“Whatever a man sows, that he shall reap.” Pretty
straightforward. We may not talk like that today but we have other words for
this basic idea. Karma. Paying it forward. What goes around comes around. Even
our superheroes follow this mantra – “the bill comes due,” speak the prophets
of the Marvel universe.
So what gives? Why is something pretty straightforward –
what you do, good or bad, will generally come back to you one way or another –
shocking in our world today?
The recent scandals in Hollywood and Washington D.C. have
provided a monumental shift in perspective for most of America. Perhaps, we
aren’t as noble as we’d like to think. With each passing week the list of the
disgraced grows – Matt Lauer, John Conyers, Al Franken, Roy Moore, and on and
on. And that’s just in the last month – never mind the stories that got this
whole conversation started – Louis C.K., Harvey Weinsten, Kevin Spacey. And as
new victims come forward, naming predators with each new story, it becomes
obvious that perhaps there is no true end in sight. What began with a movie
mogul has rapidly spread into a reckoning not just for Hollywood or Washington
D.C., but for America.
What has led to this – why in 2017 has all this scandal, extortion,
and sorrow come screaming to the front of cultural conversation? A prophet in a
culture not totally unlike our own once spoke these very wise words:
“These people have planted the wind, and they will harvest
the whirlwind,” (Hosea 8:7).
Translation – whatever you do, good or bad, will come back
to you. The universe is set up to have moral consequences. As some have said
“The truth will out.” Or, to quote Jesus, “All that is done in secret will
eventually be brought in to the open, and everything done in darkness will be
brought to light before all,” (Luke 8:17).
So with some ancient wisdom to illuminate our contemporary
scandals, the answer should be rather simple. Our world is in sexual ruin and
suffering preciously because we have been planting seeds of sin and rebellion
for decades. Whether in the sexual revolution of the sixties or the advent of
internet pornography in the nineties or modern sexual exploits on apps that
masquerade as dating services, the scandals of this year are the culmination of
the past 60. We have sown the wind – sexuality without boundaries, without the
commitment of marriage, without the grace and structure of God’s design. Now,
we harvest the whirlwind.
This harvest is not something done vaguely by “American
culture.” This was done by you and me. Ever looked at pornography? You have fed
the sexual industrial complex. Read Fifty
Shades of Grey? Watched a sitcom or drama with raunchy sexual dialogue and
obvious agenda to promote “liberated” sexuality? Even more recently, have you
watched something that sexualizes teenagers who are legally and morally
speaking, children? Netflix is full of it. Enjoyed a Victoria’s Secret runway
show? The ESPN magazine Body Issue?
Lingered over an inappropriate sexually suggestive photo on a website or
Facebook? Answer yes to even one of these questions and you’re a part of this.
And how have our cultural leaders responded? Pathetically.
Political leaders call out the sexual failings of others but hedge on their own
colleagues. Trump supports Moore while his staff decries the misdeeds of
Conyers and Franken. Nancy Pelosi launches an “official investigation” into
sexual misconduct among politicians but in a recent interview defends John
Conyers’ reputation saying “we need to trust him to do the right thing.”
Because after all, if we can trust sexual criminals to do one thing, it’s the
right thing.
And with each new revelation comes a new call to bolster
decency and respect among men and women…but it’s one thing to speak of decency.
It is quite another to be decent. To not just modify external behavior but to
change internal character. Do we believe this problem really can be fixed so
easily, like a teacher reminding a child to color within the lines? Is the
problem really just that we forgot to
act decently?
Or perhaps, the problem is that we are no longer decent
people. We create committees and make public calls for integrity, faithfulness,
and respect but for 60 years we’ve belittled, mocked, and demeaned the values
that make those traits possible – faithfulness, self-control, virtue. We want
all the benefits of chastity and honor but aren’t willing to put in any of the
work. Now as we begin to pay the price for a bill 60 years in the making, we
wonder why a simple reminder won’t suffice. It won’t suffice because we haven’t
done the work – we can’t plant rebellion and expect the fruits and joys of
obedience. Selfishness and lust will never yield a harvest of respect and honor
for others.
Even before our modern descent into sexual liberation began,
C.S. Lewis warned of the consequences that lay before us. In The Abolition of Man, he wrote
Such
is the tragedy of our time – we continue to clamor for those very qualities
that we are rendering impossible. You can hardly open a magazine without coming
across the statement that our civilization needs is more ‘drive’ or
‘self-control’ or ‘creativity.’ In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the
organ and demand the function. We make men without chests and expect of them
virtue. We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We
castrate and bid the young horses be fruitful.
It is not enough to simply remind all men and women to be
decent. Until we begin to realize that we each have sown the seeds of this
harvest, we will continue down this painful road. If we only cry out for more
respect but don’t foster the disciplines and character that create honor for
others, we will be lost from the start. We must begin with what we sow. We must
repent of our sexual sin, however small or egregious, and in faith, look in
hope for Christ to redeem this intimate part of each of us while submitting in
obedience to His guidelines for sex.
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Anything else simply will not do. To tell ourselves
otherwise is to hope that we can sow weeds yet, with fingers crossed, somehow
avoid a bitter harvest.
