now if someone would just do it…

It may also be true that the systems we have in place that make American Christianity what it is only complicate being a genuine Christian attempting to live as the genuine Church.

But Americans have a way of making the things they value most work and work well—which is why I wonder if we truly value being the Church.

Do we wake up and immediately ask God to make us the Church? Is that such a burning concern for us that we give it the priority it deserves?

It’s not that we don’t love God or Jesus or the Holy Spirit. It’s that we’re not so sure about people. The vertical still has value. The horizontal, not so much.

Let’s get real, though: If the horizontal isn’t there, is the vertical? Or are we fooling ourselves?

Then there are the endless battles…

For all the talk of trying to preserve the Church in America by taking on the culture and standing up for what is right, have we really preserved anything? Or did “fighting the good fight of Faith” lead us into the wrong battlefields, allowing our flanks to be decimated? Do we now find ourselves in a position where our soldiers are walking away and going back to their homes, weary and looking for something, anything, to distract them from realities they can no longer face because their wingmen went home too?

How many people out there are asking if they can do this anymore? How many have already decided they can’t?

Does anyone care?

Maybe this post is too grim. Maybe it’s not grim enough.

As for me, I think some people still care. I just don’t know if they have enough momentum to steer anyone else their way. Maybe the final outcome was always the remnant, and this is what it looks like.

I admit that I don’t have any answers beyond what I’ve posted here already on Cerulean Sanctum.

It just seems to me that somewhere we went off the rails, and instead of working to rectify the situation, we wandered off, distracted. Maybe this is the “powerful delusion” the Bible speaks of. Maybe we Americans who profess to know the Lord are falling under its spell too.

Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe it’s not as dire as I think it may be. God knows I want to be wrong on this issue.

Do we Americans really care about being the Church? If we still do, how do we prove it?

Maybe you have an answer. If so, please comment.

Sad Stats and a Sobering Trend for the Church

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Baseball is a game of numbers. Oddly, blogging can be also.

Now, I’m not a statistics hound when it comes to Cerulean Sanctum. I’m not analyzing every bit of data generated by the operation of this blog. Still, from time to time, I do check stats because they reveal the heartfelt questions of people on the Internet.

One trend I’ve noticed this year is the increasing number of search hits coming into this blog from people looking for guidance on what to do when someone they know walks away from God. Recently, searches in that vein have been moving up from nowhere to be in the top two or three for the last few months.

This blog post from late 2013 has been getting more than its share of hits lately:

When Someone You Love Turns Away from God

Say what you will about “lies, damned lies, and statistics,” but I see this as a warning couched in numbers.

Much has been made about the supposed weakening condition of Christianity in America. Some pundits who wish to diminish the handwringing have claimed that the folks who once attended church but now do not were not serious about their faith anyway.

But people tend to hang with others like themselves. “I can take it or leave it” Christians don’t tend to hang with the ardently devout. They befriend people who can take Christianity or leave it too. Those lukewarm folks are not the kind who care enough to scour the Internet for what to do about apostasy.

'Girl on Tracks' by Barta IVNo, I think the people coming here to find out what to do about prodigal friends and family are more serious believers. They’re distraught that someone they know and love, someone like them who once was a serious believer too, has seriously flown the sacred coop.

Are we seeing the first trickles of a genuine falling away?

It’s too early to say yes, but we Christians need to be on our watch, noting the signs of folks ready to give up on God.

Some Christians are so concerned about losses to the flock, they’re invoking anew an old idea, which is being dubbed The Benedict Option. To generate some search engine stats of your own, Google that phrase and check out the results.

I’ll be writing more on The Benedict Option in days to come.

Until that time, consider someone you know who might have walked away from the Lord, and pray for him or her.