Out With the New and In With the Old

Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t care. There is simply too much at stake to remain silent.

Some things – like bell bottom pants, fanny packs, man buns, Nehru jackets, and the AMC Gremlin – should go out of style, never to return. Well, maybe not bell bottoms but definitely skinny jeans for men, so you can substitute the AMC Pacer instead.

The Detroit automakers sure produced some real clunkers in the 1970s!

However, some things should never be allowed to diminish in influence and importance, let alone pass away entirely, and organized religion is one of them. Unfortunately, the United States seems to be trending in that direction.

According to a recent study conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute, more than a quarter of all Americans now consider themselves to be religiously unaffiliated. The study also showed that only 52% of our fellow citizens cited religion as the most – or one of the most – important things in their lives, which reflects an 11% decline over the past decade.

Say what you want about organized religion, but over the course of our country’s history, churches have served as gathering places that promote a sense of community and stability. For instance, the first home my wife and I owned was in the Amon Heights section of Pennsauken, New Jersey, just 12 blocks from the Camden border. Despite Camden being perennially on the list of America’s poorest and most dangerous cities, Amon Heights was a safe and secure place to raise a family mostly because the Catholic church in the heart of the neighborhood was a religious and social hub that drew good working-class people. As a Baptist, I never attended St. Cecelia’s, but our family benefitted from its stabilizing presence.

With church attendance on the decline, more and more Americans find themselves isolated, alone, and almost completely disconnected. In fact, for some people, their only contact with the outside world is through social media, which is impersonal at best. This unhealthy self-isolation became even more prevalent during the pandemic when schools, businesses, and even some churches were temporarily closed, and shelter-in-place orders were imposed.

Sadly, some churchgoers still prefer live-streaming services to attending in-person. Virtual church is great when you’re sick, but staying home so you can watch the service in your pajamas isn’t the answer. Humans are communal beings, meaning that we covet and require face-to-face social interaction. Without it, we are like ships passing (and adrift) in the proverbial night.

I guess that’s one of the reasons the writer of Hebrews commanded his readers not to forsake “the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.” The phrase “the Day” refers to the Lord’s return, a highly anticipated event for Christians and a terrifying certainty for non-believers.

That’s also the reason why Solomon wrote in Proverbs 27:17, “As iron sharpens iron, so a man sharpens the countenance of his friend.” It is difficult if not impossible for a knife to be sharpened absent a grinding wheel or a whetstone, and it is equally hard for a person to flourish in self-imposed solitary confinement.

Returning to our starting point, there are some things that need to be tossed into the ash heap of history and there are others that are the critical, essential, and irreplaceable building blocks of our society. The latter includes the family, the church, and dare I say it, the Bible itself. As Dr. John MacArthur said, “Scripture needs no updating, editing, or refining. Whatever time or culture you live in, it is eternally relevant. It needs no help in that regard. It is pure, sinless, inerrant truth; it is enduring. It is God’s revelation for every generation.”

Dr. MacArthur also spoke to the subject of the Bible’s positive influence on societal mores and how, when we reject its teachings to make room for “updated” theology based on political correctness and human desires, we do so at society’s peril.
“If you reject the Bible, you have no foundation for morality,” MacArthur said, “so you come up with a new morality which is to turn the old morality on its head. Evil is good and good is evil. Fornication, adultery, homosexuality, homosexual marriage, abortion, whatever it is, that’s acceptable in the new morality. Once you’ve rejected the Bible, you turn morality upside down.”

Folks, if the Gremlin or the Pacer makes a comeback, I can live with that (although I won’t be buying one). However, if the Judeo-Christian principles upon which America was founded go out of style, our country is in danger of going over the moral cliff.

We are already dangling by a thread, so let’s take a collective step back from the ledge before it’s too late. As Ronald Reagan reminded us in a paraphrase of Alexis de Tocqueville’s words, “America is great because America is good. And if she ever ceases to be good, she will cease to be great.”

Goodness starts with a vibrant personal faith, regular church attendance, and daily Bible reading. There is no substitute for any of them if America wants to survive, let alone flourish.