24-0211a Transcript

Preacher: Scott Reynolds

(3:18) Good morning. (3:19) I’ve been bringing sessions of a webinar series entitled, (3:23) Seven Threats of Our Time, by Dr. Del Tackett, (3:29) the author of the Truth Project and the Engagement Project. (3:32) And today, we’re going to cover his wrap-up session, (3:36) because we’ve gone through all seven of the threats.

(3:40) So this may be a little bit difficult for those who haven’t heard any of this, (3:45) but it’s a wrap-up. Where do we go from here? (3:47) And as a reminder, the seven threats that we looked at (3:52) were the rise of the scoffer and the depraved mind, (3:57) the rise of homo deus and neo-Christianity, number two. (4:02) Number three, the loss of the noble male, and the rise of malevolent compassion.

(4:08) Number four, the consolidation of massive earthly power, (4:13) the rise of a demonic worldview and a national rift. (4:17) And number five, number six, America, looking at the status of America, (4:23) addicted and soft, dependent and lost. (4:26) And number seven, the attack upon the biblical family.

(4:31) And Del begins the last session of the series by saying, (4:36) we have seen as we’ve gone through the seven threats, (4:41) more and more evidence of each of these threats, as they’re played out around us. (4:46) But today, and I’m splitting it in two tonight, (4:50) what we thought we would do is go through these a little bit differently. (4:55) I want to talk about some of the common threads that we see through each of these threats, (5:01) and how these threats are being expressed in our time today.

(5:07) Remember, we began by trying to help us have the context, (5:11) the proper context of all these threats. (5:15) We didn’t want to get caught up in the knees knocking and our hearts melting, (5:20) and the hindering and the woe is us in the midst of all of this. (5:26) We wanted to make sure we kept in the context here of who we are and where we are.

(5:33) That we are pilgrims in a fallen world, (5:36) and God has chosen to allow us to remain in that fallen world (5:41) until the time that he’s going to restore all things. (5:45) And so we looked at a passage from Chronicles about the sons of Issachar. (5:51) 1 Chronicles 12, verse 32.

(5:55) The sons of Issachar were men who understood the times with knowledge of what Israel should do. (6:03) And we wanted to make sure that they were commended, (6:08) because they understood. (6:10) They had this banah, the Hebrew word for understood, (6:14) which meant that they had a wisdom, a discernment, a cause and effect understanding, (6:20) and this understanding of the times in which they lived.

(6:24) And because of that understanding, they then knew, properly knew, (6:28) and I think that’s what the scripture’s implying here, (6:32) that they knew and knew rightly what Israel should do, (6:35) what the people of God should do in those times. (6:40) And so we need to remember and recognize, and oftentimes, (6:44) the wisdom that the people of God apply to the times in which they live, rightly so, (6:51) may not be wise when the times change. (6:55) And so we need to understand that sometimes Christian traditions, (7:00) and they may have been perfectly right and

wise in the times in which brothers and sisters (7:04) in those times began to do certain things, (7:08) those things can become a tradition that may not be wise in the times in which we live.

(7:14) And so we have to revisit and understand and call upon God to give us that kind of discernment (7:20) and wisdom that we might understand the times in which we live, (7:25) so that we might know what we should do. (7:29) And Del says one of his favorite passages was associated with our inner action (7:35) and responsibility with those around us, and in particular, those who are outsiders, (7:41) as the scripture calls them. (7:43) It’s from Colossians Chapter 4. (7:47) Now, we are to conduct ourselves with wisdom toward outsiders, (7:51) and Del interrupts the reading to say this, (7:54) and I confess, he says over and over again, (7:57) we just got back from a week retreat in Pennsylvania, and this is in 2022, (8:03) and I must have confessed this numerous times, (8:07) that a lot of my Christian life was not characterized by what I would say (8:13) was dealing with outsiders with wisdom.

(8:16) I was dealing with outsiders based upon tradition, (8:19) based upon my idea of how Christians are supposed to relate to outsiders, (8:25) and have consequently realized how really unwise this was. (8:30) And so we must, as Colossians 4, 5, and 6 says, (8:34) conduct yourselves with wisdom toward outsiders, making the most of the opportunity. (8:41) Let your speech always be with grace, as though seasoned with salt, (8:45) so that you will know how you should respond to each person, (8:50) and it’s an important passage, as you can tell, from the emphasis.

(8:57) So we’re driven here, and in my confession, he says, (9:03) I would say that I never followed that kind of biblical wisdom, (9:07) because I always dealt with people according to my agenda, my plan, and my questions, (9:13) and really was not listening to them, really not interested, quite frankly, (9:18) at all what they thought, other than to hear enough to know what my next response to be. (9:25) So we’re driven here when we look at all these threats (9:29) that are converging upon our culture at this time, and they’re serious threats. (9:34) These are not minor threats, but we don’t look at those in order to cause us, (9:39) therefore, to be hopeless, or cause us to do things that are unwise, (9:45) but we look at them in the context of what to know, (9:49) and for God to help us to understand with his wisdom what we should do (9:54) in the times in which we live.

(9:57) And so we looked at each of these seven threats. (10:01) We ended last time with the attack on the biblical family, (10:05) which to some extent, and you look at each of these others, and they’re all serious, (10:11) but the attack on the biblical family is one of the most critical, (10:16) but there are some common threads that run through each of these. (10:21) There are three of them that I want to look at, (10:25) the first this morning and the other two tonight, (10:30) and these common threads are found in almost all those threats, (10:34) and that’s why I thought it was important for us to think about these common threads, (10:39) which in reality then form a common threat that becomes evident (10:44) and apparent to each of those individual threats.

(10:48) The common threads through each of these threats, the first is the destruction, (10:54) the overall destruction and the desire to destroy God’s social design, God’s social order. (11:02) The second thread is the rise of homo deus, that’s God, man, where we’ve made ourselves deity in essence, (11:10) and therefore the consequence of that is the hunger for significance (11:15) that is so deeply pathological in our culture. (11:19) And the third threat is back again to the very first, (11:22) the third thread is back again to the very first threat, (11:28) and this giving over the people to a depraved mind.

(11:33) And as we’ll see in Romans as we kind of end up tonight, which will be tonight, (11:39) driving us, our culture towards almost a self-inflicted destruction, a suicidal tendency. (11:48) So let’s look first of all at the attempted destruction of God’s social design and order. (11:54) And these are the six systems, as I see them biblically, of God’s social order.

(12:06) Number one, the relationship of God and man. (12:09) Number two, the family. (12:11) Number three, the church.

(12:12) Number four, the community. (12:14) Number five, the state. (12:16) And number six, labor.

(12:17) We have the design of each of these, the blueprint provided for us in the scripture. (12:24) For those who’ve been through the truth project, we spent several tours looking at these. (12:29) In fact, we spent time on each one of these.

(12:32) And it is this design for social order that is in conjunction with what I believe is God’s modus operandi, (12:41) that God creates his creatures and equips them and empowers them. (12:46) He delegates authority to them so that they have the opportunity and the responsibility to bring forth fruit. (12:54) And this is the modus operandi of God.

(12:57) And that fruit then brings glory to God. (13:00) And so fundamentally, as remember Jesus said it, by this is my Father glorified that you bear much fruit. (13:09) And this, the fruitfulness of God’s creatures, then brings glory to God.

(13:14) And all of this was to take place within these divine relationships and under his social order that God made. (13:24) I think this is reflective of the triune, three-in-one nature of God, (13:28) that he created a universe that is filled with relationships. (13:33) In fact, everything exists in some sort of relationship, (13:37) and everything exists within a relationship of diverse pieces and parts (13:42) that come together in order to produce fruit.

(13:47) My God created the male and female in the beginning, the animals and humanity and so forth. (13:53) And all of that, I am convinced, is found underneath the blueprints of the social order, (13:59) of the socially design, of the socially complex God, the triune God, (14:07) who created a universe all in relationships. (14:09) And he created this design for us and his purposes for man to come together in these social institutions.

(14:18) And these social institutions, all of them, were to bring forth greater fruit. (14:24) So it isn’t surprising to us, we mentioned this last time, that Satan’s ultimate scheme, (14:33) and we talk about this in the engagement project, (14:36) and spend a lot of time there, and the implication of all of that is that Satan’s ultimate scheme (14:44) is therefore to destroy relationships. (14:47) Because it is the relationships that bring forth the fruit in God’s design.

(14:54) If he can destroy relationships, he can therefore destroy the fruit of God’s creation, (15:00) and therefore cut off the glory that is due to God from those creatures. (15:07) And he’s doing all of that. (15:09) He’s attempting to counter God’s purposes, that modus operandi that we talked about.

(15:14) And just to remind ourselves that in God’s design, it is the family that carries the deepest (15:20) and most intimate relationships in all of creation. (15:25) And those deep and ultimate relationships are the cause of people, if you ask them, (15:31) what is the greatest joy that you can recall in your life? (15:37) What is the greatest tragedy in your life? (15:40) Almost all of the time,

they stem from the family. (15:44) And Satan monkeys with the family, wants to destroy the family, (15:48) because the biblical family is a heart of the culture.

(15:52) So if you can destroy the biblical family, then you can destroy the culture. (15:58) So I want you to see this thread, Satan’s attempt to destroy God’s social design and order, (16:05) as we go through several threats. (16:08) We’ll just list some of these threats we’ve been talking about, (16:13) to understand the thread associated here.

(16:17) And Satan’s attempt to destroy relationships, to destroy these institutions that God has designed. (16:26) It is the relationships and the relationships in those institutions (16:30) that brings about this fruit that brings glory to God. (16:37) And so, beginning with the third threat, we look at a huge threat in our culture, (16:43) the loss of the noble male and the loss of the virtuous female, (16:48) and therefore, the rise of malevolent compassion.

(16:53) So if you recall, we were talking about what happens when the noble male and his purpose, (17:01) driven primarily for truth and righteousness and wisdom, (17:05) and all that is bridled by the second engine driving the noble male, of grace and compassion. (17:13) The female has both those engines, they’re just in reverse order. (17:17) The engine that drives her primarily is an engine of grace and compassion, (17:22) but she has the grace and compassion bridled or controlled by truth and righteousness and wisdom.

(17:29) So in a culture that attempts to throw out God, to throw out absolute truth, (17:35) any notion of righteousness and any notion of true wisdom, (17:40) then of course what happens is the male is left without his primary purpose in life. (17:47) The male then, left without his primary purpose, either becomes a buffoon or a brute. (17:55) And the female then is led by a desire for compassion that is unbridled, not controlled by truth.

(18:03) And what happened to our culture as we talked about it, (18:07) our culture is tipped then towards this feminine side of grace and compassion. (18:14) But it’s unbridled, uncontrolled grace and compassion. (18:19) It’s an unbiblical grace and compassion.

(18:21) It’s a grace and compassion that ends up becoming malevolent, becoming evil. (18:28) And so those supposedly benevolent and compassion actions and policies acting (18:35) actually become malevolent and they destroy people. (18:40) You may have heard of the very, very difficult and perilous situation that is occurring in Argentina (18:47) as we speak and Del is referring to Argentina in 2022.

(18:54) Argentina is caught up, I believe, in what I would say the malevolent compassion (19:01) as much of the world is caught up in that, Western culture in particular, as the prime ethic. (19:08) It is the ethic that drives almost all of our public policies today (19:12) and it is the prime ethic under which everyone is judged. (19:17) And so many men find themselves in this desire to show themselves most compassionate.

(19:24) But those public policies that we see as in Argentina has for years and years, (19:31) they have increasingly followed this malevolent compassion where monies were taken (19:38) and given to people such that people didn’t have to work. (19:41) Well, now in 2022, Argentina has a 60% a year inflation rate. (19:48) They don’t have the ability anymore to fund all those programs, those social programs.

(19:54) In preparing for today, I checked up on the situation in Argentina. (19:59) According to a January 24th, 2024 article in the BBC, (20:06) instead of 60% inflation, as Del mentioned in 2022, just less than two years later, (20:16) Argentina now has 200% inflation. (20:20) The poverty level has reached 40%.

(20:25) A new government promising deregulation and government spending cuts (20:30) was voted in just 45 days prior to January 24th, the date of this article. (20:38) And on the 24th, there were tens of thousands, as the BBC headlined, (20:45) that marched against the new president’s proposed cuts. (20:48) And I inserted the word proposed because none of these cuts have been enacted.

(20:53) They’ve just been announced. (20:57) They’re trying to pass the legislation and the Labor Union has vowed, the BBC says, (21:03) they will not yield an inch of what has been achieved for workers. (21:09) And what have they achieved? 200% inflation and 40% poverty and growing.

(21:16) They’ll continue back in 2022. (21:19) And so they’re making these announcements that people have got to work. (21:24) Well, there are riots in Argentina because people are crying, you know.

(21:28) Making us go to work is evil. It’s unloving. It’s unkind.

(21:33) And that’s what happens, of course. (21:35) And that’s what’s happening here in our culture. (21:38) The fifth threat that we looked at, the rise of a demonic worldview, (21:43) is also involved in the destruction of the social system (21:51) that God has given to us.

(21:54) As we talked about, this demonic worldview that is rising in our culture today (21:59) is one that is pitting people against each other. (22:02) It’s destroying any kind of a relationship within the culture. (22:06) And so people are pitted together, man against women, races against races, (22:12) those with more against those with less, and it goes on and on.

(22:16) This is exactly what the demonic worldview is attempting to do in our culture, (22:21) to try and pit us against each other and destroy any kind of fabric within the nation (22:28) and bring in a split that we’ve never really seen before, (22:33) except maybe back in the Civil War. (22:36) But remember, there was a common worldview at that time. (22:41) Yes, they had serious differences of opinion on things that brought them to arms, (22:47) but there was a common worldview, and not that everyone was perfect in that, (22:52) but there was a common worldview that we don’t have anymore.

(22:57) We are broken in our worldview. (23:01) And then the fourth threat we looked at, the consolidation of massive earthly power, (23:06) a consolidation of power in a way that is strange to much of the history of nation-states, (23:12) because most of the consolidation of power, (23:15) with the exception of what happened in pre-Reformation times, (23:21) where there was significant power that was consolidated in the Roman church. (23:29) But normally, this consolidation of power has most always been associated with the state.

(23:36) It bears the sword, and the sinfulness and selfishness of man has a tendency to grow that power (23:44) until that nation-state tumbles and falls. (23:48) We now find ourselves in a culture and a day and a time (23:57) where there are massive power structures that are external to the state. (24:02) So you have these large international technological companies and entities (24:08) that

have the power to keep you from buying and selling, the power to cancel you, (24:13) and all of the other powers that we have listed when we looked at these threats.

(24:19) And then the harlot that rides over those is this malevolent compassion (24:25) that has become the primary ethic that drives everything, (24:28) including even industries who now want to signal that they’re also ethical (24:36) and following this malevolent compassion. (24:39) But it’s a destruction and a disorder. (24:42) It’s a pathology against the proper way that God has designed those institutions.

(24:49) And they’ve gotten way out of the boundaries that God has made for them. (24:54) And of course, maybe the most significant of all the social orders, (24:58) the attack upon the biblical family, and that in conjunction with the loss of the noble male (25:03) and the loss of the virtuous female, we looked at a few things. (25:07) But I want to remind you, because it is just so critical for us, (25:11) that naturalism, this rejection of God and his truth, and the rise of feminism, (25:17) a radical feminism, an unbiblical feminism that is destroying both the virtuous female (25:24) and the noble male, and that has led to an attack upon human sexuality (25:32) we’ve never really seen before in the history of man.

(25:36) There are three things that I want to talk about. (25:39) One of these, again, in light of these common roots that we’re talking about, (25:44) what happens when we disconnect human sexuality from its purpose as rooted in God’s creation, (25:52) as he originally created it to be, and therefore, number two, (25:58) the denigrating of the roles within the biblical family, (26:01) and then finally this third point, deification of personal sexuality as now the essence of one’s self. (26:12) And this then, you know, we talked about Helen Reddy earlier in a previous session, (26:20) and there are many, many songs and many things we could quote, (26:23) but this one sticks in my mind at a time that became almost a tipping point for all of us, (26:28) where all of a sudden we begin to declare that the essence of who I am is bound up in my sexuality.

(26:38) So human sexuality, rather than that which was given to us by God as a purpose within the social systems (26:47) and social order that God has given to us to bring forth fruit, (26:52) yet now becomes something private to me. (26:54) It’s personal, and it’s a fundamental aspect of my identity. (27:00) It has nothing to do with marriage or family or social systems around us.

(27:04) It has everything to do with who I am, and this has become all pervasive, (27:11) and our culture, as you know, is driving all kinds of pathologies within our culture down to even the grade school level. (27:21) I don’t know if I mentioned this or not, Del says, but I will again. (27:28) It was so shocking to me not too long ago, around the 2022 time frame, (27:35) I was speaking at a wonderful Christian academy in Florida (27:38) and had the opportunity to speak to each of the faculty groups.

(27:43) So we talked with the high school, middle school, and grade school, (27:48) and when he came to the elementary faculty, one of the questions that he asked was, (27:56) what is the number one issue in elementary school? (28:00) What’s the number one issue that you’re dealing with in your students? (28:04) And it was almost unanimous, gender identity. (28:09) And I was just dumbfounded by that because, I mean, we’re talking about first and second and third graders (28:15) who, you know, are still learning how to ride a bike, and, yeah, (28:20) they have been led by our culture around them that their biggest struggle is, (28:27) who am I in terms of my sexual identity? (28:30) Why? (28:31) Because our culture says my sexual identity is the essence of who I am. (28:38) So this severs oneself from, first of all, the creator.

(28:42) It severs my human sexuality from the context and the design of God. (28:47) The biblical worldview has no place for this kind of thinking. (28:52) Nowhere in the scripture are we led to believe that our sexuality is the essence of our identity.

(29:01) Yet that is what the enemy has laid before us, and it is a major factor in a number of those threats. (29:09) I’m going to stop here this morning. (29:12) In Part 2 we will talk about the other two threats that we find in most of the seven threats, (29:19) the rise of homo deus, deified man, which drives hunger.

(29:26) I’m sorry. (29:27) The second threat is the rise of homo deus, or deified man, which drives a hunger for significance, (29:38) and that’s talking about why we are so lonely and unsatisfied in our culture today. (29:43) And the third threat, the depraved mind that leads us to self-destruction.

(29:48) The problem with breaking the session into two is you don’t get the solution until the end of Part 2. (29:53) So Part 1 is left unresolved, and most people only get to hear Part 1. (29:59) I will leave you with the thought that there is a solution, a biblical solution, (30:05) God’s solution to all of the craziness we see in our world today, and we will address that tonight. (30:12) But now we are extending the invitation. (30:16) If you are subject to it, come while we stand and sing. (30:20)