tion in your vocation, etc. would also come into play. This may sound com plicated, but is it hardly so. Most of us have numerous commitments and goals, but we have them pretty well arranged so that major goals domi nate. When faced with a difficult de cision, we almost automatically con clude that a proposed act easily passes muster on most counts—at least the THOU PASSETH THROUGH When thou passest through the waters Deep the waves may be and cold, But Jehovah is our refuge And His promise is our hold; For the Lord Himself hath said it, He, the faithful God and true; When thou comest to the waters Thou shalt not go down, But THROUGH. Seas of sorrow, seas of trial, Bitterest anguish, fiercest pain, Rolling surges of temptation Sweeping over heart and brain. They shall never overflow us For we know His Word is true; All His waves and all His billows He will lead us safely through. Threat'ning breakers of destruction, Doubts insidious undertows. Shall not sink us, shall not drag us Out to ocean depths of woe; For His promise shall sustain us, Praise the Lord, whose Word is true! • We shall not go down, or under, For He saith, "Thou passest THROUGH." — Annie Johnson Flint major ones—or that it clearly violates a basic commitment. The key question, of course, is, “How strong is our commitment to Christ and the com mandments of His Word?” If the commitment is weak or missing it will hardly influence our decisions. The new morality can be counteracted only by committing one’s life to the Lord Jesus Christ and by honoring the Word of God as our rule of faith and practice.
occasions hardly justify over-throw ing Biblical standards of conduct for a “situational” or “end justifies the means” approach. A Christian may, on occasion, find himself in a difficult situation where he honestly believes that no matter what course of action he takes he will have to sin. To my way of thinking, it’s much wiser for an individual to appropriate God’s provision through Christ and ask forgiveness rather than to rationalize the act by saying that it was good and hence imply that the Biblical standards of conduct is really not binding. Once you open the door to the idea that what is Biblical ly wrong (lying, for example, may actually be morally right) you are on the road to a situational morality that knows no Biblical code of standards. Sad to say, Christians do commit wrong, sometimes by choice, but once the Christian rationalizes himself in to thinking that it really wasn’t wrong after all, he has moved from violat ing God’s Word to denying it. That is a significant and tragic switch! It is my conviction that the men of the new morality are asking us to do something that will ultimately shake the very foundations upon which our society is based. Legally, they are asking us to return to a day that parallels Greece before the rise of democracy. Spiritually, they are set ting the stage for a re-enactment of the book of Judges where it is re corded several times that “every man did that which was right in his own eyes.” We would dare hope that Chris tians would turn their back upon this situational morality that asks a man to judge everything simply in the light of what pleasure or good it might ultimately bring him. The combined goals (or ends) a man adheres to should justify or qualify any act (or means). For ex ample, if you believe in obedience to God’s Word, then that is a goal or end that should claim consideration in every difficult decision (the minor de cisions are usually automatic). In ad dition, such goals (as ends) or basic honesty, patriotism, thrift, satisfac
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