Three Fundamentals Driving the Division

Three fundamentals driving the division. That's the topic we'll discuss today right here on the Christian Worldview radio program, where the mission is to reconcile to God through faith in who Jesus Christ is and what He did for us on the cross.

I'm David Wheaton, the host. Our website is thechristianworldview.org Today, we're going to do a support day on the program, and I'll tell you more about that as we get into the topic. But let's get into the topic, which is three fundamentals driving the division in our program. Now, it all seems complex, but actually it's really quite clear and simple what's taking place, what's driving this division. And it's based on the rejection of three fundamental truths that God established not just yesterday, but literally right at the beginning of time in the opening chapters of Genesis. So this weekend on the Christian Worldview, we're going to examine how a refusal to, number one, acknowledge God, and number two, a redefining of God's institutions, which He established right there at the beginning, and number three, how a rejection of man's nature explains what is taking place in our nation right now. And then we're going to follow up and ask the question, why then, if it's so clear about what is taking place right now, why then are some professing Christian influencers, whether pastors or authors or so forth, persuading Christians to not avoid those that are shaking their closed fist at God?

So we hope you can stay with us today for this important and hopefully clarifying examination of the spiritual battle that is currently taking place in our country and in the church. Now the first one I mentioned of the three fundamentals, rejection of the three fundamental truths that God established in the very beginning is, number one, just the most basic one and actually the most serious and significant one. It's a refusal to acknowledge God. The very first sentence of the Bible, first let's say read the first three verses, are incredibly critical and the ramifications are so broad and so great that it would be impossible to overstate them.

So I'm just going to read those three verses. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Right there all of a sudden it doesn't create an apologetic or try to explain that God exists, it just presupposes that of course God exists. Right there we know that there's a God who exists. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. That's the explanation for why we're here. Verse two, the earth was formless and void and darkness was over the surface of the deep and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.

Verse three is super key as well. Then God said, let there be light and there was light. So just from these first three verses, a fundamental truth that God exists in the beginning God, and not only that, verse three, then God said, we not only have a God who exists but a God who speaks, a God who's alive and active in this world. And this changes everything because once we know this, that God exists and God speaks, the obvious ramifications are, well, how do we obey this God? Who is this God? How do we obey him?

What does he expect from us? How are we accountable to this God? And as I mentioned, this is the most serious and significant point that is driving the division in our country. Much of this country, maybe up to half of the voting electorate or maybe even more, lives and thinks, thinks and lives as if God doesn't exist and we're not accountable to him and he hasn't spoken.

That's a huge, huge problem. That's much of what's driving the division in this country because much of the country still does believe that as well, that God does exist and he has spoken. So when God is removed from the equation, everything is negatively impacted.

Nothing is going to be shaped by a biblical perspective unless it's partially borrowed and that's actually what the case is today. The left in this country, those of the humanistic worldview we'll talk about, they don't believe in objective truth, but they all stop at stoplights. They realize that if you jump off a building, gravity is going to take you down to the ground and you're going to die. So they all live by objective truth, so they borrow things from the Christian worldview except they don't acknowledge that God even exists. So they have a really schizophrenic worldview is what they have. No one really lives by a humanistic worldview in complete rejection of God.

They just won't admit it. So everything is going to be man-based reasoning and someone is going to rule, by the way. If God is not on the throne in their minds, someone else has to be. So the rulers of our society are the most educated, the most erudite, the elite, because they're the smart people and they know what's best. They're the politicians, the writers, the thinkers, the professors, the scientists. Listen to the scientists, we're always told to say, I think Joe Biden said that or not, listen to the scientists as if they're God. They can't be wrong, right?

They're the arbiters of what's right and wrong. And so then when you refuse to acknowledge God, this first point, government will be viewed as the answer for all of our problems. And so much of America today refuses to acknowledge that God exists and that he has spoken.

It suppresses his clear truth he's revealed in the world and then they go from that. Once you refuse to acknowledge God, we'll get into Romans 1 in a second, it just turns into being given over and you giving hearty approval to sin. Well, lo and behold, John MacArthur gave a message this week and I think it was titled, A Nation Under God, or I can't remember the exact title of it.

I was able, someone told me about it and I listened to some of the excerpts last night that really dovetailed really well with the topic we're discussing today about the fundamentals driving this division. So I'm just going to play a couple sound bites from that message throughout the program, sprinkle them in today. And the first one is that nations are obligated to worship God. This is a non-optional principle that God created the nations. He created each one of us. We are obligated, we are commanded.

This is not a suggestion. The question is, is this a nation under God? We know that's what the founding fathers intended and not just any God but the God of Scripture. Nations are obligated to worship the true God.

Did you hear what I just said? They're obligated to worship the true God and there are dire circumstances that will come upon them if they fail to do that. So this isn't a matter of separation of church and state and don't push your religion on me.

No, no, no. Nations are obligated to worship the true God. That doesn't mean we need to force people to worship God, put a gun to their head, absolutely not. God gives us a measure of free will, of course, a test of faith whether we're going to worship him or not. But the nation itself, the leadership of the nation needs to acknowledge and worship God and his word and his commands need to be the main threads that run through the laws and policies of a society. Because this is why we're created. John MacArthur goes on to say that we're created to worship God.

That's the point. Whatever you do in life, you're created to worship God. You are a worshiper. You're either going to worship God or you're going to worship a false God or something else, money, position, power, whatever. But one of the things that particularly interested Ryle was the relationship between the church and the state. He recognized the foundational truth that all people and all nations are called to worship the true God.

That is not an option. That is a divine command. I don't think people understand that. Let me begin by establishing some foundational truth. Number one, man was created by God in the image of God for the glory of God.

That's exactly right. And when you don't worship God, you worship false gods and those false gods aren't actually really even gods. There's only one God, right? There's only one true God. All the other gods of Islam or Hinduism or Buddhism or Eastern religion gods, these are all false gods. These are all false-made, demonic-sourced gods. They're not true gods. God said there's no God besides me.

There is no God besides me. That is, there are no other gods. Scripture says back in Deuteronomy 32, it's repeated in 1 Corinthians 10, that all the gods of the nations are demons.

They are satanic counterfeits, demonic delusions. There's only one God. All the rest are some form of demon worship. That's exactly the case and I'm very thankful for someone like Pastor MacArthur to make these very, very clear statements. You don't need to nibble around the edges here and be a little nervous about offending those who worship false gods. Actually, you love them by telling them they're worshiping false gods.

And so this is the first fundamental driving the division in this country is that we have a certain percentage of society who has more of a traditional, reverent view. Let's say they're not even born-again Christians, have entered into a spiritual relationship with God through faith in Christ. But they at least acknowledge that God exists. They know there are principles that they've been influenced from, from the word of God, and they think that the nation should be established on those principles.

That's what the founders did. And then the other side, the nation is so divided now because you have more and more and more people in this country who refuse to acknowledge God. And so therefore that's in their worldview and so you always live out what your worldview is. And so that's why they are so diametrically opposed and antithetical and have so much animosity towards those who do acknowledge God. This fundamental, again, cannot be overstated.

Now I want to take a little time before the break. We're going to have a Christian Real View Support Day just throughout the program today. Wherever you're listening today, even on the internet, we are going to have to make an appeal to raise some support for the Christian Real View radio program. Not many listeners understand that the Christian Real View and all Christian programs pay for the airtime on stations.

And so if you're listening on a regular station or a network of stations, if you're listening on oneplace.com, the Christian Real View is paid for that airtime. And so the only way we can recoup those expenses is through listener donations and listeners buying resources. And we are an all-volunteer organization. Everyone, including me, volunteers our time. So you're not donating to pay for big salaries of people who are running this organization. We're all volunteers. And so today we're making an appeal for whatever station you're listening to. However you listen to the Christian Real View, we just greatly appreciate if you would become a monthly partner. And it doesn't need to be a huge amount.

It could be $10, $15, $20, $25 a month to the Christian Real View. We are on a couple of the stations behind. And I think we probably haven't made clear that we are reliant on your listener support. So we'll make that clear a bit more in the program today.

We'll get back. We have much more to talk about in these three fundamentals driving the division. You can support the Christian Real View by going to our website, thechristianrealview.org. The Bible says that children should be raised in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. There's nothing more important than sitting, walking, talking, and teaching your son or daughter to love and fear God. The church is swimming in children's resources, but it's ultra important to select ones that accurately represent God, His Word, and the Gospel. At our store on thechristianrealview.org, we are intentional about offering resources that will build a sound and strong faith in children. You will find several Bibles for children, the Adam Raccoon book series, and Good News for Little Hearts series.

We also have video and audio resources like Theo and Sugar Creek Gang. Browse them all at thechristianrealview.org and then use them daily with the child God has put in your life. That's thechristianrealview.org. You can search for The Christian Real View in the podcast app on your smartphone and subscribe for free. The program is also available at oneplace.com, sermonaudio.com, iTunes, Google Podcasts, and Stitcher.

If you need help navigating the online podcast realm, just give us a call toll free 1-888-646-2233. Or follow the links on the homepage of thechristianrealview.org. Because when believers have a sharper biblical worldview and non-believers come to saving faith, lives and families are changed for the glory of God. Thank you for listening. We're back on The Christian Real View radio program talking about the three fundamentals driving the division in America and really in the church today.

There's a lot of division there as to who we should be supporting politically and otherwise. Just a little further explanation on The Christian Real View support day today. If you've listened to the program for very long, you know we're not an organization that tries to twist your arm to give and so forth and so on.

So that's not our natural kind of bent. It is to spend our air time doing that on a weekly basis. We try to make the need known and so forth. We tell you we are listener supported and that we pay for our air time. But the reality is though that we have bills to pay and costs that we have to pay every single month to be on the air.

And in lieu of a dinner event this year, we didn't have our fundraising event there. And so we just wanted to make it known in case sometimes people forget or need to be reminded that we are a listener supported ministry. And your donations go directly to paying our costs.

Again, not our salaries but the costs of broadcasting. And so we would very much appreciate your support. Whatever station you listen to, it's really important that you, when you donate to us or become a monthly partner, which is actually most helpful because that can help us drive decisions on which stations we stay on, which stations we have to pull off of that aren't supporting themselves, that you specify where you listen. So whether it's in our Twin Cities local stations or whether you listen on oneplace.com or KGFT in Colorado Springs, we're having a campaign there right now. We're trying to raise some support, some monthly partners there. We'd like each station to be able to support itself.

And again, these don't have to be big donations. But monthly partner commitments of $10, $15, $20, $25 makes a huge difference for us to be able to cover the airtime. And we're always so focused on content.

We don't take any time to talk about this sort of thing. But the reality is that we have monthly invoices that come in and we have to pay our airtime and we have no other way to pay it except by listener, especially monthly listener support. So we would appreciate if you consider that. We, again, don't want to leverage you. We trust God completely for the future of this ministry. We know that God has other means of communicating His gospel and His word if it's not the Christian Real View.

So we're not the only ones. But we'd appreciate your support. And you can donate or support us, become a monthly partner by just going to our website, thechristianrealview.org, or you can call us in our office number, which is 1-888-646-2233. Okay, let's get back to our topic for today, which are three fundamentals driving the division in this country.

And the first fundamental, if you just joined us, is by far the most significant one. When a nation refuses to acknowledge that God exists and has spoken, that is a major, major problem that brings judgment. We played a couple of sound bites from John MacArthur in the opening segment saying that, that doesn't work. We are created to worship God, nations are ordained by God, and nations are ordained to worship God.

And when they don't, judgment is inevitable when that happens. Now I was looking at the party platforms. We had talked about this recently on the program. I was interested to find out or look into the Democrat National Committee platform versus the Republican National Committee platform, and just basically how much they even mention God in their platform. Well, in the Democrat National Committee platform, in a 91-page document, 91 pages of all that they're trying to do as the Democrat party, there is only one reference to God in the entire 91 pages.

It says, Democrats remain committed to ending poverty and enabling all Americans to live up to their God-given potential. That's the only mention of God in their entire platform. As a matter of fact, they've actually taken under God out of the Pledge of Allegiance a couple of different times.

I'm not sure what the status of that is now, but a couple of different times they've left that out. Now they may have ended it back in because of the pushback they received, but they're not for prayer in school. They're not for the Ten Commandments in school at all. And so when you go down that road of refusing to acknowledge God at this first point, poverty is not going to be remedied by encouragement to work, or personal responsibility, or making good choices, or individual charity with the proclamation of the Gospel, but redistribution of wealth by taxing income producers and giving welfare benefits to those with no spiritual counsel added to it. And that's just horrible for the person receiving it. Morality is going to be up to the individual.

That's why the Democrat Party is all about pushing the LGBTQ agenda. We'll get into that in a second. School and education will be completely void of anything spiritual. You go to a public school and there's absolutely nothing spiritual there with regard to God at all. It's like you can live your life completely devoid of the most important aspect of life, which is God. So you're educated without any framework at all of who God is and why we're here.

So how do you think that's going to turn out? Religious liberty won't be important at all because, after all, they think God doesn't even exist. They think you're just kind of some crazy person who's superstitious or something and believes in myths and legends. Religious liberty going to church, that's why churches are being shut down and not deemed essential. I mean, come on, it's just kind of something you do on a Sunday that just makes you feel better.

That's not essential for your life at all. The environment. This is why Democrats are radical environmentalists. It's like in Romans 1, they worship and serve the creature, the creation, over and above the creator.

So there's no God, so we worship Mother Earth. And this always ends in what we're seeing in the streets right now. It leads to chaos, and it leads eventually to when the chaos gets worse and worse. Well, people have to have law and order to some extent to live their lives, otherwise it turns into anarchy so you get stronger and stronger leaders, and you have to have totalitarianism.

There's no constraint in the home. They reject the biblical family. They won't believe the Ten Commandments, so when you don't do that, you have to make up 10,000 laws. And this is because the natural heart does not want to worship God, that that's what we want to resist in our unsaved state.

Here's what John MacArthur says about that. J.C. Ryle said this, Any worship is more pleasing to the natural heart than worshiping God in the way our Lord Jesus describes it as worshiping in spirit and truth. The natural heart goes in the opposite direction of God.

That is why the Scripture constantly commands everyone back from that deviation to worship the true God. Okay, so I looked up the Republican National Committee platform. Again, long document of all they believe and support and oppose and so forth.

And again, never going to say the Republican Party is the Christian Party, but I'm just going to read a paragraph from their platform showing that there is an acknowledgment of God all over it. We are the party of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. The Declaration sets forth the fundamental presets of American government that God bestows certain inalienable rights on every individual, thus producing human equality. That government exists first and foremost to protect those inalienable rights given by God, I injected that. That man-made law must be consistent with God-given natural rights. And that if God-given natural inalienable rights come in conflict with government, court or human-granted rights, God-given natural inalienable rights always prevail. That there is a moral law recognized as laws of nature and of nature's God. And that American government is to operate with the consent of the governed, skipping down. It is the solemn compact built upon principles of the Declaration that enshrines our God-given individual rights and ensures that all Americans stand equal before the law, and it just goes on and on and on.

You see, there's an acknowledgment there. Again, not everyone in the Republican Party is a born-again Christian, but there's an acknowledgment at least that our rights come from God, we are to be, these things are given by God, and God bestows certain inalienable rights. These come from God, not from man. Very, very, very, very different than the Democratic National Committee platform. And so to summarize, one major party in this country, the Democrats, is trying to think and live as if God doesn't exist and hasn't spoken.

And those who follow that party, who vote for that party, are advancing that particular agenda, and it always ends in disaster. And people who, and sometimes as Christians, we look at others who have that worldview, who think and live as if God exists, and we think they're just a little different, they have two eyes and a nose and a mouth and ears and so forth, arms and legs, and the same organs inside their body, but just realize that what is going on in their brain, in their soul, they might as well be from a completely different world. They look at the same issue as you and have a completely ungodly view of it. So they look at a preborn baby in a mother's womb as just a group of cells, and they're actually completely convinced of that. Somehow they suppress the truth and they completely miss that late-term abortion.

Well, that's not a baby, it's just a fetus or just some cells. They may look like you and they may speak your same language, but they're thinking completely in the opposite, antithetically opposed to God view than the Christian was. So they don't have God over them, they're not accountable to God, they've taken out their, well they are accountable to God, but they try to act as if they're not accountable to God, and they operate by their own rules. This is why Scripture says they do what is right in their own eyes. They will believe or they will tell a lie to achieve the ends that they believe are good. They'll define morality their own way, they'll rail against authorities, they'll intimidate people, they'll be violent, they'll call looting reparations. They're not constrained by God's laws because they don't believe God exists and has spoken. So they have no God-ordained rules constraining them. And frankly, it's not a very fair fight because Christians and those who believe in God are restrained by what God says, and they are not. This is why it's difficult to oppose, and this is why we need spiritual, supernatural help to do so. If you're listening to the Christian worldview, we're talking about what is driving the division, it's a rejection of three fundamentals.

We'll get to number two and three right after this. There's an abundance of Christian resources available, but the reality is that many of them, even some of the most popular, do not lead to a sound and strong faith. While there's only one perfect book, a key aim of the Christian worldview is to identify and offer resources that are biblically faithful and deepen your walk with God. In our online store, we have a wide range of resources for all ages, adult and children's books and DVDs, Bibles and devotionals, unique gifts, and more. So browse our store at thechristianworldview.org and find enriching resources for yourself, family, friends, small group, or church. You can also order by calling toll-free 1-888-646-2233.

That's 1-888-646-2233. Or visit thechristianworldview.org. Be sure to take advantage of two free resources that will keep you informed and sharpen your worldview. The first is the Christian Worldview Weekly Email, which comes to your inbox each Friday. It contains a preview of the upcoming radio program, along with need-to-read articles, featured resources, special events, and audio of the previous program. The second is the Christian Worldview Annual Print Letter, which is delivered to your mailbox in November. It contains a year-end letter from host David Wheaton and a listing of our store items, including DVDs, books, children's materials, and more. You can sign up for the weekly email and annual print letter by visiting thechristianworldview.org or calling 1-888-646-2233.

Your email and mailing address will never be shared, and you can unsubscribe at any time. Call 1-888-646-2233 or visit thechristianworldview.org. Back on the Christian Worldview radio program, where the aim is to think biblically and live accordingly about all matters of life and faith. We try to do that every weekend on the topics we cover.

Today we're talking about fundamentals, the three fundamentals driving the division in this country. We're calling today sort of a Christian Worldview support day. We're just going to do this a couple times a year. We're not going to be doing this all the time. We spend just maybe about 5% of the program just reminding listeners that the Christian Worldview pays for airtime. We very much appreciate if you would consider becoming a monthly partner on the station or network on which you listen. It's very important to let us know that when you become a monthly partner, and you don't need to become a monthly partner for big dollars.

We're not asking for that. But if we have more listeners just committing to be a monthly partner from even $10, $15, $20, it would make a very big difference for us. So we appreciate your support. Again, we're listener supported.

Your donations go towards really keeping the program out in the air because we pay for airtime all over the country on the more than 250 stations as well as the internet, places where you're here in one place and elsewhere. So you can support us by going to thechristianworldview.org or by calling us at 1-888-646-2233. Remember, when you do this, make sure you specify how you primarily listen to the Christian Worldview.

That's important for us in making decisions where we put the program, where we keep the program, and how we're doing on any particular station or network or online source for broadcast. Okay, let's get back to the second fundamental that is driving the division in this country. The first one was a refusal to acknowledge God, and the second is a redefining of God's institutions. In essence, this is almost a subset of number one, but I think it demands its own category because this is so prominent in our society today, a redefining of God's institutions, specifically marriage and family and child-rearing. And so God says in the first part of the program, we talk about Genesis chapter 1, that the very first verse, in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, and then verse 3, and then God said, this is a God who speaks, he lives, he speaks, and so therefore we are obligated to know what he says and what he wants us for as we're accountable to him. And now in the next chapter, God starts establishing institutions. In institutions, he establishes marriage and family. He says in Genesis chapter 2 verse 18, then the Lord God said, it is not good for the man to be alone, I will make him a helper suitable for him.

Even that, that's so offensive to today's humanistic ears. A helper to a man? You mean a woman?

That sounds like a patriarchy or something like that. Let God be true, though every man be found a liar. Then the Lord God said, it is not good for the man to be alone, I will make him a helper suitable for him. Verse 22, the Lord God fashioned him into a woman, into a woman the rib which he had taken from the man and brought her to the man.

The man said, this is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh, he shall be called woman because she was taken out of man. Verse 24, for this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother and shall be joined to his wife and they shall become one flesh. So here's the introduction of the institution, second chapter of the Bible, of one man, one woman, marriage for life, and subsequently it has implications for morality, in other words a man is not supposed to be with any other woman sexually except for his own wife, and then the implication as well is there to raise children from Ephesians 6 in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

This is a key institution. Now again, this is a refusal, the rejection of this, the redefining of God's institutions, this is a result of the refusal to acknowledge God, the first point. But again, I think it's worth a separate category because the redefining of God's institution perverts the one societal institution, corrupts it, marriage and family, that is absolutely required for a society to flourish. When you redefine marriage and redefine family and change the principles of child rearing, and that starts to happen on a broad scale as has happened in America, where anything is a family and we can, two men, two women, and whatever you want to do, and there's no biblical principles of child rearing to discipline your children, to raise them in the instruction of the Lord, when that's not prioritized, the society is going to just languish. God established principles for marriage and family that are required. They're not optional.

In other words, it's not like a suggestion. If you don't do these, there are extremely negative consequences. And a biblical family is the most important unit in a society for a stable, a safe, and a flourishing society. When the family, when marriage gets redefined and child rearing is not done biblically, you have instability, you have a violent society, you don't have a flourishing society, you have a dying society, you have a self-destructive and a dangerous society, and that's what we're seeing on the streets of our country this time right now. And not only that, like I mentioned, there's a subset of one-man, one-woman marriage, it has implications for morality. Again, I looked at the Democrat National Committee platform, and this is why there's a promotion of homosexuality and transgenderism and sexual perversion all over it. There are 32 references to LGBTQ+. None to homosexuality.

They don't use that word because you could use a code word. An acronym never seems as bad as a description of what actually it is, homosexuality. It says in their committee platform, it says, we know that we still have work to do to ensure LGBTQ+, homosexual people, are treated equally under the law and in our society. We will fight to enact the Equality Act.

We covered that earlier this summer. They want to have homosexuality and transgenderism as protected classes, as gender and other things that are already in the Civil Rights Act of, I believe it was, 1965. They want to outlaw discrimination. Outlaw against, I mean, you put people in jail?

Against LGBTQ people in housing, public accommodations, access to credit, education, jury service, and federal programs. We will work to ensure LGBTQ+, people, are not discriminated against when seeking to adopt or foster children. There, again, a perversion of the family. They're saying that anything we define can be a family. It's just as good if we adopt a child into a family with two men or two women or two men and one woman or whatever. Again, a complete repudiation of the God-ordained institution of marriage, one man, one woman, and raising children in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

I won't read the rest of the paragraph. But as conservatives are adamant about biblical marriage and families, especially Christians, the left, they're obsessed about promoting homosexuality and transgenderism because biblical morality is from God. And to them, it's oppressive. And it's not inclusive, as they would say, of all the sexual perversion that they want to see across the country. Homosexual marriage, by the way, is not just who you marry, who you love. You often hear that. Everyone should be able to marry who they love.

You see, again, code words, deceitful phrases to make people say, yeah, you know what? You should be able to marry who you love. That's true. Marriage is about love, and you should be able to marry who you love. What they're not saying is the ramifications of where that leads. Children are harmed by not having a biblical coupling, one man, one woman. It's taught in the schools as being normative, and so they get involved in it. And those who resist it and push back against it, what happens to them? They're punished. So it's not just about, you know, it's not going to affect your marriage.

That's a lie. And so the other part of this whole thing is child-rearing. Not only is it marriage, this redefining of God's institution of marriage, but it's also a redefining of child-rearing. Ephesians 6, 4 says, Fathers do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. So this means that parents, fathers specifically, are to correct negative behavior, discipline, and teach positive behavior, biblical instruction. And because much of the country now doesn't acknowledge God, they don't see things like what the Bible says about disciplining children, even corporal punishment of children, spanking children. They see that as what?

What do they call it? Child abuse. But the Bible says we are to discipline our children, not abuse them, not hit them, but spank them when they deserve to be spanked. There's other forms of discipline as well, lesser forms of discipline, but it's up to and including that. And that's what our humanistic society resists. And when you refuse or redefine what it means to discipline your child, you're going to have children who grew up to be rebels.

That's just the way it is. And God's principles, His points and His word are non-optional. They're not suggestions, they're commands to be followed. And when we don't follow them, there are negative consequences. We'll get briefly into the third point here before this break. And the third fundamental that's driving the division of the country, number one, is refusal to acknowledge God, a redefining of God's institution of marriage and child-rearing.

And this third one is a big one too, a major one. It is the rejection of the fallen nature of man. In other words, much of this country does not accept the fact that man is inherently sinful. They see man as inherently good, and with the right environment and with the right kind of federal funds, man will behave better.

This is exactly why they think they can defund the police and everything's going to be okay. But again, back to Genesis, this is a rejection of what was clearly defined in Genesis early on. We've gone from Genesis 1 on God exists and He speaks, to Genesis 2 where God establishes the institution of marriage, now to Genesis 3 where we see the fall of man. Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made, and the serpent, Satan, said to the woman, indeed has God said, you shall not eat from any tree of the garden. He's trying to twist the truth of God. And the woman said to the serpent, from the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat, but from the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden, God has said you shall not eat it or you will die. And then the first big lie comes, you surely will not die, Satan says.

And the woman went on to eat it, bringing the entire human race into sin. Not viewing mankind as inherently sinful but good is going to change everything, and we'll talk about that next on The Christian Worldview. In the podcast app on your smartphone and subscribe for free. The program is also available at oneplace.com, sermonaudio.com, iTunes, Google Podcasts, and Stitcher. If you need help navigating the online podcast realm, just give us a call toll free, 1-888-646-2233, or follow the links on the home page of thechristianworldview.org, because when believers have a sharper biblical worldview and non-believers come to saving faith, lives and families are changed for the glory of God.

Thank you for listening. There's an abundance of Christian resources available, but the reality is that many of them, even some of the most popular, do not lead to a sound and strong faith. While there's only one perfect book, a key aim of The Christian Worldview is to identify and offer resources that are biblically faithful and deepen your walk with God. In our online store, we have a wide range of resources for all ages, adult and children's books and DVDs, Bibles and devotionals, unique gifts, and more. So browse our store at thechristianworldview.org and find enriching resources for yourself, family, friends, small group, or church.

You can also order by calling toll-free 1-888-646-2233. That's 1-888-646-2233, or visit thechristianworldview.org. Final segment of the day here on The Christian Worldview radio program.

This is the last time I'll mention it today, but this is what we're calling A Christian Worldview Support Day. We're going to spend just about 10% of the entire program just reminding listeners, if you're a regular listener, just asking if you consider becoming a monthly partner to the program. It can be of any amount, but that would really help us be able to cover the cost of airtime on the stations and networks on which we pay to broadcast, and also even online, like oneplace.com and elsewhere. So really appreciate your considering that. You can become a monthly partner of any amount by going to thechristianworldview.org or by calling us at our office line at 1-888-646-2233. Again, we are completely listener supported. We are all volunteers with The Christian Worldview, and so your support goes directly towards the expenses and costs and airtime and marketing and technologies that the real cost that we have to put this program on the air every weekend.

Again, the phone number is 1-888-646-2233. I want to get straight back because we don't have a lot of time left on today's program talking about the three fundamentals that are driving the division in this country and that there's a large swath of this country that still holds to general belief, acknowledgement of God, and knows that his principles are the way a country should be operated. But then there's a huge swath, a growing swath, and this is why the division is stronger now because there's more of them pushing back against the Christian foundings and worldview that this country was based on. And so the three fundamentals are there's a refusal to acknowledge God, that's number one. Number two, and that's the most important one, when you do that then everything falls apart. Number two, there's a redefining of God's institutions, specifically one man, one woman marriage, and child ring, which is the fundamental unit for a stable and safe and flourishing society. And number three, a third fundamental is a rejection of man's fallen nature. And before the break we were reading about how sin entered the world in Genesis 3 and Satan's lie led Adam and Eve to sin and leading to the fall of the human race. And it says in Romans chapter 5, Therefore just as through one man, Adam, sin entered into the world and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned. You can't miss the point there, we're all sinners by nature, we're born sinners because of Adam our representative, the first man, but we're also sinners by choice. And the fact that we're sinners has major ramifications for how we need to order society to put a hedge against sinful natures. So the God rejecting don't see man as inherently sinful as the Bible says, but that man is inherently good.

And the only actually real sinners, if there are sinners according to them, are the oppressors that create the problems, that have created the problems in the world, like males and whites and Christians and heterosexuals imposing their oppressive injustice on the rest of the people in the world. The sinful nature of man, though, is exactly why the founders understood the sinful nature of man, and this is why they prescribed a limited government, a separation of powers in government, that you'd have states' rights instead of big federal government rights, you'd have the electoral college, you'd have more representation from spread out, you'd have a representative republic, you'd have a constitution with rule of law, you'd have three branches of government, and we wouldn't have a king ruling over us. All to try to separate and have checks and balances, and what were they trying to do? They're trying to push back against a consolidation of power by a few people with sin natures that could oppress people. That's exactly why we have the government we do, according to the founders, but that's all being, you know, we need to burn it down today, right?

That's what we're hearing. The founders designed all this to restrain the sinful natures. So the God-rejectors out there believe in man as good. This is why they want a call to defund the police. They think that you can leave people alone and they're going to do the right thing with community counselors or something.

If you treat people differently, if you give them enough money and put them in a different kind of environment, give them enough education, there won't be so much violence. This is why the left doesn't want jails. They don't want to let people out of jail. They don't want borders.

They don't think we need those kinds of laws. Man's good. Create the right environment for them, educate them the right way. They're going to behave well. You know, poverty isn't the result, and this isn't always the case, but poverty isn't the result of bad choices or bad family situations that perpetuate it, you know, having children out of wedlock and all this and that, but it's a result of oppressors.

It's not their fault because they're good. It's a result of those sinful oppressors and a lack of government help. So these are the things that are driving the division in America, and I want to apply just one or two more sound bites from John MacArthur, what he says when this complete rejection of who God is, the institutions of marriage and family and of man having a sinful nature where it leads. There's only one God. He demands that everyone worship Him, individuals for individual salvation, nations recognizing Him for a national temporal blessing.

Where am I going with this? Pretty simple. When any government separates from God and His law in Scripture and from His people and His church, it invites judgment on a personal scale and a national scale. It's unavoidable because God is immutable.

He doesn't change. When government thinks its only responsibility is for physical, material, social, temporal needs and ignores the spiritual reality of the true God and people's spiritual needs, when a nation becomes indifferent to the true God and His Word and His law, it makes a grave mistake which, if not reversed, will lead that nation to its own destruction. The notion of a secular state is a lie.

Government is ordained by God. And here's the good news. Despite all the bad news of what much of American society has become, the good news is this God who created all of us, whether you acknowledge Him or not, He created you and you will be under His judgment someday. You will stand before Him someday.

You will be accountable for your life. Whether you want to realize it or not, we all will stand before the judgment seat of Christ. The good news is this God is not only a God of judgment, but He's a God of forgiveness and mercy. We see in the example in Scripture, when Jonah went to preach to the Ninevites, it was a wicked place.

They had done all the things, the fundamentals, that are driving the division we talked about today. But amazingly, the king of Nineveh repented and the people of Nineveh repented and they were saved from God's judgment for that time until subsequent generations went back to rejecting God and His Word. So there is great hope.

There's great hope for individuals listening today. If you personally have lived in a way that doesn't acknowledge God and obeyed Him, you can repent and believe in the gospel, as Jesus said. And when you do that, God forgives you and gives you eternal life. And as a nation, when our leaders and our people worship God instead of suppressing the truth and righteousness, God is willing to relent if we repent. And so we shouldn't be saying God bless America. On what basis would God bless America at this point in our history? We should be saying instead, America worship God.

That's the starting point for things turning around in this country. Not God bless America, America worship God. Thank you for listening to the Christian Real View today. Until next time, think biblically and live accordingly. The Christian World View is a weekly one-hour radio program that is furnished by the Overcomer Foundation and is supported by listeners and sponsors. Request one of our current resources with your donation of any amount. Go to thechristianworldview.org or call us toll-free at 1-888-646-2233 or write to us at Box 401, Excelsior, Minnesota, 55331. That's Box 401, Excelsior, Minnesota, 55331. Thanks for listening to the Christian World View. Until next time, think biblically and live accordingly.