How could a Lutheran nation like Germany have tolerated the rise of Hitler? How many times have you heard that question? Of course, the tacit assumption underlying such questioning is that "it could never happen here."

I can see how a faith that refused to look to the law of God as the standard for human ethics, a faith that put radical separation between the "spiritual" kingdom and the "worldly" kingdom could lay the red carpet down for the rise of statism. Sound familiar? Sadly, the same theological milieu that led to the statism of the late 19th century and 20th century is still firmly entrenched in both reformed and evangelical thinking today.

We will interact with this acerbic editorial from Fox News.com on Friday's edition of Generations -

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,395101,00.html "It's the Christians stupid." For a more thorough review of the dualist-kingdom error and the fatal results of such thinking, listen to my Sunday sermon found here: http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?sermonID=84081234545. Could an Adolf Hitler be waiting in the wings for a theologically-ungrounded, worldview-ignorant Christian population?

I must tell you the tale of two women. There was the first woman who was very neatly put together. She had inherited three generations of faith. Her great grandmother, her grandmother, and her mother were Christians. She had a very neat life. The furniture was covered, and she hardly ever sinned. The children were placed in boarding schools and she never yelled at them, even once. The pastor never had to deal with her problems. In fact, once or twice he commended her from the pulpit.

But this is a tale of two women, and I must tell you about the other. She had no godly mother or grandmother. Her father was an alcoholic, and, to tell you the truth, she was not so neatly put together.

One day, she brought her children home from school and engaged in a real relationship with them, and let me tell you, it was messy. She yelled at her children, too much. She was afraid they would be permanently damaged by her yelling. At times, she thought maybe they were a little too close to observe her ways.

Her house was often disorganized… although the stacks were neat. She still practiced hospitality. It was new to her, but her husband thought it would be a good idea. Loving strangers? It was hard enough loving her own children! But she did anyway and she did it badly.

Her children gave her their hearts and they did observe her ways. They observed her yelling, her tears of repentance. Yes. They observed her fears that they might pick up her sinful habits. They observed her struggles to overcome her anger, the time she ran into the [bedroom because she was afraid she might say something ugly. They saw it all. They saw it all. And, trust me folks, it was a big mess.

The pastor was not very happy with this woman and her family. They seemed to require more prayer and counsel than anybody else in the church. "VDP's" he called them. "Very Demanding People."

She would bring the big mess to church with her… and fall on her face and say, "God have mercy on me, a sinner." But, let me tell you, that woman went home justified!

The moral of the story is simple. God is good. He does really well with big messes, but He doesn't do as much with those who are so neatly put together.

As Jesus taught us in His parable, it is not how many talents you start with that matters. It is what you do with the 0.2 talents you have received. What really matters are the risks you take, the sacrifice you lay on the altar, the heart molding done by His Spirit, and your willingness to uncover the mess and to remove the layers of plastic, sterile, institutionalized, white-coated plaster. If you would try risking your furniture, your relationships, and your otherwise neat life for Jesus; if you would bring the whole mess to the cross everyday, there you will find indescribable blessing and peace!

Evolution is the juggernaut of the new Humanist revolution that has captured modern societies, laying waste education, science, reason, and faith.

This is my thesis for my talk at the Beginning of the World conference taking place in the Springs this weekend.

To make my case, I will draw heavily on the most influential man who set the course for American education and thought at the turn of the 20th century. John Dewey provides the content for my presentation in his essay, "The Influence of Darwin on Philosophy."

"THAT the publication of the "Origin of Species " marked an epoch in the development of the natural sciences is well known to the layman. That the combination of the very words origin and species embodied an intellectual revolt and introduced a new intellectual temper is easily overlooked by the expert. The conceptions that had reigned in the philosophy of nature and knowledge for two thousand years, the conceptions that had become the familiar furniture of the mind, rested on the assumption of the superiority of the fixed and final; they rested upon treating change and origin as signs of defect and unreality. In laying hands upon the sacred ark of absolute permanency, in treating the forms that had been regarded as types of fixity and perfection as originating and passing away, the "Origin of Species " introduced a mode of thinking that in the end was bound to transform the logic of knowledge, and hence the treatment of morals, politics, and religion."

My point exactly.

For 2,000 years (since the time of Christ), says Dewey, "purposefulness accounted for the intelligibility of nature and the possibility of science, while the absolute or cosmic character of this purposefulness gave sanction and worth to the moral and religious endeavors of man."

But all praises be to Darwin, we are finally delivered from all these absolutes and "purposefulness!"

Dewey continues, "The Darwinian principle of natural selection cut straight under this philosophy. If all organic adaptations are due simply to constant variation and the elimination of those variations which are harmful in the struggle for existence that is brought about by excessive reproduction, there is no call for a prior intelligent causal force to plan and preordain them."

Now for Dewey, "God is a faded piece of metaphysical goods."

We are delivered from an Ultimate Originator, and an Ultimate Sustainer, and now we can live free of any ethical obligation to that one who might be the Ultimate in Ethics, and the Ultimate Judge of the earth, God forbid.

But read on, for the ultimate deliverance is a deliverance from all meaning, purpose and absolutes in human thought and predication. This new philosophy "forswears inquiry after absolute origins and absolute finalities in order to explore specific values and the specific conditions that generate them."

Stop asking the ultimate questions! There are no answers! For "intellectual progress usually occurs through sheer abandonment of questions together."

And this my friends is what brings us to where we are today. Philosophers have given up on the possibility for absolute truth, and the masses follow suit.

Pragmatism gave birth to existentialism and nihilism, and now men is very distant from God. He freely admits that he is without ultimate purpose, and his politics and economics clearly reflect this.

With God out of the metaphysic and the ethic, man quickly took his place. Of course, Dewey signed the Humanist Manifesto in 1912, placing man at the center of his universe in metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics.

Darwin cleared the path for man to define himself in his meaningless, materialist world - based upon a theory propounding a elusive mechanism never substantiated in the fossil record. The shrill defenders of the faith obtained trillions of dollars of government funding to maintain the façade of a theory, and silence all potential detractors.

So for a moment in history man became his own god. First he pretends to define his own truth, and then he builds his towers upon it. But then he is forced to dismantle his truth (because all truth demands an absolute), and his Babel collapses. Plainly, we are already seeing the breakdown of philosophy, education, and science. The family, the economy, and the state are soon to follow.

We (My son Daniel, assistant Chad and I) were so encouraged to participate in the CHEA homeschool conference in Long Beach last weekend. The California home schooling movement is alive and well on planet earth! Despite recent judicial attacks and non-stop legislative assaults, homeschoolers in California persevere in what God has called them to do.

California is a state of many contradictions. The recent law signed by their Republican Governor under the cover of SB777, mandates homosexual indoctrination in all public schools. Yet, there are still some remnants of faith, family, and freedom left beating in the hearts of 10,000s of its citizens. Because the state is 10X the size of ours, the remnant is roughly 10X larger as well.

In all of our travels, we have never seen such enthusiastic reception of our presentations. These people resonate to a message of relationships, biblical worldview, and discipleship - in a lost and lonely world.

More than that, I have a strong sense of a growing commitment to biblical ideals among these folks, in the face of raw humanism, existentialism, and hedonism that has badly corrupted society around them.

We came away greatly encouraged from the CHEA conference. And thanks to the hard work of many great leaders like Susan Beatty, Harry Beeson, Roy Hanson, Mary Schofield, and Mike Smith (from HSLDA) who have given their lives up to nurture this vital movement. Thanks be to God for these good friends who have done so much!

I am the Executive Director of a large homeschooling organization in Colorado, and our database of home schooling families would be among the largest in the country.

Several months ago, we contracted a single mom who home schools her son, to call a list of a sampling of 1000 families on the database (most of them, on the list for a few years).

Incredibly, she found that 86% of those families who started home schooling their children, have quit!

This means that for 100 families participating in a home school support group somewhere in America, only 14 will capture the vision and continue the mission 3, 5, or 8 years from now. Of the 2.4 million home educated students in America, barely 330,000 will survive. And of the 5,000 that attend a major conference, only 750 will finish the course. This means that the movement has a huge front door and a huge back door, not unlike most churches in a post-modern society. Few people stick around long enough to get a vision. A T-shirt maybe. But a deep-seated, long-standing vision that will actually make an impact on their families for future generations? I don't think so.

As leaders who are fighting valiantly against the massive failure of the national character, academic rigor, family solidarity, and the Christian faith itself, we press for radical change in the thinking and life of families. We want a radical world and life view change. We feel it's the only hope to stem the hemorrhaging flow of blood.

The reality of it, is that most families don't want to make much of a lifestyle change - and so they will just live with the rapidly-declining social, academic, and spiritual trends.

If any meaningful change will ever come about, it will come by the commitment of a principled few. The majority sits on the fulcrum of social change, while those who are most committed on the wrong side or the right side produce the real influence that changes society. It is always the 14% that bears the majority of the influence, and shifts the direction of social systems as human history unfolds. Therefore, the focus in our conferences, our support groups, our news magazines, and our radio broadcasts is not to water down the message for the 86% who are going to quit. We want to encourage the committed, and solidify the base of faithful men an women who embrace the vision, and will ensure a generational continuity that will yield even more fruit in future years.

We gave it everything we had.

Bearing a visionary message from the Word, and an application for the dying family and faith in our country, we thought we could turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children.

We hoped that we could reverse the trends that are weakening the family, destroying generational continuity in the faith, and replacing a God-centered orientation with a man-centered worldview.

Thousands of families heard the message. Literally hundreds of conversations with fathers and mothers yielded the following observations:

1. There is something happening in the hearts of parents, unlike anything we have ever seen before.

2. Men will awaken to a message of direct vision, the declaration of meaningful, illumining, incarnating, relevant application of the Word to the day.

3. Many men have never heard any visionary messages.

4. People either really like to hear a visionary message or they hate it.

5. There are still hundreds of thousands of Monicas out there who have some spiritual concern for their children, but whose husbands are still to be won by their quiet meekness.

6. It's hard to bring a message to people who think they are doing just fine in the water that is slowly rising to a boil. It is only those who can see how broken down their family (and God) relationships are, that will begin to catch the vision that is presented in the messages.

7. People within our ranks are slowly learning that home schooling is not the panacea for the ills of education, faith, and family. They must adopt a full-orbed and heart-deep application of all of the Word to relationships, fatherhood, culture, science, history, economics, church, and politics, if there is to be any meaningful transformation of life.

These are great times for the home schooling movement. While there is some softening around the edges with the government-sponsored programs and the program-heavy, co-op crowd, there is a strong core that has formed over the last 8 years or so. This core will continue to home school for generations to come, producing a movement not unlike that generational reformation that produced the American nation from 1580 - 1680. These folks are defining education as discipleship, applying a biblical worldview to every area of life, and fathers and family worship lie at the core of those home schools. From the 30+ states that I have visited over the years, this core is growing even faster than the movement itself right now.

As I suggested in my book, The Second Mayflower, God is not done with this nation yet. The First Mayflower is about to give birth to a Second. My best guess is that we stand somewhere around 1580. In another 40-50 years, the second generation will be stronger in both quality and quantity (should Christ tarry and we continue to occupy until He returns).

These were statements made in a conference held this afternoon with 20 Christian leaders representing legal defense organizations, media, and ministries from Colorado and around the country. The purpose of the meeting - outline a strategy to address what could be the most serious attack on the Christian faith in our nation's history. Three weeks after Colorado Governor Ritter signed SB200, the grim reality of it all, the true impact and sweeping implications of the law are just now setting in for those leaders (including yours truly who participated in the phone call.).

This law will impact every Christian bookstore, every Christian school, every Colorado Satellite School, every bookstore, every Christian ministry, and every Christian business in the state.

Even outlets like Walmart and Barnes and Noble Books will be prevented from selling The Bible or books authored by Dr. James Dobson. Christian ministries may have to leave the state for legal protection.

Strategies discussed in the meeting included a Facial Challenge in Court, a Get-Rid-of Ritter recall campaign, a Referendum in the next election, and a legislative reversal through the 2008 elections.

Our political strength is waning at present, in the face of a declining church that has lost its own moral compass, a powerful decadent media, a secular education paid for by the secular humanist state, and 37% of boys born without fathers (up from 6% in 1960).

Suffice it to say that Christians will break this law, and will be persecuted for it. In the words of the Apostle Peter, "We ought to obey God rather than men."

I doubt that the forty-year persecution ahead of us will ever match that of the bloody Roman persecutions or even the communist rage against Christ and His church. Fully expecting the humanist schools and hotbeds of homosexuality to produce a problem 7X worse by the latter part of the 2010s, I can't imagine a scenario where we might escape some perseuction (short of all-out national reformation and repentance at the preaching of the Word of God from thousands of pulpits).

Are there two movements within home education in America?

I think that there are those who are more interested in getting their children into Harvard, and then there are those who want to get their children into heaven.

As my good friend, Mike Smith from HSLDA has put it in some of his talks, our ultimate goal is to get our children into heaven, not Harvard.

I fear sometimes there may be those who are more interested in Harvard than heaven. Fundamentally, the kingdom of God should drive our priorities, our goals, and our agenda in education. That is, seek first the kingdom of God and his interests, and academics will be added unto you.

If you focus on faith and character in your children's paideia, God will add to you the blessings of academic success and maybe even food and clothing.

But those who focus on the academics, the right brain - left brain workshops in the conferences, and the trivium, more than they focus on the fear of God and the preeminence of faith and character in the education of their children seem to have it out of balance.

When you talk about the education of children with others, where does the conversation go? Are we more concerned that our children "get a good job," than we are in our children "walking with God?"

We all went to a play produced by our church, written by the Church Life and Drama department director. I think it was called "David and Bathsheba." We were sort of surprised to discover that Pastor Bob was playing the part of David, and one of the deacon's wives, Angela was Bathsheba.

Well, you can imagine our shock when they open up this steamy Jacuzzi scene, where pastor Bob starts kissing Angela. I mean it wasn't a peck on the cheek or anything. It was one of those Hollywood kisses, you would find in a flick like The Bridges of Madison County. Now, we've all seen movies like this, you know. But apparently, Dave, Angela's husband hadn't seen anything quite like this before, because I could see from where I was sitting he was pretty upset about the whole thing. So when Bob started unbuttoning his shirt, we all made a beeline for the door.

The story is fabricated, and the names have been changed to protect the guilty. But you get the point. Listen to Friday's program on Kissing in the Movies, and ask yourself if Paul really meant what he said in 1 Corinthians 7:1.

You can pretend to rob a bank. It's a lot harder to pretend to get intimate with your neighbor's wife.

Lev 20:13
"If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them."

No person, being the owner, lessee, proprietor, manager, superintendent, agent, or employee of any place of public accommodation... shall publish, issue, circulate, send, distribute, give away, or display in any way, manner, or shape or by any means or method, except as provided in this section, any communication, paper, poster, folder, manuscript, book, pamphlet, writing, print, letter, notice, or advertisement of any kind, nature, or description THAT is intended or calculated to discriminate or actually discriminates against... SEXUAL ORIENTATION, marital status... in the matter of furnishing or neglecting or refusing to furnish to them or any one of them any lodging, housing, schooling, or tuition or any accommodation, right [marriage], privilege [adoption], advantage, or convenience... on account of... SEXUAL ORIENTATION, marital status... [which] is unwelcome or objectionable or not acceptable, desired, or solicited.

After 400 years of religious freedom for those who wanted to own and distribute the Bible in America, Governor Ritter has ended it, at least for those who would include Leviticus 20:13 in the text.

The Bible has always sort of discriminated against men who lie with mankind as they lie with a woman, not to mention adulterers, fornicators, liars, and Governors like Ritter in Colorado.

Dr. James Dobson provides a few other reasons why this sweeping bill will take its place in some of the more heinous pieces of legislation ever passed into law in the history of civil government.

"Who would have believed that the Colorado state Legislature and its governor would have made it fully legal for men to enter and use women's restrooms and locker-room facilities without notice or explanation?

"Henceforth, every woman and little girl will have to fear that a predator, bisexual, cross-dresser or even a homosexual or heterosexual male might walk in and relieve himself in their presence. The legislation lists every conceivable type of organization to which this law applies, including restaurants, bathhouses, massage parlors, mortuaries, theaters and 'public facilities of any kind.' Those who would attempt to protect females from this intrusion are subject to a fine of up to $5,000 and up to one year behind bars.

"This is your government in action. It represents a payback to Tim Gill and two other billionaires who have essentially 'bought' the state Legislature with enormous campaign contributions. Coloradans deserve better!"

Assuming that there is a God, and He is still God, and He is bigger than Governor Ritter, and He means what He says in a book called the Bible. . . Our brave Governor along with his friend Tim, should remember that the mills of God grind slowly, but very fine.

There is no question in my mind, Cromwell was a man who set a positive direction for freedom of religion, during the highly-charged religious battles of the 17th century. Of the greatest Christians who have ever served as civil magistrate, I would include George Washington, Oliver Cromwell, Patrick Henry, and John Winthrop.

By the way, none of these great leaders ever graduated from college. Winthrop and Cromwell both attended Cambridge for one year. Cromwell was forced to return home on his father's death to care for his mother and the estate. I also heard recently that only 4 out of the 18 billionaires present in America have a college degree. No footnote on this one.

In my random survey of churches, I find few that would commit more than 2% of their income towards the widow and orphan. Until the church takes this role seriously again, it will remain largely irrelevant as a social institution.

By the way, I am presently enjoying a read of Bede's Ecclesiastical History. Highly recommended for those who have any interest in the history of the Christian faith (not to mention western thinking and life).

Despite the opposition, the naysayers, and the pragmatists, this small band of the faithful pulled off what many thought couldnt be done.

On Friday's program we will interact with National Right to Life's assessment of the personhood amendment. Here's the quote from NRL: "The pro-life movement must at present avoid fighting on the more difficult terrain of its own position, namely arguing that abortion should not be available in cases of rape, incest, fetal deformity, and harm to the mother. While restricting abortion in these situations is morally defensible, public opinion polls show that popular support for the pro-life side drops off dramatically when these 'hard' cases are the topic … This is an important debate to have, and we should be ready to convince the public of the need for few, if any, exceptions to laws prohibiting abortion when such laws can be upheld,"

We know that pragmatism is the foundational ethical principle by which conservatives construct their policies in our day. Yet, most of us are a little perturbed with the results.

If, for example, you were trying to reduce the federal budget, why did you vote for the biggest spender since LBJ, and then re-elect him? I thought he was going to increase the budget a little less than his democrat predecessors! This is just plain bad pragmatism.

As long as you're going to be a pragmatist, why not be a good pragmatist? Here, let me offer a few suggestions. . .

For example, we have performed a historical survey of church history and found that persecution of the church always strengthens the faith. So why not whip out your Obama for 2008 placards and let's get rolling with this!

If you want gridlock in your government, vote democrat for President, and Republican for Congress. That's been the most successful way of preserving freedoms and limiting government over the last 18 years.

Or, better yet, if you're just in this thing to win the battle against abortion, why not just allow the left to abort their children - and limit it to oh. . . democrats, leftist republicans, all existentialists, and all feminists. Or maybe you could offer to pay for their abortions. If you support abortion for these folks, they will abort their young and 30 years from now, the Democrat National Convention will take place in the geriatric ward of Kevorkian Memorial Hospital in downtown New Orleans.

As long as we're willing to do a little evil that good may come about, why not go the distance? Be a good pragmatist.

Search as we have, we could not find a great leader in history who embraced pragmatism and eschewed risk, as our "conservatives" do in this day.

Josiah? Nehemiah? Gideon? William Wallace? William Wilberforce? Oliver Cromwell? George Washington?

Maybe the real issue is that we don't believe in the sovereignty of God as Washington did, and therefore we hesitate to risk much - our lives, our property, and our sacred honor (political position) for the cause of righteousness. Here is Washington at the Constitutional Convention: "If to please the people, we offer what we ourselves disapprove, how can we afterward defend our work? Let us raise a standard to which the wise and the honest can repair; the event is in the Hand of God!"