This Growing Darkness
 The
history of humanity has recorded some very dark times
including that time known universally as The Dark Ages.
Ignorance, superstition and the wholesale corruption
rampant in the Catholic Church are characteristics of
those centuries. Even earlier, though, there were times
when mankind was bankrupt socially and spiritually.
It did not take long for the nocuous cancer of sin to
spread its way into every aspect of early human culture
corrupting the hearts and souls of people to the point
that God destroyed the world with a cataclysmic flood
known popularly as Noah’s Flood (Genesis 6ff).
Later, when God made His unconditional
land-grant covenant with Abram (Genesis 15) He explained
that his descendants would be enslaved in a foreign
country for four hundred years until the iniquity of
the Amorite would be complete. Canaan, the land of many
pagan cultures, was a very dark place. When God had
finally gotten enough of it He sent the Israelites there
to take the land as their own. What was the darkness
like? The prophet Ezra tells us, The land which
you are entering to possess is an unclean land with
the uncleanness of the peoples of the lands, with their
abominations which have filled it from end to end and
with their impurity (Ezra 9:11 NASBu). Immorality
of every imaginable kind was rampant along with the
sacrifice of children. This kind of living appealed
to the hearts of the Canaanites. Soon the point was
reached that the whole land was filled with abominations
of every kind. A deep and sullen darkness covered the
land.
The word darkness is used
145 times in the Bible, and often the context is not
positive. Of course there is the absence of light that
we read about in Genesis 1:2,3, but there are other
and heavier uses. Like being ignorant about God (Job
37:19), the place of evil (Ephesians 5:11), part of
eternal punishment (2 Peter 2:4), spiritual blindness
(Ephesians 5:8), etc. The real meaning of darkness is
the absence of light, and this is exactly what the world
wants. This present world system wants to be free from
all moral constraints inherent with a public acknowledgement
of God.
Darkness and the Rejection of God
Being a genuine believer in God is
no longer a positive issue if a person is on their way
up the social/professional ladder. Neither is it any
longer just a neutral issue. In fact, being a believer
in God is now an issue of liability and there are no
apologies for that being the case. People flagrantly
proclaim their agnosticism, if not their virulent atheism,
while speaking condescendingly of those who are believers.
This surely does not surprise us, for many in America
have been working tirelessly for decades to dismiss
God from our culture and to make such dismissal socially
acceptable. Consider, for example, the National Education
Association and the ACLU. There is hardly any limit
as to how low those groups, and others, will stoop in
order to inculcate their godless value system into American
culture.
Many Christians understand experientially
there is genuine power in the name of Jesus. I do not
mean the name Jesus is a good-luck charm, but I do mean
to say that heaven takes note when the name of Jesus
is spoken in a faith-based relationship. However, there
is another kind of impact associated with Jesus’
name. Just mention His name outside the context of profanity
and notice what happens. Secular people can go uncomfortably
silent when Jesus is mentioned by a believer. Further,
some people become visibly upset when Jesus is mentioned
and some can even become loud and profane. Essentially,
the name Jesus is hated by the powers that influence
the natural mind; that is, those hearts that are hardened
and inclined to a sense of evil and darkness. The fact
of the matter is God and Jesus are very seldom simply
neutral issues.
Darkness, the Bible and God’s People
Take a copy of the Koran to work or
school and people will think you are open minded and
tolerant. Bring your horoscope and they will think you
are sophisticated. However, bring your Bible and sit
quietly reading it during lunch and they will think
you are not only a kook, but you have the potential
for being dangerous. Tell people you are impressed by
the way Confucius, Guevara, or Nietzsche lived and they
will politely nod their heads in approval, but tell
them you pray often to have the persistence and impact
of Paul, Polycarp and Whitfield and they will avoid
you like the plague. Quote from Shakespeare, Voltaire
or the Beatles and people will think you are actually
more intelligent than you put on, but quote from the
Bible and you will soon be speaking to an empty room
at best or a violent crowd at worst.
Is this a rather overblown description
of the classic secular response to Christianity and
all things pertaining? Not at all. Just ask Noah Riner.
1 On September 2nd Riner spoke
to the incoming Dartmouth freshman class of 2009. Part
of his convocation speech related to Jesus and His life.
Some of the responses were encouraging, but many were
quite condemnatory, even from some who say they are
Christians. Like most other colleges founded early in
American history, Dartmouth, founded in 1769, was established
for the purpose of educating Indians as missionaries
to their own people. Things have changed in the last
couple hundred years, and it appears it is not for the
good. A dark cloud looms over our American landscape
and, unfortunately, it seems people love it.
Open-minded indulgence demands any
religious book written by any heathen is to be accepted,
or at least not spoken against. Toleration demands no
religion be criticized no matter how nutty, insidious
or bloody. Their followers can commit suicide in order
to catch a passing comet, or their “holy books”
can demand the murder of infidels, yet no one is allowed
to pass judgment upon them. Unless, of course, the religion
happens to be Christianity or the book happens to be
the Bible. There exists a perpetual open-season on anything
having to do with Jesus, the Bible and His people. The
light of truth is rejected because the corrupted human
heart desires the filth and degradation afforded by
spiritual darkness.
International Darkness
That which we are seeing in our own
country has long ago impacted western European culture.
The depravity which is now standard conduct in the seedy
sections of New Orleans, San Francisco and other dens
of debauchery was common many years ago in Europe. According
to former comrades-in-arms who traveled extensively
in Europe forty years ago, heterosexual immorality,
homosexuality, lesbianism, bestiality, sadomasochism
and various other forms of deviant, debauched and utterly
vile behavior were common. Much of what was done was
filmed by amateurs and sold as pornographic material.
When asked why the governments of those nations did
not put a stop to this behavior the answer most often
given was, “It’s not taboo over there...it’s
what the people want.”
Europe is spiritually dark, especially
some of the Scandinavian countries. The apostle Paul
was the first to bring Christianity to Europe, but in
2000 years what is left of it has become corrupted to
the point Paul would not recognize it. Most of the people
in Europe have no regard for the truth, and the overwhelming
majority who call themselves religious are wrapped up
in boring liturgy and impotent formalism. Hearts are
filled with a gloomy emptiness and faces betray the
presence of a haunting darkness that weighs down the
spirit like a heavy and evil anchor.
There are some bright spots of genuine
evangelism around the world such as some places in what
missionaries call the 10-40 window (Africa and Asia
between 10° and 40° North Latitude). But such
bright spots are the exception. Generally the world
is becoming spiritually colder and darker with most
people either rejecting any kind of religion or embracing
something false such as Islam, Hinduism, etc. Spiritual
darkness is not something common only to certain parts
of the planet—it is worldwide and growing.
What Can We Expect?
First, we can expect the war on Christianity
to not only continue, but to grow in magnitude. As the
enemies of God and His people win more victories in
courts, in the board rooms of universities and entertainment
conglomerates, in the various market places of ideas
and even in some seminaries and churches they will increase
their efforts. When investors see that Christians cannot
stop the ground swell of darkness in these last days
they will pour their money into ventures that offer
just what the spiritually bankrupt public wants: anything
and everything that appeals to the dark and corrupt
nature of humanity.
Secondly, we can expect an increasing
devaluation of the sanctity of life. Abortion on demand
has murdered millions, but the same mindset that propelled
“choice” to the forefront of society is
also making it ever so easy for anyone disgruntled about
anything to seek lethal revenge. Life is further devaluated
defacto when kids play virtual reality video games where
the goal is to kill, and to kill in the most horrendous
manner. Further, the mind is less sensitive to crime
and pain when movies and even TV programs are filled
with death and mayhem. Add to that the fascination people
often have with the macabre as seen not only in the
proliferation of horror movies of late, but in programs
that show official police photographs of crime scenes
which are graphically described by a narrator. Such
programming is not necessarily dark in itself, yet it
does seem to have an appeal to the baser side of human
nature.
The bottom line is this: when God is
removed from our collective heart, our collective conscience
is easily hardened by the evil and filth we allow into
our collective mind. This is an immutable law.
Thirdly, we can expect to see an increasing
sense of fear and foreboding among those who do not
know the truth. People who do not understand Bible prophecy
and what God is going to do are generally bent on pulling
out all stops in order to “make this world a better
place for future generations”. We must all be
good stewards of the planet, but to believe the survival
of this world as we know it depends upon human restraint
and genius has to be a very discomforting thought.
Fear permeates the hearts of any number
of people today. Americans, Israelis, Brits, Frenchmen,
Jordanians, Iraqis, Australians, Spaniards, Indonesians
and many others are no longer completely safe when they
venture from their homes. Hotels, subways, highways,
restaurants, cruise ships and other heretofore benign
places are now popular targets for terrorist activities.
No government can offer wholesale guarantees of safety
for everyone everywhere. Fear is what makes terror what
it is. It seems very clear this is the forerunner of
the rider of the fourth horse in Revelation 6; the rider
who carries an assassin’s sword.
And the assassin’s sword is not
the only weapon carried by the forth rider. He will
also kill with pestilence. AIDS is a terrible disease
with no cure, but if a person does not live immorally
it is probable that person will not get AIDS. However,
there are other new and dreadful diseases that can be
contracted without regard to conduct. Bird flu is now
a very real problem. Our country is spending billions
to fight something that was virtually unknown by most
of the public until quite recently. Other deadly pathogens
exist in our environment and it only takes mutation
and/or change in immunity to be victimized. Consider
further that any number of Moslems would love nothing
better than to load a warhead with smallpox, anthrax
or whatever other terrible bacteria or virus they can
develop and drop it into Tel Aviv or Washington.
The world is rapidly becoming darker
and more fearful. The balmy life of 1950s Mayberry is
gone. It has been replaced by the fear-filled days of
Al Qaeda, street gangs and diseases for which we have
no cure. And just think, some people out there actually
think we have a handle on all this — that the
church will finally conquer the earth and usher in the
millennium!
The present darkness is the precursor
for the most horrible and unprecedented darkness the
world will ever know — the 7 years of tribulation.
Of course, for Christians the dawn of our new day is
imminent. We will not go into the darkest of days called
the tribulation, but will be taken out of the world
at the coming of Jesus for His church. But, for those
who will be left behind the words of no language can
realistically describe the darkness that will permeate
the hearts of men. DLM
Endnotes:
- Mark Bergin, “Convocation Conviction”,
World, October 8, 2005, p. 27
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