The Consequences of a Culture That Rejects God (Romans 1:18-32) and the Collapse of Biblical Truth
Written by Virgil L. Walker |
Friday, April 4, 2025
We are living in an age of deception. The signs of divine judgment are evident, but so is the call to remain steadfast. The church must reject cultural conformity and embrace the full counsel of God.… Compromise is not an option for those who stand on the authority of God’s Word. The cost of compromise is too high, and the time for silence is over.
Western civilization is unraveling before our eyes. This is not merely a cultural shift—it is divine judgment unfolding in real time. As societies reject God, they descend into moral chaos, corruption, and confusion. The apostle Paul warned of this in Romans 1:18-32, a passage that perfectly diagnoses our present condition.
History is clear—when a people reject God, He gives them over to their own destruction. This is not speculation; it is the inescapable reality revealed in Paul’s Roman epistle.
From the redefinition of gender and marriage to the suppression of Christian convictions, the erosion is undeniable. Romans 1 is not just a historical passage—it is a roadmap for understanding cultural decline, where truth is exchanged for lies, and righteousness is openly mocked.
The Reformers understood this well. John Calvin insightfully wrote in his Institutes of the Christian Religion, “The human mind is, so to speak, a perpetual forge of idols,” emphasizing mankind’s relentless pursuit of self-made gods, crafting objects of misplaced devotion. A society that suppresses divine truth does not become neutral; it collapses into moral insanity. Our duty as believers is to stand firm, proclaim the gospel, and refuse to compromise.
God’s Wrath: When a Society Worships Self Instead of God
Romans 1:18-20 declares that God’s wrath is revealed against all who suppress the truth. When societies reject Him, they spiral into idolatry—not just the worship of physical idols but the exaltation of self, pleasure, and human autonomy. Despite the evident knowledge of God through creation, humanity chooses to reject Him, leading to futile thinking and darkened hearts. This rejection manifests in idolatry—not merely the worship of carved images but the elevation of self and personal desires above God’s truth.
This idolatry is glaringly evident in contemporary issues such as same-sex attraction and the ongoing debates surrounding gender identity. The Apostle Paul addresses this directly in Romans 1:26-27, highlighting that abandoning God’s design leads to dishonorable passions and actions contrary to nature. Recent statistics underscore this shift: a 2025 Gallup poll reported that 9.3% of U.S. adults identify as LGBTQ+, a significant increase from previous years. Notably, among Generation Z, 22.3% identify as LGBTQ+, reflecting a profound cultural transformation.
This surge correlates with the rise of self-identification and the societal push for gender affirmation, often at odds with biological and theological understandings of human identity. The Puritan Thomas Watson wrote in The Ten Commandments, “When God is dishonored, sin is cherished,” highlighting the inevitable moral decay that follows when divine authority is rejected. Our culture’s embrace of subjective identity over divine design exemplifies this tragic reality.
Romans 1:28-32 also makes it clear: God’s wrath is not arbitrary. It is the just response to human rebellion. When people reject God, they do not cease to worship; they simply redirect their worship to something else. Today, we see this idolatry in full bloom—self-worship, materialism, and the deification of human autonomy. The result? A society governed by emotions rather than truth, where men call evil good and good evil (Isaiah 5:20).
This idolatry doesn’t stop at the secular world. It has infiltrated the church. Many pulpits have abandoned biblical preaching in favor of self-help messages that soothe rather than convict. They no longer preach Christ crucified but instead offer motivational speeches. Charles Spurgeon, in his sermon Feeding the Sheep or Amusing the Goats?, warned, “A time will come when instead of shepherds feeding the sheep, the church will have clowns entertaining the goats,” lamenting the dilution of true biblical teaching in favor of superficial amusement. That time is now.
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Why You Need to Know the Difference Between Hidden and Revealed
God is a stranger because he’s a divine being who’s always beyond our grasp. He can also be even more distant because we’re the kind of beings who embrace the darkness and resist his light. Together, these things make God feel impossibly hidden. At the same time, God has done everything possible to turn himself into a friend. He sent Jesus to speak, act, and even embody the Father’s will. All of this proves God wants to be known through Jesus.
Biographies are one of my favorite genres to read. You not only get to witness the transformation of someone who will one day change the world, but their experiences also help you reimagine what is possible. You might even feel like you’ve made a new friend along the way because their story has shaped you. And yet, this person will always be a stranger to you. Since you’ve never actually met them, there’s still so much about them you just won’t know.
There’s a similar kind of suspense in knowing God—he’s both a stranger and a friend. Though you feel his presence listening to the Scriptures, deep in prayer, or in the friendships of your faith community, he can feel distant when you need him the most. You can’t always find him, but he always seems to find you.
In theology, this is known as the hidden and revealed God. If you ever feel like God is a stranger, then this article is for you. God is hidden, but that’s only because he wants to be found in the right places. His identity is first fully revealed in his autobiography, the Scriptures. Then he shows up in the incarnation of his Son, the God-man, Jesus of Nazareth, to confirm what that story says about him. In the end, encountering Jesus means being found by the hidden God.
Hidden
God is hidden in at least three ways. First, he’s hidden because some aspects of his character are simply beyond our grasp. The poet of Psalm 145 reminds us of this when he says God’s greatness is to be praised, and that his greatness is unsearchable (Ps. 145:3). It’s as if God exists in a different yet overlapping dimension than us. We simultaneously worship his greatness while lacking the ability to appreciate all of its depth. Though his knowledge and power break into our world and change it, the evidence he leaves behind isn’t always easy to decipher (Isa. 40:28; Ps. 147:5). This is why the prophet Isaiah concludes God’s ways are simply higher than human ways (Isa. 55:8-9).
We can’t find God because he exists on a different level than we do, but our moral failures also push God even farther away. Again, the prophet Isaiah makes this clear. He says our “iniquities” separate us from God, stop him from listening to our prayers, and even cause him to turn his face away from our cares and concerns (Isa. 59:2). It’s not just that we’re unable to know God, it’s that sin actively disrupts the divine connection between us.
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Who Says Who We Are—Man or Maker?
There’s an endless set of principles and prohibitions that are conveniently written down by our Maker and made available in our “owner’s manual.” Could it be any better? Despite the easy access to our Maker’s teaching, Christians often look for ways to sidestep his precepts. We’re tempted to believe anyone other than our Maker when it comes to how to live, how to identify, and how to behave sexually. Maybe we think we know better, but it seems we want to listen to man to justify our penchant for sin.
Whenever I watch an ad for a GoPro camera, my life feels boring. If you don’t know, GoPro is the company that makes those tiny video cameras that capture footage of extreme sports. Their promotional videos show people surfing massive swells, skiing off cliffs, and jumping cars—all while the action cam is mounted on their helmet, surfboard, or under a wheel well. It’s impressive.
But I have some questions. How far underwater can you take a GoPro? What’s the lowest temperature it can tolerate? What’s the best way to optimize its battery life? Is there a way to mount it so it doesn’t fall off accidentally? Any GoPro owner needs to know what this action camera can handle.
Who is the best person to answer these questions? Would it be a sports star, a news anchor, or the president of the United States? None of them is qualified, obviously. The best people to answer my questions would be the engineers at GoPro. They’re the ones who decided what materials to use, designed the device, and fabricated it. They know its limits and how to optimize its performance. After all, they’re the makers of the GoPro camera.
That’s why every GoPro camera comes with an owner’s manual that’s informed by the makers of the device. It tells the camera owner how far underwater you can take it, what temperatures it can tolerate, how to optimize its battery life, and many more important limits and features. Failure to heed the directions in the owner’s manual will lead to damage or catastrophic failure.
In the same way, there are a lot of questions we humans have about ourselves. How are we made to function? How should we build relationships like friendships and marriages? Should there be any boundaries for sexual activity?
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Gospel Audacity Today
God calls us to take risks, accept costs, and make sacrifices too. That’s how the gospel moves forward—be it to Rome, to rural America, or to Ricky in the next cubicle at work. Ambition and risk are the human ingredients God uses to put the gospel into circulation.
The word audacious hardly brings to mind serenity or comfort. Nobody ever claims to have an audacious sleep or an audacious moment of poetry reading. Nope, to be audacious is to be bold or daring, fearless, courageous, intrepid, dauntless, venturesome. That’s wild stuff—the kind of stuff that makes people cross oceans to become missionaries or move to the inner city to plant a church. It’s the kind of stuff that leads someone to speak out for Christ in a public space or to adopt a high-risk child. It’s also the kind of stuff defining Paul’s life.
Paul was audacious in his aims. Just listen to his summary of the extent of his ministry.
“From Jerusalem all the way around to Illyricum I have fulfilled the ministry of the gospel of Christ” (Romans 15:19).
Scholars estimate that by the end of his journey to Rome, he had traveled about 15,500 miles–more than half of that by foot! And Paul’s vision didn’t stop in Rome. He told the Romans that he intended to keep going all the way to Spain (Romans 15:28). Paul made it his bold ambition “to preach the gospel, not where Christ has already been named” (Romans 15:20).
This is so provoking for me. Because the older I get, the more I am tempted to settle. If you can relate to that, join me in answering two audacious questions.
Where is God Inviting Me to Exercise Audacious Ambition?
The unstoppable gospel requires a fierce aspiration to put it into play. For Paul to get the gospel to new places and new people, he had to “make it [his] ambition.” Having an ambition for the gospel pushes us to do things we never expected. It incites us to look beyond the borders of our own comfort and convenience.
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