The end of the world as we know it

There are days when I find many things to read from other Christians and days when I read nothing. I have been a reader since childhood. It started with children’s chapter books, progressed to romance novels, eventually became only ‘Christian’ romance novels and nonfiction, and now…well I think I’d be safe in saying I am no longer able to find very many books or writings that don’t promote worldly thoughts even among the so-called Christian market.

As I write this post I find myself thinking of the multiple things I read before starting, of the sermons I watched, and I quite honestly don’t know where to start. Recently I wrote a number of posts that tied together through the nature of their topics. Each one stood alone but they all kind of flowed one to another to…I hope…paint a bigger picture than any one of them alone painted.

There is a way of life in America, probably the world, in which people prepare for what they call ‘the end of the world as we know it’. There are probably as many ways of doing that as there are people that do it. I recently saw an article about a family that discovered a hidden bunker in their backyard packed with food and other supplies from years ago.

Someone, at some point, prepared for ‘the end of the world’ as they knew it. They filled an underground room with food and other things they thought they’d need to be able to survive whatever might come.

I have to admit the idea does have some merit. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a room filled with….whatever’s…that could see you through anything that might come. You’d be well supplied should a tornado come your way and wipe out your home. You’d be well supplied should rioting or other civil unrest happen in your area that kept you from going to the store. 

But those things can only prepare you for physical happenings that might come your way in the same way having insurance on your vehicle prepares you for an accident should you have one.

They are a safety net.

They’re there should the ‘end of the world’ as you know it come in this world. They are temporal.

But as I read more and more of what’s happening in the world I can’t help thinking that the end of the world as we knew it is already here. There are so many different issues in the news today that never came up in the news when I was a child. There are so many things happening in our country and the world that have never been seen before.

I recently wrote a post about calling evil good and good evil. That was what I saw as I read articles in Christian sources. At least in the Christian sources the evil is being portrayed as just that. If I had read those same articles in secular writings I’m sure I would have heard just how wonderful the evil was.

One of the things I read this morning, which I didn’t finish reading, spoke of a young woman that used to claim to be a born again Christian that now openly speaks against at least some of the beliefs held by Christians.

Another one was about a television commercial that not only speaks of, but outright shows, homosexual relationships. And it’s done so in a way that makes it look as normal and natural as the wonder of intimacy when it happens in marriage, which I must admit would be wrong to portray on TV.

There is a belief among scientists that says every so many hundreds of years the weather flips. The months that had been summer will become winter and winter will become summer. It will flip. As I understand that belief the only change that occurs is what the weather will be like in any given month. There will be no catastrophe, no widespread change beyond how the weather acts at any given time. Life will go on as it always has only people will need coats when they used to need shorts and they’ll need winter boots when they used to need sandals. It will be a flipping of seasons.

Today we have a flip in life, in long held beliefs, in right and wrong. Our world has…in a good number of ways…flipped upside down. What once was right is now wrong and what once was up is now down.

Someone close to me recently said ‘I just want to be a good person’. I had to ask what exactly that meant to them. What is a good person? They flipped the question on me and asked me what I believe a good person is.

My answer had two sides. I told them that Biblically there is no good person, that we are all sinners, that the only way a person becomes a ‘good person’ is to be saved by Christ. But I knew what they were looking for and so I gave them the answer they were seeking in addition to the first one. I told this person that strictly from a worldly perspective I’d have to say that a good person is someone that doesn’t hurt other people, someone that thinks of others, someone that stands for what is truly right and wrong.

And as that conversation progressed we also got into what defines right and wrong. If we accept that the Bible is the infallible Word of God, if we accept what it says at face value, if we understand that there are certain rules set forth in the Bible then we have a written record of what is right and wrong. We have a measuring stick.

Recently my husband, in jest I hope, asked me if I was measuring him. I told him I never measure him but if I did he would come out well past the end of the ruler. I don’t measure him but I do see how he measures up. I see in Scripture what it says a Christian is to be and I see those qualities in him. The reason I can so clearly see those qualities in my husband is because 1) the Lord has saved him, and 2) because my husband believes the Bible sets the standard for what is right and wrong and he tries to live according to those standards.

There’s a Christian man that has a video program where he goes out and questions people on the street, he gets their views on things, he challenges them, and he tells them the truth according to Scripture. I don’t watch him very often but I have seen it enough times to hear some of what the people he talks to says. I must admit that until I watched his program I had no idea that anyone held such beliefs. It is basically a belief in nothing. As some of the people he spoke with said… if you believe it’s right then it’s right for you, and if I believe this is right then it’s right for me but they held the exact same idea on what constituted wrong. Most of them had no measuring stick by which to decide what was right and wrong. They had no line on which one side was right and one side was wrong. It was more like some kind of swirling area where right and wrong were all mixed up and each person just chose what they saw as right and wrong.

According to the people that this man spoke with anything could be right or wrong depending on the person. You were free to decide what was right for you and what was wrong. There were no absolutes. No certainties.

What…I ask…about murder? Is a person free to decide if murder is right for them? Apparently so. All we have to do is look to the murder of unborn babies to see that murder is allowed and condoned, to see that it is a personal choice as to whether or not murder is right or wrong.

I read something a while back about a ten year old girl in a predominantly Catholic country that is pregnant. Her country does not allow abortions except for a few very clear reasons, I think if the life of the mother is in danger, and this little girl does not fit the definition to be allowed to have an abortion. From what that article said people from all over the world, especially America, are having fits because this little girl is being denied the opportunity to kill her child.

I had two thoughts on that part of the story. The first one was that people thought they had the right to demand a country do anything, especially a country in which they do not live. The other was to wonder if the little girl even wanted an abortion. She is a child that has been raised in a country where abortion is seen as wrong…does she believe it is? She’s also a little girl at an age where most little girls love babies…would she want to kill her own?

This little girl conceived under evil circumstances, the act that resulted in the life of her child wasn’t pretty, it wasn’t about love, but I still have to question if a child living in a country where abortion is seen as wrong would want to kill her own child or if someone is demanding this little girl be given an abortion because they think her having the baby would be bad for her.

Who is deciding what is right and wrong for that little girl and her baby?

That is just one case in a world of many where a list of circumstances can be given and a decision come to. Many couples put off starting a family until circumstances are just right for having children…but who decides what is just right for having children. If a couple has decided not to have a child until they have so much money in the bank or own a minivan or have a house with so many square feet and they discover they’re expecting a baby…who decides if it’s right or wrong for that child to live?

My grandmother is living in a nursing home. She’s got afflictions that affect the elderly. She can’t care for herself. The law in America protects her right to live. But what if those laws weren’t there? Who would decide if she had the right to live? Who would decide if murdering her because she’s too old to be able to care for herself is okay?

In cities across America dogs and cats are killed every day because someone decided they weren’t worth saving. Some of them are vicious and aggressive, some of them so sick or injured that saving them is impossible or nearly so and it can be understood why the decision would be made to kill them. But others are killed because they’re ugly, because they’ve been in the shelter more than their allotted two weeks, week, three days. The choice of whether it’s right or wrong to kill those animals rests in the hands of the people that are in charge of them.

What if our country looked at human life the same way? Well…many people may argue that there’s an over population of dogs and cats…many people argue the same thing about people.

I’ve had strangers ask me why I would ever want to have so many children. I’ve heard people speak badly of couples that have lots of children because they say we’re ruining the earth.

When does murder become right and when does it become wrong?

There are countries where euthanasia is legal. It’s been proposed in America. Some people believe that anyone that requires full time care, lives in a nursing home, or lives with chronic pain should be euthanized for their own good.

There are people that have suggested that ‘abortion’ be legalized through the age of four. That is…some say a parent should have the right to ‘abort’ their child until they’re four years old. We’re talking about a living, breathing, walking, talking child here. There’s no way a person could not realize that this child was a live person and yet there are those that believe it should be okay to ‘abort’ them at the parent’s discretion.

In a news article I read not that long ago how once our medical care is put into the hands of computers the right to life will transfer to whether or not the computer thinks we should live. A couple of years ago our local hospital was bought out by a nationwide hospital company. The new company immediately started changing what was, at that time, one of the best hospitals in our local area. They immediately began building a newer, bigger hospital. Was it better? I have no idea because I’ve only had to go there once and they weren’t able to handle the issue that took us to the hospital…they sent us by ambulance to a children’s hospital in a large city.  The thing is that as they built and began using this ‘better’ hospital they also instituted some things our area had never seen before. The biggest that I know of is the use of robots to perform surgery.

When I first heard that I was very much against the idea. My opinion on that hasn’t changed in the last couple of years. My sister told me how much better it would be because robots have steady hands, they can be programed to act in certain ways and they won’t deviate from what they’re told to do.

And in light of what’s come out lately that idea only solidifies my opinion that I don’t want a robot operating on me or one of my loved ones. Recently a computerized car was hacked. What would happen if the robot performing surgery was hacked? Or worse? I heard a news reporter speak about how once our medical care is placed into the hands of computers it would be only too easy to program a computer to save only certain people. This man also said it would be easy to tell a computer not to treat certain conditions.

There’s been talk of microchipping people. Some of that talk has said that with a microchip in a person’s brain their life would then rest in the hands of the people controlling the microchip.

In essence our lives would rest in the hands of the government.

Now…let me say that all of what I’ve just said has come from what I’ve heard from news media’s. I can’t vouch for the truth in any of it beyond saying that I heard it from a news source. What I can say is that it’s all feasible. Whether or not something is being planned or put into practice…it’s certainly within the realm of possibility given all the technology we have today.

But right or wrong…it’s just another example of the end of the world as we’ve always known it. The very fact that those things are possible and are something we can even think of means the world our parents and grandparents knew is gone.

And all of those things…if not held to a higher power of right and wrong…can become reality based on the beliefs of one or more people in a position to implement them.

There have been many mass shootings in America in recent years. With every one of them the public has cried out. They’ve protested the killing of people by one person (or two or three…). They’ve spoken of the evil of those shootings and demanded the punishment of the shooter.

But when man decides for himself what is right and what is wrong…who is to decide if those shooting are right or wrong?

In those cases the shooter believed that killing those people was the right thing to do. Let’s say they killed seven people. In their minds they had a very good reason for killing those seven people. Murder…to them…was right. If we look at a woman that has had seven abortions the world won’t cry out in protest over the death of her seven babies. It won’t demand she be punished for killing them. But what is the difference? In her mind killing those babies was the right thing to do. In her mind she had a good reason, a justifiable reason, for murdering her children. Yet…she walks away without even having to explain her reasoning.

If a mother of seven kills all of her living children…she’s a murderer and the public, rightfully, calls it murder and demands her punishment. But what is the difference?

Why is it murder to kill seven children that have been born, to kill seven people in any setting, but it’s not murder to kill seven unborn babies?

Another recent event that has gained the public’s attention, and the outcry to do something about it, is the very real, very sad, case of a large abortion company that sold baby parts to different companies after killing the unborn babies. The doctors in these clinics not only sold the parts but were very careful in how they killed the babies in order to preserve the parts they needed.

If that’s not evil I don’t know what is.

And yet…in our modern society what makes that wrong? Why is it that the mothers of those children can kill their babies without the public saying a thing but when this large company sells parts of those babies it’s all of a sudden a horrible things and the public is demanding something be done about it?

Again…let’s say there are seven women that walk into one of those clinics and have their unborn baby killed. Our society says that’s okay. If the doctor, the clinic, then sells any part of that baby our same society cries out in protest of how wrong it is. What makes the selling of dead babies any worse than the murder of them?

If that mother of seven children killed her living children and sold their organs…she’d be prosecuted on numerous charges. If another woman kills seven of her unborn babies it’s okay, overlooked, and not questioned. The woman that had seven abortions could teach children in schools, sit in public office, run for president or preside over the case of the next criminal walking into the courtroom.

Think about that for just a minute…a female judge could legally kill seven (or any number) of her unborn children then be the sole person to decide if someone that killed their child or children spends the rest of their life in prison.

Why?

Why is the murder of one set of babies legal while the killing of another set is legal?

Who decides the right and wrong of those situations? The law says one’s legal while the other’s illegal but why? And who made that choice? The people that instituted those laws were mere people. Not only that but they were people that didn’t look to a higher power to determine right and wrong. Their own ideas were what they based right and wrong on.

As a result…we have murderers in prison. And just as many, if not more, murderers walking the street.

Your child’s teacher may be a legal murderer. Your doctor may be. Your best friend could be.

What defines right and wrong when there is nothing to measure right and wrong by?

Whether we’re discussing little issues or big…there must be a standard for which we determine right and wrong.

The argument could be made that murder is wrong when the law says its murder but then the question must be asked… whose law? Why is it wrong when murder happens against those protected by the laws of our country but its okay when it happens to those that don’t have those protections?

And that’s just one subject in a long line of things that must have a definition of right and wrong. Is it wrong to steal? To cheat on your spouse? To sell your children for money? To use drugs? To sell drugs? To say something against another person? To beat them up? To be intimately involved with someone before marriage?

Where is the line in right and wrong?

Who defines what is right and what is wrong?

Who makes the decision of what any one person will stand for? There was a time in our country when a person’s last name was seen as very important. You upheld your family name, you did your family proud or dishonored your family based on how you acted and believed. A man passed his name on to his children. Men wanted son’s to carry on the family name. A person, especially a man, stood for his family because he wore the family name.

That wasn’t the only way he stood for his family. He stood for them by being the husband, the dad, the provider. He was the line of defense between them and any threat that came their way. He stood for his family in so many ways but even an unmarried man stood for the family name.

For many years Americans have stood for America, many still do. It can be seen on t-shirts and bumper stickers. It can be seen in the number of American flags flown in our country. I was sitting in a restaurant not too long ago when it began pouring rain. Minutes after the rain started workers went out, took down the American flag and brought it inside. Not only did they stop everything to go out in pouring rain and get the flag but they took the time, outside in the rain, to roll up the flag.

I’m not giving my opinion, one way or the other on that, but pointing out that there are people in America that stand for America and go to great lengths to support what they see as America.

I’m sure some of the same people that stand for and support America at all costs are the some of the same people that support abortion and hold to the belief that a person decides what is right and wrong for them.

Now I must ask…who or what defines what America is? How do we know where America ends and Mexico or Canada begins? We know because someone drew a line and declared this side to be America and that side to be Canada (or Mexico). And that line is upheld. Whether it’s crossed or not everyone understands that on one side of the line is America and on the other side is another country.

My sister and her family live in an apartment. Everyone understands that the wall that separates the two apartments marks the line between her apartment and the neighbors. If people were given the same rights in an apartment that they claim to have in life then my sister or her husband could knock out the wall separating their apartment from the one next to them simply because they believed their apartment was too small and they wanted more space. The line that says this is their apartment and that is the neighbors could be erased, removed, based on their own beliefs.

Funny thing about all that…if I want to go to Canada or Mexico I must pass the line between the two countries and I must have proper identification, given by America and accepted by the government that I want to go to, that gives me the right to cross the line between the two countries. It is wrong, illegal, for me to cross the line without that permission. If I did so I would face consequences based on the laws of both countries. If I held the belief that all land belongs to God and therefore I should be able to go where I want to when I want to without having to get permission from a certain country, or countries, I would face the very real consequences of crossing a line that was drawn, literally in the dirt, and declared to be the right place for me to be and the wrong place for me to be.

If my sister decides that she wants her apartment to be bigger and knocks the wall down dividing her apartment from the neighbors not only will she be thrown out of her home but she’ll most likely be arrested, fined, and who knows what else. And all because she crossed a line between right and wrong. Not a line that she believed to be right or wrong but a line that someone else set the standard for.

And yet…day after day, news article after news article, person after person, right and wrong is defined as being in the eye of the beholder. So many people today believe that anyone can decide, at any time, what is right and wrong for them. There’s no higher standard to decide where the line is. What may be right for me may be wrong for you. And so you are free to decide what is right for you while I decide what is right for me.

Based off that belief…no parent has the right to teach their children what they can and cannot do. No parent has the right to tell their child that they can’t do something. Because what may be right for mom or dad may not be right for Jr. or Susie. What may be right for son may not be right for daughter. What may be right for big sister may not be right for little sister.

Does any of that make sense?

What if a person believes it’s wrong for a business to charge for the products they carry? Does that make it wrong? Are they then required to give them the items they want free of charge because that person thinks it’s wrong to be charged for them?

If everyone is free to decide right and wrong for themselves what would make that belief wrong?

What if a person believes it’s wrong to tag their vehicle?

Who gets to decide that they have to do it anyway?

Today marriage is rapidly being redefined until it will soon bear little resemblance to marriage as defined by the Bible. California has passed a law making the use of the words husband and wife illegal. No longer are women in California married to their husband, they now simply have a spouse. I’ve seen where it’s being proposed to make that a nationwide law.

But if each person gets to decide what is right and wrong for themselves…can a woman still claim her husband as her husband in California…even on state documents… if she wants to? Or will she face legal consequences for doing so? If she’s filling out a state form and it lists spouse can she cross out the word spouse and write husband without worry of legal ramifications? Or has the line been drawn that she isn’t allowed to cross?

We are at a point in history that is making strides in directions that our country has never before seen. We are at a point where right and wrong are quickly being erased. We are at a point where a person that holds a belief in right and wrong as right and wrong are being labeled as wrong…does that seem right?

We are at a point where there is no line to right and wrong except the line that certain people want drawn at certain times. It’s showing up in all manner of society. Because what is right and wrong has become so mixed up that it’s nearly impossible to find.

Because what is seen as right and wrong has flipped. Where people, our country, once had a set standard for what was right and wrong, now they have themselves. And ‘themselves’ get to decide where the line is. It doesn’t matter if their line and mine are in different places, it doesn’t matter if I see one thing as wrong if they see it as right. It doesn’t matter if the law says something is wrong if they don’t like it they can change it.

What was up is now down and what was down is now up…and our society reflects the flip that has taken place.

I watched a short video clip a while back where a group of teenage/20 something girls were questioned on what they thought and believed on a certain subject. They all professed to be ‘Christians’. Their answers were disturbing because everything they said went against the Bible they claimed to believe in but what was even more disturbing to me was the complete lack of common sense.

When I was growing up I heard many times about how so-and-so had book smarts or how they had street smarts. There were those that might be very educated but they had no knowledge of how to survive ‘on the street’ or they had street smarts but might fail every written test they might be given. Taking Spanish class was the same way. You might spend years in a Spanish class but what you learned ‘by the book’ wasn’t usually transferable to the street. You could learn enough from the book to barely get by but there will be much of the actual language that they can’t speak.

That group of girls could spit out all sorts of beliefs, they might be able to survive in today’s world because they hold to a worldly belief despite their claims of ‘Christianity’ but they lacked common sense. Some of the things they said simply made no sense.

The people questioning those girls didn’t ask them what they thought on who or what defined right and wrong. I’d be surprised if they those girls didn’t hold some sort of belief that the individual is who defines right and wrong though. Despite their profession of ‘Christianity’ those girls held beliefs that were very anti-Christian.

It’s another example of society flipping. Can you imagine anyone two, three hundred years ago standing there claiming to be a Christian and speaking against something the Bible clearly speaks against?

I can’t imagine them standing there displaying the lack of common sense those girls did much less publicly speaking out for something that was morally and Biblically wrong in those days.

What is seen as right and wrong has flipped and it hasn’t been for the good of our society. It hasn’t been for the good of any individual and it sure isn’t good for Christians.

Right now in our country all a person needs to do is turn to any news outlet to see all the changes that have taken place. For the first time in history marriage is no longer defined as being between a man and a woman, a person is no longer born with their gender set but can choose what gender they are, murder of babies happens by the thousands every day, selling those babies is something some see nothing wrong with, the shooting of one person can be blamed on an inanimate object…and the list goes on.

I think it’s safe to say that the end of the world as we know it has arrived.

And it didn’t take a catastrophe. It didn’t take a worldwide disaster. It didn’t take a nationwide disaster. It didn’t take a disaster at all. Nor did it take a mass riot, a nuclear war, a world war, or any other physical occurrence.

It simply took the transfer of who decides what is right and wrong from the hands of God and placed it in the hands of evil men.