The Real Sickness at the Heart of America

It wasn't too long ago that if you talked back to your teacher you could be sent to the principal's office and he would take a paddle from under your desk and hit you hard enough to make a 12 year old boy cry.

It wasn't too long ago that our Phy Ed teacher in 7th grade took a classmate and slammed him against the lockers because he refused to shut his mouth.  Order was instantly restored and no one dared talk after Mr Hammer had blown his whistle.

Today the Principal would go to jail for child abuse and the Phy Ed teacher would be arrested for aggravated assault.

How did we get here?  What is our problem?  Can it be fixed?

People don't like to talk about America's culture for the same reason that a man who just had a heart attack doesn't want to discuss the double bacon cheeseburger he's eating. He knows what he's doing is killing him, but it's easier not to deal with it. We’re in the same boat.

* We treat success as an accident or a cheat while defending people who make bad decisions, who won't educate themselves or who won't work.

* We've allowed pornography to become so accessible that it's practically universally viewed, even among teenagers.

* We love victims so much that people actually fake hate crimes to claim victim status.

* We celebrate losers and deviants by giving them their own reality shows. Meanwhile, Hollywood regularly portrays businessmen, Christians and soldiers as the worst people on earth.

* More children have died because of Roe v. Wade than were killed during the Holocaust.

* Marriage is falling apart and we’re encouraging that by pushing gay marriage.

* Our universities reward Communists, terrorists and blatant anti-American sentiment with professorships. Those are the last people who should be teaching impressionable young Americans.

* There's a whole grievance industry full of people who make a living claiming to be "offended" by things.

* Religion and morality are denigrated while nihilism and immorality are considered cool.

* Legalism has superseded morality and what's "right" and "wrong" has become secondary to what's "legal" and "illegal."

Many people believe Rome fell because of a decline in morals while the Soviet Union disintegrated because it spent so much money trying to keep up with Reagan that it went broke. Well, we have both problems going on simultaneously. Meanwhile, preppers have become legion. Billions of dollars are being held back from the economy because people are saving up in case there's an economic collapse. Businesses are sitting on mountains of cash and looking to move their headquarters overseas. Many educated, informed people believe America is headed towards bankruptcy or runaway inflation not in fifty years, but within the next decade or two. If you're looking for signs that this country is in deep trouble, there are red flags galore waving in your face.

But this isn't just an economic problem, a spending problem or a leadership problem -- although those are all concerns. It's a cultural problem with our morals and what we value as a society on the most fundamental levels.

* In practice, our society focuses almost exclusively on the short term without thinking about the long-term consequences of our actions.

* We have a higher moral standard for the NFL than we do for our own leaders in Washington.

* We have a political party dedicated to the idea taking things from people who've worked for it and giving it to people who haven't.

* We make little effort to assimilate immigrants into our society and instead, encourage them to embrace the culture they fled for the United States.

* We've stopped acting as if we have to pay back the money we borrow.

* We treat the rule of law as optional, depending on who's impacted by it.

* We believe our children can grow up in a moral sewer and still turn out to be fine, upstanding citizens regardless.

We've become so divided, so antagonistic, so morally separated that for the first time in over a century there are people asking hard questions how much we really have in common with other Americans. If you're comparing let's say a conservative from South Carolina to a liberal from California, the honest answer is "not much that matters." Perhaps not even enough to hold a country together over the long haul if one group or the other ever became politically dominant.

There's only one way to change that and it's to address the real sickness at the heart of American culture. That sickness is our newfound reluctance to address the moral health of our society. Over the long haul, we can't thrive and we may not even be able to survive as a divided, degenerate society full of people who reward failure, resent success and live for the moment. Morality matters and if we forget that, our nation is doomed to descend into decadence, decay and perhaps one day, even dissolution.

http://townhall.com/columnists/johnhawkins/2014/09/16/the-real-sickness-at-the-heart-of-american-culture-n1892235

Yes, morality does matter....and you will NEVER be able to legislate morality.  It has to be something that society decides to have but can never be ordered to have.  It's something that is taught in our church Sunday schools...things like honesty, fidelity, integrity, consequences, responsibility, treating others as you would have them treat you, etc....

Today there are thousands of churches being boarded up every year across the country.  Our kids are not in Sunday School but have traded that in for hockey practice, baseball and basketball tournaments with the blessings of their parents!  They aren't going to Wednesday night confirmation or AWANA's anymore so the Public schools were more than happy to schedule some more activities for them.  More sports practice!

Meanwhile another 5 states are looking to legalize pot so we can make it easier for our kids to get high...."Everyone else has it legal!....why shouldn't we?"

Our TV shows and movies have taught our kids that if they aren't having intercourse by the time they are 14 or 15 then there is something wrong with them....and the parents drop their kids at the theaters and give them their blessing to watch any of the crap they choose!

If you believe that America will be able to indefinitely survive living in this sewer....you are sadly mistaken.  One day, probably much sooner than anyone thought, America will implode.  We hope the trigger is the rapture of the church....but we can't know for sure.  Meanwhile the writing is on the wall virtually everywhere you look...America is woefully deficient of Godly morals.  When will judgment fall?

Daniel 5
5 Suddenly the fingers of a human hand appeared and wrote on the plaster of the wall, near the lampstand in the royal palace. The king watched the hand as it wrote. 6 His face turned pale and he was so frightened that his legs became weak and his knees were knocking.

22 “But you, Belshazzar, his son, have not humbled yourself, though you knew all this. 23 Instead, you have set yourself up against the Lord of heaven. You had the goblets from his temple brought to you, and you and your nobles, your wives and your concubines drank wine from them. You praised the gods of silver and gold, of bronze, iron, wood and stone, which cannot see or hear or understand. But you did not honor the God who holds in his hand your life and all your ways. 24 Therefore he sent the hand that wrote the inscription.

25 “This is the inscription that was written:

mene, mene, tekel, parsin

26 “Here is what these words mean:

Mene: God has numbered the days of your reign and brought it to an end.
27 Tekel: You have been weighed on the scales and found wanting.
28 Peres: Your kingdom is divided and given to the Medes and Persians.”
29 Then at Belshazzar’s command, Daniel was clothed in purple, a gold chain was placed around his neck, and he was proclaimed the third highest ruler in the kingdom.

30 That very night Belshazzar, king of the Babylonians, was slain, 31 and Darius the Mede took over the kingdom, at the age of sixty-two.