Ill-Equipped

The wife-half of a couple we know has had a breakdown. Her husband is trying to get her the best care he can, but these kinds of things are tough. She requests the outlandish and then wonders why people are so mean that they won't let her. Like, "My husband is mean to me; he won't let me fly off the roof." (Fictional; just to present the idea.) The wife is friends with my wife and she calls fairly often to talk, complain, chat, whatever. My wife tries to maintain a pleasant demeanor and friendly conversation while steering her away from the bizarre, but it's not easy. The woman is no longer in touch with reality, so offering reality as a remedy doesn't help. My wife says she is ill-equipped to handle this kind of thing.

Scripture indicates that sin rots the brain. Starting first with suppressing the truth about God (Rom 1:18-20), humans become "futile in their speculations" (Rom 1:21). Left unchecked, this leads to becoming fools (Rom 1:22), the exchange of the truth for a lie (Rom 1:25), and eventually to a debased mind (Rom 1:28). It's for this reason that God said, "The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it?" (Jer 17:9). (That's actually a quote from God.) It's for this reason that Paul urged the renewing of the mind (Rom 12:2). Simply stated, the longer we are immersed in sin without any brakes, the more we lose touch with reality.

In our current society, we've created a bifurcation. There is "logic" and there is "feeling." This is easy to see in a child. They want something. You say, "No." "Why?" they want to know. "What's wrong with you? Why so mean?" Well, they want to drive or smoke or drink or ... something that will cause them harm. You say "No" because you care. Because you understand the rationale behind the "No." But you can explain all about how much harm it would cause and how they shouldn't be doing those things -- at least, not yet -- and about how much you care and how much better it would be if they listened. But we're not talking about "logic" here. We're talking about "feeling." And the reasons (logic) you offer are not typically persuasive because they're feeling, not thinking. We, largely, as a society, have arrived at that place. We don't think; we feel. We use bullet-words. (I just made that up; a combination of "bullet points" and "words" with the clear link to "bullets".) These are intended to express something, but it's not just an idea; it's a judgment call. "Anti-abortion," "homophobic," "transphobic," "racist," "sexist," "hater" ... these sorts of words. They have meaning, but we've re-engineered them to have feeling instead. And having endowed them with emotional impact, we use them with the intent of preventing thinking and gaining a feeling instead. So we calmly and coolly talk about "inclusiveness" while we exclude those who don't meet our version. We happily complain of those "judgmental" folks in judgmental terms. We have no problem castigating those we deem "intolerant" and their views ... which we won't tolerate. We don't think it through. Think. Why does "he" who believes he is a "she" need to take on "socially-constructed" "she" characteristics? Is "she" defined by dresses and make up and breasts? No. But that's where we go. Why?

This, then, is where we find ourselves. This society has so immersed itself in unabated sin that it has, literally, lost its mind. It has had a breakdown. So here we Christians are, trying to help those around us with the one thing that can help them -- the Gospel. And we're doing the best we can explaining the logic and the reasoning and the notions. We're Apologizing -- defending the faith with logic -- and we're pulling out our Bibles and presenting all the evidence we have. And they're not listening. Why? Because we are ill-equipped to deal with a society that operates on "feel" rather than "think." They think they're thinking, but they're perfectly happy to operate with their cognitive dissonance, holding blithley two contradicting ideas, one in each hand, and affirming them both.

We've moved past logic. Post-modernism required it. Quantum physics required it. ("Yes, it is perfectly reasonable that something could come from nothing.") Logic is out; "feel" is in. For the believer, though, it is our minds that are important (Rom 12:2). Our minds are damaged and renewal is necessary. Our hearts are questionable, but that is fixed by a new heart. We have God's Word and we have the Truth (John 14:6), but we are ill-equipped to address the insanity that is modern society, where boys can be girls and "marriage" can mean everything or nothing and "good and evil" are relative and God is "whatever I say he/she is." For starters. This is why we must not rely on our finely honed reasoning skills. First, most of us don't have them, fooled by the world as we are. More importantly, the world doesn't care, not interested in "think" rather than "feel" as they are. So it's a good thing we have the God of the universe to rely on, isn't it?