The More Things Change, the More We Realise God Doesn't (Part 1 of 2)

The More Things Change, the More We Realise God Doesn’t (Part 1 of 2)

The Christian strategy against liberalism, political correctness and every change that is destroying the world

Khen Lim

Image source: thoughts-about-god.com

“I can’t believe it,” the church member said, “but this is not the school I thought I knew.”

“I signed up to do my practicum at my old school, thinking that familiarity will ease things up a little for me. Y’know… I know where everything is… the classrooms, teachers’ staff room, the school hall, canteen and even the administration and the headmistress’ office. I’m familiar with the teachers, some of whom actually taught me.”

She sounded upset but I wasn’t sure I fully understood what the problem was and so I probed a little more.

“What were you really looking for when you applied to do your teaching experience back at your school? Favours, maybe?” I asked.

“Favours? Of course not! When you do the practicum, you know that assessment is going to be tough. So if I could eliminate as much of the unnecessary uncertainties that surround a strange and unknown school, I could at least focus more on the teaching instead. I thought if I could do my teaching experience at my own school, that familiarity would be helpful. What I wasn’t prepared for was that the school seemed to have changed so much in such a short time. I wasn’t ready for that!”

Introduction

Things change. It’s part of life. The world is in a perpetual flux and it’s up to us to cope and keep up. Unfortunately, the changes are not always for the better and that’s where life becomes, at best, more challenging.

That church member was in her final year of her tertiary programme to become a qualified English teacher. And much to her dismay, she wasn’t prepared for the changes she encountered. In the end, she became convinced that teaching wasn’t something she enjoyed but I believed that those changes had partly to do with her decision.

There are a few things we can say about all these changes that take place.

Change is unavoidable

Image source: gabWorthy

Essentially, there is nothing we can do to stop many of the changes we’ve been experiencing. In fact if we look at the history of the world, changes are as unavoidable as they are part of the transforming landscape. Change can come naturally as in the Ice Age or it can be man-made as in the case of the Industrial Age. Perhaps they can be part of a huge progressivist-style hoax called Climate Change in which people are forced to accept what amounts to pseudoscience. At any rate, the changes that rang in had significant impact on everyday lives.

Changes that have worldwide impact are some of those that are impossible to rein in. In recent times, dramatic changes were the result of technological introductions including the smartphone, the mobile Internet and Facebook. When combined, the shifts in society were stunning but at the same time, they brought unsavoury character changes to the individual as well as family and workplace. To put it another way - No one seems interested in developing or using social skills to communicate face to face anymore.

From idle stores and station stands to restaurants and just about everywhere, most people are too busy to look up and talk as their eyes are glued to their smartphones while their fingers stroke the touchscreens. The success that Facebook enjoys has come at a huge cost to civilised society because it has not only stopped people from communicating in the normal sense but it has also opened up avenues for people to use it to terrorise others and commit serious crimes that continue unabatedly. With people finding social media networking to be the perfect platform to hide their real identities behind, civilisation can’t possibly ever be the same. And worse is yet to come.

Another example of broadening worldwide change comes in the form of widespread liberalism and political correctness, both of which when combined, have been producing lethal results everywhere from North America to Europe and in varying degrees, the more liberal parts of Asia such as Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong and even Singapore. We’re not exactly spared in Malaysia as well. We’ve been seeing the ill-effects of socio-cultural changes that pose the single most serious threat to conservative society.

Liberals have been turning against conservative governments and lashing against anyone who held different opinions or views. The dissension has become so bad that society has become more divided than at any time in its history. There is now intolerance everywhere, from corporates, cafés and departmental stores to banks, boutiques, big businesses and of course Hollywood and the mainstream media. There is no room for discussion; anyone who thinks it’s worth debating will be tarred and feathered.

Change is a matter of choice

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In other words, you can choose whether or not it applies to you. While the sin-creaking world is attempting to normalise recreational marijuana consumption and homosexuality – and transsexuality – and force it down our throats, we have a choice. We don’t have to allow it to change us. 

If others choose to get high and irrelevant, we can reject marijuana in whatever forms other than for serious medical situations. Like prostitution, it is unethical, irresponsible and unacceptable that marijuana be legalised and governments around the world that legislated in support will have a lot to answer for.

As for sexual perversion, anything that God proscribes is anathema to society anywhere. That essentially cuts out the entire LBGTQ movement. Contrary to the misinformation and deception that has been spread, Christians do not reject anyone of such sexual persuasions. We still love them and we will not just warmly accept their presence but pray for them in church. The Christ narrative is to love them but not follow their practices. Instead we must walk away armed with the conviction that we don’t have to agree. It’s a free world and we must stick to what we know and obey God.

Another horrendous liberal movement is the pro-choice abortion movement that has been spreading its message of change and embrace for five decades. A conservative politician was widely criticised for saying that Planned Parenthood’s practice of abortion is no less a crime than the Nazi extermination of the Jews. 

In fact, it probably is even worse especially when statistics show an estimated 40 to 50 million babies are killed every year. It gets more frightening when we realise that the United Kingdom legalised abortion in 1967. Six years later, America followed suit. It is unimaginable to think the total number of babies that have been senselessly murdered since then.

We still believe staunchly in free speech and the right to disagree. A civilised society cannot exist if we have neither. We used to be able to have both coexist but the stampeding – and largely unchecked – liberalism movement has been so rampant that we’re now paying a huge price for not having fought back. Still, if God gives us the gift of free will, that is exactly what we have and no one should be able to take that away from us.

Change is something we adapt

Image source: Modern Health Talk

When we get left behind by changes, maybe it’s because we struggle or simply fail to adapt. This is particularly true when we talk about Technology. When technology comes face to face to those reluctant to change or embrace, the disruption can be traumatic. But it happens all the time. 

And all the time, there are those who are in perpetual self-denial. They refuse to budge. They are unwilling to accept that they will be left behind. They resist all calls to get on-board for the ride. They just want to be left alone but it gets worse, because they actually get left behind.

The abacus surrendered to the slide rule and then the electronic calculator, which in turn, was swallowed by computers and smartphones. Even digital watches can now do calculations. Lawnmowers seem pretty passé these days since the ubiquitous back-mounted grass trimmer became popular. 

Once-famous can’t-do-without software products like WordPerfect and Lotus 123 quickly became history because they did not catch on with the Windows platform. Today, Microsoft’s Office business suite is the standard. Nokia’s mobile phones were so dominant that they ignored the noteworthy introduction of, firstly, the Blackberry, and then the iPhone. Once the Android operation system was introduced, the Finnish company died a quick death.

There are numerous other such stories where we can draw lessons of wisdom about how not to be irrelevant because of technology. But there are also socio-economic changes that have been coming thick and fast, and we cannot cope as well. Issues like rapid rising costs of living are continuing to catch almost everyone napping. 

This is worsened when our wages and salaries are not keeping up. Even when interest rates plummet, our costs of insurance and medical care continue to rise. Groceries are not getting cheaper. Petrol prices may be unpredictable but mainly, they are on the up. And so are prices of necessities, not to mention, luxury items. Nothing is going the way we all prefer it to and in the end, many of us might be facing irrelevance.

Change is up to us

Image source: Workopolis

Ultimately, it might be up to us to go along or reject the changes. Some changes may or may not be ethical. They might not force us to choose or reject God. Instead, they offer us a choice that we must then be able to live with. Unfortunately, some of these choices may not be easily reversible while some are albeit with some pain.

Should we upgrade our car? That flashy smartphone from Google sounds exciting. Maybe get that great looking Samsung Internet watch I’ve been eyeing. A large ultra-high-definition Sony TV certainly sounds tempting too. New clothes for a change might liven up my wardrobe. 

Perhaps that lovely looking pair of Hush Puppies shoes could be nice or that new fragrance from Calvin Klein is worth buying. My wife might be interested in that forty-week slimming programme from Weight Watchers or quite possible, a home kit from Body Shop could do the trick. Maybe I should get a more premium bicycle than just a basic one.

Consumerism is a hard one to quantify. It is not wrong to buy things that we like to have. After all, what we earn is for us to decide how to spend. But then, if we have to make a choice between spending $20,000 on some merchandise we like and the same amount if not more on a surgery option that could save our lives, the decision could be a little clearer and more obvious. But sometimes you’d never know – there are those who live for the moment and do the unpredictable!

A case in point are elective cosmetic surgeries that might not be necessary but many young Koreans especially feel more compelled to commit to compared to most others. The general idea seems to be that there is a certain physical look that Koreans endeavour to attain and therefore, such surgeries are vital to them regardless of the risks that they may entail. 

Are these surgeries life-changing or life-enhancing? You make your choice and you wear it. To someone else, that choice may be incorrect, if not unwise but you might beg to differ. Whatever it is, that change is up to us. We can choose to accept or reject. In some cases, we can even reverse our decision once it is made.

Change in reaction to the past

Image source: University of Minnesota Published Works

Sometimes we change the way we feel about things in the past. The past holds no possibilities of being changed. That time is past. The events are now set in stone. Nothing in our history can ever be reversed or altered. However how we view them can. Our opinions about our history may differ today maybe because we know more about it or maybe because our sentiments have changed. Perhaps it is because our outlook is now more matured or simply different.

I used to think that the school I attended during my childhood days was great. I certainly did have some fun times there. I made good friends along the way. And it had an admirable history and played a contributing role in the early development of the country. That was what I thought decades ago but my view has changed in recent years and that was because there were significant events in my past that I had, for a long time, suppressed and ignored; events that out of personal humiliation and shame, I neither knew how to nor wanted to deal with.

Once I began to review them, I faced a litany of questions I had to answer for myself and in doing so, my conclusion about that same school had changed. Those questions were a long time coming but in the transitional years between concealment and awakening, they were conveniently missing. Those were the growing-up years. They were exciting and I had a life to fulfil to its maximum but once I began to ease up and settle down, those missing years slowly crept up and presented themselves to me. It was almost as if they needed a closure and I hadn’t given them that all these years. By then it was time and it was unavoidable. I had to resolve them.

Today, I feel nothing for the school. I have neither the loyalty nor the affection for a school many of my ex-schoolmates still think so highly of. For the hurt I had to endure, I had received not a single word of apology nor shown remorse but I had since moved on and done my best to left them behind.

Of course, very few people ever knew what happened to me. I don’t have to share them with everyone; so, in that sense, I also don’t have to agree with their views. Yet it is also true vice-versa. For me, the truth did end up differently eventually. Over time, we all have that benefit of maturity and hindsight that enable us to reshape the way we think about things especially those that have been stashed up in our past.

The dread of hopelessness

The world is hardly a happy place at the moment but then, it hasn’t been for many, many years. For sure, we’re not just talking about the wars that are occurring everywhere but also all the serious social conflicts that are happening on all levels of life. If the Cold War was intimidating enough, today’s myriad problems are actually magnitudes worse and the future, at best, is foreboding. 

While the Cold War involved a nefarious political bloc driven by a communistic agenda intent on a pan-geographical domination, the people at large were not involved. Today, the difference is palpable because the people – essentially the liberals – like to believe that they are ‘disenfranchised’ and hence, feel empowered to unleash their anger and bitterness. The world has never been closer at courting disaster as it is today when affluent countries wilfully flirt with every conceivable risk imaginable.

The American crisis

Image source: sultanknish.blogspot.com

In the past decade, the previous American government has meted out changes that pitched to the preferences of one group in deference of the majority. Clearly it wasn’t a consensus decision as in many cases, the government pushed and shoved its way into decisions that were instrumented by agencies that deliberately acted in its favour. 

In making this possible, compromised officials were in place in almost all major government departments including those in national security. Till today, some of them remain intact to make sure that any concerted efforts in reversing their policies would be thwarted. Such is the case with the judges across the country and the Justice Department including also the FBI, CIA and NSA and others.

Many of these policies have helped in fomenting racial discontent or exacerbated a disproportionate sense of social entitlement among one group of minorities against the rest of the nation. These leftist ideas have also been surreptitiously funded by foreign interests with a view to neutering American democracy thus in the long term, dismantle its power and ultimately bring down the country. To those who believe this is an overly-dramatic reaction, it takes a few years of careful study and research to come to this point. Ignoring it would be perilous.

Many of these ideas have pushed by anti-American initiatives such as the racist Black Lives Matter (BLM) which has incited numerous serious and deadly attacks on police officers, the sexist Rainbow movement that pushes the LGBT, same-sex marriage and gender-neutral bathroom agendas and then also, the pro-choice National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League (NARAL), which parades itself as ‘fighting for women’s rights’ but is nothing but a political support arm for the infamous Planned Parenthood. 

Liberal political initiatives, their policies and directions have also given enormous power and influence to groups like Planned Parenthood (PP), American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Southern Poverty Law Centre (SPLC), Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF), National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP), Arab-American Association (AAA), Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA), Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and National Organisation for Women (NOW) and numerous others. 

In the case of the Islamic entities, there are sufficient evidences of links to registered terrorist organisations including the Muslim Brotherhood but seemingly these allegations have been dismissed or ignored.

In turning the country into a socialist state, liberals – unknowing or otherwise – will join the globalisation efforts that are already showing its deadly effects across so many countries in Europe. The crisis has grown to such an extent that many fear that America is creeping indefinitely towards the brink of a civil war that can only be decided in very deadly terms to its own people. 

Camped on one side will be the liberals, progressivists, socialists, anti-Semitists and Islamic apologists not to mention ‘paid protestors’ funded by Hungarian multi-billionaire George Soros and other elitists of his ilk and loudly hailed by left-leaning Hollywood celebrities. On the other side across the battle lines are the conservatives, Christian evangelists, orthodox Jews and basically the larger majority of everyday middle- and working-class Americans.

Most Americans are only beginning to see how their country is being undermined by elitists, celebrities and the distrustful mainstream media who has not only been feeding its readers an entirely false narrative but have also been bias in their reporting. Unfailingly till today, newspapers like the New York Times, Washington Post and Huffington Post amongst many others, have been relentless in looking for the silver bullet to bring down the new Republican government while they cover up any news that look bad for the liberals.

But it isn’t the destruction of America that is the big news. The even bigger news is that the socialist agenda is expansive beyond. The idea is that by crippling and then toppling the American government, the grander plan is to create a tsunami effect – or a domino cascade – that will sweep the rest of the affluent western-minded countries far and wide. 

As we can see it today, that ambitious project is working – the destructive effects have been deeper and wider than the Republican government had imagined. Much of what the Democrats have wreaked in the past eight years looks increasingly irreversible. Even if policies can be repealed, widespread attitudes and mindsets are more difficult. Entrenched in the psyche of the average American behavioural response may not change all that easily. 

Socialism didn’t die with the collapse of the Iron Curtain and the Soviet Union. As the Democrats have envisioned, it is well and alive and making a larger impact than feared. Virtually every pillar of society in America is being threatened and liberals are making serious inroads in deconstructing them. And yet for all these many years, at least half its population don’t appear the least bit worried mainly because they have been deceived by the faux narrative painted by the liberal mainstream media.

The collapse of Europe

Image source: Walid Shoebat

The harder thing to accept in all these sweeping changes is that it isn’t just America. But of course, should America collapse, the chain reaction throughout the world will be nothing short of cataclysmic. At this point, beyond America, Europe is in even deeper strife. Large swathes of the continent all the way to the north have been plunged into chaos with the ill-fated borderless immigration initiative that has so far moved more than a million unscreened refugees from Syria. Yet no one is alarmed that the Islamic State has been planting terrorists among them so that they could build cellular networks across Europe in readiness for future attacks.

Despite the United Kingdom’s historical Brexit decision, Europe remains bent on moving ahead with their borderless anti-sovereign direction, which means more refugees coming in unchecked. Germany’s countless problems with violence, crimes, rapes and murders by the refugees are matched by those in other countries including Austria, Sweden, Denmark, France, Belgium and Netherlands. Yet the liberal influence has been pervasive enough to ensure that their plans are not scuttled.

Asia’s crack lines show

Image source: Queerty

Although the Asian counterparts are significantly more conservative, liberalism has been slowly creeping in over the decades. Already Taiwan is flirting with same-sex marriage and the normalisation of the LBGT presence. Singapore’s gradually loosening grip on authoritarianism may soon do the same to its socio-cultural complexion as well. In Muslim-dominant Malaysia, at least one church is being run under the government radar by an openly gay pastor – with assistance from his American gay partner – where homosexuality is encouraged. In fact the two of them has been married since 2011.

Over in Hong Kong, the little once-British colony is facing off struggles to safeguard its democracy against mainland China, to which it was returned in 1997 after 99 years of colonial rule. As many sinologists will say, political independence in Hong Kong is as brittle as freedom of speech once China flexes its muscles. Now, it’s simply a matter of when and not if Hong Kong will capitulate.

To the east, Japan is weathering a host of issues from complexities arising from royalty succession to unbelievably sluggish economic recovery. In and amongst them is the small matter of North Korea whose threats across the Sea of Japan have become worryingly real in recent times. All they could do at least for now is to watch frigidly as the hermit kingdom let fly test rockets and missiles that fall a little short of Japanese shores. 

And it isn’t just Japan; South Korea south of the 39th Parallel is in a more alarming situation. Held back by a truce, which means they are still technically at war with their northern cousins, South Koreans are also grappling with an impeached presidency that has ushered in political instability and an immediate future filled with uncertainty.

China also has its own problems but the one that has largely gone unreported in western media is their massive abortion issue. According to the country’s National Health and Family Planning Commission in 2013, population growth has been contained by means of abortion that has numbered as many as 13 million every year. 

It is a gruesome number that was perpetuated by China’s One-Child Policy and although that ended on the first day of 2016, forced abortions continue, not exactly helped by a Chinese tradition of preferring boys to girls. For that reason, a substantial number of these abortions is likely to be female babies.

Other than China’s abysmal picture on abortion, the country is struggling to overcome its increasingly overheating economy. As it is, the cracks are showing. As wages increase and better deals are struck with workers, foreign companies are exiting the country in search of more favourable operating conditions. 

Recently, many Japanese companies have turned turtle in China only to leave and re-establish their operations in Vietnam where labour is more affordable. And now with the new American government reinvesting in its own American workplace, China has to deal with a growing trade problem as its cheap exports may now either become very costly or face their untimely demise. Either way, the repercussions can be catastrophic for their own manufacturers and if this snowballs out of control, the outcome can be difficult even for China to come to terms with.

Further down south is the ASEAN region once known as the Asian Tigers for its strong economic portfolio but today, the picture might need to be slightly repainted. What has become even more obvious are the autocratic democracies, an oxymoron that defines how many of the countries in this trading bloc runs. 

Yet Western powers aren’t bothered so long as they can make money off this region. Trade, being the great leveraging counterbalance, is seen as the only way rogue countries in Asia deal profitably with the rest of the world while pretentious moralists conveniently ignore what they know is otherwise deeply troubling.

To the west, across the Indian Ocean, lies India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, an amalgam that is as inflammable as tinder on a hot and dry day. Separated by castes and divided forever by incendiary religious fanaticism, India is often at the brink of internal civil strife. It’s either Hindus against Muslims or somehow, the Christians will be caught somewhere in the middle. Second only to South Africa, India’s rape crisis continues year after year. Despite promises to rein in the crime, women continue to be under siege in this country.

But the bigger problem facing India is its relationship with its neighbouring countries such as Pakistan where its borders continue to be a source of occasional armed conflicts. To the other side of Pakistan lies impoverished Bangladesh where its workers are comprehensively exploited by big-name clothiers from the affluent west often at their peril. 

Off its east coast is Sri Lanka, to which India also has a historically cultural issue with. And of all these countries, it is India and Pakistan that have nuclear capabilities. A 2014 report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) cited both countries as among the nine that possess a total of 16,300 nuclear weapons. In a country where hot heads are aplenty, pressing the wrong button could send the whole world up in smoke.

The ‘White Asian’ issue

Image source: news.com.au

On the bottom eastern edge of the Asian continent proper lies an area that has been carrying a host of confusion names from East Asia to Oceania, Australasian and also Asia-Pacific. Of the many countries that are part of this region, the two most outstanding are without a doubt, Australia and New Zealand and between the two, the former identifies itself most closely to the affluent western-minded world in both political correctness and liberal leanings.

Despite the uniqueness of Australian culture and society, the heady brew of socialism and liberalism is well and alive, and bustling in the continent’s large metropoles including Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide, Perth and Brisbane and so on. In many ways, Australia’s liberal proclivities are almost aligned with their American counterparts; each sharing one another’s tastes and preferences on a broader aspect. 

While the maverick ‘ocker’ Australians love to mock Americans – and the British – in every which way possible, a look in the mirror will affirm the similarities when it comes to their pro-refugee programmes as well as initiatives that seemingly appease Islamisation.

Already in Australia, there have been terrorism attacks in the name of Islam. It is a worrying start and unless more level heads prevail in policy making, none of these will get stopped anytime in the future. Like America, the carnage is likely to worsen.

Africa’s never-ending problems

Image source: rt.com

As mysterious and exotic as this dark sub-continent is, there is also an alarming increase in chaos, conflicts and territorial aggression. South Africa, being the most advanced of countries in this region, also happens to be infamously called the ‘rape capital in the world,’ making it the most unsafe place for women to be in. If India is bad, South Africa is manifold worse.

Outside of South Africa, the sub-continent is being slowly torn apart by Islamists bent in destroying the very fabric of life and civilisation, threatening to plunge it into a living hell. Known for its widespread Internet scams, Nigeria is in tatters but Kenya isn’t better off. With its rampant and unchecked piracies, Somalia is nothing if not lawless. Sudan, having been split into north and south – the latter being called South Sudan – is at war with itself. 

The rest is just waiting to tumble, whichever way the dice of fate is rolled. Further up north, Africa meets up with West Asia – also known as Asia Minor – and beyond that, the highly combustible Middle-East.

Combustion and the Middle-East

Image source: Washington Free Beacon

Evangelicals believe that the future of a world spiralling out of control will be decided in the Middle-East. And the place where that will ultimately happen is called Armageddon. Whatever that is happening now, evangelicals know it as prove that we have entered the period of the End Times. This is when eschatological prophecies foretold in the Bible will unfold one at a time. The Books of Daniel, Ezekiel and Revelation are particularly harrowing to read but will prove to be unerringly accurate.

With Israel surrounded on all four fronts by fierce enemies wanting to annihilate it, the likelihood that this will result in the war to end all wars is becoming more and more probable. Almost every country including the United Nations has invested considerably in persecuting the Jewish nation in every possible way through economics, sanctions, and condemnations and so on. 

The latest movement, called BDS for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, is a worldwide initiative begun by Palestinians but endorsed by many nations to exact punishment on Israel. Though supposedly steeped in Judeo-Christianity, America in the recent past has been widely known not for its rapport but for its hostility and detachment towards their once-traditional friend.

In the meantime, America’s previous government has already paved the way for Iran to complete the building of its nuclear capabilities free of real sanctions and independent of any credible inspections. While it is true that the Middle-East is a complicated political and ideological mess, a few things are pretty clear when it comes to anyone who is up against the Islamic ideology.

Firstly Islamic factions will fight amongst one another in its continuing inter-sectarianism. In other words, Muslims do get massacred at the hands of fellow Muslims. Lives are mere statistics. People can die in the millions but in the end, the ideology is all-important.

Secondly, in accordance to the Qur’an, all of them possess the desire to kill anyone whom they call an infidel. They includes anyone who is not a Muslim in their books. There is plenty of evidence already to substantiate this point.

Thirdly, they will do anything to rebuild their caliphate across the whole world even if that means setting all the nations on fire. They’ve not forgotten their history and they are intent on exacting revenge against the western world and principally, Christianity.

And fourthly, they will work with its appeasers – liberals, sexual deviants, criminals, drug cartels, convicts and so on – anyone who fits the bill in fighting a common enemy, the conservatives. Since all of them see the same foe – though from different standpoints – all of them want the opposition neutralised and later, exterminated. The gun control bills are all part of that agenda and that is, to remove the threat posed by conservatives. In the end, once they are no longer useful to them, they will certainly all be murdered.

Continued next week for final Part 2 of 2