Day 3: The faith and the fight - 2

Jude vs 3 - 4a: Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation, I found it necessary to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. For certain men have crept in unnoticed... 

The faith, now perhaps more than ever, constitutes a fight more than in the days when Jude wrote about the need for us to contend for the faith. As we noted yesterday, the fight comes in different ways. Whereas we are aware of warfare, we are less aware of soft wars and subtle fights. Yesterday, we looked at some of the apparent fights. Today, we are looking at the subtle ones. 

Gender dictions are being rewritten, and our brains are tacitly rewired, often against our will. Autocorrect on Grammarly and many other apps are teaching us to ditch the original design - male/him/he/his and female/she/her. Except where someone has formally asked to be addressed otherwise, use spouse, husband, wife, he or she, him or her and refer to yourself as husband or wife. We are products of the original plan, as explicitly stated in the Bible - “male and female created He them” (Gen 1:27b) - Adam and Eve, husband and wife. Not Samuel and Paul, not Sarah and Mary. 

For Christian homes in the Western world, you have to be deliberate about government and policy-led systemic warfare against marriages. A wide range of benefits are available to folks outside marriages, while those in marriages are not eligible. While the socialism and welfare aspects of that argument are both understandable and laudable in some ways (e.g. to balance the gap between the haves and the haves not), the other side of the equation is that there are loads of socioeconomic benefits to marital wreckage. As we noted yesterday, many policies regarding children are not heavenly intended or sponsored.

Social media stories, adverts and patterns are other issues worth noting. The reels take ownership of people’s thoughts proactively. The news of marital woes trends more than marital testimonies. Bloggers and news outlets sell their brands with more devastating headlines than good news. These things settle in people’s minds, and many are beginning to think that’s the only story to marriage - doom. We have an essential duty to remedy this pattern without losing a grasp of who we are or are supposed to be. 

Also, adverts now employ particular patterns that sow more seeds than what is being sold. Have you had to wonder why so much sexual content and semi-nude graphics are brandished in marketing toothbrushes, perfume, shoes and so on? The enemy has continued to excel in this regard. We need to use every opportunity to correct the pattern. Are there Christians in marketing departments or business CEOs? Catchy adverts can be done by beautiful men and women who don’t have to wear bikinis to market toothpaste.

We must keep reminding our children and teenagers, especially those in the Western world, about these subtleties. The socialisation and social reengineering from the leftists deserve matching and proactive intentionality from the children of God.

© Selah Series 2024