Their God Is Their Belly | Philippians 3:19
The United States is a society of abundance, we tend to often be quite indulgent as well. Indeed, we live in a breeding ground for belly-worship. Our society places very few limits on our consumption of stuff, so we are left to our own self-discipline and self-control. Of course, I believe that this freedom is better than the alternative, but such freedom undeniably reveals the truth of humanity’s sinful nature.
their god is their belly
Philippians 3:19 ESV
What does Paul mean by belly here? The stomach or appetite, as some translations read, represents our instinctual and base-level desires, our hungers, cravings, and lusts. For the ancients, the belly was the most animalistic part of all humans, and we tend to agree with them, even is subconsciously. After all, how often do you have a gut-feeling about something? Do you ever question whether or not you should just go with your gut? Have you ever felt the fluttering in your gut while in the throes of infatuation? Our gut is our primal nature, working beyond the confines of logic and reason and, because of sin’s corruption, always longing for things forbidden. For this reason, we must learn the twin arts of self-control and self-discipline, teaching our head how to keep the stomach on a leash. Christians are especially charged to do this.
But not so for these enemies of the cross. Instead of treating the gut’s cravings with a proper amount of skepticism, they elevate it into their god. Does this mean that they hold formal worship services to their own stomachs? Probably not. But worship is not exclusive to churches, temples, synagogues, mosques, and the like. Worship is simply devotion, a life dedicated to one’s deity. To worship a god is to obey it, follow it, yield to it, and serve it. Because we know the one true God, who created all things, and we know that He has love and grace toward us beyond measure, we Christians joyfully offer up our lives as worship toward the God of the Bible. Our Sunday gathering is a piece of our worship, a highly significant piece but a piece, nonetheless.
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If we don’t oppose events like the tranny story hour, we cede the war by handing over the next generation. These story hours are not an innocent opportunity for nice fairy people to give back to their community. These are confused, sinful people who are after generational acceptance. They want to confuse our children into thinking what they are doing is normal.
Bring Back the Boomer Upbringing
Our modern-day culture has many of us longing for the olden days. When our grandparents grew up, if a dude in a dress attempted to read books to some minors he sought out in the library, he would be flung out by his frills before he could crack the cover. There would be all manner of men that would assume this as their duty and eagerly put themselves to the task.
And there would be no complaints about this discriminatory behavior – only cheers – because the “common sense” of that time was well-trained by the light of nature and their God-given consciences. “Have you no shame?” they would say. They knew where to aim their shame, and the utility of dishing it out. They knew that a weirdo being weird should not feel comfortable in public. A man who liked to wear fishnets was forced into closeting his behavior or, at the very least, pulling the curtains.Shame did a lot of good back then.
Today, we see people heaping shame on those who point out obvious perversions. “Bigots,” we are called. They are using shame to curb society toward evil, not good. And this is the main way that they push their “progressive,” ideas. No logical argument will advance the normalization of clown world.
How far have we regressed.The Shame of Rotorua
Remember when librarians were considered the frigid do-gooders of society? Today, they no longer know how to blush. They invite those with the kinkiest of bents into their peaceful place of books to twist the minds of innocents. They’re on a mission to kill that natural impulse of a child to shudder at a he-she trying to suppress the inescapable. Shame on them!
“Are they ashamed of their detestable conduct? No, they have no shame at all; they do not even know how to blush. So they will fall among the fallen; they will be brought down when I punish them,” says Yahweh. (Jeremiah 6:15)Bring Back the Blush
So, how do we make cheeks respond to kink with pink again? It will not happen with more gentle permissiveness – that is what got us here. We need to cut deep with plain truths said plainly, and Lord willing, we will recover some sensitivity from the buried consciences of our city and nation.What are these truths, and how are they so plain?
Well, we all know that a man cannot be a woman, and this is seen plainly in the drag queen’s make-up dilemma. Too much, and they look like a clownish version of a woman, but any less than over-the-top, they hide nothing. Everyone knows intuitively that this is black-face for the gender confused. In the same way that black-face degrades non-whites, woman-face degrades all women. How dare they mimic feminine glory in such a debasing way. Their cheeks should be red hot when they walk amongst the real thing. It is obvious to all that they are rebelling against reality, and it is a losing struggle.
But the very young know far less how futile an attempt at transitioning is. Without any artificial influences, this will become plain to them, so they must be lied to – the earlier the better. Older trans men often keep their man parts because they know they gain nothing from cutting them off.Read More
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Before you launch your New Year ministry plan, begin with prayer. How might you pray to start the year?
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Outward movement rather than an inward bent. Pray your church has a desire to reach outward rather than inward. Ask God to give your church a wake-up call for evangelism.
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Maximizing Our Influence as Family Leaders
The call to biblical leadership is the call to serve our families. Accepting our positional authority and using it to firmly discipline our children is crucial for effective influence upon our children. Parenthetically, we don’t need to fear that wielding such authority will harm our relationship with our kids. Scripture assures us, We have had earthly fathers who disciplined us AND WE RESPECTED THEM. Firm discipline, in the long, run wins our kids’ respect. They will not respect a dad who just wants to be their play buddy. On the other hand, to maximize our influence there is no substitute for winning their hearts by caring for them well.
Some years ago, I found myself praying about whether I should pursue a DMin degree and write my dissertation on men’s ministry. But a rather sobering thought struck me. If my kids are in my home roughly twenty years and I live to be seventy, they are only going to be with me 2/7ths of my life. The price of pursuing the degree now will be paid by my 5 kids, who will get less time with me. I decided to put it off until 4 of my 5 kids were in college.
The years of greatest influence in our kid’s lives go by in a flash; so, dads whose kids are still at home, need to know how to maximize their influence, before their kids are launched into a world full of destructive worldviews. But it is not only Dad’s with kids at home who care about their influence. Even if our kids are already launched or have gifted us with grandkids, we also want to know how to maximize whatever influence we can have with both our adult kids and grandchildren. This episode examines God’s two-part design of the influence we wield as spiritual leaders of our home, positional influence and relational influence. In both cases, we must overcome false worldviews that undermine the way God wants us to lead our homes.
This is the third episode in our January series, Leading Our Homes Well in a Culture That Doesn’t Want Us to Lead. Last week we answered the first leadership question, “Where am I taking my family?” noting the biblical answer, to spiritual maturity as Christ’s disciples. Like Paul, home leaders say, One thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus… Brothers, join in imitating me. (Phil 3:13ff). Today’s episode examines the second leadership question, which has to do with my relationship with my followers. “How do I use my leadership influence to motivate them to come with me?” The biblical answer to this question, once again, requires us to overcome strong cultural headwinds, i.e. worldviews promoted in the culture, which undermine a man’s leadership calling. We identify four.
A. False Worldview #1: Men Are Unnecessary
This view is rooted in feminism, egalitarianism, and the LGBTQ+ movement. A lesbian couple can parent as well as a heterosexual married couple. Men bring nothing unique to the process of raising children. Egalitarian-leaning, church-going men know their wives have more intuitive insight about kids than they do. When the kids ask permission to do something, their response is, “Go ask your mom.” Such men don’t wear the pants in their family.
Biblical View #1: Fatherhood Is IrreplaceableCreation, itself, tells us that the nuclear family is not just a social construct. The biological fact that conception takes place in the context of husband and wife making love speaks volumes about the best environment for nurturing that child to healthy adulthood. In God’s obvious creation design, for a child to thrive, he needs a family built on mom and dad’s love for each other.
The family code sections of Ephesians and Colossians are significant. They address wives, then husbands, then children—commanding them to obey their parents. So, we might expect the next group Paul addresses to be parents; but it is not. How about mothers? No. It is striking that when Paul addresses the training of the children, he doesn’t mention mothers but gives commands to fathers. This pattern of responsibility began with Abraham, the Father of the Christian Faith. God said of Abraham, I have chosen him, that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may bring to Abraham what he has promised him (Gen 18:19). Perhaps fathers are specifically addressed because we inherited Adam’s passivity. He should have protected Eve from Satan and reinforced the truth of what God said.
Substantial research confirms that fathers and mothers discipline their children differently. Focus on the Family writes, “Dad takes an objective approach and provides his children with much needed instruction in the area of moral absolutes and the consequences of right and wrong actions. Mom, on the other hand, emphasizes compassion, empathy, relationship, and the importance of appreciating the uniqueness of each individual” (Online article, Mom and Dad Approach Discipline Differently). Both Mom and Dad are needed.B. False Worldview #2 Teaches a Parent-Centered Approach to Children’s Discipline
In our narcissistic culture, it should not surprise us that some approaches to discipline are more about the parent’s feelings than the child’s behavior. It is reactive discipline. Here is an example. A dad on the playground says to his son, “Stop playing on the monkey bars.” But his son knows that this command means nothing. His father will not act until he has told the boy four or five times to stay off the monkey bars. So, the son continues to ignore his father’s command. The father, who is busy talking, yells at him again, but the son knows that his dad is not steamed up enough to act. Finally, the father reaches his limit and explodes,“You’ve got me really angry with you now. Get into that car.”
Instead of clarifying his instruction once, and then giving painful consequences for disobedience, this parenting approach is based upon the exasperation of the parent. Kids live up to whatever is demanded of them. The dad didn’t want to be bothered with the responsibility of being a good parent, but instead to continue his conversation. Furthermore, when my parenting is based upon how patient I feel, or how irritated or angry I am, punishment becomes random, and inconsistent, which provoke hot anger in a child. One moment, he gets away with murder, the next moment he barely steps across the line and is slammed with punishment. The dad trained his son not to obey until he started to get angry. He also made the issue HIS anger instead of the son’s disobedience. Good parenting isn’t rooted in how a parent FEELS but how a child BEHAVES. In fact, good parenting makes sure that the child understands that painful consequences for his misbehavior are NOT personal and do not interfere with the parent’s love for him.
Biblical View #2: Disciplining Children Is Part of a Training Plan for the Child. Paul Writes, Fathers, Do Not Provoke Your Children to Anger, but Bring Them Up in the Discipline and Instruction of the Lord (Eph 6:4)Here are four wrong approaches to discipline that provoke anger: 1) Inconsistent discipline, as we’ve seen. Consistent discipline trains a child to know what the boundaries are because the parents have thought them through ahead of time. It is not a seat-of-the-pants, reactive discipline. 2) Discipline that attacks a child’s character using the words, you always or you never instead of correcting behavior provokes anger. 3) Disciplining a child in public will wound his spirit. 4) Discipline that is more frequent than praise wounds our child, also provoking anger. Studies show that parents use critical words ten times more than they use words to praise their children. Mostly correction with little or no affirmation CRUSHES kids’ spirits and can lead to a rebellion.
In context, as Ephesians 6:4 continues, Paul implies that the alternative to provoking anger in our children is to exercise discipline in connection with the rest of the training plan for the child. Paul describes the plan: 1) bring them up: Dads are NOT to watch their children grow up but to actively raise them with intentionality 2) in the discipline: This Greek word is PAIDEA, from which we get pediatric. It means using consequences to train children. A father’s punishing authority is never to be used selfishly, or reflexively, but as part of a TRAINING plan. Paul continues, 3) and instruction (of the Lord): Instruction, means literally “to put into the mind.” This requires a plan for what biblical truths, godly qualities, and characteristics of Jesus we plan to impart to our kids.Read More
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