“They have healed also the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace, when there is no peace. Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? Nay, they were not at all ashamed, neither could they blush: therefore, they shall fall among they that fall: at the time that I visit them they shall be cast down, saith the Lord.”
Jeremiah 6:14-15
This is a verse about someone who observed someone else hurting with an infirmity that would likely lead to their death. However, although they had the ability to do so, rather than administer aid which would lead to their full recovery, they only applied a bit of first aid. This saved their life, but it also assured that the victim would never be restored to complete health. It could be likened to a trained physician who sees a man who has been in an accident and has suffered two broken legs and he is lying face down in a pool of water.
Although the physician saves the man’s life, he also hesitates to pull him out of the water, so the man suffers severe brain damage. Then, rather than properly setting the man’s broken legs he merely splints them back together. He has saved the man’s life, but now the man will suffer retardation and will be confined to a wheel chair for the rest of his life. He healed him “slightly”! Furthermore, he does not feel guilty about what he has done. Actually, he comforts himself in the fact that the man would have died without his help. He assures the man saying “peace”, implying “I have helped you, and you should be grateful.”
Every day, I hear politicians, liberal preachers, educators, and elite professionals speak-out about American society. Yet, I find most often very few are talking about the diseases at the core of our identity, but focus on blaming the symptoms we hide behind: government, corporations, cities, societies, even capitalism. But, we must remember, government is made up of “us”, corporations are made up of “us”, cities are a dense collection of “us”, and society is the expression of the collective “us”.
Now, I love my country, yet “us”, we the people, who make up America have developed a very sick society, in part because we have taken the mediocre medicine that has been dished out to us. And then because of our laziness, foolishness, and arrogance, we can’t even recognize that we’re sick. We are thankful to be sitting in a wheelchair after losing 90% of our faculties, because we no longer realize we are here because of incompetence. May I share some signs indicating that we are a sick society?
The Boosting of the Beggar: A sick society no longer recognizes that there is no such thing as a free ride. Someone somewhere is paying the bill. Beggars are a sign of a sick society. If you visited a town and found 50% of the people on the street begging, wouldn’t you think something might be wrong in that city? Yet, how many Americans are waiting for their next government handout?
There was a time when most beggars were men. Some were suffering from a legitimate physical or mental handicap. Others were just going through a short season of hard-times, while others were just plain sorry and lazy. But today it is not just men, but women are beggars. Children line up for their free lunches, so children are taught to be beggars. College students line up for their grants, so they are beggars. Giant corporations are beggars. Even men of great wealth are beggars—and no one is ashamed. When any society has this many beggars, that society is sick. It is not poverty alone that has made our nation a nation of beggars. It sounds like the judgment of God!
When the United States was founded, people had no problem with the concept that you worked to make it through life. That was life. Each person depended on their own strengths and skills to earn their way through life. This is the way it was and the way it should be. But today, it is so different. Many people, from their childhood, have considered themselves too good to actually work. They rely on someone else to support them. Consider this, if you need months of unemployment checks before you can find a job, isn’t that a sick society? Doesn’t it indicate something is wrong when an economy like ours cannot provide employment?
The Slandering of the Sacred: A sick society no longer understands anything as sacred. There is nothing considered Holy. It is held accountable to nothing and to no one because those things that are sacred are segregated to “private” and “personal” areas of life. Morality in public life is self-determined, often by those in power and legitimized by might, not rights. The sacred is usually defamed, ignored, or segregated into an isolated corner of society. An intolerance of the sacred is a sign of a sick society.
The Legitimization of Lovelessness: A sick society legitimizes the careless and inhumane treatment of others. Abortion is a sign of a sick society. Euthanasia will become more commonplace in the future. Casual sex without love or commitment legitimizes a loveless society. A sick society does not care for neighbors, but objectifies and blames the neighbor for being in need; especially if that neighbor is of another race, religion, social standing, or political party. Such is the norm in a sick society.
The Normalization of the Nasty: A sick society legitimizes and normalizes immoral practices. The homosexual movement is clearly an example. Practices that should cause shame and embarrassment are now considered normal. The lewdness and crudeness of what constitutes as entertainment should shock us, but instead numbs us to the cruelty and perversity that is real and all around us. We have no concept of modesty and no convictions of decency. Nasty is the new normal in a sick society.
The Lack of Comprehension of the Contemptable. When Hillary Clinton gave a commencement speech at Wellesley College, she declared that President Trump’s budget was “an attack of unimaginable cruelty on the most vulnerable among us, the youngest, the oldest, and the poorest.” Unimaginable cruelty? No, it is not. Abortion is “unimaginable cruelty”. Using nerve gas on helpless women and children is “an attack of unimaginable cruelty.” The North Korean’s putting a college student into a coma is an “attack of unimaginable cruelty.” Beheading Christians just because they are Christians is an act of “unimaginable cruelty”. However, reducing the growth of unconstitutional government spending is not. There are so many things our sick society calls right, when it should be obvious it is wrong. A sick society has lost its ability to assess what should really be contemptable, so the person who kills an endangered species can be put in jail, while the man who murders a human child is subsidized. And those who speak out against abortion are committing an act of unimaginable cruelty. Our moral compass is so skewed; such has become the thinking in our sick society.
The Reaction Becomes the Remedy: People often react on impulse instead of act on rational thought. The instant response of text messages and voice mail has gotten folks into a lot of trouble. Road rage is a reaction. Some guy going on campus or to his place of work and killing people is a reaction. Violence is a preferred manner of recourse in a sick society. It is the way of solving problems. It objectifies its enemies and wipes out the problem by annihilating its opposition. This is also seen in our willingness to go to war, the incredible amounts of violence in our streets, the violence in video games and on television, and the bullying violence on our playgrounds. Peace is considered naive and unrealistic, so we amp up our violence as a response to violence. It’s like thinking we can cure our bacterial infection by fighting it with another infection. What happens? A sick society gets even sicker.
The Flourishing are not Furthered: A sick society does not understand that it prospers when the entire society prospers. Success in a sick society is based upon everyone just getting by. The rich and successful are seen as enemies of the people. A sick society cannot make the connection that its overall health involves making sure there are enough rich men to start businesses and factories. Their well-being depends on the affluent man who is able to build houses and fund the schools and hospitals. It is the affluent man who often lends the money to the poor man to help him better his place in life.
Furthermore, the sick society does not challenge the loser when everyone gets a trophy. We all should be motivated to be winners, but in a sick society it is easier to blame the wealthy and the winners, than to strive to be like them.
Freedom is a product of liberty, independence, personal responsibility, and self-reliance. When you exercise these four traits, you are Free. You are free to live your life pretty much as you see fit. Apart from God, you are not dependent on one entity for anything. There are no promises of wealth beyond what you are willing to do to acquire it yourself. You work hard, putting in long hours to exploit your skills to acquire the necessary wealth to live the life in the manner you wish. There is almost nothing to stop you from doing this… almost nothing. But there is something. It is all the people of the sick society who feed off the social programs that take wealth from you and give it to those who did not earn it. This is how government takes care of the slaves it owns.
My goal is not to make us feel badly, but to get us to reflect on our role in making our society, our communities, and our families well again. It begins by first understanding our sicknesses and then being willing to take our medicine.
We are not the first generation of God’s people to live in a sick society. Trouble is, so many Christian’s today, by virtue of the liberal churches they attend, do not realize how sick this society is becoming. Their tolerance for watered down Bibles, watered down hymns, and watered down messages have left them with a watered-down faith and a tolerance for the “slight” healing offered by the world.
During this Thanksgiving season as we reflect upon our thankfulness for living in America, we must also accept the fact that sick minds have created a sick society. As Christians we must be careful not to consider ourselves healthy when we begin to share in the mistaken values and understandings of the sick society around us.
Dr. Worthington has been in the ministry over forty years and serves as President of Pathway Ministries.