Lux Lucet

So here we sit, fellow Christian, in a collapsing nation, with all our institutions – schools, universities, government, news media, and businesses – held captive by hostile ideologies.  Why has God brought this about? That’s a natural question.  In Old Testament times, there were prophets sent by God to tell the people why certain disasters struck.  For example, in 2 Kings 21 we read,

Because Manasseh king of Judah has done these abominations (he has acted more wickedly than all the Amorites who were before him and has also made Judah sin with his idols), therefore thus says the LORD God of Israel: ‘Behold, I am bringing such calamity upon Jerusalem and Judah, that whoever hears of it, both his ears will tingle.’

We don’t have to guess as to the reason for the Babylonian captivity.  We know why it happened. 

In our own time, of course, we don’t have prophets with new revelation.  But we do have the complete revelation of God, the ability to think rationally, and the gift of the Spirit to cause us to understand God’s Word and to apply it to the world around us. 

So why do I think that America is in an advanced state of collapse?  What is God’s purpose in brining things about as they are this day?  I suspect there are several reasons.  The most basic reason, as I have stated before on this site, is the disappearance of Christianity from the West, including America.  In his Foreword to Clark’s A Christian View of Men and Things, John Robbins put it this way,

Why is Western civilization collapsing?  A Christian View of Men and Things presents the argument that the West is disappearing because Christianity, on which Western civilization was built, has already virtually disappeared in the West….

A Christian View of Men and Things, 11.

Of course, there are still Christians in the West.  But even they do not know the Bible as their forefathers did, nor do they understand the system of truth that the Bible contains, the system that guides and informs all of life, from government to music.  The remaining Christians and Christian views are a remnant, a remnant that still preserves whatever peace and freedom remain in the world, but a remnant nonetheless. 

We have, then, a collapsing civilization, which nevertheless has within it a remnant of believing Christians.  When thinking about God’s purposes in our lives, we must be humble enough to admit that he may well have purposes of which we are currently unaware.  But we can know some things about any situation in which we find ourselves.  There are three passages I’d like to mention that will, I trust, help us Christians understand, at least in part, why God has brought about the collapse of the West. 

First, we know that God purposes all things for the good of his people.  “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.”  These words from Romans 8 are a great comfort the to elect of God and only to his elect.  Note that Paul admits of no exception to the things that work together for the good of God’s elect.  Paul does not write “some things” work together for the good of God’s people, but “all things.”  Also notice that, while all things work together for good, they do not work together for the good of all people.  Scripture never promises that anything works together for the good for unbelievers.  It is believers only, “the called according to His purpose,” who can lay claim to this astonishing promise.    

Second, we know that God makes it a point to chasten his saints.  In Hebrews we read,

For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls. You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin. And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons:

“My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord,
Nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him;
For whom the Lord loves He chastens,
And scourges every son whom He receives.”

If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten? But if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate and not sons. Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live? For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness. Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

The Author of Hebrews points us to Christ and asks us to consider what great suffering he endured while on earth.  He also tells them that chastening from the Lord is a sign that they are true sons, and not illegitimate children.  Finally, he points out that chastening is unpleasant at the time, but “yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.”

Indeed, chastening is to be expected as part of the Christian life.  Peter, in the third passage I’d like to mention today, makes this point.  He writes, “Beloved, do not t think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened to you; but rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ’s suffering, that when His glory is revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy.”

So just what is God’s purpose for Christians in this day of civilizational collapse?  Likely, he has several purposes for the current troubles we see all around us.  But for our purposes today, I’d like to focus on one: chastening and sanctifying his saints.  It is my view that one of God’s purposes for the political, cultural, and financial collapse we see all around us is to chastise his people.  

One of the besetting sins of Christians is to rely on themselves rather than on God.  Think, for example, of Peter’s famous boast, “Lord, I am ready to go with You, both to prison and to death.”  Well, not so fast.  Peter, it seemed, trusted a bit too much in himself and not enough in God.  And Peter was a faithful man.  He was a believer, a Christian, yet he stumbled badly when questioned by a servant girl just a few hours later.  Peter learned a hard lesson that day about just how weak he was in himself.  But the lesson was not for Peter only, but for us also.

We Western Christians have been greatly blessed.  As heirs of the Reformation, we were blessed with the gift of a Christian civilization by our forefathers.  But we have not always shown ourselves the best of stewards. 

A few weeks back, I wrote about Augustine’s City of God.  When challenged by people to explain why, if Christianity was true, did God allow the barbarian Visigoths to sack and burn Rome, Augustine answered that one reason was that God was chastising the Christians for their spiritual sloth and cowardice. 

We [Christians] tend culpably to evade our responsibility when we ought to instruct and admonish them [unbelievers], sometimes even with sharp reproof and censure, either because the task is irksome, or because we are afraid of giving offence; or it may be that we shrink from incurring their enmity, for fear that they may hinder and harm us in worldly matters, in respect either of what we eagerly seek to attain, or of what we weakly dread to lose (City of God, Book 1, Ch.9).

In my opinion, we may well be seeing something like this in our own day.  Perhaps as Christians we have grown a bit too comfortable, a bit too concerned about the things of this world and the opinions of men.  Maybe one purpose behind God’s causing things to deteriorate as far as they have in the West is that he is calling us to seek his face and rely on him and take seriously our calling to be salt and light in a dying world.

It’s a scary task.  Not one we can undertake to do on our own. 

But maybe that’s the point.

Maybe the Lord is calling is to call upon his name rather than rely on our own cleverness, wisdom, and strength. 

We have the right man on our side, wrote a certain hymnwriter.  The man of God’s own choosing.

Let us look to him in faith, doubting nothing.

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