Saturdays...

I think there is nothing like a Saturday with no obligations. Currently, my very handy husband is on the main floor of our house remodeling the bathroom. Shortly, I will be summoned to help with the minor clean-up details and painting which is fun since I can then say that we remodeled the bathroom (when in fact, he remodeled the bathroom).

I'm upstairs in the "office/spare bedroom" listening to some lazy jazz mix that my husband put together for one of his history lessons, writing my second post for this new blog.

As a continuation of the thoughts on the previous post, probably the toughest thing for me to do as a Christian is to hold fast to God's Word and still live in God's world. When I say live, I mean to share the Gospel Truth with people in such a way that that "seems" relevant. I know the Gospel is relevant to everyone but if they don't perceive it to be relevant, well...

Something that one of my students said during our conversation was something like..."They think they [meaning the Christians in the movie Jesus Camp] are right, and everyone else is wrong." There it is in a nutshell, folks--the postmodern, no-absolute-truth, if-it-feels-good-do-it ideology. As they see it, to assert that there is a true, absolute right and wrong means someone has to be wrong. Apparently, that's not okay. Unfortunately, just like simple truths such as 2+2=4, there are some really complex truths out there too. They may be difficult to understand, some in fact, unknowable to mere mortals like me. But I'm okay with that. I'm okay with believing (and yes, there does have to be some, however small, grain of faith) that my God doesn't necessarily feel like I have to know all the mysteries of the universe right here and right now. And just because I don't know or understand it, doesn't make it any less true. If for some unseen reason I believe that 2+2=5, and I believe it with all my heart and soul, that doesn't make it true--for me or for anyone else.

This concept of an absolute truth, even if our Founding Fathers were not what we would call evangelical Christians (and for the record, I don't believe most were), is the foundation of the United States of America. Most believed that God was/is in control (maybe just of "setting the wheels in motion," maybe of every single ordered detail). And that as human beings, we would be expected to live by a set of rules that at their bare minimum would include: do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Please tell me, what happened to that?

How today, if there is no absolute truth, can we justify any law or rule. All a person would have to say is, "Ya' know, it works for me; you deal with it." Whose says it's wrong to murder? Or to do any of the other, what I would consider perverse acts, that are beginning to creep into the acceptable category? If we (and I don't necessarily mean through laws) can't have a moral absolute truth to look to and say, "It's wrong because God says it's wrong," then how can we stop any action?

I'm a simple person. I don't claim to be a philosopher or one who has a comprehensive understanding of human nature. I can look around, though. I can look around at the moral decay of our society.

I'm 40 years old. I think I'm beginning to fit into that "life stage" that says crazy things like, "When I was a kid... "I know that most people get to a point and look back at the good old days with a sense that, many years ago, all was right with the world. I know this is cyclical and somewhat unrealistic. But I also know that we have become a self-centered, self-righteous, self-pitying, self-indulgent, self-gratifying nation. See a pattern here?

More tomorrow.