Tag Archives: cultural decline

SPIRITUAL SOLUTION TO OPIOID CRISIS

Culture, morality February 20, 2018 Leave a comment

PMW 2018-015 by John Horvat

In times of crisis, we are forced to reexamine our ways and ponder our future. It is in this framework that we need to consider our present economic plight and the charting of our path forward.

In his penetrating analysis of contemporary society, author John Horvat focuses on the present crisis with great insight and clarity. He claims modern economy has become cold, impersonal, and out of balance. Gone are the human elements of honor and trust so essential to our daily lives. Society has discarded the natural restraining influence of the human institutions and values that should temper our economic activities.

Return to Order is a clarion call that invites us to reconnect with those institutions and values by applying the timeless principles of an organic Christian order.

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THE SLIPPERY SLOPE

Culture, Theology September 12, 2017 Leave a comment

PMW 2017-076 by Richard Phillips (Reformation 21)

[Gentry note: Postmillennialism is a rigorously Bible-based eschatological outlook. It has to be since it runs counter to current cultural decline (though we understand that decline only to be temporary). Too many evangelicals are not as rigorous regarding biblical foundations. They slide away from the biblical worldview, slowly but surely. This article is not written by a postmillennialist, but his sentiments are certainly valid.]

Over twenty years ago, while in seminary, I was present during a hallway conversation with a professor who then seemed to be moving toward liberal theology. A student asked how this man’s higher critical methods would enable him to remain a Christian. The professor gave quite the revealing answer: “I have a Jesus Box that I never touch.” By this, he meant that he had drawn a line of piety around his faith in Jesus to keep out the implications of his liberal scholarship. I remember thinking at the time how vain was this hope. Method always gobbles up message, and no pietistic zeal will ever protect us from our actual lack of faith. That professor has long since moved on, and from his seat in a liberal college he has not surprisingly revised his former evangelical faith in Jesus. Continue reading →

HOLLYWOOD WORLDVIEWS AND POSTMILLENNIALISM

Culture, Worldview August 26, 2015 Leave a comment

Godawa backup 2PMT 2015-102 by Kenneth L. Gentry, Jr.

Millennial views represent an important feature of a Christian worldview. How the world is developing and how it will end necessarily impact one’s worldview thinking. In our day secular humanism is the dominant worldview, crushing out all opposition. But secular humanism is built on air — literally on a chance explosion 13.7 billion years ago. Or perhaps 13.8 billion years ago, depending on who you read.

Postmillennialism is a key component of a truly biblical, and ultimately optimistic worldview. My commitment to postmillennialism is not a side venture in my thinking. It is key to what I believe to be the truth of Scripture. Unfortunately, too many evangelicals are unaware of worldviews and worldview thinking. Because of that “my people are destroyed for lack of knowledge” (Hos. 4:6). And if Christians are not self-consciously aware of the biblical worldview, they will un-self-consciously pick up on a secular worldview by osmosis from our culture. Continue reading →