“Then He said to me… ‘Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ says the Lord of hosts.’ ”—Zechariah 4:6 The setting for this word which the Lord sent through His prophet, was Israel’s return from exile in Babylon. Now, the reason why Israel had been captured by their enemies and sent into exile had to do with their spiritual condition, though the problem looked to be a political one. God chose to use a godless nation, Babylon, to bring a strong hand of discipline to judge His chosen people for their willful disobedience and idolatry. That is, they had replaced their devotion to God with worldly ideas and distractions. Much like today! How long do we have in the U.S.A. before the Lord decides to discipline our nation with a strong hand? He might use another world power to get our attention, or He may choose to send natural disasters, or other godless people to bring calamity. What God desires from His people, the church, is for us to declare His glory to the nations. We’re not doing that, are we? Many of us don’t even think it’s important to bring Him up in our everyday conversations with the people He puts in our path. We know full well that our nation has increasingly followed a path of unbelief and sinfulness, where more and more people choose to neglect or deny God altogether. My hope and prayer is that we, as people who have experienced His salvation, will repent of our complacency and indifference to His Great Commission. That we would return to Him with our whole heart. I pray that you and I would declare the wonderful truth of His salvation. His amazing grace and mercy which found us while we were still lost in our sins. While so many Christians today watch in frustration as our nation continues to wander farther and farther away from God, let us remember: Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we will trust in the name of the Lord, our God! (Psalm 20:7) Like Israel when they returned from their captivity in Israel, God’s people must remember that our problem as a nation is not going to be solved with political parties or strength in numbers. Because our problem is spiritual in nature. The U.S.A. needs to return to God.

When I was studying to prepare for church ministry, as future pastors we were encouraged to keep “a newspaper in one hand and a Bible in the other.” Even though hard copy news print is growing obsolete, the principle remains—pastors need to remain informed by current events, while viewing the world around us “through the lens of Scripture.” Which leads me to the question—should Christian believers be influenced by the world around us, or should our biblical perspective impact our surrounding culture? It’s a no-brainer rhetorical question intended to make a case that in our current day, the church is rapidly falling into a quagmire of compromise, powerlessness, and irrelevance. But, wait—in Romans 1:16, Paul wrote, “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes.” Then, Hebrews 4:12 says, “The word of God is living and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and able to pierce as far as the division of soul and spirit...” Finally, Jesus Himself said, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away.” (Matthew 24:35, Mark 13:31, Luke 21:33). These words of Jesus were important enough that three of our Gospel writers made sure that they recorded them. Stay with me, now. Newspaper in one hand, and Bible in the other, in order to view the world around me through the lens of Scripture. Churches declining in number while growing more ineffective in impacting our surrounding culture. With me so far? Now—just this morning at our men’s weekly “Burnt Offerings” breakfast, two men in separate conversations literally placed in my hands two completely unrelated ideas, and yet they were related. In the first case, I was shown a “Facebook Meme” which I won’t quote directly. But it conveyed the idea that, once upon a time, parents faced the awkward task of talking with their children about the “birds and the bees.” Now, however, it’s the birds and bees, bees and bees, birds who think they are bees, and visa versa, and so on. In the second conversation, a man placed in my hands a clipped newspaper article reporting that, just last month, our nation’s second largest Protestant denomination voted their intention to affirm same-sex marriage and to disavow their denomination’s previous stance that homosexuality is considered as a sinful behavior in the Bible. And now, I come back full circle to my opening remark. Our churches are rapidly taking on the culture of a sinful world that acts like they act because they are living outside of a personal relationship with God through His only Son, Jesus. Jesus said that we, the church, are to be salt in a tasteless world, and light in a world which loves the darkness rather than the light, for their deeds are evil. “Choose you this day whom you will serve. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” (Joshua 24:15)