When first deciding to write this post I actually didn’t think about to whom I was writing. I saw multiple disturbing reports and immediately wanted to write a very, shall we say, declarative post. Instead, I felt God was asking me: to whom are you writing? So, I took a couple of days to mull it over. Was I writing to the “wolves” of the world? Those who “refuse to believe.” Christ said “you are not my sheep.” (John 10:26) They kill their babies before they are born and then sell off their parts for profit, so, No. Was I writing to the “wolves in sheep’s clothing” then? Matthew 7:15 instructs: “Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really vicious wolves.” They say, “As a Christian I am pro-life, but I shouldn’t force my “belief” on those who are not;” so, No. That leaves the “sheep.” Those Christ calls “His own” and “calls by name.” (John 10:3) This touches on a topic we have been discussing a lot lately. On the front page of this site we welcome “approaching, new, established, faltering and flourishing Christians wishing to live a better life.” What does that mean? We have been discussing who the Bible says we, as “messengers” living in the last days, are to look for to deliver the message to. God, being beyond time, is the only One who knows whether any one individual will ultimately choose to be a wolf or a sheep. But that is not the question here. Christ goes on in Matthew 7 to illustrate the “good tree” and the “bad tree,” and how to tell the difference. The Bible clearly describes the behavior of wolves and instructs us to be good shepherds. Even the worst shepherd would not seek out and bring a wolf into his flock of sheep. In fact, a good shepherd would seek out any wolves hiding in his flock (wolves in sheep’s clothing) and remove them. There are those who will always choose to be wolves. And there are wolves so cunning they even deceive themselves with their sheep’s clothing. These sheep/wolves will never choose to truly look to or see the Chief Shepherd. In Luke 10 Christ said “Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves.” Christ tells them how to distinguish the sheep from the wolves: those who “welcome” His disciples and those who do not. To the latter Christ said tell them: “11. Even the dust of your town that clings to our feet, we wipe off as a testimony against you. Yet be sure of this: The kingdom of God is near.’ 12. I tell you, it will be more bearable on that day for Sodom than for that town.” We came to the conclusion that we are to reach out to the sheep. We are also to seek out the “lost sheep,” lead or return them to the fold where there will be “one flock and one shepherd.” (John 10:16) We also concluded it would not only be pointless to reach out to the wolves, blinded “unbelievers,” it would put the sheep in jeopardy to do so. To be clear, those who will one day open their eyes to God are not wolves, but lost sheep. To also be clear, until their eyes are open and we can see them living as sheep, we should not turn them loose in the flock. I have concluded that I write or call to the “The Church,” not the churches (established religion), but the “sheep,” separated from each other or lost among this world of wolves.
The reports to which I refer were all based on a study from The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention detailing suicide rates. USA Today mined the data in the report and offered these stunning observations on the number of teen suicides between 2006 and 2016. The CDC report offered both bulk age group data and race distinctions. The data analysis shows that the number of self-inflicted deaths of white children between the ages of 10 and 17 increased 70% during the time span. While suicides among Black children and teens are less common, their suicide rate showed an even more significant increase of 77%.
Here are some more numbers from The CDC. From 1999 to 2014, girls ages 10 to 14 taking their own lives increased three-fold; yes, a whopping 300%. In 2013, the 2nd leading cause of death for 10- to 24-year-olds was suicide. The number one cause was “unintentional” or accidental death, which includes everything from falling off a roof to a car accident. Note, 10 to 24 is basically the Gang age; fewer of these young people were murdered by someone else than chose to murder themselves. Almost 3% more of these 10- to 24-year-old young people ended their own lives than had them ended by all the major health diseases combined: Cancer, Heart Disease, Diabetes, etc. One more from The CDC. In 2015, girls between the ages of 15-19 who committed suicide hit a 40-year high.
Leviticus 18:21: “Do not give any of your children to be sacrificed to Molek.” H4432 môlek mo’-lek; (that is, king), the chief deity of the Ammonites. For those who don’t know, the Ammonites were descended from Lot’s younger daughter through Ben-ammi (Gen 19:38). They worshiped the “king” of idols, Molek. Most of their existence was spent trying to wipe out the nation that followed God, Israel (Psalms 83:1-8). They were a perverted people, truly descended from Sodom (Gen 18:6-33, 19:1-29). Their lives and lifestyles were lived for “other gods” made of their own ungodly desires. They even sacrificed their own children to justify their “detestable” ways. To this God was very clear, warning His people not to be like the Ammonites. Leviticus 18:
- 20. “Do not have sexual relations with your neighbor’s wife and defile yourself with her.
- 21. Do not give any of your children to be sacrificed to Molek, for you must not profane the name of your God. I am the Lord.
- 22. Do not have sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman; that is detestable.
- 23. Do not have sexual relations with an animal and defile yourself with it. A woman must not present herself to an animal to have sexual relations with it; that is a perversion.
- 24. Do not defile yourselves in any of these ways, because this is how the nations that I am going to drive out before you became defiled.
- 29. Everyone who does any of these detestable things—such persons must be cut off from their people.
- 30. Keep my requirements and do not follow any of the detestable customs that were practiced before you came and do not defile yourselves with them. I am the Lord your God.” *(Also, let’s not forget God’s talk with Moses, Exodus 20. The wolves & the sheep/wolves have written exceptions to all of these, making them a violation of their social/secular religion.)
To sum up: Don’t do what the Ammonites (wolves) did, and do not allow those who do into your flock. So, let me ask you. How is the modern world not following the “Ammonite customs?” Long ago we began to allow the wolves to define right and wrong. We watched as wolves in sheep’s clothing welcomed these new definitions into mainstream society. The sheep sit in their pews while wolves stand at the church doors and in the pulpits adorning themselves in the finest sheepskin. Meanwhile our children are being sacrificed to this “secular morality.” Almost three generations ago we accepted the idea that our children shouldn’t talk to God in school. Two generations ago we began to teach our children the “Theory of Evolution” as fact, while at the same time declaring God’s Creation as blasphemy to this new social/secular religion. For generations we declared it morally wrong in the eyes of God to discriminate based on the physical characteristics of race or sex. Today, we accept that very same discrimination when offered by secular morality and given the sheep’s clothing of “diversity” and “inclusion.” We teach our children that, before they can be included, they must first be divided into groups. To make it even clearer for them, we accept equating physical differences, like race or sex, with mental differences, like “orientation” and “identity.” We send our children out into a world where the wolves of social/secular religion have not just blurred the lines of right and wrong, but erased them all together.
In 1969, the wolves began a new movement that would sweep across the land like a storm, devastating families and children in its path. Sadly, the “churches” didn’t move their families into the storm shelter of Scripture, but, rather, wrote their own positions. These positions threw the families and children they were obliged to protect directly into the path of the storm. Here is an example from one of the churches I spent two decades attending (the largest mainstream protestant church in America):
In marriages where the partners are, even after thoughtful reconsideration and counsel, estranged beyond reconciliation, we recognize divorce and the right of divorced persons to remarry, and express our concern for the needs of the children of such unions. To this end we encourage an active, accepting, and enabling commitment of the Church and our society to minister to the needs of divorced persons.
The problem is that this departure from God’s morality to adopt a secular position of easy, no-fault divorce, predictably, did not protect marital partners or their children. The churches had let the wolves in and the lambs would pay the price. As a result, divorce rates would soar to over 50% and the expected negative statistics of “broken homes” right along with them. 31% of children from divorced homes were dropping out of school and 33% of girls were getting pregnant. The numbers for their counterparts in married households were 13 and 11%, respectively. These stats, referenced in the book Growing Up with a Single Parent: What Hurts, What Helps, also showed 11% of males from divorced homes under the age of 32 ended up in prison as opposed to only 5% from homes where the parents stayed together. Now look at these stunning conclusions by sociologist Paul Amato referenced in the article The Evolution of Divorce:
The divorce revolution’s collective consequences for children are striking. Taking into account both divorce and non-marital childbearing, sociologist Paul Amato estimates that if the United States enjoyed the same level of family stability today as it did in 1960, the nation would have 750,000 fewer children repeating grades, 1.2 million fewer school suspensions, approximately 500,000 fewer acts of teenage delinquency, about 600,000 fewer kids receiving therapy, and approximately 70,000 fewer suicide attempts every year. Amato’s conclusion: turning back the family-stability clock just a few decades could significantly improve the lives of many children.
There are those who would point out that the divorce rate has dropped slightly and leveled out since the late 80’s. This is true but does not indicate the positive they would have you assume. In reality it is the storm becoming a hurricane. It might be viewed as the calm in the eye; a false sense of security in spite of the devastation all around you. What it actually shows is that we have moved from a reduced commitment to marriage to not making the commitment at all. The above article also points out that in 1960 there were 439,000 unmarried couples living together; in 2007, that number had jumped to an astonishing 6.4 million – a fourteen fold increase. The damage adopting this secular morality has done to our children is unquestionable when even the world that supported it has begun to say:
Marriage provides benefits both to children and to society. Although it was once possible to believe that the nation’s high rates of divorce, cohabitation, and nonmarital childbearing represented little more than lifestyle alternatives brought about by the freedom to pursue individual self-fulfillment, many analysts now believe that these individual choices can be damaging to the children who have no say in them and to the society that enables them.
This from a published work by a group of scholars at the Brookings Institution and Princeton University. Unfortunately, this isn’t just like closing the doors of the barn after the horse is out; this horse isn’t even in the same county anymore. We not only accept the violation of Leviticus 18:20 as normal, we advocate for the violation of Leviticus 18:22 and social/secular religion (the wolves) and the churches (the sheep/wolves) have moved to recognize it as marriage. All the stats quoted in the 1969 section are now ten-years-old, and, as the CDC study shows, have gotten dramatically worse. Instead of “fewer suicide attempts,” successful suicides have skyrocketed.
In the last twenty years we have also seen the outbreak of a new phenomena, “school shootings.” But does our new secular morality look at the above stats and realize that the same thing that causes a child to kill themselves sometimes plays out in violence against their peers? Do they take note that the vast majority of these kids killing kids choose as their last victim themselves? No. The wolves seize the opportunity to further the doctrine of their social/secular religion, and the sheep/wolves play right along. They will further their agenda with the blood of our lambs and the headlines will simply change from “school shootings” to school stabbings or bombings or whatever other tool these children can find to scream, “I am lost.” Finally, most who do look at the children themselves declare them “mentally ill.” But they are not mentally ill, they are morally ill. A condition passed down to them from their parents and the rest of society in faithfulness to their Molek, their god – self and secular morality.
Even most Christian parents, to some degree, relinquish their moral authority, mandated by God, to their children. Children who haven’t begun to take in the necessary knowledge, much less developed the wisdom to apply that knowledge correctly. I see children two-years-old asked to decide to behave right, having never been clearly taught what right is. We raise our children in compliance with a world that consistently puts their idols before everything and everyone. We ignore when a society of experts like the “American College of Pediatricians” says multi-genderism and trans-genderism supported in children is tantamount to child abuse. We even up the anti and require our children to accept members of the opposite sex into their private spaces or face punishment. Then we tell them “No means No?” (which it does) We have completely ignored Scripture and provide no more than a foundation of “sand” for our children, giving them no firm place to stand. Our children are submersed in Molek’s world, confused and bewildered. We teach them it’s right to kill unborn babies, but wrong to call their friend a bad name? (by the way, when Christ was placed in Mary’s womb as a single cell, when did He become Christ? Just a Thought) We tell them color doesn’t matter and then ask them on every government form what color they are? We tell them your sex doesn’t matter and then offer them special privilege if they are the right one? We tell them not to steal from their neighbor until they inevitably get their first paycheck and see that someone has taken some of their earnings and given them to their neighbor?
We have allowed social/secular religion and their secular morality to tell our children what love is while ignoring God’s Love all together. We broke God’s Love down in “Pursuit is;” “Genuine” affection for another by a deliberate act of will, in moral clarity, as a matter of principle. Where are they supposed to get this “moral clarity” if not from us? How will they act out of “principle” if we don’t show them God’s Character? When will we teach them what “genuine affection” is? Is it really a wonder that our children see no hope? In a world ruled by “other gods,” where our children are sacrificed on the alter of political correctness and secular morality, is it really that hard to figure out why they end their lives looking for any world better then the one they’re in?
One more thing I picked up in the litany of articles written about these CDC reports. The very people who told us the answers to all our problems were their redefined morality – the same morality I just described that caused this moral decay that takes our children – are all too ready to exclaim that the solution to this problem is more of their answers. We just need to further adopt their social/secular religion into ours and our children’s lives. Just bow to Molek. How many more of our children will we sacrifice at this alter?
As sheep (believers) we were told this day would come, when the world would redefine morality, when right would become wrong and wrong become right. As sheep, we know that this world will meet the same fate as Sodom and the long gone Ammonites. Even so, should we just surrender our children to be sacrificed to their religion? Or will we go down fighting to give them a chance at the Hope and Promise of God?
So, my call is to the “sheep.” Search out the lost of the flock and bring them in as Christ commands. Beware of the wolves and stand guard over your children. If you have a sheep-dressed wolf in your church, pray; then approach your shepherd (pastor). If you are sure they are a wolf and your pastor chooses to continue to provide their sheepskin… leave. Leave and find a church or a flock that is in alignment with, and truly devoted to, “The Church” Christ defined. From there, reach out to these lost children. Show them that this physical world is weak compared to the spiritual world of the one True God. Give them the Hope that comes with that knowledge. Teach them to Love with God’s Love. Show them that to allow people to be judged by secular morality is truly hateful. Foster in them the wisdom that they are God’s creation and that, as such, are beyond earthly value. Teach them to reject the “other gods” of social/secular religion designed by man to justify their own wrong behavior. Show them parents, guardians, pastors, teachers and neighbors that Love them enough to do the same. Show them that you would never sacrifice them in pursuit of your own desires, despicable or otherwise. Show them Genuine Affection, the Courage of Conviction, Moral Clarity as a Matter of Principle.
Show them Love as a Deliberate Act of Will!
*Exodus 20 / The Ten Commandments
1 And God spoke all these words:
2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
3 “You shall have no other gods before me.
4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.
7 “You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.
8 “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.
12 “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.
13 “You shall not murder.
14 “You shall not commit adultery.
15 “You shall not steal.
16 “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.
17 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
© Scott A Caughel 3/21/2018