The U.S. is splintering deeper into isolated and contentious sides of moral and political ideologies. Paul spoke to Timothy about this age and the characteristics of its people, “but know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: For men will be … boasters, proud…without self-control…despisers of good…lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God…” (2 Timothy 3:1-4). We are being torn apart as a country, not from invading forces but from within—by our own hands. The reason is simple: man has disavowed God.
This inclination was understood by our founding fathers. Abraham Lincoln stated in his Lyceum Address “…At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer. If it ever reach us it must spring up amongst us; it cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time or die by suicide.”
While we can quickly point to a nation falling apart after generations of spiritual decay, we must also test our own foundations—seeking to continuously shore up our spiritual walls against the constant battering of Satan. We live in an age of spiritual darkness like none other. We are, by God’s Will, set apart to shine in this blackness as “children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom [we] shine as lights in the world” (Philippians 2:15).
Mankind has pushed God away and has become blinded by Satan, “whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them” (2 Corinthians 4:4). Our only hope of trudging through this darkness is by “looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2). Only by our own weakness will we fail, and only by our reliance on Jesus Christ will we succeed.
